Office of the Historian

795B.5/6–954

Memorandum for the Record, by Walter Treumann of the Office of Northeast Asian Affairs

top secret
[Washington,] June 9, 1954.

Subject:

  • Debriefing of General Maxwell Taylor.

In reply to various questions put to him by Departmental officers,1 General Taylor made the following significant points:

1.
In the event of a Communist attack, the UN and the ROK forces can take care of the situation.
2.
The ROKs presently have 18 effective divisions and two in training. Those two divisions will be ready in late fall. Present ROK manpower ceiling is 650,000.
3.
No present evidence of offensive intentions by the Communists. However, many airfields are being built and repaired in north Korea.
4.
If faced by the north Korean Army alone, the ROK Army would prevail. This takes into account present ROK air inferiority.
5.

65 percent of the ROK officers corps have seen only three years of active service. In case of an emergency, KMAG officers would undoubtedly take over command of the larger ROK units.

Ultimately, General Taylor envisages a standing ROK Army of 200,000 to 250,000 men with a reserve of 800,000 to 900,000. General Hull favors such a plan. It has not been discussed with President Rhee. President Rhee’s plan for a 35-division force is preposterous.

6.
There are 1,400,000 able-bodied men in the ROK. 1,041,000 would be the maximum that could be put into the field by the ROK. 900,000 could be maintained in the field for 18 months.
7.
ROK division size is 14,000. The ROKs have adequate tank support. We are under an obligation to leave the equipment of departing U.S. divisions.
8.
The airforce program is way behind. A moderate ROK airforce is absolutely necessary to help protect the investment which we have put into Korea. Presently, the airforce is totally inadequate. Modernizing the Korean airforce and converting it to jets would take from 3 to 4 years.
9.
General Taylor favors the complete withdrawal of UN forces from Korea. He takes a dim view of a UN corps staying behind indefinitely. Such a corps would not be much good militarily and would be a “hostage to President Rhee”. If the corps were retained there, Rhee would have to agree to keep his forces under the UNC. A UN corps would not have much deterrent effect against the Communists. The real deterrent is our determination to defend the ROK.
10.
Unilateral action is not “highly probable”. If convinced we won’t support him and if the ROK generals know it, President Rhee won’t go it alone. The ROK Army is being kept on the lowest possible supply level. This means 6 or 7 days of supplies. The ROK generals are loyal to the 8th Army. However, they fear the President’s old age and that he might take precipitate action.
11.
Present emphasis in training is the development of ROK technical and logistic services.
12.
Even if we were to consider sending ROK troops to Indochina, Rhee would undoubtedly charge us for this by demanding at least another 2 divisions to replace those sent to Indochina. He would probably not put the troops under a French command. Moreover, the troops would not put up an adequate fight without U.S. advisers as far down as regimental level.
13.
The reinforcement provisions of the armistice do not hurt us very much yet. In the future they may. For instance, atomic artillery could not be put into Korea. Also, our airforce cannot be modernized, and its effectiveness is therefore being gradually impaired.
14.
The ROK Army will only perform as well as its KMAG advisers who presently serve on the regimental and higher levels.
15.
Maintaining the ROK Army in its present size would mean that each man would have to serve for ten to eleven years.
16.
Present ROK training in logistics points up to ROK officers the difficulty of “going it alone”. The ROK officers are becoming aware of this difficulty.

  1. The source text does not indicate which Department of State officers were at this debriefing of Taylor. McClurkin did initial this memorandum and presumably he attended.↩