ronald_schoedel's review
5.0
Blaine Harden has brought to light a history of the Korean War that most Americans will find very surprising. We all know about the crazy Kim family of North Korea that threatens destruction to America and keeps their population in fear of a militarily crazed American bogeyman. What most Americans don’t know is that American forces in actual fact napalmed every last city and village in North Korea during the Korean War. The Kim dictators base their fear-inducing narrative on fact. The reality is America took it upon itself to draw an arbitrary line on a map (literally) and then destroy everything above that line, including countless civilian men, women, and children.
The American people also might not know that Americans actually fought real Russians in Russian aircraft during the Korean War. What sort of international crisis could that have sparked had that incident become known at the time?
So whilst this narrative centers on the “King of Spies” and whilst that narrative is chilling and makes one wonder what in the heck the Far East command was doing at the time that the King of Spies could be permitted to do all the dastardly deeds this book chronicles, it also tells the bigger story of an America that turned a blind eye to South Korean torture and murder by the hundreds of thousands and which burnt an entire country to the ground and bombed it back past the Stone Age, setting the stage for decades of accurate propaganda in favor of the Kims.
The full story of the Korean War seems to only be coming out in recent years, and it is more horrendous than many Americans will care to know about. America is being shown to be an aggressor and a butcher of innocents. But the truth must be known.
Don Nichols’ role in that war was outsized for a middle-school dropout with no formal training in spy craft, and his story is both fascinating and sad.
The American people also might not know that Americans actually fought real Russians in Russian aircraft during the Korean War. What sort of international crisis could that have sparked had that incident become known at the time?
So whilst this narrative centers on the “King of Spies” and whilst that narrative is chilling and makes one wonder what in the heck the Far East command was doing at the time that the King of Spies could be permitted to do all the dastardly deeds this book chronicles, it also tells the bigger story of an America that turned a blind eye to South Korean torture and murder by the hundreds of thousands and which burnt an entire country to the ground and bombed it back past the Stone Age, setting the stage for decades of accurate propaganda in favor of the Kims.
The full story of the Korean War seems to only be coming out in recent years, and it is more horrendous than many Americans will care to know about. America is being shown to be an aggressor and a butcher of innocents. But the truth must be known.
Don Nichols’ role in that war was outsized for a middle-school dropout with no formal training in spy craft, and his story is both fascinating and sad.
socraticgadfly's review
5.0
Fascinating book. I had never heard of Donald Nichols before, but when I saw this book on the remaindered shelf at Dollar Tree, I took a look. Then, when I saw Bruce Cumings blurb it, I had to get it.
This book shows incontrovertibly how MacArthur and his toady Willoughby had clear evidence of Kim Il Sung's plans to invade South Korea, and a couple of months in advance, from an Air Force non-com, and eventual officer, who wormed his way into Syngman Rhee's graces enough to call him Father, and from there, make connections to ROK intelligence forces, and from there, pick up basics of the invasion plans.
After the invasion, Nichols, at the Pusan Perimeter, organized a team to find the weak spot on a T-34 tank. Later, he organized another team to salvage info that it could from the first MiG downed near ROK/US/UN lines. And, in both cases, lied about his personal on-the-ground involvement.
Yet, after getting USAF protectors to keep the Army and/or CIA from stealing him, he was drummed out of the military by 1957. Was it because of his abusiveness to inferior officers and non-coms, as alleged? Shuffled off the stage because of propping up Rhee too much? Gay, but contra the norm, kept on the QT because of his intell background?
This book shows incontrovertibly how MacArthur and his toady Willoughby had clear evidence of Kim Il Sung's plans to invade South Korea, and a couple of months in advance, from an Air Force non-com, and eventual officer, who wormed his way into Syngman Rhee's graces enough to call him Father, and from there, make connections to ROK intelligence forces, and from there, pick up basics of the invasion plans.
After the invasion, Nichols, at the Pusan Perimeter, organized a team to find the weak spot on a T-34 tank. Later, he organized another team to salvage info that it could from the first MiG downed near ROK/US/UN lines. And, in both cases, lied about his personal on-the-ground involvement.
Yet, after getting USAF protectors to keep the Army and/or CIA from stealing him, he was drummed out of the military by 1957. Was it because of his abusiveness to inferior officers and non-coms, as alleged? Shuffled off the stage because of propping up Rhee too much? Gay, but contra the norm, kept on the QT because of his intell background?
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