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		     Farewell Address to Congress
			  Douglas MacArthur

Delivered before a Special Session of Congress
Washington, D.C.  April 19, 1951

Mr. President, Mr. Speaker, and distinguished members of the
Congress:

I stand on this rostrum with a sense of deep humility and great
pride -- humility in the wake of those great American architects
of our history who have stood here before me, pride in the
reflection that this forum of legislative debate represents human
liberty in the purest form yet devised.  Here are centered the
hopes, and aspirations, and faith of the entire human race.

I do not stand here as advocate for any partisan cause, for
the issues are fundamental and reach quite beyond the realm of
partisan consideration.  They must be resolved on the highest
plane of national interest if our course is to prove sound and our
future protected.  I trust, therefore, that you will do me the
justice of receiving that which I have to say as solely expressing
the considered viewpoint of a fellow American.  I address you with
neither rancor nor bitterness in the fading twilight of life with
but one purpose in mind -- to serve my country.

The issues are global and so interlocked that to consider the
problems of one sector, oblivious to those of another, is but to
court disaster for the whole.

While Asia is commonly referred to as the gateway to Europe,
it is no less true that Europe is the gateway to Asia, and the
broad influence of the one cannot fail to have its impact upon the
other.

There are those who claim our strength is inadequate to
protect on both fronts -- that we cannot divide our effort.  I can
think of no greater expression of defeatism.  If a potential enemy
can divide his strength on two fronts, it is for us to counter his
effort.

The Communist threat is a global one.  Its successful advance
in one sector threatens the destruction of every other sector.
You cannot appease or otherwise surrender to communism in Asia
without simultaneously undermining our efforts to halt its advance
in Europe.

Beyond pointing out these general truisms, I shall confine my
discussion to the general areas of Asia.  Before one may
objectively assess the situation now existing there, he must
comprehend something of Asia's past and the revolutionary changes
which have marked her course up to the present.  Long exploited by
the so-called colonial powers, with little opportunity to achieve
any degree of social justice, individual dignity, or a higher
standard of life such as guided our own noble administration of
the Philippines, the peoples of Asia found their opportunity in
the war just past to throw off the shackles of colonialism, and
now see the dawn of new opportunity, a heretofore unfelt dignity
and the self-respect of political freedom.

Mustering half of the earth's population and 60 percent of its
natural resources, these peoples are rapidly consolidating a new
force, both moral and material, with which to raise the living
standard and erect adaptations of the design of modern progress to
their own distinct cultural environments.  Whether one adheres to
the concept of colonization or not, this is the direction of Asian
progress and it may not be stopped.  It is a corollary to the
shift of the world economic frontiers, as the whole epicenter of
world affairs rotates back toward the area whence it started.  In
this situation it becomes vital that our own country orient its
policies in consonance with this basic evolutionary condition
rather than pursue a course blind to the reality that the colonial
era is now past and the Asian peoples covet the right to shape
their own free destiny.

What they seek now is friendly guidance, understanding, and
support, not imperious direction; the dignity of equality, not the
shame of subjugation.  Their prewar standards of life, pitifully
low, are infinitely lower now in the devastation left in war's
wake.  World ideologies play little part in Asian thinking and are
little understood.  What the people strive for is the opportunity
for a little more food in their stomachs, a little better clothing
on their backs, a little firmer roof over their heads, and the
realization of the normal nationalist urge for political freedom.
These political-social conditions have but an indirect bearing
upon our own national security, but do form a backdrop to
contemporary planning which must be thoughtfully considered if we
are to avoid the pitfalls of unrealism.

Of more direct and immediate bearing upon our national security
are the changes wrought in the strategic potential of the Pacific
Ocean in the course of the past war.  Prior thereto, the western
strategic frontier of the United States lay on the littoral line
of the Americas with an exposed island salient extending out
through Hawaii, Midway, and Guam to the Philippines.  That salient
proved not an outpost of strength but an avenue of weakness along
which the enemy could and did attack.  The Pacific was a potential
area of advance for any predatory force intent upon striking at
the bordering land areas.

All this was changed by our Pacific victory.  Our strategic
frontier then shifted to embrace the entire Pacific Ocean, which
became a vast moat to protect us as long as we hold it.  Indeed,
it acts as a protective shield for all of the Americas and all
free lands of the Pacific Ocean area.  We control it to the shores
of Asia by a chain of islands extending in an arc from the
Aleutians to the Marianas held by us and our free allies.

From this island chain we can dominate with sea and air power
every Asiatic port from Vladivostok to Singapore and prevent any
hostile movement into the Pacific.  Any predatory attack from Asia
must be an amphibious effort.  No amphibious force can be
successful without control of the sea lanes and the air over those
lanes in its avenue of advance.  With naval and air supremacy and
modest ground elements to defend bases, any major attack from
continental Asia toward us or our friends of the Pacific would be
doomed to failure.  Under such conditions the Pacific no longer
represents menacing avenues of approach for a prospective invader
-- it assumes instead the friendly aspect of a peaceful lake.  Our
line of defense is a natural one and can be maintained with a
minimum of military effort and expense.  It envisions no attack
against anyone nor does it provide the bastions essential for
offensive operations, but properly maintained would be an
invincible defense against aggression.

