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David Halberstam's magisterial and thrilling The Best and the Brightest was the defining book for the Vietnam War. More than three decades later, Halberstam used his unrivalled research and formidable journalistic skills to shed light on another dark corner in our history: the Korean War. The Coldest Winter is a successor to The Best and the Brightest, even though in historical terms it precedes it.Halberstam considered The Coldest Winter the best book he ever wrote, the culmination of forty-five years of writing about America's postwar foreign policy.Up until now, the Korean War has been the black hole of modern American history.The Coldest Winter changes that. Halberstam gives us a masterful narrative of the political decisions and miscalculations on both sides. He charts the disastrous path that led to the massive entry of Chinese forces near the Yalu, and that caught Douglas MacArthur and his soldiers by surprise. He provides astonishingly vivid and nuanced portraits of all the major figures -- Eisenhower, Truman, Acheson, Kim, and Mao, and Generals MacArthur, Almond, and Ridgway. At the same time, Halberstam provides us with his trademark highly evocative narrative journalism, chronicling the crucial battles with reportage of the highest order.At the heart of the book are the individual stories of the soldiers on the front lines who were left to deal with the consequences of the dangerous misjudgments and competing agendas of powerful men. We meet them, follow them, and see some of the most dreadful battles in history through their eyes. As ever, Halberstam was concerned with the extraordinary courage and resolve of people asked to bear an extraordinary burden.The Coldest Winter is contemporary history in its most literary and luminescent form, and provides crucial perspective on the Vietnam War and the events of today. It was a book that Halberstam first decided to write more than thirty years ago and that took him nearly ten years to write. It stands as a lasting testament to one of the greatest journalists and historians of our time, and to the fighting men whose heroism it chronicles.Includes an Afterword by Russell BakerTributes to David HalberstamDavid Halberstam died at the age of 73 in a car accident in California on April 23, 2007, just after completing The Coldest Winter. Legendary for his work ethic, his kindness to young writers, and his unbending moral spine, Halberstam had friends and admirers throughout journalism, many of whom spoke at his memorial service and at readings across the country for the release of The Coldest Winter. We have included testimonials given at his memorial service by two writers who made their reputations at the same newspaper where he won a Pulitzer Prize for his Vietnam War reporting, The New York Times: Anna Quindlen ...David occupied a lot of space on the planet. Perhaps he felt the price he must pay for that big voice, that big reach, that big reputation, was that his generosity had to be just as large. Most of us, when we take to the road and meet admiring strangers, vow afterward to answer the note pressed into our hands or to pass along the speech we promised to the person whose daughter couldn't be there to hear it. But with the best will in the world we arrive home to deadlines, bills, kids, friends, all the demands of a busy life. We mean to be our best selves, but often we forget. David did it. He always did it. The note, the call, the book, the advice. When I mentioned this once he dug his hands deep intothe pockets of his grey flannels, set his mouth at the corners, looked down and rumbled, "Well, but it's so easy." That's nonsense. It's not easy. But it is important, and why he has been remembered with enormous affection by ordinary readers all over this country, and why each of us who live some sort of public life would do well, with all due respect to Jesus, to ask ourselves about those small encounters: what would David do? ... Read her full tributeDexter Filkins .
Once again, Halberstam is predictably great.
| Customer Rating:  | Belongs on the shelf with the rest of Halberstam's great books: The Best and the Brighttest et al.
Thank you, David, for another great read, another wonderful and accurate critique. R.I.P.
Sgt Jackson, USMC 1988-2001 |
A Very Incomplete History of the Korean War
| Customer Rating:  | | The book is interesting, but a reader expecting a comprehensive history of the Korean War will be disappointed. The focus is on the first four months of the Chinese engagement (Nov 1950 through Feb 1951) and the political background to Truman's discharge of MacArthur. Important battles -- the landing at Inchon and the retreat from Chosin -- are all but ignored. What it covers, it covers well; what it ignores leaves one puzzled. |
Not Halberstam's best work
| Customer Rating: | | If you want to read a book about the Korean War, read T.R. Fehrenbach's "This Kind of War." If you instead want a book that is about Washington insider politics of the era, then maybe Halberstam's book is for you. The serious military historian will not learn much from Halberstam, though it does provide one man's view of the impact Far Eastern political turmoil had on interal U.S. affairs. |
The Coldest Winter
| Customer Rating: | | The Coldest Winter by David Halberstam is not a perfect history of the Korean War. There were two historical facts missing which I think any credible historian would have to mention. One is the incident at the Bridge of Tokun Ri where hundreds of civilians were killed by American troops in what is euphenistically known as a "friendly fire" incident. The other is the disgraceful conduct of the all-Black 92nd Regiment which was disbanded as "unbreliable" after they broke ranks and ran to the rear after hearing their first gunshot. History is a moving target and the first casualty in war is the truth. Here's a tip. Go to any library and check out the books of history of the Vietnam War. If you find no reference to "fraggings", you know you aren't going to read the whole truth but one that has been sanitized. Fraggings refers to the murder or attempted murder of U.S. officers or non-coms by their own men. The weapon of choice was a fragmentation grenade which leaves no fingerprints. More than 1,000 U.S. officers and non-coms were murdered by their own men during the war with thousands more wounded. These are estimates. The U.S. army only kept records for about 18 months in 1970-71 and recorded several hundred fraggings. And this is just one service branch, not counting the Marines, Navy or Air Force. Always read history as a moving target and understand that in a war, the first casulty is truth. |
Too Much Ink
| Customer Rating: | Being a little familiar with the topic, I decided to give this rather thick book a quick "test run". Being a lot more familiar with the Turkish Brigade history in the Korean War, I looked for it in the lengthy index. There was no entry on the Brigade, Turkey or Turks at all. Sure the book is about Americans, but Turkey was the first country to answer UN's call right after US, and suffered one of the highest rate and total casualties. Also the Brigade was closely attached to an American division. In disbelief I turned the pages to Kunuri battles, and sure enough, buried in a mountain of other details, they were there.
There was a very brief and superfluous description of them but little else or any background.
Secondly, there was this unflattering description of their action at Kunuri, where upon taking one look at the approaching Chinese forces they supposedly realized that they were out of their depth and pulled away. In reality, the massive Chinese assault had caught all UN forces by surprise. Whole ROK army to their right simply disintegrated in the face of the brutal Chinese assault and exposed them to a force that was many times their number. They began to pull back fighting through the gauntlet while unknown to them 8th was already falling back, leaving them behind everybody. Their costly rearguard action delayed the Chinese by a few days and saved countless American lives as told by many there already. Their casualties in those few days in the coldest November was over a third of their total loss throughout the whole war. They are the first foreign military unit to be awarded a US congressional medal. None of this was placed in proper context. At that point I decided that it was not worth committing to over 600 pages of ink. |
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