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The Dragon Strikes: China and the Korean War, June-December 1950
Patrick C. Roe. Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 2000. 466 pp. Maps. Index. $34.95 ($31.45).
Reviewed by J. Robert Moskin
We fought-and lost-our first war with Communist China in the fall of 1950 because timid civilian leaders failed to stop General of the Army Douglas MacArthur from provoking China into entering the Korean War. This is Patrick Roe's assertion in The Dragon Strikes; he exposes the way the year-old People's Republic of China defeated U.N. forces in North Korea and how our leaders failed to respond to what MacArthur called "an entirely new war."
In September 1950, Communist China threatened to send its armies to support North Korea if U.S. troops approached the Yalu River border. At Wake Island on 15 October, MacArthur assured President Truman that the Chinese would not intervene. Within five days, relates Roe, who was a Marine bat'alion intelligence officer in the Korean War, 12 Chinese divisions started crossing the Yalu River...