Can armed forces be used with discrimination in the nuclear age?
The past three decades have produced many events which support the thesis that predatory powers can be deterred by limited force without serious risk of general war. But failure to react to armed aggression has been even more prevalent. The reasons for failure are clear. They fall into three general categories: a lack of availability of appropriate forces to meet the aggression, a lack of determination to react to it, and, as an underlying corollary, failure to recognize the importance of an aggressor’s objective as it might affect the long-term aims of defensive or status quo powers.
Perhaps a little light can be shed on the present dilemma of whether or not a capability to wage war at a level less than total war is of sufficient importance to warrant the expense of maintaining the conventional forces required. For today, as in 1949, money is the heart of the debate. Were money plentiful, of course we would have the forces. Are these lesser forces worth enough for us to demand the sacrifices of ourselves, the American taxpayers, to support them along with our forces of massive retaliation? If political realities presuppose “living within” the present budget ceiling, does the importance of these lesser forces warrant sacrifice of any portion of our major deterrent forces in order to have the former? Is a capability to exert the subtler application of power represented by conventional forces really necessary?
Yalta to Quemoy
How did we arrive at today’s unpleasant dilemma?
At the Yalta conference held in February 1945 the feeling of camaraderie and mutual trust between the East and West was at its highest. Stalin had kept his promise to attack on the Eastern front as a supporting operation for the Normandy operation. The major Russian attack was of extreme importance to the success of the Allied landings. We were grateful for it. But in April 1945 our ambassador at Moscow, Mr. Harriman, detected and reported a new trend of Russian policy away from co-operation with the West. Unfortunately it was just at this time that President Roosevelt died. It became doubly hard for the United States to react to Russia’s subtle change of direction. Prime Minister Churchill had recommended that the Western Allies, instead of awaiting the Russian advance from the east, drive on into Berlin. His plea was shelved and instead the American plan was adopted and followed. It called for an operation envisaged at Yalta in which the Russians would attack from the east and envelop Berlin while the Western forces occupied the remainder of Germany. At VE day the Western armies were poised on the Elbe well inside what is now East Germany. The Russians had unilaterally occupied Berlin and Vienna. In accordance with the sense of the Yalta agreements, we fell back to the present line of demarcation between East and West Germany. The Russians on their part welcomed Western forces into Berlin and Vienna.
No sooner was the victory won in the Pacific than the great postwar demobilization began in the West. The feeling of exultation and relief in the West knew no bounds. “Get the boys home!” In Russia there was like exultation, but Stalin did not demobilize. We, unfortunately, had not learned that military force was as important in keeping the peace as in winning the war. We decided instead to place our dependency on the bomb which we alone held. Stalin devised a strategy now commonly known by Henry A. Kissinger’s title for it, “the strategy of ambiguity,” by which he might take advantage of the West’s self- induced weakness in spite of our atomic capability. While we negotiated a European settlement at Potsdam in 1945, Stalin was pouring his forces into Manchuria and building up the Chinese Communists. While we negotiated in 1949 to secure “the Berlin Airlift victory,” heavy propaganda was blaring forth from the Kremlin deploring the horrors of the atomic weapons arsenal of the United States, and across the world the North Koreans were being groomed for the role they were to play the following year. At Geneva the tensions of Korea and Indochina were eased in 1955. Russia was meanwhile pouring arms into Egypt and Syria. The Suez crisis was induced, and we found ourselves in the embarrassing position of concerting pressure with Russia against our own allies, France and Britain, forcing them to desist from the armed action in the Suez area which was to protect what they saw as a principle of vital interest. Today the President is being lifted again on an inexorable tide of political pressure toward “the summit.” What is the true goal?
The complete frustration which the Communists met in Hungary in the one free election ever held behind the “iron curtain” in the fall of 1945 confirmed to Stalin that the Soviets would have to use other means to guarantee success. If Hungary, which had been liberated from the Nazi yoke by the Red Army, was so opposed to the Russians, what could he expect elsewhere?
In point of fact, Stalin must have decided months before while the hostilities were still proceeding to use his position of power to take advantage of the unstable postwar era and expand Soviet influence. For he openly showed his hand only a month after VE day. He presented Turkey with what was a thinly disguised ultimatum to revise the Montreux Convention by which Turkey controls the Dardanelles as an international waterway. Stalin demanded bilateral Turkish-Russian control of the Straits. It was in response to this challenge that the United States first reacted to Russian pressure.
Before examining the history of the post World War II era one might recall certain events of the period between the great wars which lend credence to the lesser deterrence.
In this period three events, among the many crises, would appear best to illustrate the use of force with discrimination as a major tool of diplomacy. Unfortunately these events are illustrative in that they show what might have been rather than what was accomplished to deter aggression.
