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history of World War II podcast.

0:58

Episode 529, interview

1:00

with author Jonathan Horn about his

1:03

book The Fate of Generals,

1:05

MacArthur, Wainwright, and the epic battle

1:07

for the Philippines. Mr.

1:09

Horn is a former White

1:11

House presidential writer whose earlier books

1:13

include Washington's End and The

1:15

Man Who Would Not Be Washington,

1:18

Robert E. Lee's Civil War, and his

1:20

decision that changed American history. Mr.

1:22

Horn, thank you very much for being

1:24

with us today. Thanks so

1:26

much for having me. Absolutely. And we're going

1:28

to go into this, but your book, I

1:30

mean, it's obvious that a speechwriter because the

1:32

book was just well written. But

1:34

I did notice something when I was looking at

1:36

your older books. Um,

1:39

I got a sense of string theory.

1:41

Let me explain that. So before we

1:43

talk about MacArthur and Wayne Wright as

1:45

touching your three books, you start with

1:47

Washington, then you go to Lee and

1:49

you kind of compare the two or

1:51

at least the decision that they had

1:53

to make in regards to a war.

1:55

And then in fate of generals, you

1:57

start out the book about Douglas MacArthur's. idolizing

2:00

his father who fought in the Civil War.

2:02

And I almost, and I don't, you can tell

2:04

me, but I almost just saw this string

2:06

theory connection going through the three books. I

2:08

think that's right. And one of the

2:10

things I discovered as I was working

2:12

on this book about World War II,

2:15

it's my first about World War II, is

2:17

that that generation felt very close. to

2:19

the civil war and those we

2:21

know we american history is not

2:23

very long uh douglas macArthur's father

2:25

had received the medal of honor

2:28

during the civil war he had received

2:30

it the battle of chattanooga he

2:32

had carried his regiments flag up

2:34

missionary ridge in november 1863 A

2:36

lot of other people did similar

2:38

things, but MacArthur received the Medal

2:40

of Honor for that and played

2:42

a big role in shaping his

2:44

son's outlook on life. And

2:47

Wainwright had very close ties to

2:49

the Civil War. And you could see

2:51

him thinking about the Civil War

2:53

as he made decisions in the Philippines.

2:56

And so that was very, that

2:58

was almost their version of World War II

3:00

for them was the Civil War. Right.

3:02

Because you get a sense that for these

3:04

gentlemen, and I'm sure others, but when

3:06

you become an officer, the

3:08

higher in rank you go, not

3:10

only does politics start to intrude,

3:12

but also thinking about your place in history.

3:14

And how could these gentlemen not think?

3:17

And I don't think that's ego. I think

3:19

that's human nature. But how could they

3:21

not think of a bigger picture years, decades

3:23

from now, when two people would be

3:25

talking about them, talking about a book that

3:27

one of them wrote? So I guess

3:29

that's kind of in the back of their

3:31

head. Absolutely, and

3:33

especially in the case of Douglas

3:36

MacArthur from the very beginning of his

3:38

life, he knew that his parents

3:40

expected big things of him. His

3:42

mother talked all the time to

3:44

him about Robert E. Lee. Of

3:46

course, his father was a Union

3:48

Civil War hero, and even

3:51

at West Point, as a

3:53

cadet, he began assembling a record

3:55

of success at the Academy

3:57

that was compared and likened to

3:59

Robert E. Lee's record of success. So

4:01

I think from the very beginning, especially of

4:03

his life, he saw big

4:05

things for himself. And

4:07

same thing with General Wainwright in

4:09

different ways. He had grown up

4:11

near the site of Custer's last

4:13

stand and near the site of

4:15

the little bighorn in Montana. And

4:18

for the rest of his life,

4:20

he read every single book he could

4:22

find about General Custer. He became

4:24

somewhat obsessed with this battle. And

4:26

of course, Custer had also fought in the Civil War.

4:28

We remember him for the Indian Wars, but he,

4:30

of course, was a very successful

4:32

cavalry commander during the Civil War. And

4:35

of course, Wainwright becomes obsessed with his

4:37

last stand, never knowing that he himself

4:39

is going to have to fight a

4:41

last stand of his own in the

4:43

Philippines during World War II. Right.

4:45

And so as we're reading the book,

4:47

we get to see the connections that

4:49

he would have to put together decades

4:51

later. And when I got to that

4:53

part of the book, I found it

4:55

so interesting and a reminder that parents,

4:57

that family can set a child on

4:59

their course by their expectations about the way

5:01

they treat them, what they expected of them. My

5:04

father was in the military, but

5:06

the only thing for us was don't

5:08

get in trouble. Whereas they were

5:10

saying to these, you know, at least

5:12

MacArthur was like, we expect huge

5:14

things of you. How could you not

5:16

want to try to fill your

5:18

parents' hopes? Definitely and especially in MacArthur.

