Quote:
Originally Posted by Trivers
Cool.
Why was he relieved? End of conflict? Slap another soldier or insult someone?
Amazing the things one learns on CP!  |
His increasingly erratic behavior probably hastened his dismissal as military governor and as head of Third Army, but the Army was very rapidly demobilizing anyway.
The conspiracy theories around his death are fairly absurd. He had no power or authority or ability to start a war with the Russians, and had never shown any MacArthur like delusions that he was a separate power, above and not answerable to his commanding officers and the President. MacArthur's delusions were fed in part by his long, LONG tenure away from home, and away from any more senior military officers. Patton never had that.
And, suffice to say, since Ike had punished him for slapping an officer, and then relieved him of Third Army, and since Truman would later dismiss MacArthur, NEITHER would be afraid to dismiss Patton completely from service if they felt it was warranted.