¶ … Coldest War: A Memoir of Korea, a novel written by James Brady. This paper clearly outlines the summary of the book and highlights some of the events written by the author in his book. This paper explains Brady's purpose behind writing his masterpiece and clearly defines its theme. Critical analysis of the novel and information about the author are also included. The Coldest War: A Memoir Of Korea

The Coldest War: A Memoir of Korea written by James Brady gives a first person's account of the second Korean war. In the book the author compares the tactical approach of the army vs. marine rifle companies. Serving as a young marine lieutenant in the United States Marine Corps for a year, Brady tells the story by illustrating to his audience the deplorable conditions of the soldiers and the critical experience they underwent, through his analysis and encountering. The author talks about the everyday events that went on while living in Korea during the war and thus presents to his audience an interesting guide on leadership.

The book tells a story about a young marine officer from his days as a boxer at Notre Dame to a Lieutenant fighting in the Korean conflict. The main character in the novel undergoes various situations and while his career is progressing well he is asked to serve as a young officer in the Carlson's Raiders. The Coldest War: A Memoir of Korea is one of James Brady's most brilliant works, which he presented to his audience worldwide during the year 1990. The author now writes weekly for Parade Magazines and Advertising Age and resides in Manhattan and in East Hampton in New York. He has written three novels about the Hamptons and recently signed a contract to write at least two more. His enthusiasm for life is perhaps the reason why old age hasn't been around to pencil in a few furrows on his face (Dennis Duggan, The Forgotten War Is Remembered).

The Coldest War: A Memoir...

When Brady got to Korea as an officer, the war had disintegrated into a trench affair, similar to World War I. These events gave the author a chance to muse and reflect on topics such as morality, the terror involved in the battle, although on a small platoon scale. The book focuses on the survival of men through snow, cold, mud and deprivation.
According to the author, the public and the media took a lot of hype in World War I and II and the bloody war that was fought in Korea but little attention was paid to the deathly war that was fought in Korea. The prime reason of writing this novel was to narrate to the public the calamity that occurred during the Korean War. Brady dedicated his novel to the Chosin Few, referring to his beloved Marines who "fought and defeated the Chinese army in the autumn of 1950 in the mountains of North Korea near the Chosin reservoir.. It was my honor to serve with some of them" (Dennis Duggan, The Forgotten War Is Remembered).

The novel highlights the events that took place during the Korean War. Their were 25,000 Marines fighting against a large number of perhaps 270,000 Chinese troops, trapped in the frozen mountain wilderness some 70 miles from the Sea of Japan. Maj. Gen. O.P. Smith's Marines, thwarted by thousands of routed and disheartened U.S. Army and South Korean troops and also by thousands of frightened noncombatants, battled the chilly cold and fought the Chinese, bringing out with them their injured and dead people and much of their equipment (Smith Hempstone, Tales Making Courage, Hardships In Korean War).

Gen. Smith, who contemptuously rejected an Army offer to fly him out of the barricade, disavowed that his Marines were retreating. "Hell, we' re just advancing in another direction," he quipped. Col. Lewis B. Puller, commander of the first Marines and the most decorated Marine of his or any other…