5:20

He is just raised to do

5:22

big things right and also to fulfill

5:24

in a sense his father's birthright

5:26

I think you can see that with

5:28

his relationship to the Philippines. It was

5:30

Douglas MacArthur's father Arthur Of course

5:32

he had fought in the Civil War,

5:35

but he had been just 18

5:37

years old at the time what he's

5:39

most Wow, what he most accomplished

5:41

was during the Spanish -American War when

5:43

he led the very first American troops

5:45

inside the walled city of Manila

5:47

in the Philippines in 1898 and saw

5:50

the American flag raised over the

5:52

city and of course the Philippines from

5:54

that would become a colony of

5:56

the United States. That's sort of the

5:58

origin story for the Philippines being

6:00

a part of the United States

6:02

as we go into World War

6:04

II and Arthur MacArthur had then

6:07

served as military governor of the

6:09

Philippines and he had told his

6:11

son and told the world,

6:13

but his son really absorbed it,

6:15

that the Philippines was the key

6:17

position to America's future as a

6:19

Pacific power. And he also felt

6:21

that in some ways the Philippines

6:23

might hold the key to the

6:25

future of democracy all over the

6:27

world. So this is Douglas MacArthur's

6:29

birthright in a sense. And that's

6:31

where he is, of course, in

6:33

right before World War II when

6:36

he has this assignment to defend the

6:38

Philippines. That's well said. I never thought

6:40

of it like that. And also, of

6:42

course, that partially explains his... I'll just

6:44

use the word obsession or focus in

6:46

defending the Philippines, demanding from George Marshall

6:48

supplies that there's no way that they

6:51

can deliver them, certainly not on time,

6:53

but he just could not let that

6:55

idea go. So we'll get into that

6:57

a little bit later. So you've got

6:59

MacArthur who's larger than life, and you've

7:01

got Wainwright who should. be larger

7:03

than life. And we'll get into that,

7:06

but it just didn't play out that

7:08

way in history. So let me ask

7:10

you this. So

7:12

you had this divergence of...

7:14

popularity, if I can. What

7:16

inspired you to tell these two

7:18

general stories together? And why do

7:20

you think it's important to see their paths

7:22

in tandem together as well? Well, I'll be

7:24

honest. I think what first

7:26

drew me to MacArthur really were those

7:28

three famous words he issued, I

7:31

shall return. And everybody knows that vow.

7:33

He said that vow after he

7:35

had been ordered out of the

7:37

Philippines in 1942 with his army

7:39

facing starvation and surrender and in

7:41

order to go to Australia. with

7:44

his family where he promises

7:46

to return. But

7:48

very few people remember the vow

7:50

that General Wainwright made. General Wainwright

7:52

became the top commander in the

7:54

Philippines after MacArthur was ordered out.

7:56

And he vowed on the first

7:58

page of a diary that he

8:01

began on April 2, 1942, to

8:03

stay with his men, to

8:05

share their fate. even if that

8:07

meant surrendering with them and

8:09

becoming, as he eventually did, the

8:11

highest -ranking American prisoner of war

8:13

of World War II. So

8:15

my feeling was, as I was

8:17

looking at these two vows,

8:19

that you couldn't understand the significance

8:21

of MacArthur's vow to return

8:23

unless you also understood the story

8:25

of the general who vowed

8:27

to stay. Right. And then I

8:29

got was really... pretty big break.

8:31

It had been more than 40

8:33

years since anyone had written a biography

8:35

of General Wainwright. And in that time,

8:38

his diary, his

8:40

personal letters. other documents

8:42

regarding his family had been

8:44

deposited in government and military

8:46

archives in Carlisle and at

8:48

West Point. And in

8:50

many cases as a result, because there hadn't

8:52

been a new biographer of Wainwright coming

8:54

through, these papers had really never been explored

8:56

at all in some cases. So there

8:59

was an opportunity to be able to tell

9:01

his story in a way never before

9:03

possible. Ryan Ryan

9:05

Reynolds here for Mint Mobile.

9:07

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Anyway, give it a

9:33

try at mintmobile.com, Right, and

9:35

I'm glad you did. I'm glad you

9:37

put it that way because of

9:39

those papers and the fact that there

9:42

hadn't been a biography for a

9:44

while. That, again, isn't indicative of how

9:46

he's just been kind of... over

9:48

or forgotten or a footnote a MacArthur

9:50

footnote if you will so so

9:52

you've got these two very different promises

9:54

So how does that shape the

9:56

way we remember the war with these

9:58

two gentlemen? Well, I think obviously the

10:01

phrase I shall return Is

10:03

one of the most famous phrases

10:05

from World War two and MacArthur

10:07

played no small part in making

10:10

it so of course he was

10:12

he was a master of public

10:14

relations and it wasn't also just

10:16

about promoting himself those words meant

10:18

So much to people in the

10:20

Philippines during World War two.

10:23

Yeah During the years of Japanese

10:25

occupation those were dark years

10:27

for the people the Philippines they

10:29

remain loyal Obviously we're speaking

10:31

broadly right not everybody but the

10:34

population generally did remain loyal

10:36

to the United States and it

10:38

was dark years and they

10:40

people took great faith in Douglas

10:42

MacArthur's vow to return and

10:45

of course the vow itself became something

10:47

of a national Commitment and it

10:49

didn't have to turn out that way

10:51

because no one had authorized Douglas

10:53

MacArthur to say I shall return in

10:55

that in those in that exact

10:57

way right and during different points during

10:59

World War two You see at

11:01

a very high level people saying returning

11:04

to the Philippines is a detour

11:06

from the more important goal of defeating

11:08

Japan But MacArthur never saw it

11:10

that way. I think it goes back

11:12

to what you were saying the reason

11:14

he doesn't see it that way is

11:16

Because of his deep connection to the

11:18

Philippines and because he believes we were

11:21

forced out of those islands at the

11:23

point of a bayonet and the only

11:25

way to return is the same way

11:27

this is American soil and we have

11:29

a moral obligation is what is how

11:31

he describes it to return to these

11:34

islands and so that phrase becomes so

11:36

famous that I think Wainwright's vow

11:38

to stay in

11:40

a sense, becomes a footnote as

11:43

you put it to the life

11:45

of Douglas MacArthur. And Wainwright was

11:47

famous. I don't want to say

11:49

he wasn't famous when he returned from World

11:51

War II in September 1945 to the United

11:53

States. He had a ticker tape parade in

11:55

New York City. He received the Medal

11:57

of Honor from President Truman. But

11:59

he has sort of slipped and been forgotten.

12:01

I think a large part of that was

12:03

because it had been so long since anyone

12:06

had written a book about him. Good point.

