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To: TigerLikesRooster

Truman should have listened to MacArthur.


21 posted on 03/26/2016 8:41:39 AM PDT by dfwgator
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To: dfwgator
Truman should have listened to MacArthur.

Not sure if we discussed this in the past, if so my apologies for repeating myself?

It's been my understanding that regarding the entire Truman vs MacArthur conflict on how best to proceed in Korea, that while MacArthur was in favor of using atomic weapons on the North, Truman knew something that MacArthur did not, which was that at that time, the entire U.S. nuclear arsenal consisted of 13 and only 13 atomic bombs of the 'Fat Man' (Nagasaki) design, and those nukes were needed for their deterrent value in the event that Stalin decided to invade Western Europe. If those nukes (or even some of them) had been used in Korea, it would have not only tied us down in a larger conflict with Communist China for an extended period of time, Stalin would have most likely seen such a development as a green light to attack NATO and seize as much territory as possible.

And those bombs would have had to be delivered via the successor to the B-29 (the B-50 introduced in 1947) or by the relatively still new B-36 which was sorting out it's own operational issues. The risk of losing a nuclear armed B-50 or B-36 over North Korea to MIG interceptors was probably not something they would have wanted to run.

Still it comes down to a case of "woulda, coulda, shoulda" and there is no argument that if North Korea had been defeated and made whole with South Korea, that the world in that region would be a far more peaceful place today.
23 posted on 03/26/2016 8:53:24 AM PDT by mkjessup (Ted Cruz - Endorsed by JEB BUSH, MITT ROMNEY, LINDSEY GRAHAM & GLENN BECK!!)
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