From School Library Journal
Grade 7-10-Dolan provides limited background about the division of Korea and the larger issues of the Cold War, concentrating on the military action of the conflict itself and describing the campaigns and the strategies behind them in almost exhaustive detail. He also profiles many of the commanders and discusses the Truman-MacArthur confrontation. Inset boxes offer information about leaders, strategies, and the efforts made by other countries in the United Nations alliance. Dolan is objective about the war and the nations involved in it, but offers only limited analysis of the larger geopolitical issues surrounding the conflict or its lasting consequences. Maps help readers find Korean locations and trace military campaigns, but the black-and-white photos are a disappointment. They are uniformly dark and add little to the text. Although Dolan's book is a competent examination of the military aspects of the Korean conflict, it does not offer the comprehensive coverage and analysis found in Deborah Bachrach's The Korean War (Lucent, 1991) or Maurice Isserman's The Korean War (Facts On File, 1992). An additional purchase to fill report needs.
Mary Mueller, Rolla Junior High School, MO
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Mary Mueller, Rolla Junior High School, MO
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
Gr. 7^-12. Readers interested in battlefield strategies will relish this account that tracks troop movements across the thirty-eighth parallel, chronicles the power struggle between Truman and MacArthur, and explores the bumpy road to peace. Discussion of how the U.S. worked with the United Nations to form a multinational response to the conflict will make these events relevant to today's newspaper readers. Unfortunately, the book's limited focus on strategy and politics won't help readers understand what was happening on the front lines or back home, and with the exception of some simple statistics, there isn't much about the human toll of the war. Nor is there mention of the war's impact on the Korean people. The book will provide good curriculum support for history classes, but it will need to be supplemented by other books, such as R. Conrad Stein's The Korean War: The Forgotten War (1994), to give students a complete picture of what went on. Bibliography. Randy Meyer
