Chapter 75
The Sword of the United States (5)
Dragged along tightly bound like a string of dried fish, MacArthur suddenly looked up at the sky.
Unlike the human world, the moon above was brilliantly bright.
The moon shone so clearly—so why were these blockheads acting in such utter darkness…!
As expected, the 1st Division was hopeless. Just because they were established earlier, they never stopped slandering the finest division in the United States—the 42nd Division.
Perhaps… this was all part of a conspiracy.
Suspicion began to grow, one thought leading to another.
The senile generals who feared the rise of a young and capable new generation.
The incompetent Chaumont staff, stuck with Civil War–era thinking, letting soldiers’ blood flow like rivers.
And even the 1st Division, always filled with jealousy toward the 42nd.
The so-called “surprise inspections” that everyone already knew about—yet somehow he had still been blindsided and scolded by Pershing.
Staff officers who had grabbed units just hours after brutal frontline combat, harassing them with inspections and nonsense.
Even the so-called “observers” sent from headquarters during his advance, conducting ridiculous surveys among his subordinates—asking things like, “What do you think of General MacArthur?” and “Is he fit to be a general?”
Wasn’t the picture obvious?
If the brigade commander responsible for issuing attack orders suddenly vanished, the 84th Brigade—and even the entire 42nd Division—would fall into confusion.
Meanwhile, those scoundrels in the 1st Division would simply strike at Chaumont and seize the glory. Easy and convenient.
No matter what, to stoop to something this vile… just how rotten has the United States Army become?!
Now everything fit together. MacArthur was certain.
The vague sense he had long felt—that those behind him were not on his side—was finally taking clear shape.
How deep does this rot go? General Pershing wouldn’t be involved in something like this. Never. But Chief of Staff Drum—that bastard is definitely one of them. A piece of trash who dares insult a general while only a colonel.
MacArthur’s mind busily sorted through the information, compiling a list of “enemies.”
This one—definitely an enemy.
That one—not an enemy, but incompetent.
That one—capable, but driven by selfish ambition.
If anyone could see the list forming in his head, they might think he was writing a kill list—but the soldiers escorting him, bound and helpless, had no such ability.
The United States Army… no, this entire country—I must change it.
And just as he was solidifying his resolve for the nation and the army—
He finally arrived at the 1st Brigade of the 1st Division.
“Hey, spy. Wait here for a bit.”
“We’ll bring the officers, so think up a good excuse!”
Locked in a warehouse, sitting in darkness and tasting dust for dozens of minutes—
Something squirmed nearby, but without light, he couldn’t even tell what it was. Time dragged on.
Finally, the door opened, and a clearly exhausted captain stepped in.
“Yaaawn… I’m dead tired. Hmm… Guten Abend?”
“I speak English.”
“Ah, good. Then state your name and rank first.”
“Brigadier General Douglas MacArthur. Commander of the 84th Brigade, 42nd Division, United States Army.”
“Right, right. That’s the identity you were given. Now, your real name? Fifth Army, German Army?”
“Shut up and take me to your brigade or division commander. Once someone senior arrives, I’ll gladly ‘confess’ whatever German secrets you want.”
“Ha… sure, sure. Let’s do that. Boys! Take him to the brigade commander!”
And shortly after—
“Ma-Ma-Ma-MacArthur?! What on earth are you doing here?!”
“Thanks for renaming me ‘Ma-Ma-Ma-MacArthur,’ but I prefer my original name, Colonel Hjalmar Erickson. Your brigade’s warehouse was quite cozy.”
“You idiots! Why did you capture another unit’s brigade commander?! What—what is going on here—”
“Were you that desperate for glory? Did Chaumont order this?”
It was already overwhelming enough that the “spy” they had captured turned out to be another unit’s commander—one of higher rank, no less. And now he was clearly furious.
But from MacArthur’s perspective—after enduring hours of humiliation—Colonel Erickson’s confusion looked exactly like that of a clumsy conspirator.
“You’d best confess now. Which piece of trash at Chaumont ordered you to kidnap a fellow brigade commander?”
“I-it’s a misunderstanding! A misunderstanding! My men made a terrible mistake—I don’t even know how to apologize! But I swear, by the name of the Lord above, this is not what you think—”
“And you expect me to believe that?!”
Just as MacArthur was relentlessly pressing Erickson for answers—
Bang!
