The current collapse of the unipolar world, with the inexorable emergence of a multipolar framework, has enabled a terrifying subplot to run amok – the normalization of the idea of nuclear war.
The latest exhibit comes in the form of a US admiral assuring everyone he’s ready to follow President Trump’s orders to launch a nuclear missile against China.
Forget about the fact that a 21st century nuclear war involving great powers will be The Last War. Our admiral – admirably named Swift – is simply preoccupied by democratic minutiae, as in “every member of the US military has sworn an oath to defend the constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic and to obey the officers and the president of the United States as commander and chief appointed over us.”
So it’s all about loyalty to the President, and civilian control over the military – irrespective of the risk of incinerating untold masses of said civilians, Americans included (as there would be an inevitable Chinese response).
Swift, once again, to the rescue: “This is core to the American democracy and any time you have a military that is moving away from a focus and an allegiance to civilian control, then we really have a significant problem.”
It doesn’t matter that the proverbial spokesman on behalf of the US Pacific Fleet – in this case, Charlie Brown (an apt name?) – swiftly engaged in damage control, deriding the premise of the (nuclear) question as “ridiculous.” Both the question and the answer are in fact quite revealing.
MacArthur’s park is melting in the dark
To shed extra nuances on “civilian control of the military,” a flashback to September 1950 and the Korean War, with some help from Bruce Cumings and John Halliday’s Korea: The Unknown War, may be far from “ridiculous.” Especially now that factions of the War Party in Washington have been pressing the case for nuking not China but North Korea itself.
It’s key to remember that by 1950 President Truman had already issued a “civilian control of the military” order to drop two atomic bombs over Japan in 1945 – a historical first.
Truman had become Vice-President in January 1945. FDR treated him with the utmost disdain. He was clueless about the Manhattan Project. When FDR died he had been Vice-President for only 82 days, and became POTUS knowing absolutely nothing about foreign policy or the new military/nuclear equation.
Truman had five years after bombing Japan to learn all about it, on the job. Now the action was on the Korean front. Even before an amphibious landing in Inchon, led by General MacArthur – the greatest since D-Day in Normandy, in 1944 – Truman had authorized MacArthur to advance beyond the 38th parallel. There’s substantial historical debate that MacArthur was not told exactly what to do in detail – as long as he was winning. Fine for a man who was fond of quoting Montgomery: “Generals are never given adequate directives”.
Still, MacArthur did receive a top secret memorandum from Truman stressing that any operations north of the 38th parallel were authorized only if “there was no entry into North Korea by major Soviet or Chinese Communist forces, no announcements of intended entry, nor a threat to counter our operations militarily”.
And then, MacArthur received an eyes-only message from Pentagon head George Marshall: “We want you to feel unhampered tactically and strategically to proceed north of the 38th parallel.”
MacArthur kept going. He was sure China would not intervene in Korea: “If the Chinese tried to get down to Pyongyang there would be the greatest slaughter.” Well, he was wrong. US forces captured Pyongyang on October 19, 1950. Exactly the same day, no fewer than 250,000 soldiers of the 13th Army Group of the Chinese People’s Volunteer Army crossed the Yalu river and entered Korean territory. US intel was clueless about what military historian S.L.A. Marshall described as “a phantom which cast no shadow”.
The North’s industry and infrastructure was totally destroyed. It’s impossible to understand the actions of the leadership in Pyongyang over these past decades without considering how this human and physical destruction is still very much alive in their minds
MacArthur progressively ran amok, including calling for nukes to be used on North Korea. He had to go. The question was how. The civilians – Dean Acheson, Averell Harriman – were for it. The Generals – Marshall, Bradly – were against it. But they were also worried that “if MacArthur were not relieved, a large segment of our people would charge that civil authorities no longer controlled the military”.
Truman had already made up his mind. MacArthur was replaced by Lt. Gen. Ridgway. But the war folly still raged, hostage to the Sino-Soviet “threat” of “communist world domination”. Over two million North Korean civilians were killed. And what General Curtis LeMay – a real- life Dr. Strangelove – later said about bombing Vietnam “back to the stone age” actually was inflicted by the US on North Korea.
The North’s industry and infrastructure was totally destroyed. It’s impossible to understand the actions of the leadership in Pyongyang over these past decades without considering how this human and physical destruction is still very much alive in their minds.