The holding of this littoral defense line in the western
Pacific is entirely dependent upon holding all segments thereof,
for any major breach of that line by an unfriendly power would
render vulnerable to determined attack every other major segment.
This is a military estimate as to which I have yet to find a
military leader who will take exception.  For that reason I have
strongly recommended in the past as a matter of military urgency
that under no circumstances must Formosa fall under Communist
control.  Such an eventuality would at once threaten the freedom
of the Philippines and the loss of Japan, and might well force our
western frontier back to the coasts of California, Oregon, and
Washington.

To understand the changes which now appear upon the Chinese
mainland, one must understand the changes in Chinese character and
culture over the past fifty years.  China up to fifty years ago
was completely nonhomogeneous, being compartmented into groups
divided against each other.  The war-making tendency was almost
nonexistent, as they still followed the tenets of the Confucian
ideal of pacifist culture.  At the turn of the century, under the
regime of Chan So Lin, efforts toward greater homogeneity produced
the start of a nationalist urge.  This was further and more
successfully developed under the leadership of Chiang Kai-shek,
but has been brought to its greatest fruition under the present
regime, to the point that it has now taken on the character of a
united nationalism of increasingly dominant aggressive tendencies.

Through these past fifty years, the Chinese people have thus
become militarized in their concepts and in their ideals.  They
now constitute excellent soldiers, with competent staffs and
commanders.  This has produced a new and dominant power in Asia
which for its own purposes is allied with Soviet Russia, but which
in its own concepts and methods has become aggressively
imperialistic with a lust for expansion and increased power normal
to this type of imperialism.  There is little of the ideological
concept either one way or another in the Chinese makeup.  The
standard of living is so low and the capital accumulation has been
so thoroughly dissipated by war that the masses are desperate and
avid to follow any leadership which seems to promise the
alleviation of local stringencies.

I have from the beginning believed that the Chinese Communists'
support of the North Koreans was the dominant one.  Their
interests are at present parallel to those of the Soviet, but I
believe that the aggressiveness recently displayed not only in
Korea but also in Indochina and Tibet, and pointing potentially
toward the south, reflects predominantly the same lust for the
expansion of power which has animated every would-be conqueror
since the beginning of time.

The Japanese people since the war have undergone the greatest
reformation recorded in modern history.  With a commendable will,
eagerness to learn, and marked capacity to understand, they have,
from the ashes left in war's wake, erected in Japan an edifice
dedicated to the primacy of individual liberty and personal
dignity, and in the ensuing process there has been created a truly
representative government committed to the advance of political
morality, freedom of economic enterprise, and social justice.
Politically, economically, and socially, Japan is now abreast of
many free nations of the earth and will not again fail the
universal trust.  That it may be counted upon to wield a
profoundly beneficial influence over the course of events in Asia
is attested by the magnificent manner in which the Japanese people
have met the recent challenge of war, unrest, and confusion
surrounding them from the outside, and checked communism within
their own frontiers without the slightest slackening in their
forward progress.

I sent all four of our occupation divisions to the Korean
battlefront without the slightest qualms as to the effect of the
resulting power vacuum upon Japan.  The results fully justified my
faith.  I know of no nation more serene, orderly, and industrious
nor in which higher hopes can be entertained for future
constructive service in the advance of the human race.

Of our former wards, the Philippines, we can look forward in
confidence that the existing unrest will be corrected and a strong
and healthy nation will grow in the longer aftermath of war's
terrible destructiveness.  We must be patient and understanding
and never fail them, as in our hour of need they did not fail us.
A Christian nation, the Philippines stand as a mighty bulwark of
Christianity in the Far East, and its capacity for high moral
leadership in Asia is unlimited.

On Formosa, the government of the Republic of China has had
the opportunity to refute by action much of the malicious gossip
which so undermined the strength of its leadership on the Chinese
mainland.  The Formosan people are receiving a just and
enlightened administration with majority representation on the
organs of government; and politically, economically, and socially
they appear to be advancing along sound and constructive lines.

With this brief insight into the surrounding areas I now turn
to the Korean conflict.  While I was not consulted prior to the
President's decision to intervene in support of the Republic of
Korea, that decision, from a military standpoint, proved a sound
one as we hurled back the invaders and decimated his forces.  Our
victory was complete and our objectives within reach when Red
China intervened with numerically superior ground forces.  This
created a new war and an entirely new situation -- a situation not
contemplated when our forces were committed against the North
Korean invaders -- a situation which called for new decisions in
the diplomatic sphere to permit the realistic adjustment of
military strategy.  Such decisions have not been forthcoming.

While no man in his right mind would advocate sending our
ground forces into continental China, and such was never given a
thought, the new situation did urgently demand a drastic revision
of strategic planning if our political aim was to defeat this new
enemy as we had defeated the old.

