At 04:34 PM 12/20/02 -0700, Robert wrote:Mr Small seems a bit dillusional, or perhaps just slightly misinformed. The Marines and the South Koreans informed both Almond and Willhoby(sp) of the first contact with the Chinese, and both Almond and others discounted the reports with Almond commenting to Gen. Smith, "you're not going to let a few Chinese Laundrymen stop you are you?." This was prior to Mac,s meeting with Truman at Wake, where he assured Truman that the Chinese would not interfere. They attacked in force the very next day.Quite to the contrary, I'm afraid. The Marines had no separate intelligence service in the FEC and the South Korean intelligence at that point was run under the CIA, not FEC. Thus, there was simply no way either could have told either Almond or Willoughby (note the spelling: it is a common English-language name, Robert) anything other than battlefield experience, which is not what is being discussed here. I would suggest, instead of tossing canards around, that you read works such as Clay Blair's THE FORGOTTEN WAR to learn what really occurred. The higher-level intelligence was simply not passed on to FEC by the CIA or DoD or State. The record is pretty clean on this. Marc msmall@infi.net FAX: +276/343-7315 Cha robh bàs fir gun ghràs fir!