Douglas MacArthur – The Intelligent Collector Magazine

For all his humanitarian work, Hoover remembered for one, crucial moment

A vibrant from-life oil on canvas portrait of Herbert Hoover, autographed, realized $5,250 at a December 2017 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

With the specter of another depression on America’s horizon, my mind flashes back to the past and sad irony of Herbert Hoover. He was born in 1874 in West Branch, Iowa – the first president born west of the Mississippi River. An orphan at the tender age of 9, he was taken in, luckily, by relatives in Oregon. The Minthorns were Quakers like his parents and they taught him the value of community service and hard work.

In 1891, he enrolled at Stanford University, the first year that classes were open. He was a geology major and after graduation ended up in London with a company investigating gold deposits in Western Australia. While at Stanford, Hoover dated Lou Henry, a fellow geology major and the first female to earn a degree. Hoover proposed to her in a telegraph from Australia and they were married in California in February 1899 – two mining engineers … both intrepid travelers.

Together they set off for China, where Herbert discovered coal deposits. The hard work earned him a junior partnership with his London-based employer. This was followed by a stint in Tientsin just in time for the Boxer Rebellion in 1900 when Chinese rebels rose up against colonial powers. The couple became fluent in Mandarin, a skill they would use later in the White House to communicate in private without the WH staff listening in.

Next was a series of trips starting in Burma (silver, lead and zinc), copper and oil in Russia, and then back to Australia in a quest for more zinc. After forming his own company in 1908, their fortunes began to accumulate and by 1913 exceeded $4 million. After the United States entered World War I in 1917, President Wilson asked Hoover to manage America’s domestic food supplies. In Washington, D.C., he was successful in establishing programs to control prices, eliminate waste and promote conservation by the public. His managerial reputation was beginning to grow and his ability to cut through government bureaucracy produced results almost unprecedented in American history.

After flirting with the presidency in 1920, the ultimate winner, Warren Harding, selected Hoover to become the third Secretary of Commerce. When Harding died unexpectedly in 1923, President Calvin Coolidge retained Secretary Hoover in the Cabinet. Coolidge had observed Hoover’s work and decided to expand his formal duties. He put him in charge of the American Relief Administration to assist the recovery of post-war Europe. Hoover was more than qualified and had played a role in assisting thousands of Americans get back home when the war exploded in 1914. In addition, he had helped Belgium and France from starvation after the German invasions.

He soon became universally recognized as the greatest humanitarian alive in the world. In addition to being widely admired, he had the distinction of having an orbiting asteroid, Hooveria, named in his honor. Earlier, Assistant Secretary of the Navy Franklin D. Roosevelt had proclaimed, “Hoover is certainly a wonder and I wish we could make him president of the United States! There could not be a better one.”

By 1928, Coolidge had tired of Washington and chose not to run for reelection. The 54-year-old Herbert Hoover was certainly not tired and was eager to demonstrate his extensive experience by expanding America’s fortunes even further. He easily defeated Al Smith, the governor of New York, with help from anti-Catholic voters and the burden of corruption associated with the infamous Tammany Hall group. The newspapers excitedly touted Hoover as an innovator and set high expectations for his administration. In his inaugural address, the new president confidently declared, “I have no fears for the future of our country. It is bright with hope!” The joy of his Inauguration day, March 4, 1929, seems totally incongruous with the events of the next four years.

Just seven months after he entered the White House, economic trouble trashed his campaign prediction about “being near the final triumph over poverty.” On Oct. 24, 1929, panic enveloped the New York Stock Exchange when almost 13 million shares changed hands. There was a short respite, but on Tuesday, Oct. 29, the market basically collapsed, heralding the beginning of the Great Depression. No one expected the Depression would last a full decade, including the American Economic Association. Virtually all the experts assumed it would be a matter of months until the normal business cycle resumed. Scholars are still debating the cause of the Depression and the stock market crash is only one of the contributing factors.

Just as it was one of the factors that cost Hoover his job. He didn’t cause the crash, but an episode in 1932 certainly contributed. In 1924, President Coolidge vetoed a bill to pay war veterans a bonus to compensate them for loss of income during their military service. However, Congress overrode his veto and the money was to be paid in 1945. In 1932, 20,000 veterans marched on Washington hoping to get an advance payment to alleviate Depression hardships. Congress was considering a Bonus Bill, but President Hoover opposed it and the Senate rejected it. Veterans turned their sights on the Capitol Building, marching for three days and four nights in a “Death March.”

