Denied popular support, Truman functioned without it. Possibly history will accord him that as his greatest feat. History must also condemn him, with his Cabinet, for his inability to communicate. Wherever there is rule by consent of the ruled, the rulers must always be salesmen, however difficult the task.
For the first time in history, or at least for the first time since before the War Between the States, America had embarked upon a foreign policy that was not at least partially a crusade. The policy was the restoration of order in the world, and the orderly containment of Communism—not its hysteric extirpation, as with Hitler and 'Kaiser Bill,' by means of cataclysmic war that could, at best, solve nothing.
Since Wilson's time, some Americans had learned much.
In Europe, beginning with 1947, the policy succeeded brilliantly. It succeeded without the
The policy in Asia succeeded less well, because American planners were slow to see the importance of the East, and did not early recognize the Soviet shift to that area in 1949. Because of a certain indecisiveness on Asian policy, apparent to the Soviets, there would be war.
But even then it would be war different from all wars in American experience, except the Indian campaigns on the Plains. It would not be a crusade, because neither Harry Truman nor the men who handled his foreign policy were crusaders across the water. Because it was different, it would have far-reaching results. It would be the first war to bring down a government, to oust a party in power, not because of the actions that party had taken, but because the policy makers were never able adequately to explain those actions to a troubled and increasingly hostile public.
Like the Indian Wars, it would leave a troubled feeling, a trauma, in its wake. Crusades, even when failures, are emotionally satisfying. Wars of containment, wars of policy, are not. They are hard to justify unless it is admitted that power, not idealism, is the dominant factor in the world, and that idealism must be backed by power.
It was hard for a nation and a people who had never accepted the idea of power, not as something immoral in itself, but as a tool to whatever ends they sought, to fight and die for limited goals. In short, it was hard to grow up.
The Korean problem came again in Swink in 1947. Now the men of the State-War-Navy Coordinating Committee understood three things:
The Russians had different ideas as to what should be the solution to the Korean problem, and they would not cooperate, not now, not ever.
Without massive American support and economic aid, Korea would never achieve a viable economy.
And in event of large-scale war, Korea was a liability; the men based there would be lost to the services.
Swink wanted a way out of Korea, if there was a graceful one to be found. They requested the views of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. A complete decision was not, of course, the responsibility of the Joint Chiefs, who should have had no influence on what was, essentially, a political rather than a military matter. But in 1947, the civilian branches of government were letting Asian policy fall to the military by default—someone, qualified or not, had to make decisions, however painful such decisions might be to make.
Later, this power of decision would be taken away from the military, just as it should never have been given them. But it must be remembered that all through the 1940's civilian policy makers tended to shun Asian questions, letting the military have a disproportinate voice. Only when it came to cutting back military strength and expenditures did civilian planners advance with firm and happy tread.
At the end of World War II, American military policy, digesting the Japanese lessons in China, was to control air and sea lanes throughout the East but never to engage in ground hostilities on the Asian mainland. As one spokesman put it, 'There was no point to mucking about through Manchuria.'
The only war that military planners could envision was a big one between the United States and the Soviet Union. They assumed that in the future, as historically, America would never fight for limited goals; in the event of actual war, an all-out effort would be made to break or destroy the Soviet homeland. This was neither faulty thinking nor planning. The military men were following what had been American experience in the twentieth century. Many of the military planners themselves were not aware of the change to conservative, pragmatic thinking in certain quarters of Washington—thinking that was never explained to the public or to the military. The military continued to plan for the only kind of war they had been told to plan for: worldwide, atomic holocaust.
On 26 September 1947 the JCS sent Secretary of Defense Forrestal their reply:
Thinking of the then-American atomic monopoly, the JCS wrote:
But the JCS made one other point very clear:
The JCS, then, clearly understood that the problem was in essence not military but political. They were nervous and uncomfortable at having to make recommendations on it. They knew that military considerations, as they foresaw them, required the removal of troops from the Korean periphery, but also that the 'rat leaving the sinking ship syndrome' was very prevalent in Asia. Korea was not militarily vital to American security. But American withdrawal from Korea might discourage Japan, which clearly was. American refusal to interfere with the fall of Nationalist China was already hurting American prestige in the Far East.
There were American planners who saw that a million ground troops, and a billion in aid, could hold the problem in check. But these planners knew that such things were not in the cards. The pragmatists in the high echelons of foreign policy could accomplish many things by fiat or executive agreement, but they could not raise troops or money against the popular will. This was a basic weakness to the policy of containment inherent in any parliamentary democracy, and as it proved in Asia, an insurmountable one, that would recur again and again, in China, in Korea, and finally in Vietnam.
Listening to the Joint Chiefs, the Government saw an out—one that got the United States off the hook militarily, and yet seemed to promise stability for Korea. They offered the question to the United Nations, which immediately, at American urging, accepted responsibility, voting Korea a U.N. ward and establishing a U.N. mandate over the divided nation.
On the surface, it look like a good solution, in keeping with the United States' professed aims in the world. Yet under the surface it was and remained an American withdrawal. There were only two centers of power in the world, and the United Nations was neither of them.
Stalin, who had asked how many divisions the Pope had, knew exactly how many divisions the U.N. maintained: none. When UNCOK, the United Nations Commission on Korea, tried to cross the dividing parallel, the Russians weren't even polite. UNCOK, after much debate, was able to accomplish nothing toward the reunification of Korea.
Despairing, the United Nations proposed free elections in South Korea to set up a rump state. After much political turmoil, these elections were held 10 May 1948.
The elections were reasonably honest, but Koreans were a disorganized and submissive people, almost without political education. It is not always easy to get an honest count in Chicago or Jersey City; what happened in Pusan or Seoul cannot be considered too harshly. The conservative parties behind Syngman Rhee came legally to power, and by 15 August the Taehan Minkuk, the Realm or Republic of Korea, had been established.
Russia protested each proceeding. Then, in September 1948, Russia established the Chosun Minjujui Inmun Kongwhakuk, the Korean Democratic People's Republic, in the North. This 'republic' was in all respects what has since become known as a 'tank democracy'; however, from the million Korean refugees that had fled Japanese tyranny Russia was able to cull many able, dedicated Communists to organize its government. Kim I1 Sung, a Soviet
