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Ike was trying to avoid large scale military conflict. God only knows what would have happened had he pressed on. Given the world had witnessed the bloodiest war in history only a decade prior (this war coming only a few decades after the war that was supposed to end all wars) and military use of atomic weapons, Eisenhower frankly made the smart choice. Did it have consequences? Of course, but find me a war that hasn't.
Eisenhower was generally a great president (now 5th greatest per CSPAN's survey of historians), but he left us a 64 year catastrophe in North Korea. Soon after his election in 1952, Ike met with the South Korean President Syngman Rhee. Rhee was gung ho for fighting to defeat the communists, and for reunification. The overall commander of UN forces in Korea, Mark Clark, was on board with this, as was Secretary of State John Foster Dulles.
Ike said no. He told Mark Clark "...I have a mandate from the people to stop this fighting. That's my decision." An armistice was signed on July 27, 1953.
Ike had a deep aversion to war, having witnessed the horrors of war first hand. That's understandable and admirable. But in some cases the cost of not fighting is even greater than the cost of fighting.
Today the average North Korean is 3 inches shorter than his/her counterpart in the South due to malnutrition. By allying with Islamists, North Korea has become an existential threat to the world. Kim might not actually use a nuke, but the Islamists will.
Sixty-four years... and no end in sight.
Quote:
Originally Posted by burdell
Good to see hindsight is still 20/20. There's absolutely no way to know if things would be better today had we continued fighting 60+ years ago.
burdell is right on this.
Quote:
Originally Posted by LordSquidworth
Did you forget that the Chinese flooded over the border and rolled the US military back into South Korea?
Ike realized there was NO winning, so instead of surrendering, yeah, we're at a stand still... The same result of doing anything further.
You do realize had Ike pressed on it probably would have meant WWIII?
yep. the korean war would have taken more and more resources just to maintain the 38th parallel. ike made the best decision he could. at the time a peace treaty was not possible. in fact a cease fire agreement almost didnt happen.
no we are paying the price of macarthur shooting off his mouth and and threatening to attack china, and inf act demanding that truman supply him with the necessary weapons, aka nuclear tipped artillery shells among other weapons, to do the job.
had truman not fired macarthur, the cease fire agreement would never have happened, and very possibly china would be controlling the entire korean peninsula now.
if macarthur had kept his trap shut about wanting to attack china, and instead reassured the chinese that we would not cross the yalu river, its possible that the two koreas would be united today under a democratic form of government.
Eisenhower was generally a great president (now 5th greatest per CSPAN's survey of historians), but he left us a 64 year catastrophe in North Korea. Soon after his election in 1952, Ike met with the South Korean President Syngman Rhee. Rhee was gung ho for fighting to defeat the communists, and for reunification. The overall commander of UN forces in Korea, Mark Clark, was on board with this, as was Secretary of State John Foster Dulles.
Ike said no. He told Mark Clark "...I have a mandate from the people to stop this fighting. That's my decision." An armistice was signed on July 27, 1953.
Ike had a deep aversion to war, having witnessed the horrors of war first hand. That's understandable and admirable. But in some cases the cost of not fighting is even greater than the cost of fighting.
Today the average North Korean is 3 inches shorter than his/her counterpart in the South due to malnutrition. By allying with Islamists, North Korea has become an existential threat to the world. Kim might not actually use a nuke, but the Islamists will.
Sixty-four years... and no end in sight.
The alternative was a full-scale war with China, which would have been winnable but at a tremendous price to all parties involved. There probably wouldn't have much of a Korea left to fight for.
This is the first time I've seen some one complain about the cost of peace!
Speculation on the outcome of the war if it had been continued can be spun a thousand ways.
But the fact is: By 1953, both Koreas were exhausted, as both had fought the Japanese earlier, since 1939, and then each other after the Japanese surrender. The war was stalemated. The Chinese were fully engaged, as were the U.S. and our allies, and none of them wanted to continue the fight either. All had fought throughout World War II.
Why did the armistice come in 1953? Why not 1952 or 1954? Think about it. The answer is written above. By 1953, they all wanted it to end because all sides were spent at that time. If any one of the combatants had wanted to continue, the war would have gone on another year. Or more.
Another question to ask yourself is: Why didn't the fighting begin again after a period of Korean rest and reconstruction?
Armistices have been broken in the past many times. By 1953, both Koreas were shattered nations, lying in general ruin. The Chinese had their own nation to rebuild, and Mao had to re-kindle his old revolution to get it done and to make sure his first revolution would last. And America wanted no hot more wars at all. By 1953, we had our hands full with the Cold War.