So what Admiral Swift actually said, in code, is, if a civilian order comes, the US military will start WWIII (or WWIV, if one counts the Cold War), duly applying the Pentagon’s first-strike doctrine. What Swift did not say is that President Trump also has the power to pull a Truman and fire any run-amok, aspiring MacArthur clone.
we are living in a crazy crazy world so God help us
Falk Rovik I too follow Pepe Escobar because he is very informative, but I could not disagree with you more. He hates America and Americans and looks down upon us. That is unimportant, merely an obsevation that colors his references to America and Americans. Your description of us tells me you to have a hostile view of us.
I am not in favor of the role the United States has played in regimes around the world, but I don’t have the insight you do about all the secret stuff that the US has been involved in. You are very well informed or full of bias.
I am certain we have sided with groups in countries who wanted their country to treat them better. I hope most of what we were involved in was for well intended purposes. But I would point out to you that lots of countries have engaged in such activity and not all of it was for good purposes. Cuba for one had soldiers in various countries help ing one side against another. China for example has done the same thing and is always helping to undermine Taiwanese activity in foreign countries or undermining regimes in countries they want to take over like Tibet or I hope for our sake he survives the media and deep state conspiracies against him.
Falk Rovik
My sentiments too!
Thank you Helen for speaking up for the North Korean victims and for justice!
Par for the course, considering the number of Chinese Generals who have publicly called for attacks on the United States with nuclear weapons.. (Didn’t think we were paying attention, did you?)
Very few Americans, or indeed anyone else around the world, remembers the history of the Korean War. It was the most egregious and appalling illegal assault on a people with a ferocity that knew no bounds.
North Korea’s appeals to the UN were ignored.
Millions died, Pyongyang was flattened by bombs, and when the citizens emerged, delayed bombs exploded. This was clearly attacking civillians, not military targets.
When they had flattened all the buildings, they started bombing infrastructure. Power stations, dams, irrigation channels – all were destroyed.
More recently Clinton’s agreements were overturned by Bush and Obomba – and sanctions (an act of war) have brought hardship to the citizens.
My point here is that it’s the citizens of North Korea who have been targeted by the US.
The North Koreans have a long memory. It’s time we too remembered how this small country has been demonised and destroyed by the greatest criminal nation on earth.
Hi Art, I have read Pepe Escobar’s articles for years. My impression is that Escobar likes Americans, but is frustrated with US participation in more than 143 armed conflicts and the 50+ regime changes. Most Americans think US should put AMERICA FIRST and not have 180+ CIA covert operation teams all over the world; doing assassinations, terrorism, false flags, and destruction of nations that never have posed a danger to the US.
Anyway, let us hope President Trump keep his election promises and stop US foreign interventions. US tax payer’s money should be help the homeless, build infrastructure, improve health care, and schools in the USA. Let us hope Trump is allowed by the US "Deep State" to do his job.
The admiral’s quoted words sound like very normal prewar talk. This means that the literalists in the readership will start to hyperventilate.
I agree. Hillary Clinton & Obama initiated the Libya war AGAINST the advice of Pentagon. CIA advice has been ignored too. The US is run by the “Deep State” lobbyist. Too many US lives has been lost as a result of false flag operations and the protection of Middle East US “friends”.
Daryl Shen, you are right, take away the profits. Russia, China, and Iran should work together to stop US aggression by using economical tools.
Increased oil production in Iran and Russia will have a negative impact on the US and the Petro dollar. China should invest the $1 trillion in new commercial air plane production lines, reduce Chinese poverty further in order to increase domestic demand. China should look for investing in EurAsia, Iran and SE Asia to gain more access to markets.
Increase the Gold reserves and issue Chinese Government Bonds with Gold reserves as collateral. These bonds will sell like hot cakes. Saudi Arabia and many of its alliance is political unstable. EU might ignore the new US sanctions against Iran and Russia. The US Empire will collapse, without using one bullet.
It is always safest to follow orders, if not you can end up in jail. However, an officer must use common sense. To kill 75 Million Koreans and millions of Chinese is mind boggling. What if President Trump use twitter to message: “Wait not, nuke the Chinese” and he meant “Wait, not nuke the Chinese”.
Fortunately, there is checks and balances to avoid such mishap, but there is a lot of tension in Ukraine, Iran, and North Korea and a false flag from a third party, could trigger a huge war.
It was VERY CLOSE nukes could have been used against China and Korea in 1951. On 9 December 1950, MacArthur requested field commander’s discretion to employ nuclear weapons; he testified that such an employment would only be used to prevent an ultimate fallback, not to recover the situation in Korea. On 24 December 1950, MacArthur submitted a list of "retardation targets" in Korea, Manchuria and other parts of China, for which 34 atomic bombs would be required. President Truman talked to the United States Atomic energy commission, Gordon Dean, and arranged for the transfer of nine Mark 4 nuclear bombs to military control.
