Korea—Back to the Facts of Life

The attack of North Koreans across the 38th parallel, on 25 June 1950, did more than bring the U. S. flag back to the Asian mainland. It also brought our national military thinking back to the facts of life.

For all too long too large a portion of our national military thinking had abandoned the principles on which our national security is based, abandoned those immutable axioms of common sense for the siren song of those advertising that security could be bought in the bargain basement where patent medicine for victory was available without paying the historic price of adequate ground troops and sea power.

In order to realize the suddenness of our return to sound military thinking, we need but recall how badly addled it was just about a year ago. So deep seated was the confusion and conflict over proper concepts of war that the House Armed Services committee, in an almost unprecedented move, initiated a full scale investigation of the issues involved, seeking in the conflicting testimony to find the truths upon which a sound military policy could be based. After weeks of patient and probing investigation, the Committee rendered its report. That report¹ constitutes one of the most enlightened expositions of military thought ever to be penned on this side of the Atlantic. Naval readers of the report, incidentally, will recognize the same kind of cold analysis and sound logic that characterized the writings of Mahan almost half a century ago, which characteristics have since been all too scarce in non-naval writing emanating from American sources. That report of the House Armed Service Committee should be required reading for every person in the armed forces. Such a reading policy would go far toward blowing away much of the haze that has encircled so-called military thought since the end of World War II.

Anyone who takes the time to read that committee report will find that the committee’s recommendations at the conclusion of the long hearings were essentially in accordance with the views of the naval witnesses. But in hewing to a line of utter objectivity, the committee refused to judge the correctness of the opposing theories of war in terms of the future. In refusing, quite properly, to turn the thought-packed committee report into a crystal-ball forecast, the committee succinctly summed up the basic issues with the observation, “It is a sad fact that neither can be proved right or wrong except through the supreme test of actual war and the nature of the peace that follows.”²

Few indeed were those who suspected that within a year that “supreme test” would be proving who was right and who was wrong. But that is exactly what happened. Even since 25 June, 1950, the conflicting views have been subjected to the supreme test in the crucible of war. Here are some of the matters clarified by Korean experience:

“The one-weapon, easy-war concept.” This has been at the bottom of much of the dispute over concepts of war. Basically it has been a product of a number of factors: the Douhet-Mitchell-de-Seversky over-emphasis on the capability of air power alone; assumption that the atom bomb is the “absolute weapon”; and an all too prevalent attitude that anyone who pointed to past experience and established principles of war was just too old fashioned to understand the scintillating brilliance of those who could talk in terms of fighter-proof bombers, a 30-day war, and victory through air power alone. The essential danger of the “one- weapon, easy-war concept” (the term is taken from the House Armed Services Committee Report)³ is derived from the fact that it sprang from and depended upon either an ignorance of military principles or a deliberate disregard of principles. Attractive in its simplicity and its so-called capability of eliminating the need of suffering the attrition of heavy ground and sea warfare, its attractiveness temporarily overshadowed the logic of those who warned of its danger. Korea was a battlefield test of the concept. How it reacted to the test was illustrated by the report of a national network commentator who, in summarizing the day’s events during the early phases of the Korean conflict, began his broadcast with the announcement of “Victory in the air—defeat on the ground.” The incongruity of such a statement affirmed what so many adherents of sound military thought had been saying for so long: the one-weapon easy-war concept refused to recognize the inseparability of all action in the prosecution of a war. It was a kind of military theorizing that could only result in a combat anomaly. And wars are won by coordination, not by incongruity.

