Leadership In The Crucible: The Korean War battles of Twin Tunnels and Chipyong-ni -- by Kenneth Hamburger

 

Leadership is the keyword here.

Author Col. Kenneth Hamburger was a West Point History professor when he wrote this as both its own self-contained history lesson, and a lesson in leadership in 2003. Army administrative heroes like then Colonel Paul Freeman and French Lt. Col. Ralph Monclar were the good guys. 

U.S. Army Col. Marcel Crombez, who led the armored relief column that broke the three-day siege at Chipyong-ni, received plenty of criticism for his handling of that assignment. He allowed soldiers to ride on tanks in the gauntlet fired on from both sides of the road, leading to Chipyong-ni. Not all of them made it.

Freeman was wounded in the lower leg in a mortar attack. However, he was very fortunate that he had momentarily just switched from having his head where his lower body had been on a cot in his tent.

Monclar, then 58, was one of the most experienced and decorated French war veterans in the 20th century and was a three-star general prior to going to Korea. He self-imposed his own rank reduction so he could participate in the United Nations' action against the invading communist forces. He impressed many when climbing the surrounding hills and mountains on patrol with the younger soldiers, despite his age.

The fierceness of the French was also noted in their numerous bayonet charges when ammunition ran out. They entered Korean action with a chip on their shoulders from the French army's quick collapse against the invading Germans in 1940.

Freeman rose to become one of the U.S. Army's top generals before retirement, and his eventual death at 80 in 1988. This was Monclar's last war. He died in France in 1964. Both were certainly worthy of more attention than only Hamburger's West Point cadets. Both also demonstrated genuine concern for their troops.

Monclar reached retirement age in 1952 after having served since WWI. He was wounded many times but died from heart failure in 1964 at 72. He was also a polyglot, speaking several languages. Freeman was assigned to China early in his career in the 1930s where he also seized the moment and learned to speak Chinese -- a job skill he used to interrogate battlefield prisoners. Both also believed that it was important to lead from upfront with the men.

Hamburger noted that communist troops ran, exposing themselves to heavy Allied fire and many casualties when Crombez's relief column arrived. The UN victory is credited with being decisive in halting any further communist advances toward the south.

Leadership reads easily and quickly.

 

There were some editing errors, combined with maybe too much military jargon for the average reader, but in all fairness, High Tide flowed very nicely illuminating an undeserved obscure place in history.

The combined U.S., French, and South Korean victory over the Chinese and North Korean multitude of thousands is worthy of much greater attention. The main problem it faced in the past was the Korean War time slot, 1950-1953, being too soon after WWII. But the United Nations' response and the cultures it brought to the world stage have rarely been touched by creative writers and researchers. Besides France, the UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Greece, Turkey, South Africa, Ethiopia, Colombia, Thailand, The Philippines, Belgium, and even little tiny Luxembourg sent fighting forces. The Scandinavian countries, along with Italy, and India sent medical support.

One of the most emotional stories to come out of this international endeavor was the Turkish troops' adoptive care for Ayla, an orphaned little girl. There are no doubt other stories from that war just waiting for writers and film crews.

It was a televised documentary about the decisive battles at Twin Tunnels and Chipyong-ni that prompted author Leo Barron, who most often writes about WWII, to write High Tide in 2015.

"Immediately I was intrigued. The central elements of the story were right out of a Hollywood blockbuster: a single U.S. Army infantry regiment found itself trapped behind enemy lines, facing several Chinese Army divisions. Despite the long odds, the 23rd Infantry Division, together with its attached French Battalion, whipped the Chinese divisions and altered the course of the Korean War.," Barron wrote in his introduction. "The story was tailor-made for a great movie. After reading more about the engagement, I asked myself, why I had never heard of the Battle of Chipyong-ni?"

Barron noted that Korea has few anchors in popular American culture. He's absolutely correct, but possibly the new movie Devotion, filmed partly just a few miles from here at the Statesboro Airport might help plug that hole in our education.

High Tide is laid down in order with serious detail, and bolstered by maps.

There's a mystery in the maps for me. I come across several of the immediate battle areas showing a Som River. As most any military historian would know one of the biggest fights in the trenches of WWI in France was the Battle of the Somme (River). I'm still working on that one for a French perspective on that name similarity, and any possible ironies.

