No figure of the Korean War looms quite so large as General of the Army Douglas MacArthur, simultaneously brilliant, ar- rogant, inscrutable, successful, and fallen—all the elements of a Greek tragedy. His military career, spanning the major portion of the twentieth century, also ren- ders him appealing as a symbol of broader themes of that war and of American soci- ety. So we come to Stanley Weintraub’s MacArthur’s War, advertised on its dust jacket as a “fascinating, well rendered history of the general who refuses to fade away,” a book based on “extensive re- search in primary and secondary sources and laced with colorful anecdotes.
