General Douglas MacArthur

After a heroic, if flawed, performance coordinating the battle in the Pacific, in which he struck where the Japanese were weak, in order to weaken the places where they were strong, General MacArthur became Supreme Commander in the Asian region. This totally went to his head.

His self-absorption cause two MAJOR losses in the Korean War. The first was our initial entry. He surrounded himself with loyal officers, and doctored intelligence reports to ensure he looked good. At first, this led almost to the annihilation of South Korea. the actions of the limited, very green US troops in the area faltered, only finally digging in at the Pusan perimeter. MAcarthur salvaged this with the landings at Inchon.

After that, though, he blatantly refused to acknowledge that the Chinese were going to enter the war. He split the 10th Army and had them trudge north to the Yalu river, at the onset of Korean winter, with the troops in their summer gear.

The closer the army got to the Yalu, the more apparent it became that not only were the Chinese going to enter the war, but there were already some 300,000 Chinese elite "volunteers" in Korea, waiting for ambush.

When that trap closed, it effectively annihilated the 2nd battalion.

The reason the trap was allowed to close was that MacArthur was playing politics. He would not allow any intelligence form the field to show that he was wrong about the Chinese.

As the war progressed, he because more and more politically active, in effect attempting to forge a new foreign policy in Asia. The problem with that is that wasn't his job. This eventually led President Truman to strip him of his command.

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