MacArthur at War

MacArthur at War
Author: Walter R. Borneman
Publisher: Little, Brown
Total Pages: 697
Release: 2016-05-10
Genre: History
ISBN: 0316405310

The definitive account of General Douglas MacArthur's rise during World War II, from the author of the bestseller The Admirals. World War II changed the course of history. Douglas MacArthur changed the course of World War II. Macarthur at War will go deeper into this transformative period of his life than previous biographies, drilling into the military strategy that Walter R. Borneman is so skilled at conveying, and exploring how personality and ego translate into military successes and failures. Architect of stunning triumphs and inexplicable defeats, General MacArthur is the most intriguing military leader of the twentieth century. There was never any middle ground with MacArthur. This in-depth study of the most critical period of his career shows how his influence spread far beyond the war-torn Pacific. A Finalist for the Gilder Lehrman Prize for Military History at the New York Historical Society

War at the End of the World

War at the End of the World
Author: James P. Duffy
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 449
Release: 2023-12-05
Genre: History
ISBN: 0593471725

A harrowing account of an epic, yet nearly forgotten, battle of World War II—General Douglas MacArthur's four-year assault on the Pacific War's most hostile battleground: the mountainous, jungle-cloaked island of New Guinea. “A meaty, engrossing narrative history… This will likely stand as the definitive account of the New Guinea campaign.”—The Christian Science Monitor One American soldier called it “a green hell on earth.” Monsoon-soaked wilderness, debilitating heat, impassable mountains, torrential rivers, and disease-infested swamps—New Guinea was a battleground far more deadly than the most fanatical of enemy troops. Japanese forces numbering some 600,000 men began landing in January 1942, determined to seize the island as a cornerstone of the Empire’s strategy to knock Australia out of the war. Allied Commander-in-Chief General Douglas MacArthur committed 340,000 Americans, as well as tens of thousands of Australian, Dutch, and New Guinea troops, to retake New Guinea at all costs. What followed was a four-year campaign that involved some of the most horrific warfare in history. At first emboldened by easy victories throughout the Pacific, the Japanese soon encountered in New Guinea a roadblock akin to the Germans’ disastrous attempt to take Moscow, a catastrophic setback to their war machine. For the Americans, victory in New Guinea was the first essential step in the long march towards the Japanese home islands and the ultimate destruction of Hirohito’s empire. Winning the war in New Guinea was of critical importance to MacArthur. His avowed “I shall return” to the Philippines could only be accomplished after taking the island. In this gripping narrative, historian James P. Duffy chronicles the most ruthless combat of the Pacific War, a fight complicated by rampant tropical disease, violent rainstorms, and unforgiving terrain that punished both Axis and Allied forces alike. Drawing on primary sources, War at the End of the World fills in a crucial gap in the history of World War II while offering readers a narrative of the first rank.

Douglas MacArthur

Douglas MacArthur
Author: Arthur Herman
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
Total Pages: 978
Release: 2017-03-28
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0812985109

