MacArthur's Desk

[John Wright]

The desk that GEN MacArthur used in his Brisbane office was made by a furniture maker in Melbourne, Australia from Australian timbers. It accompanied him to Brisbane when GHQ moved there on 23 July 1942. The desk ( being his personal property) followed him to the Philippines. It is now part of the exhibits in the MacArthur Memorial in Norfolk, Virginia in USA.

 

[p51]

I'm not quite the Mac idolator that some people are.

Not a Dougout Doug fan, myself. Not a fan of what he did to the Bonus Marchers in DC or the backdoor intrigue he took part in, in Korea...

 

[filfoster]

Not to go too far away from the OP on a tangent but I'd offer that p51 isn't alone in his feelings about Mac. He was a complicated character and from my reading, gives haters and fans both enough to grab onto. I didn't think Manchester's American Caesar got too hagiographic but some do.
Johnathan Jordan's American Warlords (I dislike 'warlords' in a modern history title) is a fine read, full of many original (or at least not recently published) records of the relationships of FDR, King and Marshal, Stimson and Leahy. MacArthur is often mentioned and is depicted with favorable and unfavorable aspects, in his dealings with the primary characters.
A fair reading seems to support claims that he contributed more than he took away.

 

[Harp]

He was a complicated character...
A fair reading seems to support claims that he contributed more than he took away.

MacArthur-warts and all, boiled down to the brass tacks-was a soldier's soldier from bore-to-butteplate. An interesting ba***rd.

 

[ChiTownScion]

Not a Dougout Doug fan, myself. Not a fan of what he did to the Bonus Marchers in DC or the backdoor intrigue he took part in, in Korea...

True of a lot of careerists: a well nurtured attitude of entitlement that overlooks the fact that, in this nation at least, the military is subordinate to civilian authority. He wasn't- and isn't- the only one, of course.