12:08

And I think it's fair to say, and

12:10

I read this somewhere years ago, but I

12:12

think it's fair to say that MacArthur, in

12:15

a lot of ways, practically invented PR, military

12:17

PR. I mean, he was his own

12:19

PR machine. It was I, I, I, I,

12:21

when there's obviously a staff, there's obviously,

12:23

you know, thousands of soldiers fighting,

12:25

but it's eye -eye. And in that,

12:27

it's almost like Caesar's commentaries. He

12:29

stuck himself right there in the history.

12:31

That's not going to be a

12:34

name that you're not going to forget

12:36

because you keep hearing it all

12:38

the time. Whereas with Wainwright, like you

12:40

said, it's been a while since

12:42

a book has been written. So I

12:44

guess it tends to fade

12:46

from memory or history. Right. One

12:48

of MacArthur's biographers looked at the

12:50

communiques he issued during his time

12:52

in the Philippines before he left

12:55

and just a crazy percentage of

12:57

them only mentioned one man and

12:59

that was Douglas MacArthur himself. And

13:02

of course that played no small

13:04

role in a sense in the decision

13:06

to order MacArthur out of the

13:08

Philippines because of course when you think

13:10

about it ordering the This

13:12

is essentially, and the way Roosevelt himself sees

13:14

it, is the captain deserting the sinking

13:16

ship. This is something that no general would

13:19

ever really want to do. And to

13:21

be fair to MacArthur, it wasn't his idea.

13:23

I think he was legitimately willing. to

13:25

die in the Philippines. I don't think I'm

13:27

not sure he would. I don't think

13:29

he would have been willing to do what

13:31

Wainwright did and become a prisoner of

13:33

war. But I think he was willing to

13:35

die. Right. And he gets this order

13:37

to come out. And the reason is if

13:39

you look at the situation in March,

13:41

1942, all across the

13:43

Pacific, the Japanese are succeeding

13:46

with with very little

13:48

resistance in Hong Kong, Singapore,

13:50

the Dutch East Indies, Guam, Wake

13:52

Island, only in the Philippines can

13:55

Americans find what they so. desperately

13:57

want evidence that we are fighting

13:59

back, and that fight becomes

14:01

synonymous with MacArthur, even

14:03

though, ironically, he's not.

14:05

He only makes one visit to Patan,

14:07

the peninsula, where most of the fighting

14:09

is happening, and of course, it's Wainwright.

14:12

who's on the front lines with the

14:14

men there. Right. But you make a

14:16

good point because it's MacArthur's self -promotion

14:18

that in a political sense, not a

14:20

military sense, that makes him so valuable.

14:22

It's like we're losing all these territories. Is

14:25

there anything we can save? And the

14:27

answer is yes, we can save MacArthur.

14:29

Yes, the president does have to order

14:32

him out of there. But the Americans

14:34

took it as a win at a

14:36

very dark time because he's this larger

14:38

than life. And in your book, the

14:40

newspaper newspaper headlines about MacArthur. It sounds

14:42

like he was personally just slapping Japanese

14:44

troops all over the place, which of

14:46

course he wasn't. But he was the

14:49

hero, the bright spot

14:51

that we needed in late 41,

14:53

early 42. And he didn't

14:55

mind that. We'll leave it at that. He

14:57

didn't mind so much. But and you brought

14:59

up something a minute ago, having access to

15:01

the letters and diaries. in

15:03

other documents of Wainwright, out

15:06

of all of the stuff that you read

15:08

and that you came across, was there anything

15:10

that surprised you or anything like that during

15:12

that research to make you go, oh, okay,

15:14

I think I understand this man a little

15:16

bit better now? You know, there

15:18

really were some revelations for me

15:20

as I was looking through his diary

15:22

and the letters he wrote. mean,

15:25

I think about, I mean, the vow

15:27

he made. We knew about that vow before,

15:29

but still seeing it on a piece

15:31

of paper on April 2nd and realizing that

15:33

that one page is going to set

15:35

this tone for everything that follows in the

15:37

diary. That is a striking thing to

15:39

see in someone's diary that they know what's

15:41

going to happen to them. But

15:43

I also think about other things. I mean,

15:45

for the rest of Wayne Wright's life, he

15:49

was very careful about the way he

15:51

talked about Douglas MacArthur. And people

15:53

always wanted to know, what did Wainwright

15:55

really think about Douglas MacArthur? And

15:58

he would say, when pressed, Douglas

16:00

MacArthur was one of the three

16:02

best soldiers America ever produced. If

16:04

you're curious, the other two were Ulysses

16:06

S. Grant and Robert E. Lee in

16:08

Wainwright's opinion. And

16:10

one clue to understanding that

16:12

is in Wainwright's diary. He

16:14

writes a list of rules.

16:16

for young officers and prominent

16:18

among them is never criticize

16:20

your commanding officer. Even

16:23

Wainwright's own son conceded late in

16:25

life and nobody would ever

16:27

really know what his dad thought

16:29

of MacArthur. I think about

16:31

some of the really moving entries

16:34

that Wainwright made during his

16:36

time in prison. The

16:38

Japanese moved him. From

16:40

the Philippines to Taiwan and

16:42

eventually all the way

16:44

to Manchuria in 1940 and

16:46

in there in 1945.

16:49

He's facing negative 49 degree

16:51

temperatures, right? His body

16:53

begins to break down and he thinks he

16:55

might not make it and there's this one

16:57

entry that I mean I just really stayed

16:59

with me where he says I

17:02

fought for life in the Philippines and

17:04

I'm gonna fight for life now and no

17:06

one call me yellow then and no

17:08

one will call me yellow now and just

17:11

to see that and also just to

17:13

see the pages he devoted to worrying. that

17:15

Americans wouldn't understand the decision he made

17:17

to surrender for the sake of his men.

17:19

Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up

17:21

because I think I kind of forgot it.