A new, definitive life of an American icon, the visionary general who led American forces through three wars and foresaw his nation’s great geopolitical shift toward the Pacific Rim—from the Pulitzer Prize finalist and bestselling author of Gandhi & Churchill Douglas MacArthur was arguably the last American public figure to be worshipped unreservedly as a national hero, the last military figure to conjure up the romantic stirrings once evoked by George Armstrong Custer and Robert E. Lee. But he was also one of America’s most divisive figures, a man whose entire career was steeped in controversy. Was he an avatar or an anachronism, a brilliant strategist or a vainglorious mountebank? Drawing on a wealth of new sources, Arthur Herman delivers a powerhouse biography that peels back the layers of myth—both good and bad—and exposes the marrow of the man beneath. MacArthur’s life spans the emergence of the United States Army as a global fighting force. Its history is to a great degree his story. The son of a Civil War hero, he led American troops in three monumental conflicts—World War I, World War II, and the Korean War. Born four years after Little Bighorn, he died just as American forces began deploying in Vietnam. Herman’s magisterial book spans the full arc of MacArthur’s journey, from his elevation to major general at thirty-eight through his tenure as superintendent of West Point, field marshal of the Philippines, supreme ruler of postwar Japan, and beyond. More than any previous biographer, Herman shows how MacArthur’s strategic vision helped shape several decades of U.S. foreign policy. Alone among his peers, he foresaw the shift away from Europe, becoming the prophet of America’s destiny in the Pacific Rim. Here, too, is a vivid portrait of a man whose grandiose vision of his own destiny won him enemies as well as acolytes. MacArthur was one of the first military heroes to cultivate his own public persona—the swashbuckling commander outfitted with Ray-Ban sunglasses, riding crop, and corncob pipe. Repeatedly spared from being killed in battle—his soldiers nicknamed him “Bullet Proof”—he had a strong sense of divine mission. “Mac” was a man possessed, in the words of one of his contemporaries, of a “supreme and almost mystical faith that he could not fail.” Yet when he did, it was on an epic scale. His willingness to defy both civilian and military authority was, Herman shows, a lifelong trait—and it would become his undoing. Tellingly, MacArthur once observed, “Sometimes it is the order one disobeys that makes one famous.” To capture the life of such an outsize figure in one volume is no small achievement. With Douglas MacArthur, Arthur Herman has set a new standard for untangling the legacy of this American legend. Praise for Douglas MacArthur “This is revisionist history at its best and, hopefully, will reopen a debate about the judgment of history and MacArthur’s place in history.”—New York Journal of Books “Unfailingly evocative . . . close to an epic . . . More than a biography, it is a tale of a time in the past almost impossible to contemplate today as having taken place, with MacArthur himself as a figure perhaps too remote to understand, but all the more important to encounter.”—The New Criterion “With Douglas MacArthur: American Warrior, the prolific and talented historian Arthur Herman has delivered an expertly rendered, compulsively readable account that does full justice to MacArthur’s monumental achievements without slighting his equally monumental flaws.”—Commentary

MacArthur's Jungle War

MacArthur's Jungle War
Author: Stephen R. Taaffe
Publisher:
Total Pages: 338
Release: 1998
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN:

His book tells not only how victory was gained through a combination of technology, tactics, and army-navy cooperation but also how the New Guinea campaign exemplified the strategic differences that plagued the Pacific War, since many high-ranking officers considered it a diversionary tactic rather than a key offensive.

MacArthur's War

MacArthur's War
Author: Stanley Weintraub
Publisher: Free Press
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2008-11-21
Genre: History
ISBN: 9781439152942

Douglas MacArthur towers over twentieth-century American history. His fame is based chiefly on his World War II service in the Philippines. Yet Korea, America's forgotten war, was far more "MacArthur's War" -- and it remains one of our most brutal and frightening. In just three years thirty-five thousand Americans lost their lives -- more than three times the rate of losses in Vietnam. Korea, like Vietnam, was a breeding ground for the crimes of war. To this day, six thousand Americans remain MIA. It was Korea where American troops faced a Communist foe for the first time, as both China and the Soviet Union contributed troops to the North Korean cause. The war that nearly triggered the use of nuclear weapons reveals MacArthur at his most flamboyant, flawed, yet still, at times, brilliant. Acclaimed historian Stanley Weintraub offers a thrilling blow-by-blow account of the key actions of the Korean War during the months of MacArthur's command. Our lack of preparedness for the invasion, our disastrous retreat to a corner of Korea, the daring landing at Inchon, the miscalculations in pursuing the enemy north, the headlong retreats from the Yalu River and Chosin Reservoir, and the clawing back to the 38th parallel, all can be blamed or credited to MacArthur. He was imperious, vain, blind to criticism, and so insubordinate that Truman was forced to fire him. Yet years later, the war would end where MacArthur had left it, at the border that still stands as one of history's last frontiers between communism and freedom. MacArthur's War draws on extensive archival research, memoirs, and the latest findings from archives in the formerly communist world, to weave a rich tale in the voices of its participants. From MacArthur and his upper cadre, to feisty combat correspondent Maggie Higgins and her fellow journalists, to the grunts who bore the brunt of MacArthur's decisions, for good and ill, this is a harrowing account of modern warfare at its bloodiest. MacArthur's War is the gripping story of the Korean War and its soldiers -- and of the one soldier who dominated the rest.

