White Tigers (H)

This is the untold story of the U.S. Army's role in unconventional warfare in the Korean War. An army first lieutenant, Malcom was handpicked to go behind enemy lines to recruit, train and lead North Korean partisans in their war against Chinese and North Korean forces. He recounts how he won the guerrillas' trust and, with a minimum of support from Far East Command, mounted a series of operations that combined sabotage with intelligence-gathering. (His 4th Partisan Infantry Battalion provided the framework for establishing the Army's Special Forces in 1952.) His account of the raids behind enemy lines makes for exciting reading, and he pays moving tribute to the Koreans' extraordinary stamina, seeming indifference to pain and chivalric code of conduct. But the most eloquent passages revolve around his complaint that the institutional knowledge he acquired during the war was ignored in Vietnam, where U.S. military advisers had to learn the hard lessons of guerrilla warfare on their own. Malcom served as a battalion commander in Vietnam; Martz coauthored Solitary Survivor. (Feb.)