The Doctrine of Pre-emptive Strike

My best recollection on this it that it was the Dullas brothers (John Foster and Allen), Eisenhower's Director of CIA and Secretary of State that were so keen on the use of nuclear weapons in Korea. Would this have really been such a great idea? I'm just visualizing the US, Pakistan, India, Israel, and whoever, tossing nukes around whenever they or we feel somewhat threatened. Eisenhower's restraint seems to have provided a valuable precident. In any case, how would any use of nuclear weapons at that time have prevented anyone else, and specifically, the Soviet Union, from developing the same?


To your main question, my main problem with a pre-emptive strike at this time lies with the lack of support from the rest of the world, excluding Britain, of course. The United States is not the most threatened country in the world in regard to Iraq so I just don't see why we should take on the entire cost of the operation while being condemned by the countries who have the most at stake. 'Costs' of course, go way beyond dollar sums.

I think there are some major issues being ignored here. How would you propose that he should have attacked Russia and China? Destroying one or two facilities in a pre-emptive attack might have slowed the Soviets by a few months but it would not have stopped them overall. We would have had to establish an occupying force to prevent them from rebuilding their research facilites and prevent their scientists from continuing.

We had no ability to support sustanied land forces across all of Asia and half of Europe in a combat capability. This was a major issue throughout the course of the Korean conflict. While both China and the Soviets supported North Korea directly in limited circumstances one of the major concerns throughout that war was that China would launch and all out offensive and roll right through North Korea and into the South.

The only time we might have had such an opportunity was in the wanning days of WWII while Japan was withdrawing from mainland China and The Soviets were recovering from their numerous battles against Germany. But even at that point we would have ended up taking on the rebuilding of not only Western Europe and Japan but the rest of Europe and Asia as well - a task we would have failed at miserably.

Roger and Fishin

All very valid points however must reply later

The pre-emptive strike doctrine will only work - and this is realised by all major powers - when the pre-emptive strike is used as a one-time only strike to dissuade an enemy power from using its 'muscle' to impose its will on another.

Should the United States have followed General MacArthur's wishes and used a battlefield nuclear weapon duruing the Korean War, no amount of diplomacy or force would have prevented China fcrom replying with an all-out war. Likewise Russia. Had Eisenhower used nuclear weapons against the then USSR, at the height of the Communist Bogey-man scare, the USSR and all its's client armies would have poured throught the Fulda Gap, and would'n't have halted until they had reached the Channel Ports.

What took NATO (and Western) Leaders a long time to hoist on board was that China and the then USSR, needed and required "Buffer State" between themselves and a potential or perceived enemy. USSR had their buffer states in the East European Countries, Poland, etc. The US attack on North Korea and the race of MacArtur's Forces to the North Korean/Chinese Border rang bells in Peking that caused the Chinese to send millions of its troops into battle against the UN.

I think that in this day and nuclear age, the use of a pre-emptive strike is only effective against an enemy that will realise that a reply to a pre-emptive strike would be suicide.

General (Retd) Sir John Hackett wrote an excellent book "The Third World War". Worth Reading.

Roger--Fishin and Tommy

You all raise very substantial issues and of course what I advocated for Eisenhower to do is horrific to contemplate however when placed in the context of deciding the ultimate destruction or survival of the world then I would suggest that a very different attitude could be taken. At the very height of the cold war, say from 1962 until it ended with the "Wall" coming down, Russia and the US had "THOUSANDS OF THERMO-NUCLEAR DEVICES". and essentially still have. Each one of these devices is many times more powerfull and destructive than the two dropped on Japan.
Can anyone imagine even one hundred of these devices exploding almost simultaneously? The brutal fact is that the world could survive easily the explosion of one---or two ----or maybe ten---but one hundred---or a thousand? Here suvival becomes doubtful.

When it comes down to the survival or extinction of the human race should we have taken a more visionary look? I admit that it is unreasonable to ask or expect any man to make a decision of that magnitude but you will remember that MacAuthor was in Japan and saw the devastation of those two bombs but yet he advocated their use in stopping the Chinese. I wouldn't consider him to be an irrational suicidal maniac.

