The Key West Citizen

MacArthur-Truman
Talks
At Wake
Island Revealed

Declare General
Believed Organized
Resistance Would
End Thanksgiving

NEW YORK, April 21.-
(AP).-Everyone has
yearned to know what went
on when President Truman
met General Douglas Mac-
Arthur on Wake Island
last fall. And today, after
MacArthur's greatest wel-
come-home in New York,
the New York Times gives
its version.
In an exclusive "story
by a Times Washington
reporter, Anthony Levis-
sero, and based on what
GENERAL'S AIDE SAYS NO
NOTES OF MEET TAKEN

NEW YORK, April 21.-(AP).
-.A General MacArthur aide
has said that no stenographic
notes were taken when the
general and President Tru-
man conferred on Wake Is-
land.
MacArthur Advisor Major
General Courtney Whitney
also
said
that
part of the
time
MacArthur
and
the
President talked
alone
on
Wake.
Whitney made the com-
ment today when questioned
about
a New York Times
story.
The story said records show
that at the Wake conference
Mac-
Arthur was so sure of vic.
itory in Korea he offered his
best troops for Europe and
that he also apologized for
embarrassing the President
on the Formosa issue.
The Times called docu-
mented sources, the New
York paper says:
That MacArthur told the
President he was so confi.
dent of victory in. Korea
(Continued On Page Eight)
MacArthur-Truman

(Continued from Page One)

that he could send his best troops, the Second Division, to Europe.

That MacArthur told the President he saw little chance the Chinese or the Russians would intervene in Korea.

That MacArthur predicted to Mr. Truman that organized resistance would end in Korea by Thanksgiving Day and he hoped to withdraw the Eighth Army to Japan by Christmas.

The Times' story also said General MacArthur apologized to the President for embarrassing him on the Formosa issue. That was a sequel to MacArthur's message to the Veterans of Foreign Wars last August, which suggested American occupation of Formosa.

The President ordered MacArthur to withdraw the message after he had seen advance copies distributed to newspapers.

According to the Times, General MacArthur urged President Truman to announce a Truman doctrine for the Pacific war after the Wake Island conference. The Times pictured MacArthur as agreeing that a Pacific pact, patterned on the Atlantic Pact, would be a great arrangement, but difficult because the countries were so widely scattered and lacked military forces.

The Times story said the MacArthur offer of his second division was made because he, the general, thought its presence would have a good effect on Europe.

The story records the Wake Island Truman-MacArthur meeting as thoroughly amicable, ending with a friendly talking-away of their differences. The Times said it was after the Chinese showed their strong hand in late November, that MacArthur began to change his mind. It said he then pressed for more aggressiveness, in the Far East, and became more outspoken against the President.

This is the New York Times version of what happened on Wake Island last October 15th when the President last talked face to face with MacArthur.