The powers who were to become the Allies of World War II probably missed their first and greatest chance to avert the forthcoming holocaust by refusing to react to the Japanese aggression in Manchuria and the associated attack on Shanghai in 1931 and 1932.
U. S. Secretary of State Stimson was the leader of those statesmen who wished to resist the Japanese aggression. President Hoover, though outraged at the aggression, was opposed to any action which might lead to American participation in the struggle in the Far East. The British Government likewise took a passive view of the affair. A proposal to make a U. S. and U. K. naval show of force at Shanghai was shelved. Total reaction to the aggression was the refusal of the League of Nations to recognize the Japanese puppet regime in Manchuria.
But the Japanese aggression was given de facto recognition for practical purposes. As a result of this successful conquest the Japanese Kwantung Army of Manchuria gained power throughout the Imperial Army and finally in the government which kept Japanese policy firmly headed toward Pearl Harbor. Their grip on the government was broken only when defeat began to cast a shadow over the Empire from the eastern horizon.
Next let us consider Italy’s conquest of fellow League member, Ethiopia, in 1935. When Mussolini decided to use the Italian colony of Eritrea on the Red Sea as a springboard for a campaign against Ethiopia, he had to assess the chance of Britain’s preventing movement of Italian forces by sea either through the Mediterranean and via the Suez route, or via the longer route around Africa. The British Navy was recognized supreme in European and African waters. Would Britain move? Mussolini thought not. His convoys went through unmolested and Ethiopia struggled alone until the country collapsed.
These events must have been weighed by Hitler as he was assessing the chances of success on the great gamble he was thinking of making the following spring. Would France or Britain react with force if his small reconstituted Wehrmacht seized the demilitarized Rhineland in a lighting stroke? The small force he could move in quickly, later admitted to consist of less than five thousand men, would be helpless before an onslaught of the great French Army poised on the French side of the Rhineland. Hitler thought he could get away with it in the pacifist atmosphere then all-pervading. Against the advice of his own General Staff, he threw his little force across the Rhine that March morning in 1936. He had armed his generals on their own insistence with permission to fall back if the French moved. But this was unnecessary. Hitler had figured the odds correctly. The French nation sat stunned and amazed in the face of the bold move against them, as a contented cat might watch the move of a mouse stealing a tempting morsel from between its paws.
The success of this audacious move had results of transcendent importance. Hitler thereafter met no effective voice of opposition to his new-found arrogant confidence within his own army. And he was confirmed in his belief that he could have what he wanted in Europe if his threats were backed by audacious moves. The road to September 1939 was clear. He was confirmed further in his theory when he successfully imposed the Munich agreement on British Prime Minister Chamberlin and soon thereafter occupied the Czechoslovakian Sudetenland without opposition, even though intelligence must have informed France, Britain, and Czechoslovakia that their combined forces were very much stronger than his own.
In the period between the wars only tiny Finland’s stout stand against mighty Russia’s aggression in the winter of 1939-1940 relieved this otherwise dismal and repeating picture of lack of determination to react to armed aggression. The means to oppose the aggression were available in each case. It was simply the will which was lacking.
What lessons may be derived from post- 1945 experience? One might summarize the East-West successes and failures in a very rough sort of balance sheet along the following lines.
We would note down that the Russian policy succeeded in Manchuria, China, Tibet, Czechoslovakia, and Eastern Europe. It did not attain its objective in Korea, but it was partially successful in Indochina. It was sufficient to hold East Germany, Poland, and Hungary in line with only verbal opposition from the West. The Communists found it wise to recede from their World War II position in northern Iran, to allow Yugoslavia to detach itself from the Soviet Bloc, and to cancel the Berlin Blockade. Today the Berlin issue has been revived and the locus of Soviet success is in the Middle East.
Limited Force and Containment
During this period when “containment” was the catchword of Western policy, was there any correlation between success or failure of the West and use or non-use of force?
Russia’s bid to gain partial control of the Bosporus was blocked by a minor show of force by the United States, which took the form of a visit by the USS Missouri, a visit that presaged formation of the Sixth Fleet. Prime Minister Churchill criticized the move as being so small as to be worthless, but Secretary of State Byrnes later was to assess that the visit accomplished the desired result of removing Russian pressure from Turkey. The U. S. answer to Russian overt pressure on Greece through aid to the rebel guerrillas was proclamation of the Truman Doctrine in 1947 and establishment of the military missions to Turkey and Greece. The success of this reaction needs no retelling.