Certainly events have progressed to a point where we are placed in the ridiculous position of hope. We can only HOPE that China will advance beyond the point where world domination is not the key to the communist ideology. We must HOPE that China will come to love materialistic "things" as much as we do and that they will actually become an ally instead of a mortal enemy. HOPE is not much to hang your hat on when it comes to our future.

All of the above is now only conjecture and irrelevant because it is history. I merely wanted to provoke meaningful thought regarding the current situation and to suggest that the Doctrine of Pre-emptive Strike may be worth a serious look. I am suggesting that we may be in a position of controlling our destiny rather than HOPE that prospects for the future are not as bad as they seem.

Well, in the current situation, I agree - with the noted reservation. You are not referring to the use of nuclear weapons in this instance, are you? If so, we would have to part company for a while.

Roger

I am certainly NOT advocating the use of nuclear weapons now. There is no requirement in view of our fantastic superiority in Airpower.

Well, I'm not going to quibble with much of this but I will make one comment here relating to this one paragraph.

Why should we not have "hope" about China? I don't know about you but I hardly see China as a mortal enemy. China is a nation of a whole lot of INDIVIDUAL people that want nothing more than you or I want - to live their lives as they choose and be free to do so. The Cold War is over. Let it fade. Why should the people of China see us in any different light than you see them?

Fishin

I HOPE you're right but I'd just like to leave you with one thought-------I wasn't aware that they had any individual freedom in this communist country-----this is a country where they kill girl babies just the second before they are born-----because they are not recognized as humans yet.

It's a double edged sword there perception. Is it not my individual right to give up whatever I choose to of my personal freedoms for whatever cause I may choose? Who are we to decide for China what their own level of freedom should be within the borders of their country? Isn't that their decision to make?

Fishin

I have no argument with that however the "Stated goal of communism" was world domination because as they saw it their "UTOPIA" could never be achieved as long as there was anyone not under the yoke. It would appear that is no longer their goal, which I am very thankful for. We again must HOPE they want to co-exist peacefully because they are gaining on our technological advantage every day and what previous administrations did give or sell to them, they have stolen through espienage. We must continue to foster friendly relations and make them our biggest trading partner. They have 1.2 Billion people.
That is a huge market and we are a capitalist country---right?

There is no "must" there. We may WANT to foster friendly relations because it might be to our benefit but no where in the stated concepts of capitalism is there anything that says we should force others to be capitalists too.

It might not be a stated concept of capitalism but I count it as the most influential (on capitalism) piece:

George Kennan in 1947 wrote in the journal Foreign Affairs that we should "contain" communism "by the adroit and vigilant application of counter-force at a series of constantly shifting geographic points" this annonymous article (under the pseudonym of "X") set capitalism on a collision course with communism and the rest is history.

I think it was paranoid bunk but fighting communism has been part of capitalism since then.

Fishin

I'm beginning to think that I'm the most mis-understood person on this board-----What I meant was:" we must continue to foster good relations with them because it is in our best interests as a trading partner and because we can't fight them. And I don't advocate "forcing" capitalism or democracy on anyone however if they can't understand it is the best system----that's their problem.

Awww, don't give up perception. With no body English or facial expressions, and even verbal feedback being delayed 20 minutes to several hours, you've just got to practice checking over your words before posting for possible misunderstandings. Then, anticipate the likely objections and answer them before posting. Anyway, I knew you said 'foster', not 'force'.

Your statement about being the most mis-understood. . . gave me a laugh, but it wasn't a mean laugh, I promise.

Roger

Thanks for the feedback----after going back over my posts I had a good laugh too.

perception - My apologies if I've misread your words. As roger said, without the "body language" and voice inflection it is sometimes hard to get exactly what is being said.

And umm.. I often feel the same way about being misunderstood on these types of boards. It's just one of the limitiations of the medium that we'll have to live with for now.

Cheers!

Some are human
peception.
my views are based or recrption

Just I had revived this thread to uphold/honour your perception.
Rama