The General vs. the President: MacArthur and Truman at the Brink of Nuclear War

Pulitzer Prize finalist Brands (history, Univ. of Texas at Austin; Reagan: The Life) has perfected the art of popular biographies and is well qualified to recount the well-known conflict between Gen. Douglas MacArthur (1880–1964) and Harry S. Truman (1884–1972) on whether or not to attack China during the Korean War. MacArthur, an ambitious five-star general who sought glory during World War II and the Korean War, was once considered by Franklin D. Roosevelt to be the greatest threat to American democracy. Truman unexpectedly assumed the presidency upon Roosevelt's death and would have preferred remaining in the Senate. Though MacArthur sometimes sneered at politicians, he hungered for the presidency in 1940, 1944, and 1952. In short, pointed chapters, Brands captures the dilemmas of foreign policy during the Cold War, pitting a self-effacing democratic personality against a cagey authoritarian. The author demonstrates that both Truman and the democratic process ultimately triumphed from the president's willingness to forego short-run success.