<< 1 >>
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting memories of era in Washington and wartime China
Review: As a staunch Cold War and extraordinarily connected political columnist in Washington for forty years, Joseph Alsop has many fascinating and amusing anecdotes to relate. Moreover, the issues of the period between 1945 and 1965 (the period of his greatest influence) were far more momentous than the mostly tittle-tattle of much of the last decade of Washington journalism: the Cold War, the Truman Doctrine, the Marshall Plan, the recurrent Berlin crises, the creation of NATO, SEATO and CENTO. Alsop's connections with the high and mighty (even family connections such as Eleanor Roosevelt or former Connecticut neighbor Dean Acheson sent to Groton as a boy on Alsop's father's recommendation), and others are astonishing. He had much "inside" knowledge of how the "greats" and "near greats" dealt with global issues. Alsop is also amusing and interesting about his WASP privileged background - his education at Groton and Harvard, the anticipated dress and social etiquette. Although Alsop's close friendship with JFK may have given him the most pleasure in writing this memoir, it is his experience in China during W.W.II, about which he writes at wonderful length, that is truly historic. In Chungking (China's war-time capital), Alsop played a central role in the corner of famous Flying Tigers' leader General Claire Chennault and T.V. Soong (sometime Foreign Minister and Chiang kai-Shek brother-in-law) in the great feud with the Stilwell-State-War Dept. - foreign correspondents over the proper political and military strategy for China. Alsop's accounts of what occured are memorable and truly valuable. (The heated feud persisted - so that long after Stilwell's death, Chennault was testifying before Congress that Stilwell was a traitor!). Alsop actually secretly drafted the demand for Stilwell's recall for the Chinese government! He was convinced that Stilwell harmed the American cause by his unconcealed contempt for Chiang, by a proposed Burmese campaign military strategy that would divert needed resources from the more potentially fruitful air war, an unwillingness to allocate sufficient supplies to Chennault (and later to those seeking to defend Eastern China, particularly the forward-most airfields), and too great an openness to the possibility of allying with the Communists. The China story is fascinating - in part because these are views that are in direct contradiction to most American accounts which are quite pro-Stilwell and anti-Chiang. The memoirs convey throughout the sadness implied by the book's title. Alsop was suffering from cancer at the time of writing - and had felt increasingly out of the mainstream of American journalism and political opinion in the early 1970s due to his more conservative views on the Vietnam War. (E.g., Alsop is mentioned mostly in derision by Vietnam correspondent, David Halberstam in his book, The Best And the Brightest, a view that seems to have been shared by other journalists in Vietnam). Alsop seems to have been of a rare breed - born into privilege, greatly enjoying his physical comfort(his man-servant astounded the Flying Tigers pilots) and yet who seems in his memoirs to be actually without any snobbery whatever and to have been irritated when he encountered it. Smart, loving the battle, very opinionated (the opposite of an "objective" journalist or even soldier), the memoir is highly enjoyable and recommended - even if to be read by some as the reminiscences of a great contrarian.
<< 1 >>
| 