Contrary to a plea from U. S. Ambassador Steinhardt at Prague that the U. S. Army Corps based at Pilsen in the Sudeten mountains dominating the western plain of Czechoslovakia remain there until the country was stabilized, this force was withdrawn in late 1945. He thought such action on our part would be an open invitation to the Communists in the country to take over. No direct tie-in can be found, but Ambassador Steinhardt’s prediction came to pass with dramatic suddenness on the morning of 24 February 1948. The Iron Curtain had closed from the Black Sea to the Baltic.
The frightened reaction of the Europeans was the immediate formulation of the Western Union Treaty, which became the forerunner to NATO. But Western demobilization continued apace.
Meanwhile, as Ambassador Harriman had predicted, the Russians, contrary to their promises at Yalta, set about arming and supporting the Chinese Communists against the Chinese Nationalists. Military commitments of the Western Powers throughout World War II had been such that the requirements of campaigns elsewhere were always overriding when compared with those for the China theater. The Chinese forces were large, but they were ill-equipped and poorly organized. Lack of available resources resulted in our taking half-way measures. The bitter controversies between General Stilwell on the one side and Generalissimo Chiang and U. S. General Chennault on the other were one result. General Wedemeyer, commanding the China theater at VJ day, requested deployment of a force of seven U. S. divisions to north China to assist in stabilizing the situation there. He was furnished two, the Marine divisions later stationed in the Peking-Tsing-tao area. But the task was too great even for these combat veterans. Their fighting skill was dissolved in trying police-type duties which rapidly involved them in the fratricidal war between the forces of Chiang and those of Mao in the area. U. S. Commissioner Robertson at Peking and the U. S. military authorities there were in agreement that withdrawal of the U. S. Force would be followed quickly by collapse of the Nationalists in north China. Secretary of the Navy Forrestal recommended regrouping the Marines and confirming them as a permanent force in the China area much as the Sixth Fleet had been given permanent status in Mediterranean waters. The Peking predictions were right in all except extent. When the Nationalists collapsed in the winter of 1948-1949, the momentum of the Communists was such as to carry them across that great water barrier, the Yangtze, and on into South China, finally forcing the Nationalists to their haven on Taiwan. Somehow the seriousness of the Communist threat to our aims was never assessed. Instead of regrouping our forces and setting up a truly effective military mission to aid Chiang along the lines of our successful mission to Greece, we turned to the abortive diplomatic effort of attempting to force the implacable enemies, the Nationalists and the Chinese Communists, into a coalition government. In 1948 we no longer had the required forces in the China theater, but we had them in 1945.
So our failures in Czechoslovakia and in China must be assessed as lack of appreciation of the threat.
It took the Berlin Blockade to shock the West into unified action. The courage of the West Berliners and of the men of the airlift were such that what Russia envisaged as an easy elimination of this hated Western “island” in their territory turned rapidly into a propaganda war being won by the West. The Berlin venture was liquidated by the Russians. The West was sufficiently shaken by the Czechoslovakian and the Berlin developments to take the initial steps which resulted in the formation of NATO.
But the demobilization continued. And we heard Secretary of State Acheson in the spring of 1949 declaring publicly that Korea and Formosa were outside the area of strategic importance to the United States. We were trimming our sails.
The Communists’ Korean venture rather fully dispelled for the West the fallacy that we could depend on the bomb and treaty promises as the sole requirements to deter the Communists from local aggression. However, Russian reaction to the prompt entry of the United Nations forces under U. S. leadership into the Korean conflict must have been one of shocked surprise. Though we cannot say we won the Korean war, the mission of the U. N. force, to cast back the invader, was fully accomplished. Meanwhile, for the first time since World War II Stalin found himself confronted with effective military force.
Reaction against the Communist aggression in Indochina, which was well-disguised as an internal revolutionary movement, was less successful. The United States had no stomach for entering this conflict, following so close on the heels of Korea. But over a half-million of Indochina’s people were evacuated by U. S. and French forces to the south, and in Vietnam today we find a government that in time promises to develop with our assistance sufficient strength of its own to prevent further armed encroachment by local Communists in that area.
As we approach the present, two events are most familiar, Quemoy and Lebanon.
Quemoy is worthless as real estate. Most of our allies and a good many authorities within the United States thought Mr. Dulles was foolhardy in recommending resistance to the Chinese Communists’ venture last fall. But had we failed to react to that challenge, we would have suffered an irreparable psychological defeat, or so many Asians who are authorities on the philosophy of the peoples of that part of the world feel. It would have been a very severe loss of face had we allowed the Chinese Communists to push our allies, the Nationalists, willy-nilly into the sea at a time of their own choosing. The President stood firm. The Nationalists were encouraged. The Seventh Fleet was positioned in the straits; the Far East Air Force and the Marines were moved forward. The Communist pressure abated.
