MacArthur's heart attack

Suppose at the start of the Korean War, MacArthur suffers a heart attack. MacArthur was already a heavy smoker, and I believe also a heavy drinker (too much drinking can raise blood pressure). Suppose MacArthur also had poor eating habits, though this might not be necessary.

Anyway, in the early days of the Korean War, MacArthur suffers a heart attack. In the 1950s, there was no treatment for a heart attack, and all they could do was put you in bed and shoot you up with morphine while your body shut down. So MacArthur dies in July 1950, before he can really take command in Korea.

Matthew Ridgeway is immediately given command. How does Ridgway handle Korea up to the point where MacArthur would have been relieved, and what would the course of the war be with Ridgeway in command from the very beginning?

I'm especially interested in how the Inchon landings would go under Ridgeway's command.
 
I think Ridgeway would not change Inchon. He as far as I know did not have the same ego as MacArthur. So I don't see him defying the president over China SO I see him keeping his job. I really don't know Ridgeway at all.
 
A July 1950 death might eliminate Inchon. MacArthur was the one who got it approved - everyone else thought it was far too risky. Not only did MacArthur have the self-assurance that it would work, he also had the clout to get people to not overrule him.

If Ridgway came that early, Inchon could still easily be cancelled. I think a later death would be needed when Inchon was already a certainty for it to still occur.

Also, if this is meant as a hard POD, would Ridgway really be considered to take over from MacArthur at that point? Ridgway is a Lt General, but I think he is at the Pentagon at this point in time. While MacArthur is commander of all UN Forces, the US 8th Army is lead by Lt General Walton Walker. He would seem to be the natural replacement for MacArthur at the time. Unfortunately, General Walker seems just as responsible as MacArthur for the poor troop disposition that lead to defeat at the hands of the Chinese.
 
A July 1950 death might eliminate Inchon. MacArthur was the one who got it approved - everyone else thought it was far too risky. Not only did MacArthur have the self-assurance that it would work, he also had the clout to get people to not overrule him.

If Ridgway came that early, Inchon could still easily be cancelled. I think a later death would be needed when Inchon was already a certainty for it to still occur.

Also, if this is meant as a hard POD, would Ridgway really be considered to take over from MacArthur at that point? Ridgway is a Lt General, but I think he is at the Pentagon at this point in time. While MacArthur is commander of all UN Forces, the US 8th Army is lead by Lt General Walton Walker. He would seem to be the natural replacement for MacArthur at the time. Unfortunately, General Walker seems just as responsible as MacArthur for the poor troop disposition that lead to defeat at the hands of the Chinese.

I think Ridgway was Deputy Chief of Staff before going to Korea. That sounds like an important enough position to make his replacing Macarthur somewhat plausible. I'm not sure. if not, there might be a surer way to get him to Korea sooner- if it is permissible to suggest a slightly different POD

Ridgway goes to Korea OTL when Gen Walker is killed in a traffic accident in late December. The fatal jeep crash could just as easily have happened in July or August. Walton is also rpeorted to have spent a lot of time doing his own recon, in a light plane, flying low over the Pusan perimeter. ANother way to get killed easily.

Halbertam s book on Korea suggests that Walton wasnearly relieved of his command during the fighting around Pusan. Halberstam suggests that Ridgway, if arriving earlier in Korea, would have been one to question the orders to march to the Yalu, and would have had the strong connections to the Pentagon that might have gotten Macarthur s reckless advance countermanded.

A less drastic difference an earlier Ridgway arrival might have meant would be a slower, methodical advance north. 1st Marine Division's commander moved north way way too slowly to suit his Army superiors, and his force made a much more orderly fighting retreat from the east coast of North Korea than the rest of the UN force managed. Had Ridgway carried out Macarthur s order to advance, but in slow motion, and with due attention to the likelihood the Chinese would intervene on a large scale, maybe the UN forces retreat would have stopped on a line from Hngnam to Pyongyang or thereabouts. A UN force ready to fight the Chinese might have pulled it off (I think).That would leave a small, sparsely populated buffer zone between today s Republic of Korea and China, not a militarized, nuclear armed (sort of) police state that threatens its neighbors with war every little while.
 
You know, it doesn't necessarily have to be Ridgeway if it wasn't too plausible. Just say what you think is most likely to happen if indeed MacArthur dies in July 1950.
 
Death from a drunk driving accident in the Philippines prior to Pearl Harbor would be better. Why should the Filipinos and Australians not benefit from his early demise too?
 

pnyckqx

Banned
Suppose at the start of the Korean War, MacArthur suffers a heart attack. MacArthur was already a heavy smoker, and I believe also a heavy drinker (too much drinking can raise blood pressure). Suppose MacArthur also had poor eating habits, though this might not be necessary.

Anyway, in the early days of the Korean War, MacArthur suffers a heart attack. In the 1950s, there was no treatment for a heart attack, and all they could do was put you in bed and shoot you up with morphine while your body shut down. So MacArthur dies in July 1950, before he can really take command in Korea.

Matthew Ridgeway is immediately given command. How does Ridgway handle Korea up to the point where MacArthur would have been relieved, and what would the course of the war be with Ridgeway in command from the very beginning?

