The Yanks Are Coming! (42 page)

20
.
    
Quoted in Carlo D'Este,
Eisenhower: A Soldier's Life
(New York: Henry Holt, 2002), 226—though the most famous Eisenhower comment on MacArthur came in response to a woman's question of whether Ike had ever met him:
“Not only have I met him, mam: I studied dramatics under him for five years in Washington and four years in the Philippines.” Quoted in Manchester,
American Caesar
, 182

21
.
    
Though in ill health, she even shipped out to the Philippines with her son in 1935, lived in a suite next to MacArthur's in the Manila Hotel, and died there. Throughout her life she did everything she could to advance her son's career.

22
.
    
And for a short time he kept a young Eurasian mistress, until he broke off the affair, realizing that it was a mistake in and of itself—and lest Mother should find out.

23
.
    
Hoover liked MacArthur as well, urging him to run for president against Franklin Roosevelt in 1944 and Truman in 1948.

24
.
    
At the same time, he did promote mechanization within the Army and won agreement with the Navy for the nation's coastal aerial defense to be handled by the Army Air Corps.

25
.
    
That doesn't mean he was wrong: so was Churchill; so was Patton.

26
.
    
Caesarean in demeanor, yes; but MacArthur was, in his political views, very much an American democrat, domestically at one with the moderate, limited-government conservatism of a Hoover or an Eisenhower.

27
.
    
In April 1942, he became supreme commander of the southwest Pacific. The Navy, under Admiral Chester Nimitz, took the rest.

28
.
    
General Jonathan “Skinny” Wainwright surrendered Corregidor on 7 May 1942.

29
.
    
Quoted in Perret,
Old Soldiers Never Die
, 282. As Perret notes, the field was strafed by the Japanese shortly after MacArthur boarded another B-17 and flew on to Alice Springs.

30
.
    
MacArthur,
Reminiscences
, 252.

31
.
    
Joining him in this distinction were Dwight Eisenhower, George Marshall, and Henry “Hap” Arnold.

32
.
    
Though, as Geoffrey Perret points out, MacArthur's dream of making Japan a Christian society foundered on the potential political fallout should the emperor, who was supposedly mulling conversion, choose to become a Catholic or a Protestant. See Perret,
Old Soldiers Never Die
, 520.

33
.
    
MacArthur,
Reminiscences,
449.

34
.
    
Ibid., 459.

35
.
    
Interestingly, he advised President Kennedy not to commit American troops to South Vietnam, seeing it as irrelevant to American interests.

36
.
    
William Safire, ed.,
Lend Me Your Ears: Great Speeches in History
(New York: W. W. Norton, 2004), 87.

CHAPTER ELEVEN: BILLY MITCHELL (1879–1936)

1
.
      
Columbian College eventually became George Washington University.

2
.
      
Mitchell's father was, however, very proud of his service in the Union Army in the Civil War and nurtured in his son a great love of touring battlefields, both in Europe and at home.

3
.
      
Quoted in Alfred F. Hurley,
Billy Mitchell: Crusader for Air Power
(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1975), 6.

4
.
      
He had been part of a volunteer Signals unit in Cuba and the Philippines.

5
.
      
He also noted a widespread Japanese fascination with flying machines and advised a Chinese warlord that the best way to keep flies off his bald head was to tattoo a spider web on his skull.

6
.
      
Quoted in Burke Davis,
The Billy Mitchell Affair
(New York: Random House, 1967), 29.

7
.
      
Quoted in ibid., 30.

8
.
      
He was well aware of the dangers as well as the glories of the sky. His younger brother, John, had died in a plane crash during the war.

9
.
      
Quoted in Davis,
The Billy Mitchell Affair
, 62.

10
.
    
Quoted in Roger G. Miller,
Billy Mitchell: “Stormy Petrel of the Air”
(Washington, DC: Office of Air Force History, 2004), 36.

11
.
    
Quoted in Davis,
The Billy Mitchell Affair
, 127.

12
.
    
Mitchell's wife won custody of their three children.

13
.
    
The union produced one child, a daughter.

14
.
    
Though it was not on his itinerary, he noted the military potential of Wake Island.

15
.
    
Some see racism in Mitchell's depiction of “yellows” (Asiatics) versus “whites” (Europeans/Americans), but Mitchell himself derided those who said the Japanese could not fly, saying they could fly as well as any Westerner; he saw China as a reemerging giant, with a people superior to any other; and he recognized that mainland Asia offered allies against an expansionist Japan.

16
.
    
Quoted in Douglas Waller,
A Question of Loyalty: General Billy Mitchell and the Court-Martial That Gripped the Nation
(New York: HarperCollins, 2004), 20.

17
.
    
During a lull in the trial, one newspaper wag quipped, “If the court-martial stays off the front page another two days it's feared Col. Billy Mitchell's going to lose interest in these proceedings.” Quoted in Davis,
The Billy Mitchell Affair
, 267.

CHAPTER TWELVE: JOHN A. LEJEUNE (1867–1942)

1
.
      
At the time, cadets at the Naval Academy had four years of academic work, then two years at sea as midshipmen, before returning for final exams and commissioning. In 1912, Congress abolished the requirement of serving two years at sea and authorized graduating cadets to be commissioned as ensigns.

