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Title: MacArthur and Defeat in the Philippines by Richard Connaughton ISBN: 1-58567-118-5 Publisher: Overlook Press Pub. Date: 19 March, 2001 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $35.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.67 (3 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Objective study of MacArthur' true roll in the Pillippines
Comment: I found this work on McArthur the best objective opinion of this military "icon" written to date. It was appropriate and necessary for such a work to be written by an academic historian who was not an American in order to obtain an objective view of such a controversial man in American history. I would like to see the author write a similar analysis of McArthur's generalship in the Korean conflict. I think the author could have gained a more complete understand of the reduction of the Air Corps forces if he had reviewed the fine article by Richard Slater found in the November 1987 issue of Airpower Magazine.
Rating: 5
Summary: What might have been
Comment: This book makes an excellent contribution to a chapter of history that has been overlooked. Connaughton shows that the seeds of a possible US-Japan confrontation in the Philippines were sown decades earlier. Could it have been anticipated? MacArthur's career has many examples of his military brilliance and personal bravery which are at odds with his dismal performance in the Philippines between December 1941 and April 1942. MacArthur had five years to prepare for the defense of the Philippines and his strategic plan called for Japan to land troops at Lingayen, exactly where they did. Yet lack of co-ordination among his senior military commanders and the US Navy, together with sudden changes to long developed defense plans allowed the Japanese to land virtually unopposed, making defeat inevitable.
It is intriguing to speculate how a successful defense, which should have been possible given the fact that the Japanese landed exactly where MacArthur expected them to, might have changed the course of World War II.
MacArthur is fortunate that widespread US setbacks early in the war neccesitated a national hero and allowed him the opportunity to restore his reputation. Even today there are many people who cannot accept the idea that MacArthur made any mistakes, as other reviews of this book make clear. Perhaps another writer will one day tell us why MacArthur was so convinced that the Chinese would not attack across the Yalu during the Korean war. This mistake resulted in a massive setback for the UN forces and added years to that war.
Rating: 1
Summary: Well Written, But Misconceived
Comment: This is another in a long line of dispise MacArthur books.
Here are a few of its misconceptions:
1. Mac Arthur was a great hero of World War I - virtually the only general officer who actually led his his troops into action on the Western front. His personal courage was unquestionable, and should not have been called into question during the battle for the Philippines.
2. At that time (1941/42)he was the Commanding General of the allied forces in the Philippines, just as Eisenhower was in Europe in 1944/45. How much time did Ike spend on the beaches of Normandy in June of 1944 or in Belgium during the Battle of the Bulge? Yet MacArthur was called "Dugout Doug" for not managing the defense of the Philippines from a fox hole on Bataan. This has always been utter nonsense!
3. In December 1941 MacArthur was as bereft of intelligence information from the War Department as were his counterparts in Hawaii.
4. His defensive operations were dictated by "War Plan Orange," - originally developed by the War Department during the 1920's and still in effect in 1941/42 - which required a retreat into the Bataan Peninsula until the Philippine defense forces could be relieved by reinforcements from the U.S., following a victory over the Japanese Navy in the mid Pacific. Pearl Harbor forclosed such a naval victory for six months and thereby doomed the defense of the Philippines.
5. In spite of their mutual dislike President Roosevelt ordered MacArthur out of the Philippines to command allied forces in Australia. He, at least, recognized MacArthur's inestimable value as a military commander.
6. Against all odds the Philippines held out for six months, until May 6, 1942 - the day of the Battle of the Coral Sea, and one month before the great American naval victory at Midway, which was the turning point of the war in the Pacific. The British surrendered Singapore in February 1942, within two months of the Japanese invasion of Malaya.
7. Ultimately the criticisms of MacArthur come down, as usual, to the claim that he was "arrogant." Well, so what? Was not Alexander the Great arrogant? Was not Julius Caesar arrogant? How about Napoleon? Wellington? Field Marshall Montgomery? George S. Patton? Even Washington was accused by his enemies of being aloof and arrogant. Only U.S. Grant is remembered as a humble soldier. There is no particular military virtue in humility. Douglas Mac Arthur was one of the four or five truly great strategic geniuses in American military history. He desreved his pride. What's more, his self confidence was, without doubt, an essential element in his military genius. It's time to stop criticising him for being who he was.
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Title: Crisis in the Pacific : The Battles for the Philippine Islands by the Men Who Fought Them by Gerald Astor ISBN: 0440236959 Publisher: Dell Pub. Date: 02 January, 2002 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: Corregidor by Eric Morris ISBN: 0815410859 Publisher: Cooper Square Press Pub. Date: November, 2000 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: Battle for Manila by John Pimlott, Duncan Anderson, Richard Connaughton ISBN: 0891417710 Publisher: Presidio Press Pub. Date: 03 January, 2002 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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Title: Pacific Alamo: The Battle for Wake Island by John Wukovits ISBN: 0451208730 Publisher: New American Library Pub. Date: 01 July, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: Reminiscences by Douglas MacArthur ISBN: 1557504830 Publisher: United States Naval Inst. Pub. Date: March, 2001 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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