My reactions after reading this book in 2000.

I really only see two flaws in this book.

First, I think Alexander down plays Russian involvement and assistance in the North Korean. This is primarily a political history from the partition of Korea between Russian and U.S. forces to the final armistice, though he mentions the battles of Heartbreak and Bloody Ridge – Pork Chop Hill is not even mentioned, he considers the war done – in a political sense and strategic sense – in June 1951 when both sides entrenched and began a war of position. Of course, thousands died after than on both sides but to little effect since the lines at that time were close to the 38th parallel – the starting place of the war.

Second, Alexander doesn’t really explain the intelligence failures that caused MacArthur to underestimate the strength of Chinese forces in Korea and misread their intentions. Alexander covers Inchon showing that it was a surprisingly obvious move that no one could see except Douglas MacArthur and makes a gruding admission that was brilliant. He does defend MacArthur by saying that Inchon’s success was not luck but the result of careful planning.

But he takes MacArthur to task for clearly being publically insubordinate to President Truman and rightly points out that, yes, Korea was a case of Communist aggression but fighting it would divert resources (soldiers and the goodwill of America’s European allies) from opposing Soviet aggression in Europe – probably rightly deemed as being more in America’s strategic interests. The goodwill of France and Europe and the U.N. (who supported America’s decision to defend Korea and placed forces, combat and non-combat,under U.S. command) would have evaporated if America would have carried the war to Chinese soil or used nukes on China. It galls, but, given the realities of the situation (the political environment, the necessity to keep a U.N. coalition, America’s military and last, but, by no means least, the abilities of the Chinese military) Korea had to be a limited war.

Indeed, Alexander says that WWII created an unrealistic American attitude that wars should end in total victory. He doesn’t define that, exactly, but, if he means occupying an enemy’s home and dictating terms from a position of overwhelming strength then few wars, except the Civil War and World War II and, perhaps, the Mexican War, can be depicted as ending that way.)

He says the Korean conflict was mismanaged. MacArthur’s military superiors and the Truman administration should have noted the signs of MacArthur’s of intending to unify all of Korea after Inchon. They partially went along with his idea because they hadn’t formed a plan what to do after Inchon’s success. (Alexander points out that MacArthur’s brilliance at Inchon was marred by the odd decision to move forces north in a bizarre criss-cross – forces in eastern Korea were to move to the north-western border with the Yalu river and western forces were loaded on boats and landed at Winsan on the east.) The failure was in not following the original notion of simply driving North Korea forces out of South Korea.

Alexander puts up a convincing argument that China didn’t come up with the idea of North Korea invading South Korea since it interfered with their plans to invade Taiwan. It was after the invasion of South Korea that U.S. pledged to protect Taiwan and patrolled the Formosa Strait. For their part, the Chinese also made a fatal mistake on Dec. 21, 1950 when they rejected a cease fire thinking they could force the withdrawal of all UN troops from Korea. A de-militarized zone would have the 38th parallel as a southern boundary, no new troops would have been introduced, and prisoners of war would be exchanged) . This miscalculation cost a lot of lives since the lines ultimately ended up to be close to the lines at this time.

Alexander doesn’t give a lot of low-level detail in describing various battles except when they’re famous or involves noted individual exploits (i.e, medal winners). He does show the weakness (and, at times, surprising skill and tenacity) of American troops quickly jerked out of their (primarily) Japanese postings and whisked to the battle front where their poor physical conditioning and training also showed. (He also shows the Republic of Korea soldiers as frequently not up to the task. Partly, that was a cultural fear of the Chinese. However, American officers found them adequate soldiers if well-led and well-trained.)

The Chosin disaster is covered as well as the battles of Unsan and Taejon. Alexander speaks of the excellent physical conditioning of the Chinese troops whose favorite tactic was to pin American troops down with frontal assaults and sweep around their flanks. This worked well in Korea since the heavily motorized UN forces relied on narrow, rare roads easily blocked. The Chinese forces were highly mobile possessing no artillery, usually, bigger than a mortar and carried everything on their backs. However, this limited their mobility, and they couldn’t exploit breakthroughs well and frequently had to stop to consolidate. American forces – while the war was in its mobile phase – found the best tactic was to hold positions against typically night assaults and pound the Chinese in the day with their overwhelming air and artillery superiority.

Alexander speaks at length about arguments over prisoner exchanges prolonged the word, pointlessly in geopolitical terms, for over two years from its de-facto end when both sides entrenched. The dispute largely hinged on whether all captured North Koreans and Chinese had to be, as required by the Geneva Convention, repatriated. Truman didn’t want to forcibly return anyone to a Communist country – some of the soldiers had been Chinese Nationalists or no lovers of North Korea. Alexander talks about the prison riots amongst the Communist POWs – instigated by infiltrator/organizers deliberately allowing themselves to be captured by the UN. The bizarre case of the badly handled prison riot of Koje in May 1952 is covered and the justified demotion of camp commander General Francis T. Dodd.

Alexander also covers the ungrateful actions of South Korean President (and despot) Syngman Rhee who tried to blackmail his way into continuing the fighting if he was not given final say over armistice terms. Eventually, America bluffed and said they would withdraw all troops unless he signed off on the agreement. He did but America pledged to protect South Korea’s sovereignty.

Most of the book is drawn from secondary sources though Blevin quotes one of his works – on captured Chinese weapons, I believe. However, Alexander does use his personal experience in the Korean War as a lieutenant in the Army’s Historical Detachment Unit (at least, I assume it’s personal memory) to comment on Korea’s distinctive smells (Korean cabbage on the breath of Korean girls protected their virtue and human feces as fertilizer). He also comments that R&R in Japan probably, despite soldierly boasts, consisted mostly of sleep. He notes that soldiers after found Japanese girls, with their non-western sexual morality, cleanliness, and limited English, more appealing than the many American women then working in occupied Japan; perhaps, he speculates their lack of English made them seem more sympathetic to the soldiers' plight and stories of Korea.

At the time I read the book, there had been talk of No Gun Ri (nowhere mentioned here), I found it interesting to see Alexander noting several friendly fire episodes in the opening months of the war including both American and South Koreans knowingly blowing up bridges with civilians on them. ( )