I endeavoured to follow through my readings of the Vietnam conflict, from my last post, with a shopping excursion to right my centre of gravity and ensure that I tackle the history from every angle – well, more than one. Being a historian first and foremost this is part of the obligation that is owed to the seriousness of the subject, apparently. I, of course, am not a historian, but I can read and do and pretend at the writing part. My esteemed colleague, of the Secular Sundays posts, lent me his encyclopaedic knowledge of sixties and seventies American writings with a collection of Michael Herr-equalling shots of literature to vacuum up my soul into the US Armed Forces. Two things happened to impel a slight discursion on my Nam – centric world view.
• Firstly, while perusing the four epic floors of Hodges and Figges (certainly they must have every book in the world) I found (as is normal practice for me) I couldn’t find two of the books on my list. Being a total independent I refused to ask for help from the staff, so I started to flick through the recently published section. My United States historiafied mind saw David Halberstam’s The Coldest Winter sitting in a paperback edition, then sitting on the shop counter and then travelling to my home in a paper bag. I forgot to continue looking for the books I came in for; I plowed through the sharp chapters of Halberstam and fell into the Korean War.
• Secondly, I discovered the flawless work of stunning breadth that is Generation Kill, David Simon and Ed Burn’s (The Wire in television, The Corner in non-fiction gold-medal genius) play-like adaptation, of the book of the same name, following a first recon division in the Second Iraq conflict; as they weave through the desert mess of former-Mesopotamia and founder in the incompetence of the United States strategic armed forces.
Halberstam, very sadly, passed away not long after he finished work on this tome. I had for a long time meant to pick up just one of his many searing topical books, which tackle US history. The Coldest Winter is a lengthy walk through the miserable counter-Soviet, counter-Communist mess that was the three year Korean conflict. A prelude to Vietnam and the half a dozen later skirmishes with Soviet imperialist agenda, the Korean War was as much an aberration of modern war as it was a dynamic statement of US hegemony in East Asia. Akin to Nam, where the terrain was as much hostile as the opposition, Korea was simply staggeringly poor conditions. One of the major themes of the book (and which I intend to pursue in a later post on Korea) was the ineptitude of Douglas MacArthur. True the man was very old at this stage, but to say he was mildly sluggish when the North invaded in the South, would be an understatement. I found myself once again agog that MacArthur was so immune to any negativity: having recently read Max Hastings authoritative work on the final stages of the US pacific campaign of WWII, Nemesis, were Hastings depicted MacArthur as, definitively, a loose cannon, and, likely, insane. It was interesting (read: horrifying) to see this consistent interpretation of the Pacific Supreme Commander, and American warhero, continue into the opening pages of The Coldest Winter.
I could not fail to draw comparisons to Michael Herr’s withering portrayal of MACV which spent its time effectively trying to make it appear as though the Americans were winning when they were clearly not. MacArthur, following absurd decisions carried over from the pacific campaign, deliberately refused to use any intelligence that did not specifically agree with his own strategic opinion. This fantasy existed until it was fatal, and then frequently was ignored – though MacArthur was eventually found out in Korea. Most of this madness was rolling around my mind when I sat down and watched the first three episodes of Generation Kill. Not surprisingly the themes reappeared with the narrative following the grunts on the ground in Iraq, as they encounter the Ba’athists in a sea of despairing locals. Once again the strategic objective is poorly actioned, or hopelessly ignored. This, of course, does not lessen the impact of this finely crafted story. I mentioned above that it has a play-like feel to it – and this is no joke. Absolute rivers of dialogue materialise and hang around the scenes. In the similar way to, say, Tarantino pours forth the open conversations, walling in the tale; Generation is hilarious and serious in equal measure. I shall wander through the rest of the episodes, as I sit and wait out The Pacific which lands next month. I wonder how they will deal with MacArthur in that programme.
I endeavoured to follow through my readings of the Vietnam conflict, from my last post, with a shopping excursion to right my centre of gravity and ensure that I tackle the history from every angle – well, more than one. Being a historian first and foremost this is part of the obligation that is owed to the seriousness of the subject, apparently. I, of course, am not a historian, but I can read and do and pretend at the writing part. My esteemed colleague, of the Secular Sundays posts, lent me his encyclopaedic knowledge of sixties and seventies American writings with a collection of Michael Herr-equalling shots of literature to vacuum up my soul into the US Armed Forces. Two things happened to impel a slight discursion on my Nam – centric world view. (continue reading…)