The Most Dangerous Man in America

The Most Dangerous Man in America
Author: Mark Perry
Publisher: Basic Books
Total Pages: 417
Release: 2014-04-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 0465080677

At times, even his admirers seemed unsure of what to do with General Douglas MacArthur. Imperious, headstrong, and vain, MacArthur matched an undeniable military genius with a massive ego and a rebellious streak that often seemed to destine him for the dustbin of history. Yet despite his flaws, MacArthur is remembered as a brilliant commander whose combined-arms operation in the Pacific -- the first in the history of warfare -- secured America's triumph in World War II and changed the course of history. In The Most Dangerous Man in America, celebrated historian Mark Perry examines how this paradox of a man overcame personal and professional challenges to lead his countrymen in their darkest hour. As Perry shows, Franklin Roosevelt and a handful of MacArthur's subordinates made this feat possible, taming MacArthur, making him useful, and finally making him victorious. A gripping, authoritative biography of the Pacific Theater's most celebrated and misunderstood commander, The Most Dangerous Man in America reveals the secrets of Douglas MacArthur's success -- and the incredible efforts of the men who made it possible.

The General vs. the President

The General vs. the President
Author: H. W. Brands
Publisher: Anchor
Total Pages: 482
Release: 2017-10-03
Genre: History
ISBN: 1101912170

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From the two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist, bestselling historian, and author of Our First Civil War comes the riveting story of how President Harry Truman and General Douglas MacArthur squared off to decide America's future in the aftermath of World War II. "A highly readable take on the clash of two titanic figures in a period of hair-trigger nuclear tensions.... History offers few antagonists with such dramatic contrasts, and Brands brings these two to life." —Los Angeles Times At the height of the Korean War, President Harry S. Truman committed a gaffe that sent shock waves around the world, when he suggested that General Douglas MacArthur, the willful, fearless, and highly decorated commander of the American and U.N. forces, had his finger on the nuclear trigger. At a time when the Soviets, too, had the bomb, the specter of a catastrophic third World War lurked menacingly close on the horizon. A correction quickly followed, but the damage was done; two visions for America’s path forward were clearly in opposition, and one man would have to make way. The contest of wills between these two titanic characters unfolds against the turbulent backdrop of a faraway war and terrors conjured at home by Joseph McCarthy. From the drama of Stalin’s blockade of West Berlin to the daring landing of MacArthur’s forces at Inchon to the shocking entrance of China into the war, The General and the President vividly evokes the making of a new American era.

MacArthur

MacArthur
Author: James W. Zobel
Publisher: Stackpole Books
Total Pages: 218
Release: 2015-04-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 0811715477

General Douglas MacArthur was one of the most colorful, controversial, and image-conscious military figures of the twentieth century. This military biography in photos captures the spirit of the man and his legend in hundreds of historical images. • Focuses on the Pacific theater of World War II • Features his decorated service in World War I, postwar duties in Japan, and role in the Korean War • Compelling reference for military history fans, scholars, and anyone interested in this legendary military figure

MacArthur's War

MacArthur's War
Author: Bevin Alexander
Publisher: Berkley
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2013
Genre: Civil-military relations
ISBN: 9780425261200

