For proof of this, he showed them a radio teletype mes-sage from the Supreme Commander himself, which said: "Be of good cheer. Momentous events are pending."
Colonel Wright regretted that under the circum-stances-KMAG had just returned to Seoul; he would make improvements tomorrow-the only accommodations he could offer the distinguished members of the press would be rather spartan. The men would share quarters, as would he, with the senior officers of his staff, and he would turn over his own quarters to the lady.
Miss Priestly took a shower and went to bed in Colonel Wright's narrow bed.
She was awakened in the very early hours of the next morning by an excited lieutenant who reported that the North Koreans had broken through the South Korean de-fense lines around Seoul, and that they were going to have to run for it.
Moments later, the North Koreans brought the KMAG compound under mortar fire.
Miss Priestly dressed quickly and went outside the building, where she found Colonel Wright waiting for her in a Jeep. Her fellow journalists, she was told, had already left.
Followed by another Jeep, they raced out of the KMAG compound toward the Han River. They had almost reached the river when a brilliant flash of light and a terrifying roar announced that the bridge had been blown.
Their only escape route to Suwon, thirty miles south of Seoul, where there was an air base, had been cut.
Colonel Wright drove back to the KMAG compound, where he assembled a sixty-vehicle convoy of stragglers and started out to find another way across the Han to safety. After several hours of frantic search, none was found. But they came across a place where small boats could take them across the river.
Wright ordered the vehicles destroyed, and the fleeing Americans made it across the river, and started for Suwon on foot.
About eleven o'clock in the morning, there was a growing roar of aircraft engines. After a few moments, it was possible to identify the aircraft as USAF P-51 fighters. They were obviously strafing Kimpo Airfield, with the ob-vious conclusion to be drawn that if the P-51s were strafing it, it was now in the hands of the North Koreans.
After a four-hour walk, a Jeep appeared, and Miss Priestly accepted the offer of a ride in it to Suwon. There she found her fellow journalists, two of them wearing bloody bandages. They had been on the Han River bridge when it had been blown.
There were a number of American aircraft on the field, one of which was headed for Itazuke Air Force Base in Japan, the closest one to Korea. All four journalists climbed aboard. There was no way that any of them could file their stories of the fall of Seoul from Suwon, and two of them required medical attention.
All four filed their stories from Itazuke. The two wounded men then went to the hospital, and Miss Priestly and the unwounded other one got on another plane headed back to Suwon.
The next morning, as Miss Priestly was trying to find a Jeep or something else with wheels to go see the fighting, a glistening C-54 made an approach to Suwon and landed. When she saw that it had "Bataan" lettered on its nose, she ran to get a closer look.
Thompson submachine gun-armed military policemen climbed down the stairs, followed by the Supreme Com-mander himself, and then a dozen general officers, and fi-nally four members of the press corps.
Jeanette Priestly knew all of them. They regarded themselves-perhaps not without some justification; they were the Tokyo bureau chiefs of the three major Ameri-can wire services and Time-Life-as the senior members of the Tokyo press corps. They were known by their fel-lows in the press corps as "The Palace Guard" because they covered the Supreme Commander himself, leaving coverage of whatever else happened in Japan to their un-derlings.
They had obviously been invited by MacArthur to ac-company him to Korea-"space available" did not apply to the Supreme Commander's personal aircraft; passage on the Bataan was by invitation only.
If the members of the Palace Guard were surprised to see Jeanette Priestly in Korea, it did not register on then-faces. But the Supreme Commander himself smiled when he saw her, and motioned her over to him.
There's a headline if there ever was one, Jeanette thought: MACARTHUR IN KOREA.
But how do I get the story out?
"Good morning, Jeanette," he said, offering her his hand. "I wasn't aware that you were here."
"I came yesterday," Jeanette said, and blurted, "and was almost caught in Seoul."
"Seoul will, I am sure, soon be rid of the invader," MacArthur said.
A battered sedan, a Studebaker, not nearly as nice as the Buicks Jeanette had seen deserted at Kimpo, drove up, and Colonel Sidney Huff walked up to them.
"The car is here, General," he said.
"Jeanette, if you would like to wait until I have a chance to assess the situation here," Douglas MacArthur said, "you may, if you like, ride back to Tokyo with me on the Bataan."
`Thank you," Jeanette said. "That's very kind of you."
I can file from Tokyo just as quick as the Palace Guard can.
"Not at all," MacArthur said. "For the time being, at least, this is no place for a lady."
Jeanette had another unladylike thought, but managed to smile as dazzlingly as possible at him. And then she smiled dazzlingly at the Palace Guard, who were reacting to her being on the Bataan as if she were a whore in church.
She waited until MacArthur's small convoy had driven off, and then sat down on the grass by the side of the run-way, took her Royal portable typewriter out, and began to type.