Never in history have circumstances of a conflict provided a more scientifically controlled test for a theory than the Korean war provided in testing the purported self-sufficiency of the air weapon. In Korea air supremacy was practically absolute, permitting complete attention to be devoted to the destruction of the enemy. But despite the total air supremacy, the enemy ground forces advanced. Finally, it was ground troops supported by air and sea forces—not air supported by ground and sea—that turned back the aggression from the north. Of course, the slowly-daunted air extremists may say that Korea was not the kind of war that the one-weapon easy-war concept was designed for. Such an argument exposes its own weakness. To say that Korea was not the kind of war a weapon was designed for, is the same as a boxer, recovering from a KO by a right hand, explaining that he only planned to defend himself against his opponent’s left hand. It is just about as weak an excuse as that offered by a high ranking supply officer in the Spanish-American War who sought to justify his failures by arguing that his office was functioning perfectly until the war came along and “disrupted and disorganized it.”

Korea has brought the air weapon into a more clearly defined perspective, allowing a much more accurate evaluation of the capabilities of the air in relation to the prosecution of a war. It is not too early to derive the following principles from Korean experience:

1. Air power alone cannot stop a determined enemy.
2. Strategic air can aid materially the ground forces by attack on enemy supply installations and lines of communication.
3. Strength in the air is an indispensable, vital component of the over-all combat effort. But it is not in itself a constantly decisive factor. That is the lesson that we must learn and remember from Korea.

The atom bomb: Korea was preceded by altogether too much irresponsible thinking and writing to the effect that the intercontinental bomber, with its belly-loaded with an atomic bomb, was a one-shot, sure-fire weapon for bringing any enemy to his knees. Just as the more calculating military thinkers have long held, Korea has proved that the atom bomb, as well as its especially designed conveyance, is not a weapon of universal use in all kinds of warfare. It was a shock to many Americans who had accepted the absolute weapon theory, to learn that a big bomber with an atom bomb wasn’t going to save Americans from fighting a tough and bloody war in Korea. Indeed it was not easy for many to realize that, in spite of the fact we had the atom bomb and the means of delivering it to Korea, we would have to slug it out on the ground, in the air, and from the sea in order to beat back the North Koreans. This dose of reality certainly was contrary to what we had been told and what we had read.

The implications of the failure to use the atom bomb in Korea are not limited to Korea. We are faced with the stark fact that it is entirely possible that, as a nation, we may never be able to exploit our most powerful weapon. Already there are those who foresee the possibility of an Eurasian power being able to overrun and subjugate our

European continental allies in a matter of weeks, with the enemy power then proceeding to serve notice that the peoples of France, Belgium, and the other captured nations would be held as hostage against our use of the atomic bomb against either the Eurasian nation or against the captured nations’ people or industry. In fact, Fleet Admiral Nimitz has expressed the view that “it is inconceivable that such bombing would be resorted to in allied territory temporarily occupied by the enemy.”⁴

There is also the real possibility that strategic bombing attacks of mass destruction and annihilation will come under closer public scrutiny from the standpoint of the cost and result. The American people may gain a deeper appreciation of General Fuller’s conclusion that the great allied strategic bombing of Germany to the spring of 1944 was not worth the cost.⁵ We may also change our popular opinions by further contemplation of the fact, as Fuller points out, that the peace is seldom won by resorting to “Mongoloid destructiveness.”

Tactical Aviation: Pre-Korean complaint that ground troops would not receive adequate close air support was not limited to Navy-Marine spokesmen. However, it was the naval position in the hearings last fall that close air support was being dangerously slighted, and it was naval spokesmen that presented the case for adequate air support of ground troops. As the investigation progressed it became obvious that the difference of opinion revolved largely around the equation of what was “adequate” close air support.

Marine aviation, the pioneer of close air support, was pointedly criticized by non-naval witnesses as so excessive in terms of comparative requirements that it was “overwhelmingly out of balance.” Marine close air support requirements, judged by Air Force group standards, were “fantastic.”⁶ Navy and Marine spokesmen stood firm, however, convinced of the correctness of their views, knowing in their own minds that, when the day of conflict came, the Navy-Marine concept of close air support would find complete justification in the assistance it would give ground troops in gaining the ground objective, and the test of Korea gave such vindication. There is nothing in the record of Korean combat to indicate that the ground troops complained that they were getting too much Marine and Navy close air support.