Douglas MacArthur famously said there is no substitute for victory . . . As a United States general, he had an unparalleled genius for military strategy, and it was under his leadership that Japan was rebuilt into a democratic ally after World War II. But MacArthur carried out his zero-sum philosophy both on and off the battlefield. During the Korean War, in defiance of President Harry S. Truman and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, he pushed for an aggressive confrontation with Communist China - a position intended to provoke a wider war, regardless of the cost or consequences. MacArthur's ambition to stamp out Communism across the globe was in direct opposition to President Truman, who was much more concerned with containing the Soviet Union than confronting Red China. The infamous clash between the two leaders was not only an epic turning point in history, but the ultimate struggle between civil and military power in the United States. While other U.S. generals have challenged presidential authority - from Zachary Taylor in the Mexican War and George B. McClellan in the Civil War to General Stanley A. McChrystal in Afghanistan - no other military leader has ever so brazenly attempted to dictate national policy. In MacArthur's War, Bevin Alexander details MacArthur's military and political battles, from the alliances he made with Republican leaders to the threatening ultimatum he delivered to China against orders - the action that directly led to his dismissal on April 11, 1951. 'Bevin Alexander's MacArthur's Waris a superbly written, blow-by-blow account of the most controversial civil-military clash in American history. His riveting narrative pulls no punches as it reveals how the feisty U.S. president confronted America's most revered military hero against the backdrop of brutal Korean War combat.' Colonel Jerry D. Morelock, PhD, U.S. Army (Ret.), and editor in chief of Armchair General 'When President Harry Truman relieved General Douglas MacArthur of all his military commands at the height of the Korean War, it was a seminal moment in American history . . . Bevin Alexander's hard-hitting narrative captures in vivid detail the elements of that contest, as well as the chain of significant events that produced it . . . MacArthur's Waris a valuable account of a chapter in the Cold War that we must never forget.' Harry J. Middleton, founding director of the Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library at the University of Texas, and author of LBJ- The White House Years 'Bevin Alexander has written a stirring and insightful account of General Douglas MacArthur's controversial role in the Korean War that culminated . . . Carlo D'Este, author of Patton- A Genius for War 'The last sentence of the introduction of MacArthur's War provides author Bevin Alexander's contention that 'Truman, in his quiet and unassuming way, saved the United States of America.' Thereafter the chapters build a very interesting account of Douglas MacArthur's initial brilliant Inchon assault, his strategy and tactics that led to rapid advances before his concepts for capturing and freeing North Korea collapsed in defeat, and finally his resort to political confrontation with the president. How and why he lost, tarnished his reputation, and justified the sweeping observation of Truman's impact is a fascinating, factual, and well-documented study. It is blunt, harsh, and critical of MacArthur's last year of service, more tolerant and understanding of Truman, but overall, a fair portrayal of history.' Generl Frederick J. Kroesen, former vice chief of staff of the U.S. Army and commander in chief, U.S. Army Europe Includes Photographs

MacArthur's Airman

MacArthur's Airman
Author: Thomas E. Griffith, Jr.
Publisher: University Press of Kansas
Total Pages: 352
Release: 2017-01-20
Genre: History
ISBN: 0700624465

A fighter pilot who flew 75 combat missions in World War I, George C. Kenney was a charismatic leader who established himself as an innovative advocate of air power. As General MacArthur's air commander in the Southwest Pacific during World War II, Kenney played a pivotal role in the conduct of the war, but until now his performance has remained largely unexplored. Thomas Griffith offers a critical assessment of Kenney's numerous contributions to MacArthur's war efforts. He depicts Kenney as a staunch proponent of airpower's ability to shape the outcome of military engagements and a commander who shared MacArthur's strategic vision. He tells how Kenney played a key role in campaigns from New Guinea to the Philippines; adapted aircraft, pilots, doctrine, and technology to the demands of aerial warfare in the southwest Pacific; and pursued daring strategies that likely would have failed in the European theater. Kenney is shown to have been an operational and organizational innovator who was willing to scrap doctrine when the situation called for ingenuity, such as shifting to low-level attacks for more effective bombing raids. Griffith tells how Kenney established air superiority in every engagement, provided close air support for troops by bombing enemy supply lines, attacked and destroyed Japanese supply ships, and carried out rapid deployment by airlifting troops and supplies. Griffith draws on Kenney's diary and correspondence, the personal papers of other officers, and previously untapped sources to present a comprehensive portrayal of both the officer and the man. He illuminates Kenney's relationship with MacArthur, General "Hap" Arnold, and other field commanders, and closely examines factors in air warfare often neglected in other accounts, such as intelligence, training, and logistical support. MacArthur's Airman is a rich and insightful study that shows how air, ground, and marine efforts were integrated to achieve major strategic objectives. It firmly establishes the importance of MacArthur's campaign in New Guinea and reveals Kenney's instrumental role in turning the tide against the Japanese.