Personally, any forthcoming media on Korea would get my attention. That was my dad's war, even if he was off the coast on the Manchester as a radioman and gunnery mate, and off the boat at Yokosuka, Japan when on leave. I worked in China for six years, and can't believe I never visited Korea or Japan. What stories have I missed?

Higher Is Waiting -- by Tyler Perry

 

Tyler Perry isn't rushing you, here. He lets you think and helps you think.

It was a pleasant read, and very personal -- for the reader. I found several points here that I could identify with. I appreciated that. A lot of forethought was put into the writing and layout. It glides along nicely, mixing autobiography, and careful reflection.

It is a bit religious, and preachy, and it hits those open spots in a reader's mind. It will not put you into the blues. Quite to the contrary.

Tyler Perry grew up in New Orleans, but not in a wonderful environment. His father Emmitt was abusive, and he persevered despite what he and his mother endured.

P. 50, In Nourishing The Roots, says plenty.
"Decades later, I look back on my mother's decisions, not through the lens of a child, but as a man with a family of his own, and as a man who has made his own share of mistakes. My life experience has helped me to understand why my mother stayed.
I know now that when a child is growing up, abusive voices echo loudly. I can still hear the damning things Emmitt said to me. Because of his cruelty, for many years, I didn't feel as if I deserved to be happy or successful. I didn't feel worthy because I hear his voice resonating in my head, telling me that I was nothing, that I was horrible, that I didn't deserve anything good in life. When you grow up being told those things every day, they take root in your subconscious and undermine every positive event in your life."

I'm glad my wife handed me this.

Forget The Alamo: The Rise And Fall Of An American Myth -- By Bryan Burrough, Chris Tomlinson, Jason Stanford

 

As I mentioned in my earlier notes, I doubt seriously that I could ever Forget The Alamo.

The research, plotting, and writing of co-authors Bryan Burrough, Chris Tomlinson, and Jason Stanford in Forget The Alamo might not be easy to forget, either. This book is serious food for thought, further reading, and an Alamo addiction.  Between April 1, 1992, and Dec. 1994, I frequently walked through, and around the Alamo during my newspaper days, sometimes with colleagues, and alone enough to give strong consideration to the old stories, and myths associated with the battle in 1836. This book helps distinguish between fact and fiction, and more related issues are likely to surface in the future. They fought the battle in 1836, but politics and such still roil. 

There's room for personal discovery on these pages, too. And beyond. 

I discovered my somewhat unique middle name shared with an Alamo defender from Mississippi in an unrelated internet search several months ago. Reading this, I learned that I could be of distant relation to the former slave Joe if his biological father was Daniel Boone. My favorite theory, back at the Express-News, centered around the drunken defender theory, in which this bunch of bored time-killers all really were so blasted that they were in no shape to repel a much larger force. Forget The Alamo didn't entirely debunk that possibility, either.

It goes on with many things to consider for other authors, city and state officials, and informed private citizens to learn, and eventually pilot the seemingly never-ending conflicts and controversies. 

Much of the Alamo divides come from the split between fact-seekers, and diehard myth believers. Some just can't let go of images of the drama in movies like John Wayne's 1960 The Alamo, and what proven facts tell us. A lot of this isn't necessarily a rewrite as much as it is an update with new information. We really are in a time of information surfacing, and being shared much faster than ever before. And the lack of new, researched information was part of the problem here.

"... the historian Paul Andrew Hutton marveled in 1986 "Academic historians have thus deserted the field, leaving the battle to the popularizers and propagandists."

The author trio noted the political backlash often hurled at anyone who dared offer any new information, which might differ from Heroic Anglo Narrative. There were also provincial type-casting dangers for serious academics who published anything other than the popularized Historic Anglo Narrative.

Yes, there are also racial inclusion\exclusion issues missing from those earlier versions of the story. Much of the Mexican and San Antonio native perspectives were missing from Heroic Anglo Narrative. Some of the wartime propaganda still survives today in the old narratives. We are 13 years away from the 200th anniversary of the battle.

A previously overlooked British dilemma caught my eye in these pages, too. Slaver-holding was one way for cotton planters to fly from poor to rich at the time. Forget The Alamo noted that Britain was the chief international cotton buyer and user. Ironically, it was also Britain that led the world in the international slavery movement. I presume some good historian will pick that contrast up soon, if not already. 

Plenty happened in these pages to turn my attention back toward The Alamo City. It looks like sporadic related news there, and hopefully more updated Alamo books will appear. Now, I'll be looking.