I'm especially interested in how the Inchon landings would go under Ridgeway's command.
Ridgeway was not available at the time. MacArthur had originally wanted him to replace Eichelberger in 1948. The commander of Eighth Army was Walton Walker. Ridgeway was not in theater until Walker was killed Christmas day 1950.

MacArthur was a VERY heavy smoker, but AFAIK, was not a heavy drinker, certainly not to the level of Wainwright --a functional alcoholic who could handle an army better drunk than most others could stone sober.

The initial results would have been much the same. Eighth Army was in no shape to fight with four badly trained, poorly equipped, understrength divisions. To Walker's credit, he did what he could during peace time...or the results would have been far worse during those early days of the war. In point of fact, Walker is often the overlooked commander. While he did make mistakes during the breakout from the Pusan Perimeter, he was a much under rated general.

INCHON:

Without MacArthur there is no Inchon. Simple reason. Nobody else would be that crazy, and nobody else would be able to sell it to the Department of Defense. Every disadvantage that a landing site can have Inchon has. Both the JCS and the Navy had suggested other landing sites --something that would have made Eight Army's job much more difficult. Inchon worked because it was crazy, and because it was a sufficiently deep strike to cut off N Korean forces.

What would be interesting is seeing Ridgeway take command before the Chicom intervention. Would the glaringly large gap between Eighth Army and X Corps have existed under Ridgeway's command?

If not, then the Chicoms are going to take much heavier casualties than was the case OTL. :eek: The retreat while still probably necessary, is going to be a much more orderly affair, and much less pleasant for the PLA.
 
Death from a drunk driving accident in the Philippines prior to Pearl Harbor would be better. Why should the Filipinos and Australians not benefit from his early demise too?

I think the OP wanted to reign in the butterflies so the discussion would be largely focused on the Korean War.
 
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What would be interesting is seeing Ridgeway take command before the Chicom intervention. Would the glaringly large gap between Eighth Army and X Corps have existed under Ridgeway's command?

If not, then the Chicoms are going to take much heavier casualties than was the case OTL. :eek: The retreat while still probably necessary, is going to be a much more orderly affair, and much less pleasant for the PLA.

..

Interesting indeed

It may have been impossible for any commander to keep 8th Army & X Corps close together during th advance north Wikipedia's article on Chosin Reservoir battle asserts that "North Korea is divided through the center by the impassable Taebaek Mountains, which separated the UN forces into two groups.[14] The US Eighth Army advanced north through the western coast of the Korean Peninsula, while the Republic of Korea (ROK) I Corps and the US X Corps advanced north on the eastern coast.[14]" . I thought that Taebek Mts were very close to the east coast, not in the center, but what do I know It is clear that the separation was expanding dramatically as UN forces moved north of the narrow waist of the peninsula, marching almost away from each other. One more reason to stop along a line from Pyongyang to Wonsan
General Almond seems to have been MacArthur's golden boy, commanding X Corps while still Macarthur s chief of staff. One could hope any replacement of Macarthur would have sent Almond back to Tokyo.
Even if 8th Army & X Corps were not close to one another, anyone but Almond might have had enough sense to concentrate X Corps much more than he did, and not to tell units already being hit hard by the Chinese to keep moving north

You may well be right that Pyongyang and vicinity couldn't be held-too close to too many Chinese. I wonder if there was any other more defensible line south of Pyongyang that a better led 8th Army could have advanced to and held on at? Or was it inevitable that the Chinese would push the UN forces back to something in the general vicinity of the 38th parallel? Could the defeat of the North Koreans in September-October 1950 have somehow reduced the future size and troublesomeness of North Korea? Or is what US acheived OTL in Korea the best that could be done in a limited war?
/QUOTE]
 

pnyckqx

Banned
......


What would be interesting is seeing Ridgeway take command before the Chicom intervention. Would the glaringly large gap between Eighth Army and X Corps have existed under Ridgeway's command?

If not, then the Chicoms are going to take much heavier casualties than was the case OTL. :eek: The retreat while still probably necessary, is going to be a much more orderly affair, and much less pleasant for the PLA.

..

Interesting indeed

It may have been impossible for any commander to keep 8th Army & X Corps close together during th advance north Wikipedia's article on Chosin Reservoir battle asserts that "North Korea is divided through the center by the impassable Taebaek Mountains, which separated the UN forces into two groups.[14] The US Eighth Army advanced north through the western coast of the Korean Peninsula, while the Republic of Korea (ROK) I Corps and the US X Corps advanced north on the eastern coast.[14]" . I thought that Taebek Mts were very close to the east coast, not in the center, but what do I know It is clear that the separation was expanding dramatically as UN forces moved north of the narrow waist of the peninsula, marching almost away from each other. One more reason to stop along a line from Pyongyang to Wonsan
General Almond seems to have been MacArthur's golden boy, commanding X Corps while still Macarthur s chief of staff. One could hope any replacement of Macarthur would have sent Almond back to Tokyo.
Even if 8th Army & X Corps were not close to one another, anyone but Almond might have had enough sense to concentrate X Corps much more than he did, and not to tell units already being hit hard by the Chinese to keep moving north