President Hoover ordered General Douglas MacArthur to force them back into temporary camps. MacArthur overreacted, using cavalrymen with drawn sabers and an infantry with tear gas. Six tanks joined the fray under Major George Patton. The soldiers attacked the camps and the angry veterans set their own huts on fire in protest. Colonel Dwight Eisenhower was shocked at MacArthur’s treatment and later said, “It was a pitiful scene, ragged, discouraged people burning their own little things.” The excessive use of force, especially against veterans, disgusted most Americans. Then Hoover made it worse by deriding the bonus marchers as rabble and refusing to criticize MacArthur.

When Democratic presidential candidate FDR heard about the fiasco, he simply said, “This will elect me.”

Intelligent Collector blogger JIM O’NEAL is an avid collector and history buff. He is president and CEO of Frito-Lay International [retired] and earlier served as chair and CEO of PepsiCo Restaurants International [KFC Pizza Hut and Taco Bell].

Marshall proved indispensable during his 50 years of service to the United States

A signed photograph of General George C. Marshall went to auction in 2007.

By Jim O’Neal

French President (General) Charles de Gaulle was known for reminding his aides that “the world’s graveyards were filled with indispensable men.” Skeptics were offered a simple test: Stick a finger into a glass of water and describe the hole it leaves when it is removed. Somewhat quirky, but remember this was a France where de Gaulle complained “How can you govern a country which has 246 varieties of cheese?” Sacré bleu!

I suspect Amazon would yawn at the degree of complexity implied, but they have become almost indispensable in our home, just as George C. Marshall (1880-1959) was indispensable during his remarkable 50 years of service to the United States. When he died, he left behind a cadre of admirers like Harvard President James Conant, who declared that only George Washington was Marshall’s equal as soldier/statesman (which overlooks Marshall’s superb diplomatic skills). Others like Winston Churchill went even further, crediting Marshall with high praise as the “Organizer of Victory.” Recall that when Churchill was asked what history would say about him, he deftly replied, “History will be very kind to me. I plan to write it!” And he certainly did with his six-volume “The History of the Second World War.”

In order to squeeze in a small insight into George Marshall’s extensive career, it is useful to start at the beginning of the 20th century. The Russian Empire, ruled by Czar Nicholas II, was probably the largest territorial power in the world, with control over Eastern Europe and Central Asia. But they lacked a warm water port and had ambitions that included Korea and China. Japan was dominant in Asia and the two clashed in 1904-05, primarily in northeastern China and the waters surrounding the Korean peninsula.

The Russo-Japanese War sowed the seeds for World War I and although Japan, surprisingly, eventually prevailed, President Teddy Roosevelt won the Nobel Prize for brokering the Treaty of Portsmouth (Sept. 5, 1905), which formally ended the war. Some historians now call this episode World War Zero, since it was so closely linked to what followed a mere 10 years later.

Enter George Catlett Marshall Jr. on the last day of August 1899, when he decided to become an officer in the U.S. Army. However, his ascent to prominence and power began on Jan. 27, 1914 when 5,000 U.S. Army soldiers landed on Luzon and prepared to attack Manila, some 60 miles away. It was a maneuver to test the readiness against an attack on the Philippines by Japan. After defeating the Russians, the Japanese had completed the entire annexation of Korea and the American–controlled Philippines was logically next up.

The 34–year–old Lieutenant Marshall choreographed the myriad details of the mock invasion and eight days later it was being hailed as a brilliant success. The word began to spread widely that Marshall was not only a military genius, but one of the most talented strategic thinkers in the entire Army. General Henry “Hap” Arnold would write that he had “met a man who was going to be the Chief of Staff someday soon.” Arnold would have the distinction of holding the ranks of General of the Army and General of the Air Force. He was the only U.S. Air Force General to hold the five-star rank and the only officer to hold five-star rank in two different U.S. military services. He was a keen judge of talent and George Marshall would benefit during WW2.

Marshall assumed the position as Army Chief of Staff on the same day German Panzers attacked Poland and proceeded to transform our nation’s modest military forces into the most powerful war machine the world has ever seen. In addition to guiding global strategy, he demonstrated a unique ability to win the trust of both political parties, unionists, isolationists, pro–war factions and, importantly, the U.S. Congress. The result was legislation that enabled the country to wage war on both sides of the globe, with the full support of virtually every American.

