Prof. Kathryn Weathersby
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In the last post we saw the US State Department’s Division of East European Affairs argue in September 1947 that a Soviet takeover of Korea would endanger American security because it would cause people in Western Europe to doubt that they could depend on the US to protect them against further Soviet aggression. This was a powerful argument against withdrawing forces from Korea before the political and economic situation there was stable. However, this warning was counterbalanced by concerns about the “opportunity costs” of American commitment to Korea.
The problem was that the United States had assumed responsibility for stopping Soviet expansion into the Near East, Far and Western Europe but it had not expanded its military budget to meet these new demands. On the contrary, in the face of public pressure, the US had returned to its tradition whereby it would not maintain a large standing army in peacetime. When World War II ended, American armed forces abroad numbered 7,600,000 men and women. By 30 June 1947, however, that number had shrunk to 1,566,000. Furthermore, since Washington abolished the draft in March 1947, the military was now dependent on volunteers.
Because of this situation, both the Policy Planning Staff and the Division of Northeast Asian Affairs at the Department of State concluded that the US might have to withdraw prematurely from Korea. To help resolve the issue, the State-War-Navy Coordinating Committee asked the Joint Chiefs of Staff to assess the place of Korea in American national security. The JCS responded on September 26 with a famous memorandum stating that “from the standpoint of military security, the United States has little strategic interest in maintaining present troops and bases in Korea.” Any American offensive on the Asian mainland would bypass the peninsula, and any enemy position located there could be eliminated from the air. Consequently, the US could more effectively promote its security by relocating occupation forces in Korea to areas of greater strategic importance.
A second issue regarding Korea was the danger posed by the unrest in the American zone. The JCS warned that unless there was a major investment in social, political, and economic rehabilitation in southern Korea, the disorder there could force the US to withdraw from the peninsula without having established a provisional government. If the US occupation ended in such a way, American prestige internationally would be seriously damaged.
The Joint Chiefs’ memorandum carried great weight in Washington. George F. Kennan, head of the State Department’s Policy Planning Staff and the architect of containment, wrote that if the JCS assessment was correct, “we feel that our policy should be to cut our losses and get out of there as gracefully but promptly as possible.” The War Department concluded that, given the severe strain on its resources, it could not afford to devote the money needed for a comprehensive and effective rehabilitation program in Korea. The State Department argued that the officers in Seoul should reach a settlement that “would enable the US to withdraw from Korea as soon as possible with the minimum of bad effects.”
President Truman wisely decided to avoid a hasty decision regarding Korea. Instead, he decided to wait until the United Nations had acted on the latest American proposal. He reasoned that if the UN were to create a provisional government in Seoul, he might be able to persuade Congress to approve an economic aid program for Korea. In the next post we will examine how the Soviet Union responded to the American proposal at the United Nations and how this response altered the debate over the issue within the US government.
[Sources: This post relies on James I. Matray, The Reluctant Crusade: American Foreign Policy in Korea, 1941-1950 (University of Hawaii Press, 1985).]
This page is synchronized from the post: ‘Post #40 The Division of Korea, 1945-1948’