17:23

But when I got to that part

17:25

of the book, the Japanese made it quite

17:27

clear. Look, you surrender, but you don't

17:30

just surrender your men. You have to make

17:32

everybody in the Philippines. a lot of

17:34

islands. You have to make everybody surrender or

17:36

we're going to continue the war as

17:38

ongoing, which of course means we're going to

17:40

slaughter a lot of you because they

17:42

were running out of food. There were like

17:44

thousands of them in medical beds or

17:46

whatever. And it would have

17:49

been a monumental bloodbath. So

17:51

he did what he did to

17:53

save them. It wasn't cowardice.

17:55

He was thinking of the larger

17:57

picture. But I can't help

17:59

finding a little bit ironic. MacArthur

18:02

leaves. And he's the

18:04

hero. Wainwright stays

18:06

and suffers, and he's semi

18:08

-forgotten. But again, and

18:10

I'm sure you know this better than

18:12

I do, it's all about getting,

18:14

you know, word of mouth, getting your

18:16

name out there, PR, that kind

18:18

of stuff. Wainwright didn't not focus on

18:20

that, and MacArthur did. So

18:22

he's the bigger man in history.

18:25

But again, Wainwright was

18:27

like this quiet, Straight

18:29

line waiver. He never waivers and when

18:31

you said a minute ago that

18:33

You don't when he said you don't

18:35

speak ill of your superior. I

18:37

can't help but think that's part of

18:39

the gentlemanly code But having said

18:41

that there were times earlier before the

18:43

war came where they were looking

18:45

at MacArthur's plan about defending the Philippines

18:47

are like I don't I don't

18:50

see this happening, but you're the general

18:52

we will do what you say

18:54

Right, I'm glad you brought that up

18:56

because MacArthur did have a different

18:58

plan to defend the Philippines. There

19:00

was an old plan in

19:02

effect, and MacArthur basically threw it

19:04

out shortly before World War

19:06

II, and his plan basically depended

19:08

on raising a large number

19:11

of Philippine conscripts who passed through

19:13

training camps that he had

19:15

been running on the islands, and

19:17

his plan was to stop

19:19

a Japanese invasion. at the beaches.

19:22

But the moment these troops were mobilized

19:24

for war, Wainwright and others took a

19:26

look at them and realized this plans

19:28

to no chance. Now, it's be clear,

19:30

this is not a reflection on the

19:32

troops themselves. It's a reflection that they

19:34

don't have the right equipment, and

19:36

they don't have the right training. And there's

19:38

no chance they're going to be

19:40

able to stop the Japanese at the

19:42

beaches and very quickly after the

19:44

Japanese land at Lingai in Gulf. on

19:48

December 22nd, 1941, in

19:50

the Philippines, it becomes

19:52

clear that we're going to have to

19:54

fall back on a much older

19:56

plan to defend the Philippines, the one

19:58

we had been working on for

20:00

years in rehearsing called War Plan Orange.

20:03

And by that plan, instead of trying

20:05

to defend the full island of defend

20:07

the beaches, you're just going to try

20:09

to defend the mouth of Manila Bay. And

20:12

to control the mouth of Manila Bay,

20:14

you need to control two key positions. One

20:16

is the Baton Peninsula. And the other

20:18

is the tadpole -shaped island of Carigador off

20:20

the tip of Baton. And

20:23

the problem though is

20:25

because MacArthur's plant had been

20:27

in effect before, we

20:29

had sent the supplies that our

20:32

troops would need in Baton and

20:34

disperse them across the big island

20:36

of Luzon instead of bringing them

20:38

all to Baton. And as a

20:40

result, Food and supplies would have

20:42

been a problem no matter what

20:44

under war plan orange Yeah, it

20:46

was very unlikely reinforcements would have

20:48

arrived in time and planners knew

20:50

that Mm -hmm, but it made

20:52

it all the much worse to

20:54

make the last second switch back

20:56

to America's original plan for defending

20:58

the Philippines. Yeah. And my response

21:00

to that is I was talking about

21:02

this very thing with my son who is

21:04

a Marine and we were looking and

21:06

by the way, for the readers, the maps

21:08

in this book, absolutely amazing. I

21:11

love maps. Whoever

21:13

put those together, great job. So we

21:15

were we were we were looking

21:17

at the maps and we're refighting the

21:19

invasion of the Philippines. And he

21:21

reminded me and just something you just

21:23

said, the difference between a civilian

21:25

and a soldier. is practice, is drilling,

21:27

it's getting it down so it's

21:29

second nature. And you're right, they simply

21:32

did not have enough time. MacArthur

21:34

thought this wouldn't go down until like

21:36

April of 42 that he had

21:38

months to go. He did not. And

21:40

it was just more, I guess

21:42

they were just expecting more of the

21:44

Filipino troops untrained than they should

21:46

have. So I just found that very

21:48

interesting. And again, Wainwright said, oh,

21:50

and can I just say, The part

21:52

where MacArthur leaves and goes to

21:55

Corregidor and Wainwright is still on the

21:57

peninsula, defending, going around, trying to

21:59

be that inspiring leader. That was impressive

22:01

as hell. It moved me. And

22:03

I'm sure he was doing it to

22:05

try to inspire his men. But inspiration can

22:07

only take you so far when you're

22:09

running out of bullets and food and water

22:11

and reinforcements. But again, that was just,

22:13

that was an awesome part of the book.

22:16

And I enjoy that very much. So

22:18

I just want to say thank you for

22:20

that. Moving on to

22:22

my next question, you've probably heard this

22:24

expression the first time I heard it. I

22:26

think it was in a Tom Clancy

22:28

book in the late 80s. But anyway, the

22:30

expression goes, a whisper from a president. is

22:33

louder than a scream from

22:35

anybody else. And since

22:37

you're a former presidential writer, you

22:39

come as close as any of

22:41

us to putting words in a

22:43

president's mouth, which is pretty impressive.

