Evening star., 1951-03-10
Macarthur on Korea

Although it conceivably could have an adj
verse effect on the morale of the United Nations
fighting forces, General MacArthur's latest
statement on Korea constitutes an admirably
frank and timely warning against wishfulness.
At the moment our American and allied troops,
fully supported by air and sea power, are rolling
forward in new offensive Yet, although they
are inflicting grievous casualties on the enemy
apparently at relatively light cost to themselves
there is practically no chance, given present
circumstances, that they will be able to win a
decisive, war-ending victory.
Thus as General Macarthur has outlined
the situation, the u. MS strategic plan at this
stage, instead of being aimed at achieving such
victory is strictly limited in its detectives DE
signed to meet abnormal military inhibitions"
(meaning particularly the ban on bombing Red
Chnas centers of strength in Manchuria), the
plan calls for constant movement in the Korean
theater to keep the Communists off balance and
restrict their initiative In this manner the
enemy has been forced to fight far from his home
base and expose himself to attack operations
that have resulted in continuing and exhaust
ing attrition upon both his manpower and
supplies"
Nevertheless, although this has weakened
Red Pepings grip on the Chinese people,
although 1t has dampened the Mao regimes
ardor for engaging in aggressive adventures else
where in ASIA and although it has demonstrated
that the CommunistS-short of all-out armed
intervention by the Kremlin-"cannot hope to
impose their will in Korea with military force"
the fact remains that decisive U. N victory Is
not in sight Indeed, in General MacArthurs
words, "as battle lines shift north the supply
position of the enemy will progressively improve,
just as inversely the effectiveness of our air po-
tential will progressively diminish, thus in turn
causing his numerical ground superiority to be-
come of increasing battlefield signifcance"-a
process in which a point must ultimately be
reached where our further advance would benefit
the Reds more than it would our allied forces
With all this in mind, together with indca-
tions that the Chinese Communists are attempt
ing to build up for massive spring offensive
against the U. NJ General Macarthur has fatty
stated that the Korean battle lines cannot fail
in time to reach point of theoretical military
stalemate." He has based this judgment on
three assumptions Cd That there will be mo
diminution of the enemy's flow of ground forces
and matere" to the theater of action; (2) that
his command will continue to labor under the
handicap of orders forbidding it to attack Red
China's privileged sanctuary" in Manchuria;
and 60 that there will be no major additions to
the strength now available to that command.
Presumably, if one or another of these assump-
tions falls apart his assessment of the situation
will brighten correspondingly.
However since it seems unlikely that Red
China will stop sending men and supplies to
Korea, or that the ban on Manchuran bombing
will be lifted, or that the UN.'s forces will be
markedly increased, the stalemate prospect must
certainly be reckoned with. Such prospect, of
course, is anything but pleasant to contemplate
Yet, if it cannot be avoided there Is no sense in
trying to talk it out of existence. Instead our
diplomacy must adjust itself to the possibility of
a thoroughly ndecisive situation that could result
at some point in kind of informal cease-fire
creating an atmosphere stable enough to make
conceivable an honorable settlement genuinely
guaranteeing Korean unity and independence.
In view of the Peiping- Moscow record to
date there would seem to be little or no hope
for such a settlement. But the prospective
stalemate-if one is really in the making-can
hardly last forever. Sooner or later, either by
honest negotiation or by much more stringent
armed action, it must be broken General Mac
Arthur himself has carefully refrained from
making any specific recommendations on that
score. He has simply declared that vital deci-
sions beyond the scope of his own authority
politico- military decisions at the highest in
ternational levels-must now be reached to an
swer the "obscurities" caused by Red China's
undeclared war in Korea.