great prose, well researched , objective yet gives wondeful insights and details into the lives and conversations of McArthur and Truman ( )

Listed as an audiobook while driving back and forth between LS Co and 1st TSB in 2020. Easy to lose considerable respect for General MacArthur after reading this.

If the Cold War never erupted into World War III, it still gave us some incredible history of close calls where the forces of Communism and the forces of freedom walked right up to the line. The Korean War is probably second only to the Cuban Missile Crisis for having the stakes so high. THE GENERAL VS THE PRESIDENT, subtitled MacArthur and Truman at the Brink of Nuclear War, by H. W. Brands is a good account of one of the Cold War’s most dramatic incidents, a real clash of titans. Coming in at just under 400 pages, it’s a quick read with a lot of information, especially for those not familiar with the story.

Brands does a good job of giving the reader a quick history of how war erupted on the divided Korean peninsula in June of 1950, with the Communist North attempting to use force of arms to quickly crush the new republic in the South. The Communists were backed up politically and militarily in their invasion by the newly Communist government in China, and Joseph Stalin’s Soviet Union, both of whom sharing a border with the North, and both whom having huge military forces just across that border. It fell to General Douglas MacArthur, the WWII hero and rebuilder of Japan after the war, to command the UN forces (mostly American) to stop the Communists. At first, the General had tremendous success on the battlefield, reversing the North Korean offensive with a surprising counterattack at Inchon, and then driving north (with the support of the President and the UN) toward the Chinese border on the Yalu River in an all out effort to reunify the country under the government of the South. At this point, in November 1950, with the harsh Korean winter closing in, the Chinese Communists came into war, sending three armies across the Yalu, halting the American offensive, and forcing a retreat. This is where the rub came, as MacArthur wanted to bomb Chinese supply lines on the other side of Yalu, introduce Formosan troops under the command of Chang Kai-shek into Korea, while blockading the Chinese coast, and if necessary, using nuclear weapons. President Truman, along with the State Department and the Pentagon, wanted to avoid widening the war beyond the Korean Peninsula at all costs, fearing a military disaster if MacArthur had his way. The General did not like getting his way, and made his objections to the President’s policy known in public, thus setting up an epic confrontation.

As it has been pointed out in other reviews, Brands does not take sides, but he does let the facts on the record, along with the actions and words of both MacArthur and Truman speak for themselves giving us a good feel for both men. Douglas MacArthur was a capable and inspiring military commander, bold and possessing great physical courage. He was also vain, egotistical, and clearly believing his own good press; he knew better than anyone else, especially the mere politicians who occupied the office of Commander in Chief, whether they were named Hoover, Roosevelt, or Truman. Harry Truman had been a small time office holder in Missouri until the age of 50, when, with the help of the Kansas City political machine, he was elected to the United States Senate. Ten years later he was the compromise choice for Vice President at the Democratic National Convention in 1944, where FDR was nominated for a fourth term. Three months into the that term, Roosevelt’s sudden death elevated the new Vice President to the Oval Office just as the Second World War was hurtling toward its conclusion. Though in the eyes of many, Truman could barely stand in the shadow of his illustrious and charismatic predecessor, the man was a quick study and learned on the job, while possessing a rock solid sense of values and quiet self confidence. He was also a good politician, and a good judge of talent, surrounding himself with able men like Dean Acheson and George Marshall. The book gives us a blow by blow account of where MacArthur and Truman clashed; starting with their only face to face meeting at Wake Island in October of 1950, where they discussed how to end what they thought would be a decisive victory over Communism in Asia. MacArthur discounted the possibility that the Chinese would get into the war, and belittled their military prowess on the battlefield. He would be proven wrong time and again, but the General was a hero in the eyes of most Americans, many of whom wanted him to be the Republican nominee for President in 1952. MacArthur apparently agreed with them, and may well have deliberately brought on his dismissal when he wrote a letter to the Republican Speaker of the House in which he openly criticized Truman’s policy of limited war in Korea; that nothing short of unconditional surrender of the Communist commander in the field to him personally was acceptable. This was the bridge too far for the President.

It has been well documented how MacArthur returned to America (a land he’d last seen in 1937) hailed as a conquering hero, given a ticker tape parade in New York and invited to give an address to a joint session of Congress. Everywhere, the crowds were enormous. But one of the best things about Brands’ book is that he goes into detail about what happened next when the General, and his critics from the Truman Administration, gave testimony in executive session before the Senate Foreign Relations and Armed Services Committees. Using verbatim excerpts from MacArthur, Secretary of State Acheson, Secretary of Defense Marshall, and especially JCS Chairman, General Omar Bradley, Brands makes a clear case for who was in the right, and who was most definitely in the wrong. MacArthur’s Presidential hopes would fade, not in the least because the imperious General totally lacked the common touch necessary to become President in the 20th Century. But he would retain his supporters among hard line Cold Warriors, who, even decades later, would insist that the sacking of MacArthur was an act of rank cowardice on Truman’s part, and that America had squandered an opportunity to throw back Communism in Asia, one that would have spared America the debacle in Vietnam.

Brands does a good job of putting the reader in the shoes of the protagonists, giving us a snapshot of what they knew and believed at any given time in the narrative. But we are given little to no information on what was happening behind closed doors in Beijing and Moscow at this time, which after all, factored greatly in the decisions made in Washington. It is a blind spot. I did like how Brands raises the issue of quotes about MacArthur attributed to Truman in Merle Miller’s PLAIN SPEAKING that are now considered embellishments by an author out to write a book that helped rehabilitate Truman’s reputation in the post Vietnam and Watergate era 1970s.

Brands is a good writer, and this book is excellent read for those not familiar with the history of this era, the chapters are short and to the point, breaking down a lot of information, along with many characters and changing perspectives into something manageable. But there is so much more to the story of Douglas MacArthur, Harry Truman, and their epic confrontation during the Korean War, and for those who want to know more, I’d heartily recommend AMERICAN CAESAR by William Manchester, and TRUMAN by David McCullough. ( )

Solid read. Lots I did not know about the Korean period. MacArthur seems like a piece of work. Brilliant - but maybe nuts? ( )

So what did I learn from investing my time in reading this book? There was some fill-in and some new data. There was one startling element: that the US was pretty much all-in with little left in the military cupboard in 1950. Even at a distance of nearly 70 years, it is not clear that we accomplished much of anything. Of course, our adventure in Korea proved once again that if a country goes into battle without a clear plan about the end will be it should not be surprising it's hard to bring it to an end. Many people have tried to explain Truman and MacArthur. My best guess is that one man found himself in a position bigger than he was but determined to do his best while the other knew he was great but didn't know how to lower himself to ordinary situations. ( )