Korean Job Discussion Forums

[cbclark4]

[cbclark4]

Just to help the other sarah.

Fun with Cobalt-60

Some non-medicinal uses are discussed here.

http://www.answers.com/topic/cobalt-60-2

(Radioactive half life is nowhere near 60 or 120 years)

[Zulu]

[oneofthesarahs]

I read it in a book about modern Korean history. I don't know sh*t about cobalt, other than what I read in the book (and I could be remembering it incorrectly). If you're interested I'll dig up the publication info for you. I've loaned the book out to a friend. The guy who wrote it is some uber-Korean scholar from the University of Chicago, I'm thinking? Pretty sure the guy's name is Bruce Cummings. I'll get back to you on it.

[wylies99]

[hugo_danner]

It would have been better if he nuked Canada!

[djsmnc]

[The Bobster]

MacAurthur was a military man, and his goal was winning completely. Truman was a politician and the goals of politics extend beyond when the fighting stops. There's winning the war, and then there's winning the peace.

The goal on our side was to push the Norks back to the 38th Parallel, which is what FDR had agreed with to Stalin at Yalta. If we had tried to alter the map beyond that, Moscow would have been free to alter it further, say, in Berlin. That eventually happened, of course, under Kennedy, and Jack dealt with it, but having to deal with a land war in Asia AND Berlin would have been a farking headache no one needed.

MacAurthur's main problem, of course, is that he wasn't seeing the difference between making policy, which was not his job, and carrying out military strategy, which was. That's a road that ends in military dictatorship, and that's why he was handed his papers and had to go.

[stevemcgarrett]

I suspect oneofthesarahs is referring to Bruce Cumings book, Another Country, about North Korea, which includes a chapter on the war. Cumings is considered a Korean policy expert by some, teaches at the University of Chicago and is married to a Korean educator. He's highly critical of American planning during the war and his writing is often less historical narrative than polemical. The cobalt accusation is poorly documented in his book.

MacArthur understood the East Asian mindset of the era. His decision to keep the Emperor in Japan was pivotal to peacemaking there during the occupation. However he was of two minds on China: one was to bomb the bridges over the Yalu and envelop stranded Chinese forces; the other was to push all the way to Beijing and uproot Mao before his power became too entrenched.

What most don't know is that the so-called volunteer Chinese army was comprised mostly of conscripts pressed into service. Most were poorly equipped and tired after fighting against the Kuomintang during the civil war that reignited at the end of the war. I met with and talked to two Chinese interpreters in Beijing a few years ago who described in English how the conscription was enforced.

MacArthur had some intelligence on the composition of Chinese forces and no doubt was bolstered by the prowess of American air superiority at the time (before the arrival of the MIGs) and the availability of tactical nuclear weapons.

As noted by another poster, China did not yet have the atomic bomb and we knew it, so that's a moot concern. A limited conventional war might have enabled us to seize Beijing but would have resulted in enormous resistance from the Chinese leading to a prolonged and unwinnable conflict.

Truman wasn't sure how Stalin would react and Soviet ties with China were not yet strained at that crucial juncture (that would not happen until after the war ended). I suspect egos had a lot to do with the situation in the high command. Truman didn't like MacArthur, found him wanting in tact and deference, and was insecure enough to believe he needed to show him who was really boss. Moreover, Truman did not want to give the Soviets a pretext for further involvement on behalf of the North Koreans or possible encroachment into West Berlin or elsewhere.

[shifter2009]

[oneofthesarahs]

SteveMcG, it was a Cummings book, but it was "Korea's Place in the Sun."

I do find his book to be a little "rah rah Korea," but I found it to be quite interesting, if not to be taken with a grain of salt. I think it's an interesting companion to other Korean histories, especially since America has had such a strong hand in Korean affairs.

But you raise good points.

(Man, isn't it nice when we all get along?)

[spliff]

[stevemcgarrett]

spliff wrote:

[swetepete]

[cbclark4]