2
.
      
Quoted in Merrill L. Bartlett,
Lejeune: A Marine's Life, 1967–1942
(Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1991), 3; see also pages 37–38 for the context and the possibility that Lejeune's assignment to the naval engineers was overturned by the secretary of the Navy.

3
.
      
Quoted in Bartlett,
Lejeune
, 39.

4
.
      
Allan R. Millett and Jack Shulimson, eds.,
Commandants of the Marine Corps
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2004), 108.

5
.
      
Quoted in George B. Clark,
Devil Dogs: Fighting Marines of World War I
(Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 2000), 391.

6
.
      
John A. Lejeune,
Reminiscences of a Marine
(Quantico: Marine Corps Association, 1979), 260.

7
.
      
Pershing's appointment of Lejeune quieted Marine demands for a division of their own. On Lejeune being the first Marine officer to command a division, see Bartlett,
Lejeune
, 4.

8
.
      
Lejeune,
Reminiscences of a Marine
, 321.

9
.
      
The Navy secretary was Edwin Denby. His orders are quoted in Bartlett,
Lejeune
, 155.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN: GEORGE S. PATTON (1885–1945)

1
.
      
Later, when he was serving in Mexico, he conceded to his wife that if he could not achieve greatness as a soldier, he would settle for raising horses.

2
.
      
Quoted in Roger H. Nye,
The Patton Mind: The Professional Development of an Extraordinary Leader
(New York: Avery Publishing, 1993), 14, 16.

3
.
      
Quoted in Martin Blumenson,
Patton: The Man behind the Legend, 1885–1945
(New York: William Morrow, 1985), 59.

4
.
      
Quoted in Carlo D'Este,
Patton: A Genius for War
(New York: HarperCollins, 1995), 149.

5
.
      
Quoted in ibid., 155.

6
.
      
Quoted in Blumenson,
Patton: The Man behind the Legend,
89, 92.

7
.
      
Quoted in ibid., 95.

8
.
      
Quoted in D'Este,
Patton: A Genius for War
, 204.

9
.
      
Quoted in ibid., 205.

10
.
    
Patton thought he saw his martial ancestors in the clouds urging him on. Biographer Carlo D'Este notes that Patton's son, George S. Patton IV, saw a similar apparition, his father in the clouds, telling him to get his “ass across the road” under shelling in the Korean War. See D'Este,
Patton: A Genius for War
, 257–58.

11
.
    
Quoted in ibid., 263.

12
.
    
Patton rode fiercely, not just in polo, but in hunting and racing, and like many a good horseman, endured his share of being thrown from the saddle. He was also kicked in the head by a horse. He was accident prone—whether on horseback or not—and in a car accident during World War I had his head go through the windshield. He suffered so many blows to the head that some have wondered whether this added to his emotional volatility, which became more pronounced with age.

13
.
    
Quoted in Stanley P. Hirshson,
General Patton: A Soldier's Life
(New York: HarperCollins, 2002), 131.

14
.
    
George S. Patton Jr., “The Obligation of Being an Officer,” 1 October 1919.

15
.
    
He sometimes paid a price for it too—and not only in later contrite apologies. It nearly cost him his role as captain of the Army polo team in Hawaii in 1935 until his opponents (whom he had cursed) demanded he be reinstated.

16
.
    
See Alan Axelrod,
Patton: A Biography
(New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006), 70.

17
.
    
Quoted in Rick Atkinson,
An Army at Dawn: The War in North Africa, 1942–1943
(New York: Henry Holt, 2002), 35.

18
.
    
Quoted in Blumenson,
The Patton Papers, 1940–1945
(Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press, 1996), 102.

19
.
    
Quoted in Blumenson,
Patton: The Man behind the Legend
, 215.

20
.
    
Quoted in Axelrod,
Patton's Drive: The Making of America's Greatest General
(Guilford, CT: The Lyons Press, 2009), 87.

21
.
    
Quoted in Blumenson,
The Patton Papers
, 545.

22
.
    
Quoted in Axelrod,
Patton's Drive
, 107.

23
.
    
They went armed with, among things, a prayer card from Patton with Christmas greetings on one side and the now-famous prayer Patton commissioned, beseeching God for “fair weather for Battle . . . that armed with Thy power, we may advance from victory to victory, and crush the opposition and wickedness of our enemies and establish Thy justice among men and nations. Amen.” Quoted in Blumenson,
Patton: The Man behind the Legend
, 251.

24
.
    
Quoted in Axelrod,
Patton's Drive
, 136.

25
.
    
This was Ohrdruf concentration camp.

26
.
    
Quoted in Blumenson,
Patton: The Man behind the Legend
, 264.

27
.
    
He caused an unfortunate stir in the press by more than once comparing Nazi Party membership to membership of the Republican or Democrat Party.

28
.
    
Quoted in Blumenson,
Patton: The Man behind the Legend
, 281.

29
.
    
Quoted in D'Este,
Patton: A Genius for War
, 557. D'Este also quotes “A Soldier's Prayer,” written by Patton at the request of an Episcopal chaplain, pages 557–58.