Marshall was responsible for turning raw draftees into trained fighters while running military logistics in Europe, the Pacific, China and the Mediterranean. His genius for balancing economic, political and pragmatism with the gift of eloquence shaped the willpower of military staff and world leaders FDR, Winston Churchill, Joseph Stalin and even prima donna generals like Douglas MacArthur, who tended to be highly independent.

Instinctively, he recognized the strategic advantage of attacking France to regain control of Europe and was widely viewed as the logical commander to lead the D-Day invasion. Instead, this quiet man from Pennsylvania, who had become the nation’s first five-star general, was considered too valuable to the overall war effort and General Eisenhower was selected. President Roosevelt explained to him, “I didn’t feel that I could sleep at ease if you were out of Washington, D.C.” Eisenhower could handle the massive amphibious assault, but only Marshall could be trusted to manage both wars.

Finally, after all the guns and bombs fell silent, the 64–year-old indispensable man was ready to retire. However, fate intervened and President Truman asked him to help reconcile post-war China, but the Communists prevailed over Chiang Kai-shek, who fled to Taiwan. Then Truman fired his Secretary of State and called on Marshall once again. Despite being retired, five-star generals were still considered to be subject to service. Next, he became the Secretary of Defense. Later, when Truman was asked about who had contributed the most over the past 30 years, Truman picked Marshall: “I don’t think in this age in which I’ve lived that there has been a greater administrator; a man with a knowledge of military affairs equal to George Marshall.”

Amen.

He received the Nobel Peace Prize for his post-war work in 1953, the only career officer in the U.S. Army to ever receive this honor. The Marshall Plan merely saved Europe by restoring a broad area that had been devastated by the war and gave them an opportunity to rebuild and thrive during the 20th century. R.I.P.

Airplanes added economic, psychological factors to warfare

Alexander Leydenfrost’s oil on canvas *Bombers at Night* sold for $4,182 at a February 2010 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

In August 1945, a historic event occurred: Foreign forces occupied Japan for the first time in recorded history. It was, of course, the end of World War II and cheering crowds were celebrating in the streets of major cities around the world as peace returned to this little planet.

A major factor in finally ending this long, costly war against the Axis powers of Germany and Japan was, ultimately, the use of strategic bombing. An essential element was the development of the B-29 bomber – an aircraft not even in use when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941, forcing a reluctant United States into a foreign war. Maybe it was hubris or fate, but the attack was a highly flawed decision that would not end well for the perpetrators.

The concept of war being waged from the air dates to the 17th century when several wrote about it while speculating on when or where it would begin. The answer turned out to be the Italo-Turkish War (1911-12), when an Italian pilot on Oct. 23, 1911, flew the first aerial reconnaissance mission. A week later, the first aerial bomb was dropped on Turkish troops in Libya. The Turks responded by shooting down an airplane with rifle fire.

As World War I erupted seemingly out of nowhere, the use of airplanes became more extensive. However, for the most part, the real war was still being waged on the ground by static armies. One bitter legacy of this particular war was the frustration over the futility and horror of trench warfare, which was employed by most armies. Many experts knew, almost intuitively, that airplanes could play a role in reducing the slaughter of trench warfare and a consensus evolved that airplanes could best be used as tactical army support.

However, in the 20-year pause between the two great wars, aviation technology improved much faster than other categories of weaponry. Arms, tanks, submarines and other amphibious units were only undergoing incremental changes. The airplane benefited by increased domestic use and major improvements in engines and airframes. The conversion to all-metal construction from wood quickly spread to wings, crew positions, landing gear and even the lowly rivet.

As demand for commercial aircraft expanded rapidly, increased competition led to significant improvements in speed, reliability, load capacity and, importantly, increased range. Vintage bombers were phased out in favor of heavier aircraft with modern equipment. A breakthrough occurred in February 1932 when the Martin B-10 incorporated all the new technologies into a twin-engine plane. The new B-10 was rated the highest performing bomber in the world.

Then, in response to an Air Corps competition for multi-engine bombers, Boeing produced a four-engine model that had its inaugural flight in July 1935. It was the highly vaunted B-17, the Flying Fortress. Henry “Hap” Arnold, chief of the U.S. Army Air Forces, declared it was a turning point in American airpower. The AAF had created a genuine air program.

Arnold left active duty in February 1946 and saw his cherished dream of an independent Air Force become a reality the following year. In 1949, he was promoted to five-star general, becoming the only airman to achieve that rank. He died in 1950.

