THIS MACARTHUR
Mayer, Milton
This MacArthur EXCEPTING only one—Robert E. Lee—there has never been a professional soldier—or, for that matter, a professional engineer, banker, businessman, scientist, or a professional anything...
...For neither the interventionist imperialists nor the isolationist imperialists enjoyed MacArthur's remarks, and if he wasn't spouting that eome-to-glory guff fcjr political purposes, just what was he spouting it for...
...But I do not like Gen...
...Zachary Taylor, Gen...
...the military is the most pernicious influence of all the specialist influences in government...
...The horse remained in the stable...
...But here, in a speech which I hope The Progressive is reprinting, is a victorious general, representing, as he points out himself, a majority of the people of the world, and declaring that power, organized in alliances or leagues of nations (and for "leagues of nations," read "United Nations"), never has and never will Kit up the world out of the Moody nonsense of war...
...U. S. Grant...
...it appeared to be shared, at least as far as general distaste, by soldiers and sailors...
...Is it possible that he meant it ? I am afraid it is, because a week after the guff, the American conquerors rode Into Tokyo, over the necks of the beaten and bitter Japanese...
...William Henry Harrison, or Gen...
...Back about 1920—I don't have the document in front of me—Chief of Staff Mac-Arthur recommended a small standing army—opposing the armaments clamor—and said that while we might lose priceless time that way in the event of war, a small regular military establishment was more consistent with our democratic tradition, in addition, he added, to "giving the world evidence of our non-aggressive intent...
...8, the aonqtierors rode in...
...My view was that of the liberals, confirmed by the campaign begun by Col...
...I tell you, I do Hot like this MacArthur...
...I would rather be governed by Warren G. Harding or Sanitary Ed Kelly than by Gen...
...I tell you, I do not like this MacArther, and I would ruther believe that this speech of his, and his equally majestic statement when the surrender papers were signed, is nothing but MacArthur corn, richly buttered by a high-powered ghost writer...
...McCormick, the most unregenerate reactionary in America, to run MacArthur for President against Roosevelt...
...And yet, from time to time, as I barked and bayed at his heels and committed the customary fallacy, so dear to the liberals, of hating anybody McCormick liked, I wondered a little whether, by any chance, I was participating in a necktie-party, or lynching...
...The American press positively drooled in ad-vaaee of Che spectacle...
...I was reminded of this old statement of his when the well-grounded rumor was published, a month or so ago, that the War Department had asked all ranking generals to testify in favor of peacetime conscription, and MacArthur refused...
...And so, even if I liked Gen...
...But there Wasn't any spectacle...
...And word went down the quiet line of march— MacArthur's clipped orders—"no flags," no swaggering, no gloating, no malice...
...namely, discipline and death...
...Whoever heard of such a thing ? I will tell you who ever heard of such a thing...
...The Lord God Jehovah heard of such a thing when Job asked Him for consideration on the ground that he had not gloated over his fallen enemies...
...But I knew something about Dugout Doug that everyone else had forgotten...
...Here, in the simple, measured eadenee of Lincoln, was Lincoln's deathless contribution to human affairs...
...IT is not merely that he is a professional soldier, either...
...here, for the first time in this war, while in Germany we are squeezing the very pulp out of a beaten and starving people, was a clear, flat repudiation of vengeance and malice...
...We called him Dugout Doug, without ever bothering to square the epithet with the fact that full generals are not supposed to lead jungle patrols and that anyway, MacArthur was constantly taking great personal risks...
...I'm impressed, myself...
...But, one of the blessings of war being military rule of the prostrate losers, American military dictatorship was scheduled to replace the Japanese military dictatorship in Japan, and the swaggering MacArthur was given the nod...
...Missouri in Tokyo Bay, the only speech by any leader during this whole war that rose to the height of genuine majesty...
...Still, I would not want MacArthur, or even a professional soldier I liked, to govern me...
...And then, on Sept...
...And of all these professional men in government—t h e s e uneducated specialists—I have been most fearful of the professional soldier, representing as he does the genius farthest removed from freedom and life...
...AND then came his speech on the U.S.S...
...History bears me out...
...Ever since the time he rode down Pennsylvania—or was it Connecticut—Avenue on a white—or was it a dapple?—horse and dispersed the defenseless Bonus Army on Anacostia Flats—and I have never much cared whether the technique was his idea or his commander's, Mr...
...Bull Halsey's—and all the other over-age bulls'—determination to show the little yellow monkeys they've been beaten went by the boards...
...This MacArthur EXCEPTING only one—Robert E. Lee—there has never been a professional soldier—or, for that matter, a professional engineer, banker, businessman, scientist, or a professional anything except a professional politician—in whose hands I would trust my government...
...Hoover— I have had an especially strong disinclination to be governed by Gen...
...And, since the people of Japan are all my brothers, entitled, as human beings, to all the rights I am entitled to, I would not want MacArthur to govern Japan...
...Finally, I was impressed, grudgingly, by the man's dignified and effective deflation of the MacArthur-for-President boom and his plain refusal to grab the McCormick bait for a personal' vendetta against Roosevelt...
...No bands playing, no standards unfurled, no Bull Halseys prancing and neighing, no tramp of haughty feet, no clang and clatter of triumph...
...It is his strutting and his heroics...
...the only speech by any victorious leader in this whole war, in or out of uniform, that called for tolerance as well as justice, that spoke of raising the fallen, and, above all, of raising ourselves...
...Modern history, with its Hitlers, bears me 'way out...
...But no flags...
...The Lord God Jehovah appeared to be impressed...
...MacArthur, I would not want to be governed by him...
...Admiral Bull Halsey, who had promised to ride the Emperor's white horse, was getting his saddle sores ki shape...
...I TELL you, I don't like this MacArthur, and I am against him for President or Precinct Captain...
...And it was not the view of the liberals only...
...But I am afraid that I am compelled to abandon my ruthers...
...Attacking Mac-Arthur has come to be one of the more popular parlor pastimes, and one in which, I think I may say, I excelled...
...and that, with the atomic bomb about to atomize us all, "It must be of the spirit if we are-to-save the flesh...
Vol. 9 • October 1945 • No. 37