22:45

I just wanted to ask, as

22:47

a White House speechwriter, how does

22:49

your experience writing for a president

22:51

shape the way that you approach

22:53

the history or the way you

22:55

tell your story like this particular

22:57

book? I think one of

22:59

the great parts about being a White House

23:01

speechwriter is you're a little bit like

23:03

a fly on the wall. Right. Because

23:06

the main job of a speechwriter

23:08

is to help a president explain

23:10

a decision he's making. And so

23:12

the best way to figure out

23:14

how to write the speech is

23:16

to watch as that decision comes

23:18

together and. because your job is

23:20

then going to be able to

23:22

explain it to the American people.

23:25

And so for me, seeing President

23:27

Bush make decisions during time of

23:29

war, during time of financial

23:31

crisis, was a window into how

23:33

decisions are made. And that's

23:35

been very useful as a biographer

23:37

because I've come to believe

23:40

that. And I think this

23:42

is something a lot of biographers

23:44

believe, but not necessarily all historians,

23:46

that decisions that individuals make really

23:48

do shape the course of history.

23:51

And I certainly believe that's the case

23:53

with this book. You have two

23:55

men who made very important decisions and

23:57

determined their place in history as

23:59

a result. Right, well said. So if

24:01

I could go back to Wainwright

24:03

for a second, because I was thinking

24:05

about something you said, I saw

24:07

the picture of him after, I mean,

24:10

emaciated, I think, is the word we're going for.

24:13

And in the negative 49 degrees, I mean,

24:15

he must have suffered terribly. And what really

24:17

struck me in your book was that the

24:19

entire time he's like, what does the American

24:21

people think of me? Do they do that?

24:24

You know, he's thinking that he's thinking the

24:26

worst of himself that they're thinking. And

24:28

I just was wondering about his

24:30

Japanese captivity and the personal cost

24:32

of his decision to surrender for

24:34

the sake of his men. I

24:36

mean, it was almost like he

24:38

was beating himself up more. than

24:40

anybody else was. I think that's

24:42

exactly right. The only person who

24:44

was beating Wainwright up more was

24:46

MacArthur. Yes. And I

24:48

think Wainwright knew that. Wainwright

24:51

writes in his diary, no other

24:53

course of action would be honorable,

24:55

but honorable is not the word

24:57

that Douglas MacArthur used to describe

24:59

it at all. MacArthur called it

25:02

unbalanced, especially when he heard that

25:04

Wainwright had surrendered not just Carigador,

25:06

the island he was holed up

25:08

on, but all the Philippines. And

25:10

the reason he did it was

25:12

he thought where the Japanese made

25:15

clear to him that they would

25:17

carry out a massacre of the

25:19

12 to 13 ,000 people holed

25:21

up inside this tunnel unless he

25:23

did and he believed that the

25:25

remaining fighters in the Philippines could

25:28

not accomplish enough to warrant this

25:30

massacre. So he makes the decision

25:32

to surrender for the sake of

25:34

his man. He believes that Franklin

25:36

Roosevelt would not have given him

25:38

command of all the Philippines. unless

25:41

they wanted him to have this

25:43

discretion. But he does know that

25:45

MacArthur himself almost surely would not

25:47

have approved. And that

25:49

haunts him. And one of

25:51

the things that happens shortly

25:53

afterwards is, and Wainwright doesn't

25:55

know this, is that George

25:57

Marshall sends a proposal to

26:00

give the Medal of Honor.

26:02

to Wainwright. He sends it

26:04

to MacArthur expecting that MacArthur will

26:06

have no objections because MacArthur just

26:08

received the Medal of Honor under

26:10

very dubious grounds after arriving in

26:12

Australia. But MacArthur does have

26:14

objections and he blackballs the nomination

26:16

and I do think What would it

26:19

have meant to Wainwright during those

26:21

years of captivity? How did he receive

26:23

word that he had received the

26:25

Medal of Honor? It would have meant

26:27

it would have meant everything to

26:29

him. And one of the challenges, of

26:31

course, of being a prisoner of

26:33

the Japanese is he doesn't think MacArthur

26:35

is going to understand the decision.

26:37

Well, the Japanese certainly don't understand the

26:40

decision because they don't believe in

26:42

surrender and especially they don't believe in

26:44

officers. uh, surrendering like this.

26:46

And there's almost a curiosity

26:48

about Wainwright, why didn't he commit

26:50

suicide or, or why, you

26:52

know, does he expect to be

26:54

court -martialed? Um, and these,

26:56

and these thoughts, these thoughts haunt Wainwright

26:58

during his captivity, and you can see

27:00

him working through it. And every time

27:03

though, he does reach the same conclusion

27:05

that there was no other choice that

27:07

he could have made that would have

27:09

been honorable. Um, but even as he's

27:11

released, uh, and his captivity ends in

27:13

August, even

27:16

as he's gotten some hints that maybe

27:18

he's become a hero in the United

27:20

States, it's still in his mind that

27:22

people in the United States won't understand

27:24

this decision he's made and he's worried.

27:28

You touch on this in the book

27:30

or I'm gonna interpret something you touched

27:32

on the book if you remove emotion

27:34

if you remove the concept of honor

27:36

It was the only decision. What good

27:38

would it have done to slaughter tens

27:40

of thousands of ally troops? It would

27:42

have served no purpose and so it

27:45

was the only decision but I guess

27:47

it made and it made MacArthur look

27:49

bad and there was at least two

27:51

occasions where MacArthur says to somebody under

27:53

him, you know defend my defend my

27:55

honor or defend my reputation or whatever.

27:57

I mean, as you can probably guess,

27:59

I maybe like a lot of people,

28:02

I have a love hate relationship with

28:04

MacArthur. There was a lot to recommend

28:06

him. There was certainly some things he

28:08

could have worked on. But I think

28:10

that I think that goes back to

28:12

what we touched on earlier about the

28:14

expectations set for him by his family.