And it might just as well be noted that Korea reaffirmed the wisdom of Marine- Naval close air support doctrines. Anyone who glances back through the testimony of the Marine-Naval witnesses who told the committee that if war should come at an early date “the tactical air squadrons of the Navy and the Marine Corps would have to provide the major part of the troop air support, even as they did at the beginning of the last war”⁷ can easily see that it wasn’t the Naval view on close air support that was wrong last fall. In the supreme test of war, Marine air requirements haven’t seemed so “fantastic” after all. It is hoped that the lesson will be remembered after conclusion of the Korean episode. But it wasn’t remembered after the last war, so such a hope is probably an empty one.

Sea Power: From the popular standpoint, perhaps the most surprising lesson of the Korean war has been the comeback of sea power as a prime instrument of war. In the true sense, it is not a comeback, for it has never been anything but a prime instrument of war in the view of those who understood the nature and capability of our naval power as developed in accordance with the uniquely American “balanced-fleet concept.” Actually, the willingness of some to bury sea power after the last war was nothing particularly new. The same thing had happened after the First World War when, in the hey-day of Douhet and Mitchell, air- power extremists gratuitously interred our sea power with the since-disproved contention that air power meant the end of effective naval power. So, when the same group of extremists began to sing the same tune following the last war, the burial efforts were not unexpected, but they were dangerous if permitted to go too far.

The naval view was that the kind of Navy being provided for did not have the necessary offensive power. The need for such offensive naval power was questioned by those who asked, “Offensive power against what?”⁸ and who contended that our only possible enemy had a surface navy that was “negligible.” Not only was this wrong, according to a subsequent issue of Janes Fighting Ships, but such an argument seemed to substantiate the belief of naval thinkers that the detractors of sea power did not grasp the true significance of our sea power, its unsurpassed versatility and mobility, and its utter indispensability in helping carry the attack against a foreign shore. It seemed that the argument that we should reduce our naval power because our possible enemy had but negligible naval strength contained about the same logic as if a heavyweight champion strapped his right arm to his side before a fight because his opponent had no effective right hand. Also, it appeared to violate the pretty well established idea that military planning should attempt to exploit our own strength and the enemy’s weakness.

Anyone who contends that Russia is not a great sea power seems to overlook a significant geographical truth. The continued expansion of the periphery of Soviet power has carried Soviet influence, via Red China, to almost the entire western shore of the Pacific. Merely by controlling the western Pacific littoral, the forces of Communism have the capability of challenging our control of the Western Pacific. It might be well to think back to the fact that, regardless of Pearl Harbor, we would probably have had to go to war with Japan because we could not let Japan, through conquest of China, control the western rim of the Pacific and consequently enhance Japanese ability to contest our domination of the Pacific Basin.

Thus Communism, by bringing China into the Red orbit, has attained the goal of the Imperial Tzars; she controls the western shore of the Pacific from the Arctic to IndoChina. And that makes Russia a sea power of no negligible significance. To many who understood sea power in all its implications, it seemed a bit curious that we should be discussing reduction of our naval strength at the very moment that Communist sea potential was leaping ahead.

The blow-up of Korea heavily underlined the fundamental wisdom of naval insistence on maintenance of a strong offensive naval posture in spite of the fact that we were not actively challenged on the seas. It was sea power that brought the weight of our land power to Korea, and it was sea power that kept the ground forces supplied with the tremendous supply tonnages required for modern war. And it was sea power’s aircraft carriers that delivered the urgently needed land based fighters—and this included those of the U. S. Air Force—to the Korean theater.