Korea was nothing but pocket change after the armistice.
Having an ally in the Korean peninsula gave the Untied States a huge strategic advantage over the Communist threat that had never existed before. Our forward bases in the Japanese islands provided a line of supply for our forces in Korea, if another war was to break out, and a rebuilt South Korea gave our military an effective zone to stage a war with China, if one was to break out.
So the minor expense of a few troops patrolling the border with their S. Korean allies was nothing at all. We were spending vastly more money and committing vastly more troops in Germany, our forward area if a war with Russia was to break out.
60 years is a long time but other border truces have lasted far longer in history. Armistice is a way for conflicting nations to save face; no one wins or loses. The fighting just stops. When an armistice holds for a long time, the warring nations eventually lose the heat of war as time goes on, and the old reasons for the war fade away over time.
The China we fought then is not the same nation now, nor is South Korea. All the combatant nations moved on to prosperity because the armistice allowed prosperity to happen. Except for one.
Only North Korea has not kept up with the progress all the others have made. That failure to prosper lies completely on the leaders of North Korea alone. That's what comes from a continual dictatorship that plunders a nation over several generations.
Not a perfect ending, but one good enough that peace has been kept for 4 generations. That's a far cheaper and better outcome than any of the alternatives that could have happened back in 1953.
Eisenhower was generally a great president (now 5th greatest per CSPAN's survey of historians), but he left us a 64 year catastrophe in North Korea. Soon after his election in 1952, Ike met with the South Korean President Syngman Rhee. Rhee was gung ho for fighting to defeat the communists, and for reunification. The overall commander of UN forces in Korea, Mark Clark, was on board with this, as was Secretary of State John Foster Dulles.
Ike said no. He told Mark Clark "...I have a mandate from the people to stop this fighting. That's my decision." An armistice was signed on July 27, 1953.
Ike had a deep aversion to war, having witnessed the horrors of war first hand. That's understandable and admirable. But in some cases the cost of not fighting is even greater than the cost of fighting.
Today the average North Korean is 3 inches shorter than his/her counterpart in the South due to malnutrition. By allying with Islamists, North Korea has become an existential threat to the world. Kim might not actually use a nuke, but the Islamists will.
Sixty-four years... and no end in sight.
Where in the Constitution does it say America should intervene in other nations civil wars?
Eisenhower was generally a great president (now 5th greatest per CSPAN's survey of historians), but he left us a 64 year catastrophe in North Korea. Soon after his election in 1952, Ike met with the South Korean President Syngman Rhee. Rhee was gung ho for fighting to defeat the communists, and for reunification. The overall commander of UN forces in Korea, Mark Clark, was on board with this, as was Secretary of State John Foster Dulles.
Ike said no. He told Mark Clark "...I have a mandate from the people to stop this fighting. That's my decision." An armistice was signed on July 27, 1953.
Ike had a deep aversion to war, having witnessed the horrors of war first hand. That's understandable and admirable. But in some cases the cost of not fighting is even greater than the cost of fighting.
Today the average North Korean is 3 inches shorter than his/her counterpart in the South due to malnutrition. By allying with Islamists, North Korea has become an existential threat to the world. Kim might not actually use a nuke, but the Islamists will.
Sixty-four years... and no end in sight.
any war the US enters should be fought to complete unconditional surrender by the enemy.
We did that in WWII and have had no trouble with Japan or Germany in the 72 years since !
yep. the korean war would have taken more and more resources just to maintain the 38th parallel. ike made the best decision he could. at the time a peace treaty was not possible. in fact a cease fire agreement almost didnt happen.
no we are paying the price of macarthur shooting off his mouth and and threatening to attack china, and inf act demanding that truman supply him with the necessary weapons, aka nuclear tipped artillery shells among other weapons, to do the job.
had truman not fired macarthur, the cease fire agreement would never have happened, and very possibly china would be controlling the entire korean peninsula now.
if macarthur had kept his trap shut about wanting to attack china, and instead reassured the chinese that we would not cross the yalu river, its possible that the two koreas would be united today under a democratic form of government.
At the time of Truman leaving office, who had a higher favorability rating......MacArthur or Truman.
Shame on Harry for thinking the Constitution established a chain of command or anything silly like that.
Had he not relieved MacArthur there's absolutely no way of knowing what people who are alive today would've been otherwise on both sides of the conflict or how the conflict would have progressed/ended, peering thru the hindsight glass not withstanding.
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