FOR CHITRIB
PRESS IMMEDIATE
NOTE TO EDITOR AP, UP AND INS WILL HAVE PICS
SLUG MACARTHUR COMES TO KOREA
BY JEANETTE PRIESTLY, TRIBUNE WAR COR-RESPONDENT SUWON, SOUTH KOREA JUNE 27-THE REMAINS OF AN AIR FORCE C54 DESTROYED BY NORTH KOREAN YAK FIGHTERS WERE STILL SMOLDERING WHEN THE BATAAN, THE GLISTENING C54 OF SUPREME COMMAN-DER GENERAL DOUGLAS MACARTHUR, TOUCHED DOWN AT THIS BATTERED AIRFIELD 30 MILES SOUTH OF THE JUST CAPTURED SOUTH KOREAN CAPITAL OF SEOUL THIS AFTER-NOON. WEARING HIS FAMILIAR BATTERED CAP AND A FUR-COLLARED LEATHER JACKET, HIS CORN-COB PIPE PERCHED JAUNTILY IN HIS MOUTH, GENERAL OF THE ARMY DOUGLAS MACARTHUR CONFIDENTLY PREDICTED TO THIS REPORTER THAT SEOUL WILL SOON BE RID OF THE INVADER.
She looked up from the portable, saw that the Palace Guard had somehow found a Jeep and were obviously in-tending to join the MacArthur convoy.
She slammed the cover shut on the Royal, jumped to her feet, and ran to it. She climbed over the rear seat just as it started to move.
"Yes, thank you," Jeanette said, beaming. "I would like to go along."
[FIVE]
WASHINGTON, D.C.
0905 26 JUNE 1950
The President of the United States came out the front door of Blair House, almost jauntily descended the stairway, and indicated with a nod of his head that he was going to turn right.
Two of the six Secret Service agents on the detail quickly took up positions so that they could precede him; two waited to bring up the tail; and two positioned them-selves so that they would be just a few steps behind him. Across the street, two Chevrolet Suburbans started their engines. One moved ahead of the little parade and the sec-ond positioned itself behind the tail.
The Secret Service agent heading the parade turned and looked questioningly at the President.
"The Foster Lafayette," the President said. "Senator Fowler."
"Thank you, sir," the Secret Service agent said. Senator Richardson K. Fowler maintained a suite in the Foster Lafayette. Not an ordinary suite, though God knew suites in the Lafayette were large and elegant as they came, but an apartment made up of two suites, and furnished, the President had learned, with museum-quality antiques.
Fowler was quite wealthy, and unlike some of his peers in the Senate, made no effort at all to conceal it. He con-sidered public service a privilege, and living in Washing-ton, D.C, even as well as he did, as the terrible price he had to pay for that privilege.
The President walked briskly, three times tipping his white Panama straw hat and sm
iling and waving to people on both sides of Pennsylvania Avenue who recognized him. The Foster Lafayette Hotel was directly across Pennsyl-vania Avenue from the White House, the far side-from Blair House-of Lafayette Square. The general manager of the hotel was standing under the marquee beside the doorman, obviously waiting for the President.
The Secret Service agent in the lead again turned and looked questioningly at the President.
"I guess when I invited myself to breakfast, Senator Fowler told him," the President said.
The President shook hands with both the general man-ager-and called him by name-and the doorman, entered the hotel, walked across the lobby to a waiting elevator, and followed the lead two Secret Service agents onto it.
When the elevator reached the top floor, the President saw that a large, very black man wearing a gray cotton jacket and a wide smile was standing by the open door of Senator Fowler's suite.
"Good morning, Mr. President," he said. "Nice to see you again, sir. The senator's waiting for you."
The President offered him his hand.
"Hello, Franklin," Truman said. "It's good to see you, too,"
He followed the lead two Secret Service agents into Fowler's apartment.
Richardson K. Fowler and Fleming Pickering rose to their feet.
"Good morning, Mr. President," Fowler said.
"Good morning," the President said. "Could these fel-lows wait in your study?"
"Of course, Mr. President," Fowler said.
"It's through there," the President said, pointing. "When I need you, I'll call."
The Secret Service agent was visibly unhappy with his orders to be left alone.
"It's all right," Truman went on. "Senator Fowler thinks I'm a threat to the country, but I don't think he's thinking of assassination. Go on."
"Yes, Mr. President," the Secret Service agent said, and trailed by the other, left the room, closing the door after themselves.
The President turned to Fowler.
"You can call me `Harry,' Dick. We've known each other a long time."
"A long enough time to know better, Mr. President. What is it they say, `beware of Democrats wearing smiles'?"
Truman smiled, and offered his hand to Fleming Picker-ing.
"Thank you for coming, General," he said. "And I have to say that for a man who spent the night flying across the country, you don't look very mussed."
"I was very mussed, Mr. President, when we landed at Andrews," Pickering said.
Franklin appeared with a silver coffee set and placed it on the sitting room's coffee table.
"What did you set up for breakfast, Franklin?" Fowler asked.
"A little buffet, Senator. I thought you gentlemen would rather be alone."