But the contribution of sea power to the advance of American arms in the Orient has not, by any stretch of the imagination, been limited to serving as the principal logistic agency in the prosecution of a distant war. Again, as in World War II, U. S. Naval power, organized in accordance with the concept of the balanced fleet, has shown that it still is a potent and indispensable weapon in the arsenal of democracy. Korean experience has cast a bright spotlight on the modern combat capabilities of sea power and has exposed incontrovertible evidence of the value of strong U. S. offensive naval power, even, we might add, in these days when over-enthusiastic zealots of so-called modern war methods had already relegated sea power and Mahan’s axioms to the ashcan of history. Let’s look at a few controversial components of naval power that have been subjected to the war’s supreme test.

First, the balanced fleet concept itself. Fundamentally, this question of continued adherence to the balanced force theory of naval organization has long been at the root of dispute over naval power. Briefly, as naval readers well know, the balanced fleet is the term usually applied to indicate the fundamental organizational theory of U. S. naval power, a theory and policy by which our fleets are organized to give the naval commander all the combat tools required for the prosecution of his combat task. Our naval policy makers knowingly adopted this concept as the result of the lessons of the Spanish American War. At that time, naturally, a balanced fleet consisted primarily of Marine landing forces and surface vessels. Since then the concept has been adjusted to the advancing development of naval weapons, until today it denotes a naval organization providing fleet components of submarines, surface vessels, Fleet Marine Forces, and aircraft carriers. Adoption of such a concept, simple in principle—as are most great and progressive ideas— marked a departure of U. S. Naval thought from that of continental Europe, which had previously been the pattern-maker for our naval thinking. A large segment of non-naval thought in this country has never really understood, nor has it supported, our uniquely American system of naval power. One of the reasons for this lack of comprehension can be found in the fact that our land and air power thinking in this country has derived its basic doctrine from continental Europe. Continental Europe has never understood sea power requirements for a great maritime nation such as the United States, and, consequently, the devotees of Prussian-German-French military doctrine cannot find in that continental theory any justification for the kind of naval power this nation developed and perfected for our peculiar security needs.

Largely for that reason it was incomprehensible to some why the U. S. Naval forces should be organized on the balanced force theory, rather than in accordance with the continental tri-elemental concept by which everything that flies is air force, everything operating on the ground is land power, and everything that floats is sea power. And the kind of sea power that goes along with that line of reasoning has never amounted to very much. With this in mind, it is easier to understand why such criticism of our balanced fleet components emanated from some non-naval sources. In order to bring the naval organization of this nation into conformity with military thinking that derived from the continent, it was necessary to destroy the balanced fleet. This obviously could be accomplished by destroying, or reducing the basic elements of the balanced fleet—the Fleet Marine Force and Naval Aviation—to a point of combat ineffectiveness. Hence, the unceasing attacks on naval air and the Marine Corps.

Naval leaders have long understood that one of the prime capabilities of our balanced naval forces is to be able to project our combat power against land areas. Such is necessary in the prosecution of a naval war, and it is highly helpful in assisting land and ground power effort in joint operations. Despite this well-established ability to assist land and air effort, naval spokesmen were criticized for wanting “increased carrier strength to attack land targets and to oppose hostile air in limited areas for a limited time.”⁹ This, it was said, was not the Navy’s primary mission. (The latter contention, of course, was highly vulnerable when viewed in terms of the provision of the naval roles and missions assigned by the National Security Act of 1947.) That was the argument of a year ago.

Then came Korea. While land-based support aircraft from Japanese fields were severely hampered by the round trip range, with the result that insufficient fuel could be carried to allow for desired time on station over the lines waiting for support calls, the too few aircraft carriers were serving in their traditional role of roving air fields, often within sight of the Korean coast, launching strike after strike against the enemy lines, and Marine carrier based planes were delivering staggering blows in close support of the troops. None of the carrier- based planes was working under the severe handicap of having to make the round trip from Japan. While the fate of the Pusan beachhead hung in the balance, it is highly doubtful if any of the battle-tired ground troops objected to the close air support they were getting on the grounds that the carrier- based aircraft were doing something that was not in accordance with a particular interpretation of the Navy’s primary mission.