War planning evolved with the technology and in Europe, the effectiveness of strategic long-range bombing was producing results. By destroying cities, factories and enemy morale, the Allies hastened the German surrender. The strategy was comparable to Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman’s “March to the Sea” in 1864, which added economic and psychological factors to sheer force. Air power was gradually becoming independent of ground forces and generally viewed as a faster, cheaper strategic weapon.

After V-E Day, it was time to force the end of the war by compelling Japan to surrender. The island battles that led toward the Japanese mainland in the Pacific had ended after the invasion of Okinawa on April 1, 1945, and 82 days of horrific fighting that resulted in the loss of life for 250,000 people. This had been preceded by the March 9-10 firebombing of Tokyo, which killed 100,000 civilians and destroyed 16 square miles, leaving an estimated 1 million homeless.

Now for the mainland … and the choices were stark and unpleasant: either a naval blockade and massive bombings, or an invasion. Based on experience, many believed that the Japanese would never surrender, acutely aware of the “Glorious Death of 100 Million” campaign, designed to convince every inhabitant that an honorable death was preferable to surrendering to “white devils.” The bombing option had the potential to destroy the entire mainland.

The decision to use the atomic bomb on Hiroshima (Aug. 6) and Nagasaki (Aug. 9) led to the surrender on Aug. 10, paving the way for Gen. Douglas MacArthur to gain agreement to an armistice and 80-month occupation by the United States. Today, that decision still seems prudent despite the fact we only had the two atomic bombs. Japan has the third-largest economy in the world at $5 trillion and is a key strategic partner with the United States in the Asia-Pacific region.

Now about those ground forces in the Middle East…

JIM O’NEAL is an avid collector and history buff. He is president and CEO of Frito-Lay International [retired] and earlier served as chair and CEO of PepsiCo Restaurants International [KFC Pizza Hut and Taco Bell].

It’s a Long Way from Hot Air Balloons to Lethal Drones

An 1887 complete set of 25 Lone Jack “Inventors and Inventions” cards, featuring Michael Faraday, sold for $3,107 at a November 2011 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

Wars fought from the air can be traced back to the creation of rubber balloons first made by Professor Michael Faraday in 1824 for use in his experiments with hydrogen at the Royal Institution in London (where he would later become the first Fullerian Professor of Chemistry). However, it was his work with electricity and magnetism that earned him greater fame. Virtually all electricity produced today is based on Faraday’s principles, whether it is coal, oil, gas, nuclear, hydro or wind.

Faraday (1791-1867) declined an offer of knighthood since he believed the Bible forbade earthly accumulations of wealth or honor and stated that he “preferred to be plain Mr. Faraday to the end.” He also declined to assist the British government with the production of chemical weapons, on ethical grounds, for the Crimean War (1853-1856) … a position the current government now apparently agrees with given recent activities in Syria.

I can attest to the many honorific symbols in greater London today and Albert Einstein kept a picture of Faraday on a wall next to Isaac Newton to acknowledge their enormous contributions to the extension of electromagnetism in space. Not bad for “plain” Mr. Faraday.

His work on balloons was preceded by the French Montgolfier brothers in 1783 while perched on a hillside watching a bonfire:

“I wonder what makes the smoke go up.”

“Perhaps warm air is lighter and the cold air pushes it up.”

“Then if we filled a bag with hot air, it would fly!”

Aeronautics was born.

Then on June 18, 1861, a stunned audience in Washington watched a giant balloon, the Enterprise, rise 500 feet. A man in it sent a telegraph to President Lincoln … “Sir: From this point of observation we command an area of nearly 50 miles in diameter. I have the pleasure of sending you this first telegram ever dispatched from an aerial station… T.S.C. Lowe”

This was a prelude to the short-lived formal use of aerial observations by the Armed Forces. The first balloon bought for the American military was an $850 model of raw India silk built by John Wise of Lancaster, Pa. Both sides in the Civil War were basically incapable of utilizing balloons for little more than observation of troop positions since any kind of armament was simply too heavy to be carried aloft. Aerial photography service was offered but never acted on. After viewing the First Battle of Bull Run, Lowe and other balloonists formed the Union Army Balloon Corps, but disbanded in August 1863. Confederate efforts were even more modest and legend has it that (sadly) the very last silk dress in the entire Confederacy was used to try and make a balloon.

