The Coldest Winter, David Halberstam
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The Coldest Winter
America and the Korean War

Author: David Halberstam

Narrator: Edward Herrmann

Abridged: 13 hr 51 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Hyperion

Published: 09/25/2007

Includes: Bonus Material Bonus Material Included


Synopsis

"In a grand gesture of reclamation and remembrance, Mr. Halberstam has brought the war back home."---The New York Times

David Halberstam's magisterial and thrilling The Best and the Brightest was the defining book about the Vietnam conflict. More than three decades later, Halberstam used his unrivaled research and formidable journalistic skills to shed light on another pivotal moment in our history: the Korean War. Halberstam considered The Coldest Winter his most accomplished work, the culmination of forty-five years of writing about America's postwar foreign policy.

Halberstam gives us a masterful narrative of the political decisions and miscalculations on both sides. He charts the disastrous path that led to the massive entry of Chinese forces near the Yalu River and that caught Douglas MacArthur and his soldiers by surprise. He provides astonishingly vivid and nuanced portraits of all the major figures--Eisenhower, Truman, Acheson, Kim, and Mao, and Generals MacArthur, Almond, and Ridgway. At the same time, Halberstam provides us with his trademark highly evocative narrative journalism, chronicling the crucial battles with reportage of the highest order. As ever, Halberstam was concerned with the extraordinary courage and resolve of people asked to bear an extraordinary burden.

The Coldest Winter is contemporary history in its most literary and luminescent form, providing crucial perspective on every war America has been involved in since. It is a book that Halberstam first decided to write more than thirty years ago and that took him nearly ten years to complete. It stands as a lasting testament to one of the greatest journalists and historians of our time, and to the fighting men whose heroism it chronicles.

Author Bio

David Halberstam was one of America's most distinguished journalists and historians. He covered the beginnings of the Civil Rights movement and reported for the New York Times on the war in Vietnam. The author of fifteen bestsellers, he won the Pulitzer Prize for his Vietnam reporting. He was killed in a car accident on April 23, 2007, while on his way to an interview for what was to be his next book.

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