During the hearings last fall, Navy officers were criticized as arriving at high level “conclusions that showed that they had no concept whatsoever of land operations.”¹⁰ It might be observed that the effectiveness of the aircraft carrier and its planes’ close air support of land troops indicated that perhaps Navy officers had a more realistic concept of the requirements of land operations in this particular matter than was possessed by those who criticized naval views regarding the employment of naval aviation in operations over land. Again, the supreme test of war showed clearly who had been wrong and who was right. And it wasn’t the naval view that was wrong.

The Fleet Marine Forces, comprising the landing forces of our naval power and functioning as the nation’s amphibious specialists, are a major feature of our balanced fleet concept. Elimination of such naval landing forces, as well as powerful naval aviation, was necessary in order to end our balanced naval organization and bring our fleet composition into conformity with the continental naval thought. And that would be the end of our demonstrated high effectiveness as a maritime power. Those who have read the House Armed Services Committee report have undoubtedly been impressed by the fact that the committee took exception to the bitterness of attacks against the Marine Corps, regretting the kind of testimony which, “it appeared to the Committee, intentionally slighted the amphibious training of the Marine Corps and Marine Corps aviation. . . . ”¹¹

The military history of the United States is loaded with examples of the wisdom of our national policy in maintaining a Marine Corps of strong offensive capabilities. But, of even more importance, such justification is not all in the past. In writing the Unification Act in 1947, Congress was criticized for insisting against high level advice to the contrary on including statutory provision for a strong amphibious Marine Corps. There has seldom been a more emphatic and eloquent testimonial of Congressional correctness in matters affecting national security than the example of Marines spearheading the amphibious assault at Inchon (where ‘‘the Navy and Marines never shone more brightly . . . ”), raising the American flag at Seoul, and pushing north in the van of General MacArthur’s brilliant attack. The conclusive nature of Congressional foresight in refusing the imposition of an arbitrary ceiling on Marine fighting capabilities is all the more apparent when it is realized that it was only a year ago that the House Armed Services Committee, in the course of its hearings, was solemnly warned: “Any war we may have to fight in the future will obviously be unlike the Pacific war against Japan. . . . There may or may not be amphibious landings, but if there are, they will probably be like the landings in North Africa and Normandy and probably unlike most of the landings in the Pacific.”¹² The tenor of such testimony could not but suggest that in a future war the carrier and the amphibious Marines would be items of small combat utility value.

Never in so short a time has such a prophecy of the nature of the next war been proved so wrong!

Our national military history is replete with examples of the need for a powerful amphibious force of Marines. Iceland and Guadalcanal were recent examples. The Pusan bridgehead, the landing at Inchon, each furnished testimony vindicating the truly national demand for a strong Marine Corps possessing its historic characteristics: ready availability and amphibious proficiency. And this vindication in the supreme test of war took place in a kind of war that we were told was not going to happen. Again, it wasn’t the naval view that was wrong. This leads directly into another basic issue that has been clarified by Korean experience.

The one-enemy, one kind of war concept: Through much of the non-naval testimony ran the recurring theme that our national instruments of war must be determined on the basis of our needs if we are forced into war with “our one possible enemy.” This line of thinking further deemphasized naval importance by indicating that the vitals of our “one enemy lies not on any seashore, not on any island, but inside the Eurasian land- mass.”¹³ The inference was obvious that sea power could be of but minor value in waging active combat against such a purportedly landlocked nation.

Any military policy pointing only to a great Armageddon is inherently fallacious, for past history and current events weigh heavily against such a one-war, one-enemy concept. It is fallacious because it does not provide for the possibility of what historians have so long referred to as “wars of limited objective,” conflicts that do not risk the fate of a nation. It must be remembered that great powers need not necessarily be defeated by one great blow. Rome fell, not actually when the Goths swept through the streets of the city, but over a period of many years during which Roman military strength was sapped by incessant incursions by the northern barbarians against the far reaches of the empire. Small wars on distant fronts are a commonplace in history. There certainly should be some significance in the fact that Russia, for instance, has, since Peter the Great, repeatedly used wars of limited objective as instruments of national policy.