Then a man by the name of Billy Mitchell enlisted as a private in the Spanish-American War, where he became a member of the U.S. Army Signal Corps. Subsequently, he served in France during World War I and ultimately became regarded as the father of the U.S. Air Force. It was his stubborn insistence that “the day has passed when armies or navies on the sea can be the arbiter of a nation’s destiny in war. The main power of defense and the power of initiative against an enemy has passed to the air” (November 1918).

That and a statement accusing senior leaders in the Army and Navy of incompetence and “almost treasonable administration of national defense” got him court-martialed. The court, which included Major General Douglas MacArthur as one of the judges, found him guilty on Dec. 17, 1925, and suspended him for five years. Ironically, MacArthur suffered a similar fate decades later for challenging conventional military wisdom.

We are now in the era where wars are fought using lethally armed unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) piloted from remote locations, and cruise missiles launched from ships up to 1,500 miles away. I was hoping we had the cyber-technology to destroy an enemy’s power infrastructure, disable their communications and simply render their offensive and defensive capabilities useless.

Maybe that’s only feasible for presidential elections using Facebook.

After World War II, America Immediately Faced Challenges in China, Russia

Taiwan struck a gold 2000 Yuan Year 55 (1966) to commemorate the 80th birthday of Chaing Kai-shek.

By Jim O’Neal

Chaing Kai-shek joined the Chinese Nationalist Party in 1918, succeeding founder Sun Yat-sen as the leader. In 1925, he expelled Chinese Communists from the party and led a successful reunification of China. When the Allies declared war on Japan in 1941, China took its place among the Allied nations.

Chaing may have been an ally of the United States, but he presided over a corrupt society made ungovernable by China’s decade-long occupation at the hands of the Japanese and the growing strength of communist revolutionary Mao Zedong. Inflation was rampant, as was starvation, but Chiang’s police crushed opposition and no amount of American pressure could dissuade him.

In 1946, George Marshall made a valiant effort to consolidate power between Chiang and Mao, but it proved futile. As the Cold War advanced, Americans saw their own security at risk by supporting the anti-communists. Then, the Communist Revolution created an ardent hatred of all things American, followed by more bad news in September 1949. As the last of the Chinese Nationalists fled to Formosa (now Taiwan), a squadron of USAF B-29s detected traces of radioactive material while flying over the North Pole. This provided irrefutable evidence that the Soviet Union had successfully exploded their first atomic bomb.

Americans were disillusioned. This was not the way things were supposed to go. Right was supposed to triumph over wrong, freedom over oppression, God over the godless. Hadn’t the Allies just finished proving this on the beaches of Normandy and in the vast waters of the Pacific? And hadn’t the gods determined that Americans alone should possess the atomic secrets to keep the forces of evil in check?

Mao’s victory and Joseph Stalin’s bomb forced a reconsideration of plans for occupied Japan, for now the line between East and West had to be drawn even more firmly, and every American decision had to be viewed through the prism of the Cold War. The initial strategy, as it had been for occupied Germany, had been to halt Japan’s capacity for future aggression, to disarm the former enemy and slowly introduce democracy. But, just as the Russian actions in Eastern Europe had changed the pace of reeducation in West Germany, the victory of the Chinese Communists made it essential that Japan be immediately strengthened to resist the spread of the Red Tide in Asia.

General Douglas MacArthur, the supreme commander of occupied Japan, had personally written the new Japanese constitution, which banned “land, sea and air forces” and stated any war potential “will never be maintained – or the development of a military industry.” Just three years after the end of the war, that ban was lifted, creating a “self-defense force” of 75,000.

Today, as North Korean nuclear threats continue to grow, there are discussions about Japan assuming total responsibility for their own defense, including the possibility of a nuclear deterrence, something that many believe could be viable in a matter of months.

We seem to be incapable of eradicating or even mitigating war capabilities. Maybe there is just too much profit potential involved.

Intelligent Collector blogger JIM O’NEAL is an avid collector and history buff. He is president and CEO of Frito-Lay International [retired] and earlier served as chairman and CEO of PepsiCo Restaurants International [KFC Pizza Hut and Taco Bell].

Bataan Death March a Cruel Episode of an Already-Brutal War

The 1945 film *Back to Bataan* starring John Wayne tells the story of the U.S. Army Ranger raid at the Cabanatuan prisoner-of-war camp.

By Jim O’Neal

Last month marked the 75th anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor (Dec. 7, 1941) that resulted in the United States entry into World War II.