Many say we made enemies and lost face in the Middle East by the Lebanon venture and Britain’s associated move to aid Jordan last summer. At the least these dual moves were a success diplomatically and militarily. There occurred no Baghdad revolution in Beirut nor Amman. Neither President Chamoun nor King Hussein were shot down like common thieves by lynch-mad mobs. And when the job was done we got out as promised. The Arab will continue to attack us with his virile propaganda at every opportunity. He is the world’s master in this art, and he needs a whipping-boy. Nevertheless, he respects strength and he despises weakness.
Flexibility
But what validity have these events in the context of today’s problem?
It is generally conceded that when the West has been successful in reacting to Communist imperialism, two factors somewhat interrelated have been present. These were, in the larger sense, the U. S. nuclear capability, supported in the smaller sense by the West’s willingness to confront Communist covert aggression or “aggression by proxy” with force or show of force when vital interests have been at stake and such measures have been feasible.
The crux of the problem today is that when faced with a choice of reducing our major nuclear retaliatory forces or reducing these lesser forces “of the smaller sense,” the choice in the main has been to cut back the latter. These are the tactical forces, ground, sea and air, that can exert counterforce with discrimination. This tendency may best be illustrated by contemplating that the combined numerical strength of Army and Marine Corps personnel has been reduced in excess of 60,000 men a year from mid-1955 to date. At the same time the Navy and Air Force have been forced to cut back on those means and weapons systems which could project these ground forces to threatened areas beyond the seas and support them there. As we allow these forces of the lesser deterrent to erode away, just so do we decrease the chance of our reacting successfully to any of the minor Communist probing actions that we have come to accept as routine. The choice can well be reduced to nuclear holocaust, which is the likely result of use of weapons of mass destruction by either the East or the West, or compromise. Compromise with the East, guided by its revolutionary drive and outlook in international negotiations, can only mean piecemeal defeat for the West through sacrifice either of territory or of principle.
We tend to forget that the strength of the West rests on the nautical nature of the world and the advantage we possess by our preponderance in that sphere. We tend to disregard Russia’s logistic problems in projecting her massive landbased power outwardly to peripheral areas more quickly reached in strength from the sea. We cannot hope continually to protect all spots Russia may probe, but some of them are sufficiently vital for us to fight to protect them regardless of the risk involved. Some are economic, such as the Persian Gulf littoral; some strategic, like the straits through the East Indies; and some psychological, as Berlin is today.
The Goal
To maintain “the lesser capability” at a level that will demand respect, several correlated decisions need be taken and supported by all elements of the Government on a continuing basis. We must confirm in our budgetary planning the maintenance of a truly credible combat-ready mobile force of Army and Marine Corps troops. The size of these forces must be sufficient with their ready reserves that if forced into such a position they can stabilize a front as was done in Korea. Otherwise the movement of smaller forces which can do the job can have no credibility either in the eyes of the friends we may wish to help or in the eyes of our potential enemies.
Having decided on the size of these forces, we must continue to develop the means to project the mobile elements overseas rapidly when required to support the national policy. Most important is the capability of moving a small combat echelon into a threatened area with great dispatch. A regiment provided at the point of stress within hours or days may be worth an Army provided more leisurely. General Bedford Forrest is still correct! Consequently we should emphasize first the continued development of a capability to move streamlined combat elements at high speed by air and by sea. These are complementary, not opposing elements. The U. S. advance echelon arrived at Beirut from the sea, but the advanced British element could only arrive at Amman in time to save the situation by proceeding by air. Total tonnages to be lifted will in any event require sea lift as well as air lift.
Lastly, but of greatest importance, as we cast about for elements of our forces that we can sacrifice to balance the budget, we must not cut too deeply into those forces that secure for us control of the sea and local air and can provide close support, air, missile, rocket and gunfire in a selected combat area until that area can be stabilized by larger forces or preferably by diplomatic means.
The lesser forces which are the subject of this article can only operate in today’s world under an umbrella provided by the major nuclear forces. We must have a credible major deterrent in any case.
It is not intended herein to enter the lists of those pointing up the facets of the argument of the level of major nuclear deterrence required to prevent Communist conquest by blackmail. This debate is dramatized by the proponents of the counterforce theory as opposed to those who support the requirement for a finite deterrent.
We are concerned here only with the necessity for those lesser forces, the conventional forces that can deter Russia’s ambiguous moves which result in an ever-increasing girth for the Sino-Soviet Bloc. We must have men who will protect the neighborhoods and the hinterlands while the populace is gathered in the town square. The monies required to support these mobile forces of the lesser deterrence are sufficiently small in comparison with those required to support the massive deterrent forces that they should be decided upon first. All the remainder can go into the more powerful forces. But let us not lose the whole for failure to provide a small part. Let us not throw away the balance spring to make room for a bigger main spring.