Furthermore, the preparation for only a war involving the final clash of the titans overlooks the possibility of a nation attempting to achieve her aims by the devious but often effective device of war by proxy. This again is but another version of the war of limited objective. It gives the initiative to the nation that fights by proxy, and it demands that the nation subjected to such an attack must be capable of reacting quickly, in fire-brigade fashion, able to bring decisive power to bear against the aggressor country. That calls for mobility of a high order, a kind of mobility that can move air, surface, and amphibious striking power to distant corners of the world. It is a job tailor-made for U. S. balanced fleets. This, incidentally, points up how perfectly suited our balanced fleet, with its own ships, planes, and marine amphibious troops, is for functioning as part of a United Nations military force in the event such an agency comes into being. If we devoted years to staff studies in an effort to devise a properly organized force for such a purpose, it would be impossible to come up with a better solution than we now possess in our naval power as presently constituted.

The only time a nation is even relatively safe in following a policy of preparing for only one kind of war against one enemy is when that nation intends to initiate the conflict. But aggression by any name is wrong, even when bearing the euphemistic label of preventive war. It is wrong militarily because no nation today is capable of destroying enemy military power with one savage blow. Therefore, a war of attrition must inevitably result, and nothing is prevented. It is politically wrong because under our form of government only Congress can declare war, and to launch a war without Congressional approval is a violation of our Constitution. It is morally wrong, because a war of aggression is a crime against humanity, and nations, like individuals, cannot with impunity violate the immutable moral laws upon which our beliefs and civilization are built. Since we are a nation that cannot militarily, politically, or morally take the initiative in starting a war, we would appear to be on pretty thin ice to base our war planning on one kind of war against one enemy.

The fallacy of such inflexible strategic thinking has long been recognized both within and outside of the services. However, it was never more neatly and incisively summed up than during the hearings last fall when a responsible Marine-Naval witness warned against the kind of strategic thinking which “so studiously eliminates the nation’s only emergency force in readiness.” This testimony, continuing to emphasize the need of maintaining a strong balanced fleet, contained the following appraisal of our strategic situation: “We are confronted with the possibility of war in which our opponent would hold the initiative. We must prepare to meet his moves with promptness and with whatever force we can muster. Circumstances alone will restrict us to a series of “damage control” operations against the time when we can grapple with him somewhere on the outer fringes.”¹⁴ That was the Marine-naval testimony of a year ago. Korea has underlined the soundness of its strategic insight, the accuracy of its prophecy. The one-enemy, one kind-of-war thinking must be re-examined in the light of the fact that the world contains many more potential Koreas, many more potential “damage control” operations. Again, this time in the matter of sound strategic thinking, it wasn’t the naval view that was wrong.

Militarily speaking, Korea has brought much of our national strategic thinking back to the facts of life. In the light of events since 25 June, 1950, it would seem that we could summarize the lessons as follows:

The dream of a one-weapon, easy-war is over. No one weapon wins wars.

1. It is dangerous to overestimate the capabilities of air power alone.
2. There must be greater effort in providing close air support for all ground troops.
3. We must retain a strong strategic air force for the purpose of carrying the atomic bomb if such a kind of war ever materializes. But we must also realize that we may never be able to use such a weapon. In fighting wars, as in fighting fires, we must remember that it is often possible to extinguish a blaze in the kitchen by methods short of blowing up the whole house.
4. United States sea power provides, with its balanced fleets, the most versatile and mobile strategic fighting force in the world.
5. The atom bomb does not mean the end of large amphibious operations.
6. Our Nation’s security requires continued maintenance of strong forces of Marine amphibious specialists.
7. We may be just beginning an era of wars of limited objective.
8. Our strategic thinking must be realistic, not subjective.