28:17

How could he not, you know, inflate

28:19

the ego? But obviously later on in

28:21

the war, he does. Gains

28:23

some perspective. He becomes a very

28:25

effective military commander and he does

28:27

some amazing things so so yeah

28:29

MacArthur my blood pressure immediately goes

28:32

up when I start talking about

28:34

MacArthur, but he does he does do

28:37

much better in the future. So

28:39

it was good for the Allied

28:41

effort. So if I could zoom

28:43

out a little bit and kind

28:45

of move forward to modern times,

28:47

in your opinion, what lessons does

28:49

Wayne Ryde and MacArthur's story offer

28:52

us today, given America's ongoing treaty

28:54

commitments and rising tensions in the

28:56

South China Sea? Well,

28:58

right as you look at the map

29:00

today, we're talking about a lot of the

29:02

same places in the Pacific Yeah, that

29:04

we were talking about during World War two

29:06

and in sense reading a World War

29:08

two history is a great way to understand

29:10

If you want to understand the current

29:13

tensions in the South China Sea now, of

29:15

course Today, we're talking

29:17

about China making grand claims

29:19

to the South China Sea. The

29:22

Philippines does remain a treaty ally to

29:24

the United States. We're bound to come to

29:26

their defense. You have

29:28

Chinese ships ramming Philippine

29:30

vessels in the South China

29:32

Sea off the Philippine

29:34

islands. This is a

29:36

potential flash point for conflict

29:38

with China. As I look at

29:40

the story of Wayne Ryan

29:42

McArthur, I take

29:45

the same lesson I think that

29:47

Wainwright drew from his experience

29:49

which was the need for preparedness.

29:51

Essentially as he looked back

29:53

on his ordeal he basically concluded

29:55

that he was just the

29:57

general left holding the short stick

29:59

and in a sense the

30:01

United States had taken this colony

30:03

across the Pacific Ocean, but

30:06

in the interwar years was

30:08

not willing to make the commitments

30:10

necessary to be a great

30:12

national, being a great military

30:14

power. And as a result, we

30:17

were not able, we had to have

30:19

a plan like war plan orange, which was

30:21

always, strategies always knew

30:23

there was not really a good chance at

30:25

this succeeding. And it didn't

30:27

succeed. And so we, because we weren't willing

30:29

to, pay that price.

30:31

It was our soldiers who paid

30:34

a terrible cost for that unpreparedness

30:36

in the Philippines during World War

30:38

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31:28

to pay the price just after that. So

31:31

I totally understand that concept. In fact,

31:33

I think if I remember the last little

31:35

paragraph of your book was about this

31:37

very thing about we need to make sure,

31:39

you know, and I'm paraphrasing, we need

31:41

to make sure this doesn't happen again. We

31:43

need to be ready. So I totally

31:45

understand that. And my son very

31:47

loudly supported that idea. So I think

31:49

we're all on the same page there.

31:52

Going back to the word honor, because we've used

31:54

that a couple of times. How

31:56

would Wainwright and MacArthur, because

31:59

they each pursued the Medal of

32:01

Honor in their own way,

32:03

but what do you think the

32:05

word honor meant to those

32:07

two gentlemen? Wow, that's a great

32:09

question. I think

32:11

for MacArthur, he had

32:13

almost a He

32:15

saw the the Medal of Honor

32:17

as his birthright. Yes. Yes, his

32:19

his father had received it But

32:21

he didn't receive it immediately During

32:23

the Civil War Douglas Carther, of

32:25

course was not alive during the

32:27

Civil War But when he was

32:29

about ten years old his father

32:31

had embarked on a long campaign

32:33

to get recognition For what he

32:35

had done as a young man

32:37

during the Civil War and to

32:39

receive the Medal of Honor and

32:41

he saw his father campaigning

32:44

for it. And you can find, if

32:46

you look at Arthur MacArthur's military files,

32:48

not just about the Medal of Honor,

32:50

but on lots of different subjects, he's

32:52

constantly pursuing recognition for his achievements. I

32:54

don't want to make it sound like

32:56

it's that odd because this was a

32:58

period of time when a lot of

33:00

Civil War veterans were looking back on

33:02

what had happened and hoping to get

33:04

recognition for what they had done during

33:07

the Civil War. So it wasn't necessarily

33:09

that unusual, but Arthur MacArthur was certainly

33:11

at the forefront of

33:13

this movement. And so I

33:15

think Douglas MacArthur, his conception of

33:17

himself, was very much tied to

33:19

this medal and the idea that

33:21

his life, his career would

33:23

not be a success unless

33:25

he had it. And you can

33:27

see all throughout the years

33:29

before World War II, and

33:31

Douglas MacArthur as a young

33:33

officer, he often takes extreme

33:35

risks that in some cases

33:37

don't seem to serve a

33:39

lot of purpose, but to

33:41

try to receive this medal.

33:44

I've been told you're never supposed to say you

33:46

won the medal of honor because no one

33:48

in the right mind would want to win the

33:50

medal because of the sacrifice it's required to

33:53

get it. But MacArthur wanted to win that

33:55

medal. For MacArthur, it was winning

33:57

the medal. And for

33:59

Wayne Wright, I think

34:01

it's really inseparable from

34:03

the concept of

34:05

sacrifice and duty and

34:08

being loyal. to

34:10

your troops and also

34:12

being loyal to your

34:14

commanding general, MacArthur. I

34:17

mean, those values were such a

34:19

part of who Wainwright was. And when

34:21

I think about the sacrifices he

34:23

had to make, and this is

34:25

what we haven't really talked about, but

34:28

he was a pretty cavalryman who

34:30

loved horses. And on the Baton Peninsula,

34:32

he has to order the

34:34

horses of the last great cavalry unit

34:36

in the United States history to be

34:38

eaten by his own men. You

34:40

know, I mean, this is the

34:43

man who really suffered and believed in

34:45

sacrifice and believed in setting an

34:47

example for his soldiers. And

34:49

he received the Medal of Honor and meant

34:51

everything to him. It meant a lot

34:53

to him. But it was only because, in

34:55

my view, it sort of validated what

34:57

he had already done. In my view, he

34:59

had already found honor. And

35:02

I don't think he, I hope he

35:04

didn't need that medal to know he found

35:06

honor in the end. But I think

35:08

it's certainly validated and it meant a lot

35:10

to him to receive it from President

35:12

Truman. Right. Based on what you just said,

35:14

the appropriate response should be, oh. I

35:16

earned the medal, thank you, as opposed to

35:18

I'm going after this thing. And again,

35:20

I'm sure he can't go back in time

35:23

from 1942 and feel better about himself,

35:25

but from that moment on that he earns

35:27

the medal and for the rest of

35:29

his life, hopefully that gave him some solace.

