Twice Forgotten: African Americans and the Korean War, an Oral History by David P. Cline

Abstract

Reviewed by: Twice Forgotten: African Americans and the Korean War, an Oral History by David P. Cline Selika Ducksworth-Lawton Twice Forgotten: African Americans and the Korean War, an Oral History. By David P. Cline. (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2021. Pp. 387. Illustrations, notes, bibliography, index.) Most histories of African Americans in the military focus on World War II or Vietnam. African American soldiers tell their own stories in Twice Forgotten, the first work to highlight such voices in Korean-conflict literature. This book bridges African American experiences between World War II and Vietnam and offers African American men's perceptions of military integration, thereby correcting for this absence in previous literature. Author David P. Cline's purpose is to discuss the Korean War from the standpoint of African American soldiers. The work starts in 1946 with the [End Page 603] beginnings of desegregation, discussing various types of small-unit integration and President Harry F. Truman's 1948 Executive Order 9981, which banned segregation in the military but did not integrate it. Cline's discussion of the complexities of desegregation, removing discrimination, and integration is excellent. The book then moves through 1950 to the July battlefront in Korea and ends with the soldiers' return and how they influenced the civilian world, a period of rapid change. Cline's framework is chronological. He uses oral testimonies that he and his team collected for American RadioWorks, the documentary arm of American Public Media. The wide array of testimonies cover all military branches except the Coast Guard. The testimonies are eloquent, bracketed with explanatory context, and illustrate the pain experienced by African American soldiers who worked against bias while defending the country. Testimonies from Texas soldiers illustrate the state's unique racial landscape, with examples from East Texas revealing harsher examples of harassment and Jim Crow than those from the western part of the state. Cline's writing is nuanced, and throughout the work is readable. Impeccably researched, the book does justice to its subject matter. Nevertheless, readers will not find an evaluation of the courts-martial for misconduct under Article 93 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (failure to obey orders) wrongfully inflicted on the 24th Infantry Division and 159th Field Artillery Battalion. This book is still invaluable because the voices of the men who were there give readers an authentic sense of battle and being prisoners of war; the latter experience especially is new in the literature. These men fought a dual war against bigotry, both in war and at home. This work documents their experiences in their own words. Selika Ducksworth-Lawton University of Wisconsin—Eau Claire Copyright © 2022 The Texas State Historical Association