The Japanese war plan assumed that a quick strike that disabled American naval forces would deter the United States from interfering with their strategic objective of conquering Asia and acquiring rich natural resources.

They predicted a surprise victory would preclude a declaration of war and keep us focused on Europe, where Nazi Germany was on a rampage. The primary target was the Pacific Fleet, which included aircraft, battleships and aircraft carriers. They intentionally ignored the fuel depots and maintenance facilities since they would become superfluous (wrong!).

Ironically, U.S. plans included a proviso “to avoid charging across the Pacific” … in stark contrast to the core Japanese rationale. Further, the three aircraft carriers (Enterprise, Lexington and Saratoga) were at sea and escaped damage. So, quite perversely, these assets, three aircraft carriers, airplanes and all the supporting infrastructure, were precisely what we used to respond. “Remember Pearl Harbor” was the rallying cry that gave Congress the cover to declare war, something the American public opposed.

Six hours later, in a less-familiar situation, the Japanese also started bombing the U.S. Protectorates in the Philippines and Guam. General Douglas MacArthur was in Manila the day the bombing started – in his cozy suite at the Manila Hotel – and inexplicably failed to pass on the warning he had received hours before. He then relocated to the island of Corregidor in the mouth of Manila Bay and was there from December until March 1942, when FDR ordered him to Australia for his safety.

Bataan is a peninsula in the Philippines between Manila Bay and the South China Sea. It is a mountainous, hot, densely jungled place. It is also the location of one of the worst American defeats in WWII. On April 9, 1942, U.S. and Filipino forces on Bataan surrendered unconditionally to the Japanese after months of bombing and an invasion.

What followed was the infamous Bataan Death March.

More than 70,000 already-weakened Allied POWs were forced to walk over 60 miles to Japanese prison camps; many were sent to the Cabanatuan prison camp on the coast of Luzon. Thousands died en route of sickness, dehydration and murderous acts inflicted by their Japanese captors. Conditions at the camp are almost too gruesome to repeat.

In addition to the ordinary conditions of malaria, dysentery, scurvy, pellagra, beriberi and rickets, the long-term effects of vitamin and mineral deprivation exposed an abyss of human physiology. When the last phantom residues burned away, prisoners lost their voices, hair, eyes, teeth and hearing. Even their skin fell off. It was a pseudo-human medical freak show.

Finally, after nearly three years of tortuous living conditions, in January 1945, 121 hand-selected troops from the elite U.S. Army 6th Ranger Battalion slipped behind enemy lines and rescued the 513 American and British POWs that were still alive at Cabanatuan. It was a long three years for these survivors and it is almost miraculous that any made it.

President Eisenhower’s Wisdom was Crucial to Ending Korean Conflict

Korean War tales were popular in American comic books. This copy of *Frontline Combat* #1, 1951, a William Gaines file pedigree, sold for $6,612.50 at a March 2002 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

On the last weekend of June 1950, the United States was sweltering in that summer’s first heat wave. Those who could, left their small-screen TVs for air-conditioned movie theaters (that was the month my family acquired our first TV). Treasure Island, starring Robert Newton as Long John Silver, was Walt Disney’s first completely live-action movie and The Maverick Queen, Zane Grey’s 51st novel, was published posthumously. I missed both of them.

Half a world away, heavy rains from the first monsoon were falling on the rice paddies when the North Korean artillery – 40 miles of big guns, side-by-side – opened fire. The shelling was sporadic at first, but soon all artillery was erupting as officers corrected their range. Overhead, Yaks and Sturmoviks were headed toward Seoul, less than 50 miles away. North Korean People’s Army generals put 90,000 troops into South Korea smoothly with no congestion as junks/saipans were unloading amphibious troops behind Republic of Korea lines to the south.

It was early afternoon in New York, noon in Independence, where President Harry S. Truman was, and 4 a.m. on the faraway 38th parallel when, as General Douglas MacArthur later put it, “North Korea struck like a cobra.”

In a larger sense, it represented the inevitable collision of the Sino-Soviet push to extend communism and the U.S policy of containment. Truman secured a mandate from the United Nations to expel North Korea from the south, euphemistically called a “police action.” A U.N. force comprised of 90 percent Americans and South Koreans under MacArthur launched a counteroffensive with a daring amphibious landing in September 1950. By seizing the initiative, they drove the communists north, back across the 38th parallel. For the first time in history, an international organization had met aggression with force and when it was announced, Congress rose in a standing ovation. The Chicago Tribune congratulated the president, noting the approval of the action was unanimous.

