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The Dragon Strikes: China and the Korean War: June-December 1950. By Patrick C. Roe. Novato, Calif.: Presidio, 2000. ISBN 0-89141-703-6. Maps. Glossary. Appendixes. Notes. Bibliography. Index. Pp. xvi. 480. 34.95.
Patrick Roe's The Dragon Strikes is one of the many books marking the fiftieth anniversary of the Korean War. Roe is a veteran of that bitter conflict, having served in the Seventh Marine Regiment through some of the hardest fighting any American military unit ever endured. His emotional investment in his story is obvious, but strengthens rather than weakens his account.
The author focuses on China's decision to intervene in the peninsula and the effect of that decision on the war. Roe aims to tell the "comprehensive story of how we got into that situation, what the Chinese were doing, what decisions...