Douglas MacArthur: The Far Eastern General

by Michael Schaller (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  1991

  $12.31

  Douglas MacArthur, a key military figure in the American recovery of the Pacific during World War II, its occupation of Japan, and the subsequent, ill-starred incursion into North Korea, provoked widely varying opinions even at the height of his fame. George Stratemeyer, his top air officer in Japan, called him the greatest man in history , yet Franklin Roosevelt considered his defence of Corregidor criminal and Harry Truman declared his return to the Philippines a fiasco . This biography provides a critical study of the American Caesar , whose delayed reaction to the attack on Pearl Harbour cost the USA nearly all of its Philippines-based B-17 bombers, whose interference in foreign policy was often destructive, and whose attempts to become President can best be described as futile. Professor Schaller's portrait of a man torn between talent and opportunism, duty and ego, also provides background to current American relations with the Far East.