"Why don't you move the coffee into the dining room? Then I won't spill it on my new tie."
"Yes, sir," Franklin said, and picked up the tray and car-ried it into the dining room, with the three men following him.
He set the tray on a table that would hold sixteen diners, then left the room.
"Before we go a word further, it is agreed that this is out of school, right?" Truman asked.
"Agreed, Mr. President," Fowler said.
"Yes, sir," Pickering said.
The President looked at Pickering as if making up his mind about something.
"What is it they say in the Navy, General? `Let's clear the decks'?"
"It's something like that, Mr. President. But I'm really not a general, Mr. President. That was a long time ago."
"Let's clear that part of the deck first, General," Truman said. "Yes, you are. You are a brigadier general, USMC, Reserve."
Pickering was about to argue when he stopped.
Goddamn it, maybe I am. Probably, I am. I was never discharged, in `45. I was released from active duty and or-dered to my home of record.
"And as your commander-in-chief, General, I can order you to keep anything that's said in this room to yourself."
Pickering looked at him but said nothing.
"Unfortunately, I can't order you around, Dick," Truman went on, "as either a senator or a journalist. I can only ap-peal to your patriotism. We've said-and probably be-lieve-some unkind things about each other, but I don't think you've ever questioned my patriotism, and I certainly have never questioned yours."
"What is it you want, Mr. President?" Fowler asked, coldly.
"I don't want headlines on the front page of every news-paper in the country reading, `MacArthur Ignored Warning of North Korean Attack,'" Truman said.
"In point of fact, Mr. President," Pickering said, "I don't believe General MacArthur was aware of McCoy's assess-ment."
"He's in charge over there, General," Truman said. "He should have been made aware of this assessment. He's re-sponsible for the actions-or lack of action-of his subor-dinates."
Pickering shrugged his agreement.
"We're about to go to war over there," Truman said. "The League of Nations failed because nobody paid any attention to it. Remember when Mussolini was getting ready to in-vade Ethiopia in 1936? The Emperor of Ethiopia... what's his name, Dick?"
"Haile Selassie, Mr. President," Senator Fowler fur-nished.
"Haile Selassie went to the League of Nations," Truman went on, "and the League of Nations told Mussolini to stop. He knew the League of Nations had no teeth, so he invaded Ethiopia. And the League of Nations didn't- couldn't-do a damned thing about it."
"I remember, Mr. President," Fowler said.
"And so the dictators of the world-Italian, German and Japanese-drew the logical conclusion that since the League of Nations was a joke, they could get away with anything they wanted to do. And that gave us World War Two."
"You think the United Nations is going to be different?" Fowler asked, on the edge of sarcasm.
"For one thing, Dick," Truman said. "We belong to the UN; we didn't belong to the League of Nations. For an-other, we now face the indescribable horrors of a nuclear war. We can't afford to have the UN fail."
Fowler shrugged, in agreement.
"The UN has just told the North Koreans to get out of South Korea," Truman went on. "If the UN can't make that order stick, the whole world's likely to go up in a nuclear explosion. So the North Koreans are going to have to get out of South Korea. I've decided the United States has to do whatever is necessary to see that's done."
"By ourselves, if necessary?" Fowler asked.
"I don't think it will come down to that, but if it does, yes, by ourselves."
"Mr. President, have you read McCoy's assessment?" Pickering asked.
"Admiral Hillenkoetter told me about it."
"McCoy feels that the Army of Occupation of Japan is neither equipped nor trained for combat-that they are fac-ing a superior force."
"He's competent to make a judgment like that?"
"I have absolute faith in his judgment, Mr. President," Pickering said.
"Well, he's been right so far, hasn't he?" Truman said. "MacArthur feels he can `contain the situation.' I told him to send a team to Korea to see how bad things really are."
For a long moment, no one said a word.
"There're two possibilities," Truman said. "That once the North Koreans understand we're taking action-I've given MacArthur permission to bomb railheads and bridges, that sort of thing-they'll back down, as the Rus-sians backed down in Berlin after we ran the airlift."
"Mr. President, they may have interpreted Acheson's speech, leaving Korea out of our zone of interest, as mean-ing we would not react."
Truman looked at him, and nodded, and then went on.
"The other possibility is that they-and the Russians, who are behind this-will decide it's the League of Na-tions and Ethiopia all over again, and keep up their attack. That means the involvement of American ground forces. I think that's what's going to happen."
He looked between Fowler and Pickering.
"After Pearl Harbor, President Roosevelt fired the Pearl Harbor brass-Admiral Kimmel and General Sh
ort-for what amounted to dereliction of duty. They hadn't ade-quately prepared for what happened, and they deserved to be fired. General MacArthur-if we are to believe this young captain of yours, General-has not adequately pre-pared for what is happening there now. Do I have to ex-plain the problems that would be caused if I relieved MacArthur for dereliction of duty and ordered him home?"
W E B Griffin - Corp 09 - Under Fire Page 17