Apart from the military need as I saw it to neutralize the
sanctuary protection given the enemy north of the Yalu, I felt
that military necessity in the conduct of the war made mandatory:

1. The intensification of our economic blockade against China.

2. The imposition of a naval blockade against the China coast.

3. Removal of restrictions on air reconnaissance of China's
coast areas and of Manchuria.

4. Removal of restrictions on the forces of the Republic of
China on Formosa with logistical support to contribute to their
effective operations against the common enemy.

For entertaining these views, all professionally designed to
support our forces committed to Korea and bring hostilities to an
end with the least possible delay and at a saving of countless
American and Allied lives, I have been severely criticized in lay
circles, principally abroad, despite my understanding that from a
military standpoint the above views have been fully shared in the
past by practically every military leader concerned with the
Korean campaign, including our own Joint Chiefs of Staff.

I called for reinforcements, but was informed that
reinforcements were not available.  I made clear that if not
permitted to destroy the buildup bases north of the Yalu; if not
permitted to utilize the friendly Chinese force of some 600,000
men on Formosa; if not permitted to blockade the China coast to
prevent the Chinese Reds from getting succor from without; and if
there were to be no hope of major reinforcements, the position of
the command from the military standpoint forbade victory.  We
could hold in Korea by constant maneuver and at an approximate
area where our supply line advantages were in balance with the
supply line disadvantages of the enemy, but we could hope at best
for only an indecisive campaign, with its terrible and constant
attrition upon our forces if the enemy utilized his full military
potential.

I have constantly called for the new political decisions
essential to a solution.  Efforts have been made to distort my
position.  It has been said, in effect, that I am a war-monger.
Nothing could be further from the truth.  I know war as few other
men now living know it, and nothing to me is more revolting.  I
have long advocated its complete abolition as its very
destructiveness on both friend and foe has rendered it useless as
a means of settling international disputes.  Indeed, on the 2nd of
September, 1945, just following the surrender of the Japanese
nation on the battleship Missouri, I formally cautioned as follows:

Men since the beginning of time have sought peace.  Various
methods through the ages have been attempted to devise an
international process to prevent or settle disputes between
nations.  From the very start, workable methods were found
insofar as individual citizens were concerned, but the
mechanics of an instrumentality of larger international scope
have never been successful.  Military alliances, balances of
power, leagues of nations, all in turn failed, leaving the
only path to be by way of the crucible of war.  The utter
destructiveness of war now blots out this alternative.  We
have had our last chance.  If we will not devise some greater
and more equitable system, Armageddon will be at our door.
The problem basically is theological and involves a spiritual
recrudescence and improvement of human character that will
synchronize with our almost matchless advances in science,
art, literature, and all material and cultural developments of
the past 2,000 years.  It must be of the spirit if we are to
save the flesh.

But once war is forced upon us, there is no other alternative
than to apply every available means to bring it to a swift end.
War's very object is victory -- not prolonged indecision.  In war,
indeed, there can be no substitute for victory.

There are some who for varying reasons would appease Red
China.  They are blind to history's clear lesson; for history
teaches with unmistakable emphasis that appeasement but begets new
and bloodier war.  It points to no single instance where the end
has justified that means -- where appeasement has led to more than
a sham peace.  Like blackmail, it lays the basis for new and
successively greater demands, until, as in blackmail, violence
becomes the only other alternative.

Why, my soldiers asked of me, surrender military advantages to
an enemy in the field?  I could not answer.  Some may say to avoid
spread of the conflict into an all-out war with China; others, to
avoid Soviet intervention.  Neither explanation seems valid.  For
China is already engaging with the maximum power it can commit and
the Soviet will not necessarily mesh its actions with our moves.
Like a cobra, any new enemy will more likely strike whenever it
feels that the relativity in military or other potential is in its
favor on a worldwide basis.

The tragedy of Korea is further heightened by the fact that as
military action is confined to its territorial limits, it condemns
that nation, which it is our purpose to save, to suffer the
devastating impact of full naval and air bombardment, while the
enemy's sanctuaries are fully protected from such attack and
devastation.  Of the nations of the world, Korea alone, up to now,
is the sole one which has risked its all against communism.  The
magnificence of the courage and fortitude of the Korean people
defies description.  They have chosen to risk death rather than
slavery.  Their last words to me were "Don't scuttle the Pacific."

I have just left your fighting sons in Korea.  They have met
all tests there and I can report to you without reservation they
are splendid in every way.  It was my constant effort to preserve
them and end this savage conflict honorably and with the least
loss of time and a minimum sacrifice of life.  Its growing
bloodshed has caused me the deepest anguish and anxiety.  Those
gallant men will remain often in my thoughts and in my prayers
always.

I am closing my fifty-two years of military service.  When I
joined the Army, even before the turn of the century, it was the
fulfillment of all my boyish hopes and dreams.  The world has
turned over many times since I took the oath on the plain at West
Point, and the hopes and dreams have long since vanished.  But I
still remember the refrain of one of the most popular barrack
ballads of that day which proclaimed most proudly that --

Old soldiers never die;
they just fade away.

And like the old soldier of that ballad, I now close my
military career and just fade away -- an old soldier who tried to
do his duty as God gave him the light to see that duty.

Good-by.