You may well be right that Pyongyang and vicinity couldn't be held-too close to too many Chinese. I wonder if there was any other more defensible line south of Pyongyang that a better led 8th Army could have advanced to and held on at? Or was it inevitable that the Chinese would push the UN forces back to something in the general vicinity of the 38th parallel? Could the defeat of the North Koreans in September-October 1950 have somehow reduced the future size and troublesomeness of North Korea? Or is what US acheived OTL in Korea the best that could be done in a limited war?
/QUOTE]
The Taebek Mountains are on the east coast of the Korean Peninsula. As you head inland from the east coast, they come up rather sharply. On the western side, the slope is gradual. Much of what you say has merit, however, Keep in mind that the PLA managed to deploy and attack out of those same mountains.

i do not say that Pyongyang could not be held, but i am saying that 'quantity takes on it's own quality'. Under Ridgeway, UN forces would have made a fighting withdrawal into prepared positions, and we would probably not have seen the rout that was the initial story.

The difference in the outlooks of the commanders is of note:

For the offensive operations to the Yalu River, Walker was probably the best guy to have. He was an Armor commander under Patton during WWII, and rapid, crushing movement was his forte.

Defensively, Ridgeway was a genius. Coming from an Airborne experience, he was more of a counter puncher than a straight ahead brawler like Walker. --not to denigrate Walker's ability to maneuver, he certainly demonstrated that ability during the early days at Pusan. It was Ridgeway who made the PLA and PRK armies pay dearly for every inch of ground they took. Estimates of KIA for the Chinese forces have been as high as over 1,000,000. (Wiki had the high end at 1.5 million Chinese KIA:eek: ) Ridgeway's thinking was to gradually withdraw in an orderly manner, get them to pursue, and channel them into killing zones. --something that is still standard US tactical doctrine.

BOTH Ridgeway and Walker were able to see that the Chinese offensive was running out of steam. However Walker was killed before he could take advantage of this knowledge.

If there is an enigma about MacArthur, it was the selection of his staff and his subordinate commanders.

With some rare exceptions such as Eisenhower, Bill Kenney (Fifth Air Force), Casey (Chief of Engineers), and some others, Mac selected people who were either unknown, or completely inadequate working for any other commander.

Some were total disasters. Almond could have easily been a clone of the previous chief of staff Dick Sutherland. Intelligence chief Charles Willoughby was a disaster --a right wing ideologue who let his politics get in the way of the truth, and told his boss what he thought the boss wanted to hear.

In fairness to Mac on this particular point though, who else did he have available with the requisite seniority besides Almond? i have to concede that the commander of First Marine Div. Oliver Smith would have probably been a better selection and his more cautious deployments might have written a different history of the Chosin Resevoir campaign., but interservice rivalry was pretty strong back at that time. It would have been an insult to offer a corps command to a Marine three star General (assuming one was available), in light of the fact that an Army three star was commanding a field army.

Other commanders were head scratchers. When Mac asked for Walter Kruger to take over US Sixth Army in WWII, many, including Marshall could not figure out what Mac saw in the man...Kruger did work out adequately even if not an inspirational commander.

That MacArthur was able to get any decent work at all out of some of his staff members is a credit to his ability...since the same people could not perform their duties adequately for any other commander.

Of course Van Fleet, who replaced Ridgeway in Eighth Army after Ridgeway became UN commander was in the same mold as Ridgeway, and at any rate was not selected by MacArthur.
 

pnyckqx

Banned
I know. I said In the end, the general found himself serving under two men who had served under him Bradley and Truman. Neither one was willing to play along with his autocratic mode of operation.
Bradley, to the best of my knowledge, never served under MacArthur, except for when Bradley was teaching Mathematics at West Point while MacArthur was Superintendent.

Truman NEVER served under MacArthur. Mac was the Chief of staff of the 42nd Division, later commanding the Division's 84th Brigade, and briefly the Division when General Menoher became a temporary Corps commander. Truman was an Artillery officer in the 35th Division.

Besides, both Truman and Bradley could be pretty damned autocratic themselves. It's called Leadership, an art that isn't often practised these days.

Incidentally, The JCS are NOT part of the chain of command of their respective services. They are advisers to the President and Sec Def, and have been since the National Security Act of 1947.

Still, Omar Bradley would not have been the ideal General for the Korean Theater.

Walker, despite not having the confidence of MacArthur, and later Ridgeway after Walker was killed would have been adequate.

It would have been somewhat of a loss of face for Bradley and Ridgeway to have been named to that position.

Had he been young enough, i'd have loved to see how Bradley would have handled the situation in Vietnam. It would have had to have been better than Westmoreland's "Light at the end of the tunnel" BS. It may have resulted in the US getting out of that mess sooner.

Now here is a curve ball...It was suggested that General Lawton J. Collins replace MacArthur in 1948. That never happened for whatever the reason, and Collins became Army Chief of Staff.

Collins would have been more qualified than most, having already fought in the Pacific Theater of Operations.

All Truman had to do was give the order. FDR would not have hesitated. He'd have ordered MacArthur home.
 
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