However, as MacArthur was busy planning the next steps of the campaign, he tragically misread the intentions of Communist China. As U.N. forces approached the Yalu River, hundreds of thousands of Chinese troops poured across the border in January 1951 and drove MacArthur back south. These setbacks prompted him to consider using nuclear weapons against China or North Korea. When Truman refused to extend the conflict and a possible nuclear exchange, MacArthur criticized public policy. Unwilling to accept this insubordination, on April 11, 1951, Commander-in-Chief Truman relieved the popular general and replaced him with General Matthew Ridgway.

Although peace negotiations dragged on for months, as soon as Dwight D. Eisenhower was elected president, he made a special point to conclude all discussions. As the only general to serve as president in the 20th century, he was acutely aware of the ravages of war and was not about to let diplomats or the United Nations muddle along.

We miss him and his wisdom as we face an even more dangerous, nuclear-armed North Korea that grows more aggressive each day with solutions that are more limited and risky.

When Nation Faces Uncertainty, Good Leaders do What They do Best

Merritt Mauzey’s Depression-era oil on masonite, *Uncle Fud and Aunt Boo*, realized $77,675 at a December 2007 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

In January 1931, a 46-year-old tenant farmer drew the nation’s attention to a small event in rural Arkansas. Homer C. Coney harvested corn and cotton on land he rented for $8 an acre. But a tremendous drought the previous summer meant that most farmers had no crop, no money and no way to survive the winter.

Coney tried to sell his truck for $25 … no takers. So he and his family – trapped in a one-room shack – tried to exist on a Red Cross relief ration of $12/month. Coney, his wife and five sons lived on beans mixed with lard (to “give it flavor”).

A young neighbor mother visited the family frantically seeking help because her children had not eaten for two days. Coney said, “Lady you wait here. I am a-going to get some food over at Bells – the Red Cross man that never give out nothing.” In England, Ark., Coney discovered a big crowd of people, hungry since the Red Cross office there was out of food vouchers. Soon, there was a crowd of 500 people who confronted the mayor and chief of police. “We’re not beggars and will work for 50 cents a day, but we will not let our families starve.”

All over the country, people read about the brave souls who gathered to demand food. “500 Farmers Storm Arkansas Town Demanding Food for Their Children,” read the front page of The New York Times. “You let this country get hungry and they are going to eat, no matter what happens to budgets, income taxes or Wall Street values,” wrote populist Will Rogers in his newspaper column. “Washington mustn’t forget who rules when it comes to a showdown.”

The Great Southern Drought of 1930 was a catastrophe, to be sure. But this act of desperation was only a small part of the bigger issue in the new decade. In 1930, 26,000 businesses collapsed. In 1931, 28,000 more, and by the beginning of 1932, 3,500 banks, holding billions in uninsured savings, went under. 12 million people (25 percent of the workforce) were unemployed and real earnings fell by one-third. In some cities, it was worse; 50 percent of Chicago was out of work, 80 percent of Toledo.

Soup lines stretched as far as the eye could see. America the land of possibility was the land of despair. In 1931, the people of Cameroon in West Africa sent a check to the people of New York for $3.77 to aid the “starving.” About 20,000 veterans of WWI arrived at the U.S. Capitol to demand early payment of their pensions. On July 28, 1932, General Douglas MacArthur – side by side with Major Dwight Eisenhower with a parade of infantry, cavalry and tanks – routed the squatters as ordered.

Today, it is hard to imagine the level of expectation that greeted President Franklin D. Roosevelt when he took the reins from the much-maligned Herbert Hoover. However, the Democratic platform in 1932 was much the same as Hoover’s: a balanced budget and a curb on spending. Even the term “New Deal” was a fluke line from a nomination acceptance, until it surprised everyone and became popular.

But Roosevelt had a supreme confidence, enormous energy, and a determination equal to that of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. He quickly cribbed a line from Henry David Thoreau (“Nothing is so much to be feared as fear”), began fireside chats with the American people from a room with no fireplace, and started leading.

That’s what good leaders do.

Intelligent Collector blogger JIM O’NEAL is an avid collector and history buff. He is President and CEO of Frito-Lay International [retired] and earlier served as Chairman and CEO of PepsiCo Restaurants International [KFC Pizza Hut and Taco Bell].