35:32

We can only hope that it does. Can

35:34

I want to go off the cuff for

35:36

a second and just get your personal opinion

35:38

on something? I just find this Fascinating.

35:40

In the book, you mentioned, how

35:42

should I put this? Wayne Wright's fondness

35:44

for alcohol, which of course is

35:47

nothing new. It's certainly not new in

35:49

the military. And this is

35:51

a weird question, but this is just how my

35:53

brain works. I apologize. So when he's a

35:55

prisoner, clearly alcohol is out

35:57

of the question. He's barely eating. He's

35:59

certainly not going to get that. I

36:01

wonder, based on your learning about this

36:03

man, was it something, was that maybe

36:05

either an extra torment for him or

36:07

was it like, right, this is not

36:10

going to happen. This is not an

36:12

option. I'm going to switch some gear

36:14

or whatever in my brain. And it's

36:16

just not a part of the day -to

36:18

-day trying to survive. Because we all

36:20

have our creature comforts or whatever the

36:22

appropriate term is. And now he's going

36:24

to have to go years without something

36:26

that he was getting on a regular

36:28

basis that gave him a certain amount

36:30

of comfort. Right.

36:33

You know, and I think it's how you

36:35

put it is well said in the

36:37

sense that. Wainwright drinking

36:39

was a part of the

36:41

army. It was especially a part

36:44

of cavalry culture. Good point. It

36:47

wouldn't be notable to say that

36:49

a cavalry officer drank at that period

36:51

of time. But what was notable

36:53

was that some people did mention that

36:55

Wainwright drank, which suggested he drank

36:57

a little bit more than a group

36:59

of people who are already drank

37:02

a lot. But,

37:04

you know, you have

37:06

different accounts of how much this

37:08

actually mattered. You

37:11

know, there's one aide who said, you

37:13

know, he found that it alcohol sort

37:15

of fortified Wayne right and gave a

37:17

little bit of extra courage but maybe

37:19

maybe it gave a little bit of

37:21

bravado that he didn't need right and

37:23

then another officer another aide who said

37:25

you know he never noticed and made

37:27

any difference on him at all and

37:29

he just you know yeah it wasn't

37:31

really the big story of Wayne Wright's

37:33

life but it is a story in

37:35

the sense that MacArthur. insinuated

37:38

in rejecting or blackballing the

37:41

Medal of Honor nomination for Wainwright

37:43

in 1942. Right. That

37:45

if you look between the lines,

37:47

what he's saying is I will

37:49

come forward and say that Wainwright

37:52

was drunk at critical moments during

37:54

the Philippines campaign. And that's what

37:56

he's insinuating that he's going to

37:58

destroy Wainwright's reputation if George Marshall

38:00

proceeds. Yeah. You know, as to

38:02

how it affected him during captivity,

38:05

I mean, There he was able

38:07

to sometimes get alcohol and baton

38:09

there is there is some record

38:11

of him sometimes having a drink

38:13

on baton But it was not

38:15

nearly as often as had been

38:17

of course before the war so

38:20

I think he had had sure

38:22

some time Without it and I

38:24

yeah, I don't I know I

38:26

don't think that was there were

38:28

so many other forms of deprivations

38:30

they faced during those years in

38:32

prison one one thing that is

38:34

sad is when he Left

38:37

and finally was released and came home

38:39

mm -hmm He finds and of course

38:41

his wife was part of this culture

38:43

too. He finds that his you can

38:45

see in his diary How much he's

38:47

looking forward to coming home to his

38:49

wife and living out the rest of

38:51

his days with her right? He finds

38:53

that she's become addicted to alcohol and

38:55

sedatives in her at his absence Yeah,

38:57

and he's not able to control that

39:00

and eventually he has to make the

39:02

very difficult decision to institutionalize his wife

39:04

so in a sense he doesn't get

39:06

the happy ending of the years together

39:08

with his wife which is one of

39:10

the things that's sustaining him during his

39:12

years in prison is making plans for

39:14

what life will be like with his

39:16

wife so that is it's a heartbreaking

39:18

ending and it's also a reminder of

39:20

the costs not just that our soldiers

39:22

bear but the costs that their families

39:24

bear. Good point because she was suffering

39:26

too and that's how she coped I

39:28

guess it would be a fair guess

39:30

but yeah it just adds Maybe

39:32

the word tragedy is too much, but

39:35

to the tragedy or at least the

39:37

projectory of what Wainwright had to go

39:39

through, you know, during World War II

39:41

and after, a very, very intense story.

39:43

So having said that, and we've kind

39:45

of touched on this a minute ago.

