Evening star., 1952-10-30
Top Secret

Top Secret
Since most Americans are unable to break
through the barrier of official secrecy, they will
find it difficult to Judge the dispute between
President Truman and General Eisenhower over
responsibility for withdrawal of our troops from
Korea prior to the Communist attack.
The President says that if the decision was
a mistake, General Eisenhower, instead Of seek
ing some political advantage, must share the
blame since he concurred in a report of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff recommending withdrawal.
General Eisenhower says this is niSrepre-
sentation. He does not deny joining in the
recommendation He says, however, that the
recommendation really military estimate,
made in 1947 which concluded that "the military
occupation of Korea is not essential to the mill
tary security of the United States" And he
claims, further, that there was no "very great"
connection between that military estimate and
"a political decision to abandon Korea which was
made two years later"
The difficulty in appraising this conflict
arises from the "top-secret" stamp placed on the
facts. The public does not know the instruc-
tions, or even the circumstances, under which
the 1947 estimate was made. It does not know
what other factors, affecting the military security
of the United States, were taken into conSidera-
tion when the Importance of continued military
occupation of Korea was being weighed against
the risks of withdrawal. And, lacking access to
these and similar facts, an intelligent judgment
is almost impossible.
It would seem, however, that there u.s. in
this matter, certain element of discrimination
against the public.
Senator Wayne Morse of Oregon who re-
Gently switched his support from General Esen-
hover to Governor Stevenson was discussing the
incident Monday night. He told group of Uni
versity of Minnesota students that the decision
to withdraw from Korea was military decision
signed by James Forrestal then Secretary Of
Defense and agreed to unanimously by the Joint
Chiefs, General Eisenhower included.
Furthermore, the Oregon Senator said he
was reading the Forrestal statement from top
secret document which twas made available to
me-"
General Eisenhower wants to know, and the
American people should want to know, who made
this top secret document available to Senator
Morse and why.
Senator Morse may be an effective cam
paigner for the Democrats in Minnesota And
he certainly would be more effective If he could
bolster his arguments with quotations from top
secret documents drawn from official files. There
are some people, however, who will think that
top-secret documents ought not to be used as
ammunition in political campaign. And there
are those among them who, being something less
than ardent admirers of Senator Morse, will
think 1t singularly inappropriate that he should
be chosen as the one to whom secret documents
are to be made available for campaign purposes.
The Senator, it should be noted, did not say
who made the document available to him. But
unless he obtained it in his capacity as Senator
and used it in violation of the confidence thus
reposed in him, 1t must have been made avail
able from some official source for partisan pur-
poses. If the latter is the case, some one in the
Democratic camp is playing both dirty and dan
gerous politics. It is dirty politics because an
unfair advantage is being taken of the Repub-
ican Party and of the public, neither of whom
has access to the facts needed to dispute or Judge
the Morse claim. 1t is dangerous politics because
the national security is certain to suffer if top
secret documents are to be used as political
tomahawkS in presidential campaigns
Had this secret report been used for Repub-
ican electioneering purposes, the Presidents
cries of outrage would be heard across the land
If Senator Morse is not going to identify the per-
son who gave the report to him. Mr.. Truman
should make it his business to find out and to let
the voters in on at least this much of the secret