General MacArthur, used his wisdom, and never used the nukes. Unfortunately, the United Nation forces committed a lot of atrocities. Now, 70 years later we see the North Korean’s using nukes to avoid another aggression. We started the mess!
china is not japan
Pepe Escobar hates the United States. Pepe Escobar is an evangelist for China and Russia. While he is plugged in to what is happening, his musings regarding nuclear war started by anyione are irresponsible and a senseless attempt to be provocative. There are some 330,000,000 people in the United States. With that many people you can find an opinion to cite for any view you wish to find support for. What this politically insensitive person said is simply that he acknowledges civilian control over the military. Because he used that example, a notion that no sane person has expressed before, at least in public, he allowed trouble makers like Pepe Escobar to spin it to his own purposes.
My own view is the United States is no longer a superpower except in the minds of some peter principled people, some being in the media, who maintain this fiction. We are a powerful country but so are Russia and China. India and Pakistan are nuclear armed. Some say Israel ia nuclear armed. Iran and North Korea are or soon will be nuclear armed. To talk of nuclear war is insane. And it is not the United States that talks of nuclear war. Nor is it China or Russia. It is North Korea with their puerile giggling dictator and military leaders, Trump recognizes how dangerous their minds are. He is pressing other countries to stop ignoring these maniacs and do something before they become strong enough to carry out their very overt verbal threats. And don’t overlook their troublesome option to spread their nuclear knowledge and capabilities to other regimes. The more nuclear armed countries, the greater threat that one of them will become unhinged and start a war with nuclear bombs. The United States used them when pressed too hard and thank God it has not happened again, but the fact that we did it shows that it is possible another human with the power could make such a decision. We will never remove nuclear weapons from a nuclear capable country, but we should discourage as aggressively as possible the spread of nuclear weapons to more countries and we should shit all over media types like Pepe Escobar who try to make trouble using this idea as a subject. He should be confined to lesser subjects like pushing BRI.
Forget nukes. The best way to bleed China is to stop the massive US corporations to stop making profits in China.
Brian Niziol The chinese even tried to threaten Burundi a south african country saying Dalai Lama can’t visit them……in future the chinese may say as head of state if you want to visit any country you have to take my permission……this is chinese century
Brian Niziol America & UK had bad histories & they have reformed themselves now……do they go to Mexico & France to blackmail them to give land or better trade deals they don’t.In case of china despite suffering colonialism it is behaving very badly like building roads,seas,keeping tibet & other lands like aksai chin etc etc,it indulges in unfair trade practice & it uses buffer states for politiking…it even purchased a port from srilankans by giving a loan where it became unsustainable,it is deploying its entire capability of military,money power,scientific talents,industrial dominance to hurt smalller nations……that is why they will get nuked
Vijay Raghavan Of course they will work nukes are old technology. Unlike the American empire China can still fire wepons designers if they produce wepons that do not work. On the other hand one should take a critical look at the shall we say western wepons procurment. Based on payoffs and lobbyists they produce for the most part very unreliable and substandard wepons. One only has to look at the F35 Turkey and all of the naval ships built for the last 10 years or so. To call these vessels sea worthy is a strech and then some. The F35 is a death trap that is simply a sitting duck for old soviet era planes. No Vijay WW3 will come home to America and the result will be total destruction of the planet. Even Donald Trump will come down with radation sickness if he is lucky enough to survive the inital blast. This navy fool is beyond stupid. Most of them are. No one wants this war execpt the old fools like this idiot. Least of all China considering the painfull fact for westerners that they are the #1 power on this planet today all things considered.
The 1st and 2nd world wars were the then catastrophic to the mosts but some were up to in having bit-coins(Brainy minds) availed of within their paw range and sneaked them all off their habitat.They are called super powers now and a shadeless phantom,too.
Vijay Raghavan
1 055 cruiser can take out an entire carrier battle group not to say of the superior numbers of attack submarines defending China and their SSBNs capable of destroying half of USA. WU-14 glider missiles may also be already operational.
You are a stupid CIA troll to think that such rubbish talk will frighten China.
J20 stealth fighters are operational now while the flying pig is still a joke and can be detected by the latest Chinese and Russian radar.
If you want a spanking, please go to your mama or prostitute rather than China and Russia.
Vijay Rag I’ve already told you unlike rat & snake worshippers, U.K. is smart.
Only those dumbshits living south of Chinese border would talk about nuking anybody. Got it?