Cry "Havoc!" and let slip the dogs of war: McCarthyism, Korea, and other nightmares

Monthly Review, April, 1997 by Doug Dowd

What motivated such seemingly mindless destructiveness?

More: what was it that led MacArthur - and also Truman and Acheson - to propose and prepare for the use of atomic bombs in Korea and China?(8) How and why did Korea take on such proportions? As the war was coming to a close, this is what Churchill said:

Korea does not really matter now. I'd never heard of the bloody place until I was seventy-four. Its importance lies in the fact that it has led to the re-arming of America.(9)

Not quite as eloquent as some of Churchill's other pronouncements, but close to the bones of truth: as for so many other countries that have become graveyards, Korea's tragedy was a means to the larger ends of the Superpowers. Was it at least an end that can be dignified in words? It seems not. What did bring war to Korea?

The general and lasting impression about the origins of the Korean war, especially in the United States, is simple, too simple: North Korea invaded South Korea. Indeed there was such an invasion. But that fact, when examined in its historical context, raises more questions than it answers.

Japan established a "protectorate" over Korea in 1905, annexed it a few years later, used it and abused it in ways customary to colonial powers and, during the war, went beyond the established boundaries of even those cruelties and indecencies.(10) And then in 1945,

Japanese armies, according to Soviet-American agreement, were disarmed north of the 38th parallel by Russia and south of the line by the United States. Lengthy conferences failed to unify the nation, for neither the Soviets nor the Americans wanted to chance the possibility that a unified Korea would move into the opposing camp.(11)

From the moment of its establishment as a dividing line, the 38th parallel took on a life of its own, and became a looming Frankenstein monster. The "line that was found . . . cut across natural areas of geographic, cultural, and climatic continuity."(12) How and why was the dividing line established? The answer to that question well represents the deadly mix of accident and design, strategy and hysteria, that underlay U.S. foreign policy as the 1950s began.

The Soviet Union had promised the United States it would declare war on Japan no more than three months after the end of the European war. In the event, that meant early August 1945; and it also implied the probability of Soviet troops in Manchuria and Korea. The importance of this probability and, among other matters, its role in creating the 38th parallel deserve sustained attention:

If the Soviet Union dominated Korea, it could undermine Chiang Kai-Shek's position in China and place the security of Japan in jeopardy. Truman began to search for a way to occupy Korea unilaterally, thereby removing any chance for Sovietization. His decision to use the atomic bomb against Japan was in part aimed at forcing Tokyo to surrender quickly and thereby preempting Soviet entry into the Pacific war. The gamble failed. [The atom bomb was dropped first on August 6.] On August 8 Stalin acted to ensure that he would play a role in reconstructing East Asia after World War II, declaring war on Japan prior to its surrender and sending the Red Army into Korea. Two days later, the State-War-Navy Coordinating Committee instructed Colonels C.H. Bonesteel and Dean Rusk [later JFK's and LBJ's Secretary of State] to find a line in Korea that would harmonize the political desire to have U.S. forces receive the surrender [of Japan] as far north as possible with the inability of the closest U.S. troops on Okinawa to reach the area before the Soviets occupied the entire peninsula.... Many American leaders doubted if Stalin would accept the proposal, but the Soviet leader agreed, probably in hopes of receiving a voice in the reconstruction of Japan. Truman's refusal to grant Stalin an equal role in determining Japan's future meant that Korea's reunification was unlikely from the start.(13)