Gen. Douglas MacArthur was a hero from two World Wars who had served as the supreme commander of the Allied forces in the Pacific. He personally accepted the surrender of Japan, oversaw the Allied military occupation of Japan.
But after he was put in command of the Allied effort to liberate South Korea, MacArthur learned a difficult lesson: When you work for the president of the United States, you might disagree with him. But if you disagree with him publicly and repeatedly, be prepared to lose your job.
That’s not the case any more. Newspapers have seen an alarming shrinkage of their revenue, their resources, their staff and their readership.
And while smaller, local papers are hit especially hard by this, it is by no means limited to certain areas. This is a nationwide problem.
The Korean War
On June 25, 1950, the North Korean army poured across the 38th parallel — the border between communist North Korea and democratic South Korea.
Within two days, the President of South Korea, Syngman Rhee, was forced to flee with his government from his capital city, Seoul.
The United Nations Security Council condemned the invasion and authorized member nations to provide military assistance. The U.S. — already hip deep in a widening Cold War in Europe — was placed in charge of the military reponse to the attack.
On July 8, President Harry Truman called upon Gen. Douglas MacArthur — who had spent the past four years in Tokyo, in charge of the Allied occupation of Japan — to find a way to halt and reverse the attack, which was rapidly pushing the South Korean army and its allies to a small corner of that country. MacArthur’s solution: an enormous amphibious landing more than 100 miles behind enemy lines at Incheon, near Seoul.
More than 75,000 troops landed on the beaches of Incheon on Sept. 15. The counterattack was successful — U.N. forces freed Seoul on the 25th, pushed North Korean troops back past the 38th parallel on Oct. 1 and captured the North Korean capital city.
Truman wanted to meet with MacArthur to discuss what should happen next. MacArthur, in what would be the first of several shows of disrespect to the president, declined to fly to the United States as he was asked. Instead, he insisted Truman come to him. They met at Wake Island in the Pacific on Oct. 15.
At that meeting, MacArthur continued what military leaders considered to be major breaches of courtesy. MacArthur wore a dirty, rumpled uniform and a greasy hat. Instead of saluting the president, MacArthur shook hands with Truman. MacArthur assured Truman and his Army Chief-of-Staff Omar Bradley there was little chance of China or the Soviet Union jumping into the war and that he expected he could withdraw his troops from Korea by the end of the year. Truman, in turn, awarded MacArthur the general’s fifth Army Distinguished Service Medal.
But the good feelings wouldn’t last long. Even as MacArthur and Truman met on Wake, the Chinese army was on the move. More than a quarter-million Chinese troops crossed the border into South Korea before the end of October. MacArthur’s troops found themselves in retreat again.
MacArthur made moves that conflicted with the orders he had been given by the Joint Chiefs of Staff. On Dec. 1, MacArthur complained to a reporter about how political concerns were “a handicap to effective military operations.” After the White House issued a light warning to MacArthur for his statements, he continued to bad-mouth the administration and insisted on an attack on China.
The last straw came on March 23, 1951, after MacArthur’s forces halted the North Korean and Chinese armies’ advance, when without authorization, he raised the possibility of a ceasefire.
Truman had had enough of MacArthur’s insubordination. “This was a challenge to the authority of the President under the Constitution,” Truman later wrote. “It also flouted the policy of the United Nations.”
Truman had his top military advisers draft a formal letter relieving MacArthur of command and replacing him with Lt. Gen. Matthew Ridgeway. Reporters were called to the White House for an after-midnight press conference. The official correspondence, dated April 11, 1951, was held up by a technical problem. MacArthur, in Tokyo, would be told about his firing from aides who heard the news on the radio.
MacArthur returned to the U.S. and was hailed as a hero for his work in World War II, with the occupation of Japan and in Korea. He ended his service with a stirring speech before Congress in which he noted “old soldiers never die; they just fade away.”
In May and June, the former general would testify in front of closed sessions of the Senate Armed Services and Senate Foreign Relations committees about the situation in Korea. Many of MacArthur’s statements in those sessions — including his claim that the Joint Chiefs had supported his views that he should attack Red China — would prove to be false. But the public wouldn’t discover this until testimony of the Joint Chiefs was declassified in the 1970s.
MacArthur reportedly hoped to be drafted to run for president in 1952. Republicans would choose another former World War II general, Dwight Eisenhower, instead.
Truman’s approval ratings would fall to what are still the lowest levels in history for a sitting president.
