General Douglas Macarthur Speech Rhetorical Precis

On April 19th, 1951 General Douglas MacArthur was invited to speak at the joint session of Congress. He made use of this invitation to let all of Congress know about his opposing viewpoint on the communism and the Korean War. During his lifetime, General Douglas MacArthur was a figure of great controversy in the United States. As the son of an United States Army officer, it is not surprising that Douglas MacArthur followed in his father’s footsteps. The young MacArthur was at the top of his class at West Point, a prestigious military academy. During his career in the military he was the Supreme Commander of Allied forces at the time of World War II. In addition to achieving the highest rank possible in the United States military, a 5 star general.

He knew that he had to make the topic of his speech relatable to current issues. So the main topic of his speech was centered on the Korean war and communism, which was a current issue of the time. He mentions that if we were to let the Asian continent fall to communism it would not be very long before Europe also fell. He also mentions that the key to winning the Korean war is to attack their supporters the Chinese communist. After all, without their support the North Koreans would not have the resources to sustain the war longterm. During his speech General MacArthur is able to establish a positive ethos. The first thing he does in his speech is make himself look humble by mentioning all the great people who stood where he was standing. He also says that he is not the head of any cause, he is just here as another American citizen trying to let his viewpoint be known. He says that his only wish is to serve his country to the best of his ability. MacArthur makes the wording of his speech complement the demographic of his audience. Which in this case is a bunch of well educated men. He tries to be as diplomatic as possible with his approach since the person whose viewpoint he was countering was the head of the country. MacArthur knew that Congress was filled with well educated men so he did not need to keep the wording of his speech simple. He used formal language since it was a formal address to Congress. Not

Parts of the speech tended to be a little dry. He could have improved this by using stylistic devices, such as metaphors or alliteration. The speech was written appropriately for its intended audience, but this would not be the case if he wanted to be able to reach the common man. Though his speech was written mainly for the well educated men of Congress, it was sure to be printed in the newspapers all well. So it would only be logical that he would want the average person to be able to comprehend his speech as well. He used a lot of complex vocabulary within his speech and political jargon, which would make it somewhat more difficult for an outsider to digest. If he made those two corrections to his speech I would see no reason why his speech would not have made it into the top ten