Halberstam and History

There has been a lot of hype about the publication of David Halberstam’s book, published shortly after his death in an automobile accident. While I have a great deal of respect for Halberstam, both as an author and as a historian, I am hoping that the book does not, as has been suggested by those who have already seen it, fall into the trap of so many books on the Korean War.

The trap is that for them the Korean War is an afterthought. Their war, the one that concerns them, is Vietnam—and they use it to recount their concern and deliver their insights about their own experiences. Hopefully Halberstam was a good enough interpreter of history that he has not fallen into this pattern. As the book is called "The Coldest Winter", hopefully he has also not fallen into a retelling of the story of the Chosen Reservoir as if it was the whole conflict. When it is readily available we will see.

Senior Fellow, Paul M. Edwards

From Stalemate to War

During the early phases of the Korean War, specifically on one important occasion on 9 January 1951, General Douglas MacArthur recommended to the Joint Chiefs of Staff that troops be withdrawn from Korea. Earlier the Joint Chiefs had identified MacArthur’s job as holding a series of defensive lines in Korea, causing as much harm to the enemy as possible, and then if that failed, to withdraw and see to the defense of Japan.

Interestingly, according to the release of some Soviet archives from the period, we now know that Joseph Stalin was also expressing the belief that Chinese Volunteers should stay north of the 38th parallel in order to avoid provoking a larger international war. It was from this political and military stalemate that the tide began to shift, the UN took the initiative while at the same time trying to open up talks on a potential cease fire.

Senior Fellow, Paul M. Edwards

Operation Blueheart

The 22nd of July, 1950, was the original date set by General MacArthur for Operation Blueheart. Blueheart was the plan to invade the North through Inchon, a plan carried out several months later, 15 September 1950, as Operation Chromite.



While the plan was drawn, and MacArthur was ready for an immediate response to the North Korean advances, there were just not enough troops to hold the advancing North Koreans and still pull out enough to make the end-around invasion. It was necessary to wait until the middle of September before elements of the First Marine Division were available, with the 7th Infantry Division, to make the highly successful assault.



One must wonder what the outcome would have been if the earlier attack had been possible.

http://www.koreanwar.org/; http://www.cnn.com/; http://www.korean-war.com/.



Senior Fellow, Paul M. Edwards