The bitter years : MacArthur and Sutherland /

This sequel to Rogers's The Good Years: MacArthur and Sutherland (1990) is much more than simply the remembrances of a low-echelon soldier in a key clerical position at General Douglas MacArthur's military headquarters. It is also a continuing study of the relationship between two military figures: MacArthur, Supreme Commander of the Southwest Pacific, and his primary subordinate, Chief of Staff and Deputy Commander Richard K. Sutherland. This volume's title reflects the difficult fighting in the Philippines and the bad relations that developed between MacArthur and Sutherland. It was a period when Sutherland stretched the limits of his authority in a way that caused MacArthur to reassert control and leave his deputy "alone, humiliated and exposed." Rogers provides the tone and feeling that possibly existed at MacArthur's GHQ. He describes--sometimes unintentionally--the pettiness and grandeur of men at war. In addition to using his own recollections, Rogers did a great deal of research in original sources. Having served both MacArthur and Sutherland, his loyalties were divided, a fact that causes some unevenness in his recounting of events. He entered the military as a private but was commissioned in early 1945. If his stories are accurate, he was a bold individual who regularly overstepped himself but somehow survived in the authoritarian world of the United States Army. Public and academic libraries. -R. S. La Forte, University of North Texas