39:48

So he does kind of fade from

39:50

the broader public memory, but despite, again,

39:52

everything that we've covered so much. So

39:54

do you see this kind of

39:57

book as a restoration for his, I

39:59

think, rightful place in history? That's

40:01

exactly it. And my hope is that

40:03

with this book, you know, Wayne Wright

40:05

was once a very well -known figure

40:08

when he returned from the war. He

40:10

was considered a war hero. He

40:12

received a ticker tape prey in New York City. I

40:15

would like, you know, my dream

40:17

for this book is to restore Wayne

40:19

Wright to his proper place in

40:21

history. And I'd like when Douglas MacArthur

40:23

is mentioned in the Philippines, you

40:25

also mentioned Wayne Wright when you mentioned

40:28

the vow that MacArthur made to

40:30

returned to the Philippines, you also in

40:32

the same breath mentioned the general

40:34

who vowed to stay in the Philippines,

40:36

even when that meant surrendering with

40:38

his men and sharing the terrible ordeal

40:40

that was ahead of so many

40:43

of them. Yes. And you just reminded

40:45

me of something. The part of

40:47

your book that I will never forget

40:49

is after Wainwright is captured, the

40:51

Japanese, I mean, they're going to do

40:53

what they're going to do. But the psychological

40:55

torture, they made him go over and

40:57

over and over again. They drove him around

40:59

to where he suffered. His men died

41:01

and he had to surrender. I mean, they

41:04

just, they put him through the ringer

41:06

before they put him in a camp. So

41:08

again, this man suffered so much for

41:10

the decision he made. But that decision also

41:12

saved tens of thousands of lives. So

41:14

again, a very honorable man. And I just

41:16

have to say the picture of him

41:18

that I see of him after the war.

41:20

I mean, he is a skeleton. He

41:22

went through hell and back. But

41:24

I'm obviously very proud of him for making

41:26

it. And Mr. Horn, I do appreciate

41:28

your time today. Just just a couple more

41:30

questions and then I'll let you go.

41:32

I'm sure you're busy. So

41:34

if the readers had to take just

41:36

one thing away from the fate of

41:38

the generals, what would you like that

41:41

to be? I think

41:43

it's very much what you

41:45

said. I hope people appreciate and

41:47

remember the sacrifice and courage

41:49

that Wayne Wright and our other

41:51

prisoners of war showed during

41:53

World War II and remember these

41:56

stories of intense sacrifice and

41:58

courage and also to remember the

42:00

cost that our country and

42:02

most important are to be honest

42:04

because it was not an

42:06

evenly born cost our soldiers and

42:08

the people the Philippines because

42:11

they're the other people who really

42:13

suffered and we owe them

42:15

better because they were a colony

42:17

of the United States this

42:19

was not Douglas MacArthur was right

42:21

about one thing the Philippines

42:23

were not just another island chain

42:25

that could be then my

42:28

opinion could be bypassed on the

42:30

way back to Japan

42:32

I think that's a good point

42:34

to make because that's also part of

42:36

this book and and He believed

42:38

that we had been forced out at

42:40

the point of a bayonet and

42:42

we had to return the same way

42:44

and I think he was right

42:46

even if in a terrible irony his

42:48

return resulted in the Japanese carrying

42:51

out one of the worst atrocities of

42:53

the war and destroying the city

42:55

of Manila because when you visit the

42:57

Philippines today In the United States

42:59

people have different opinions about Douglas MacArthur,

43:01

but The fact that he

43:03

kept his vow is remembered in

43:05

the Philippines. He is still a

43:07

hero in that country and it's

43:09

a reminder of what it means

43:11

when our country keeps its word

43:14

and it's not forgotten and the

43:16

United States remains a very popular

43:18

Country in the Philippines among the

43:20

Filipino people Right. You just made

43:22

me think of one of the

43:24

planks of honor is keeping your

43:26

word. And he did, and the

43:28

Americans did. So again, one of

43:30

the better moments of World War

43:33

II. So before I let you

43:35

go, just one last

43:37

thing. Is there anything else that you would like

43:39

to add about the fate of the generals,

43:41

any experiences you had? I'm going to try very

43:43

hard, even though I love to talk, to

43:45

give you the last word today. Well,

43:48

I think as we're 80 years to

43:50

the end of World War II. For

43:52

me, this book was a reminder that

43:54

there are still so many stories that

43:56

we have more to learn about. There

43:59

have been so many books written

44:01

about World War II. It's easy to

44:03

say what is there left to

44:05

say. But when I went into the

44:07

archives, I found so many papers

44:09

and letters that I don't think had

44:11

ever been read by anyone outside

44:13

of General Wainwright's family in many cases.

44:16

And so this was a reminder for me

44:18

that World War II is still, and

44:20

you know this better than anyone because of

44:22

this outstanding podcast, there's still

44:25

more stories that we have to

44:27

tell and there's more heroes that

44:29

we should be raising up and

44:31

there are more lessons that our

44:33

country should be learning from this

44:35

great struggle. Absolutely. Whenever I

44:37

think about the records, the memoirs,

44:39

everything that's been produced from

44:41

World War II. I think about that scene

44:43

in Indiana Jones where they go into the

44:45

giant warehouse and there's all those crates that

44:47

haven't been opened yet. They haven't been touched.

44:49

There's a lot more stories out there. And

44:51

I hope you get to tell some of

44:54

those stories. So thank you very much for

44:56

your time today. The book is The Fate

44:58

of Generals, MacArthur, Wainwright, and the Epic Battle

45:00

for the Philippines. This book has

45:02

been available since April 15th, Tax Day. And

45:04

I have to tell you, sir, in

45:06

avoiding filing my taxes, I found your book.

45:08

So it was a win -win. for everybody,

45:10

but I did get the taxes done

45:12

on time. But seriously, this book was very

45:14

well written. It gave me a lot

45:16

of things that I did not know, and

45:18

I've read a lot on MacArthur. And

45:20

again, the maps were just, the people are

45:22

really going to enjoy this. So thank

45:24

you for your time today, sir, and thank

45:26

you for this book. Thank

45:28

you so much for having me on today. Welcome

45:40

to True Spies, the

45:42

podcast that takes you

45:44

deep inside the greatest

45:46

secret missions of all time.

45:48

You'll meet the people

45:50

who live life undercover. What

45:53

do they know? What are their skills? And

45:56

what would you do in

45:58

their position? Vengeance felt good. Seeing

46:00

these people pay for what

46:02

they'd done felt righteous. True

46:04

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