“Wait… why are you here, sir?”
“Brigadier General Kim? And why are you here?”
“I heard the 1st Division smashed through sector boundaries and was charging like a horse with dynamite shoved up its rear—so I came running to watch the show… I mean, out of concern. But why are you here?”
MacArthur paused.
Was Kim also one of them?
Ridiculous.
At last, he felt relief—an ally had arrived. He gathered his thoughts.
“Those damned political hacks at Chaumont have gone beyond undermining my achievements—they’ve abducted me while I was on reconnaissance.”
“It’s a misunderstanding, I tell you! What must I do for you to believe me?!”
“Then confess who’s behind this! Yujin, help me!”
Yujin Kim, who had been silently watching this scene—too absurd to be a conspiracy, too tragic to be a comedy—finally stepped forward.
“Yujin, the Germans aren’t the only enemy. Right now—”
Smack!
“Is it because you haven’t slept, or because you inhaled too much gas? Stop talking nonsense and let’s get you back to your unit.”
“Tr-traitor… you…”
“One rabid dog like Patton is enough. Haji! Haji! Load this baggage into the car!”
Those were the last words MacArthur heard before losing consciousness.
***
When he opened his eyes, he was in a vehicle.
“You’re awake now?”
“Yu… Jin?”
“Yes, yes. Yujin Kim.”
“You! What on earth was that?!”
“A traditional Eastern remedy for treating mad dogs.”
To call him, MacArthur, a mad dog—!
Yujin’s calm reply left him momentarily speechless.
“Do you even know what I went through?”
“I heard. You wrapped yourself head to toe in random gear, wandered out alone at night without any identification, and got yourself captured, right?”
Was he foolish—or just stupid?
Yujin clicked his tongue, and MacArthur nearly choked with frustration.
“That’s not the point. Listen carefully. There’s a conspiracy at Chaumont to strip me of my command!”
“So the conspirators somehow knew you’d wander off alone at night dressed like that and sent telepathic orders?”
This time, MacArthur was completely speechless.
Yujin glanced at him, then let loose like a machine gun.
“Sir, did you inhale too much gas and develop paranoia? Think logically. Why on earth would Chaumont be so desperate to get rid of you? Why?”
“That absurd inspection, the interference, the lack of cooperation, the negligence! You think that’s normal?!”
“Uh… well… I went through all of that too.”
The “junior officer—yellow monkey leading a Black unit”—answered with a faint, amused smile.
“Exactly. Doesn’t that make it even clearer? Those bastards are trying to get rid of threats like us because they’re afraid of losing their positions!”
“And it’s not just us—the 2nd Division, the 3rd Division, the 26th Division… they’re all saying the same thing. Everyone’s furious, banging their chests over the same nonsense because of those idiots at Chaumont.”
“……”
“Time to come back to reality, sir. The Chaumont crowd isn’t particularly malicious. They’re just so ridiculously incompetent it’s practically sabotage. Actually, ever since Colonel Marshall moved to headquarters, hasn’t it gotten a lot less insane?”
He didn’t want to admit it, but once again his mind concluded that this explanation was closer to the truth.
“Ha. Ha. Hahaha. So… they were just incompetent? Not a conspiracy—just unbelievably bad at their jobs?”
“If there really were schemers at Chaumont capable of cornering you, wouldn’t they have killed me first? I’m the one boosting the prestige of Black troops, after all.”
There was nothing he could say.
Then what on earth had he just been doing?
As his thoughts finally reached the string of outrageous claims he had made, an overwhelming sense of humiliation—far worse than before—washed over poor MacArthur.
“C-cough!”
“Now that you understand the situation, hurry back and prepare your offensive.”
“…I have nothing to say.”
“We’ve arrived! 42nd Division!”
“I should head back too. If I’m not at my unit by morning, my chief of staff will probably shoot me.”
After dropping MacArthur off, Yujin grinned and waved.
“Good luck.”
“Thank you for today.”
“You tend to overestimate people, sir. When you think about the average human intellect, set your baseline to someone so incompetent you wouldn’t even imagine it. Stop assuming intent and conspiracies every time—you’ll just end up banging on empty windows in your sleep.”
Leaving behind that absurd advice, Yujin’s black staff car—riddled with bullet marks—disappeared beyond the mountain road.
MacArthur kept staring in that direction until it vanished completely into the night, lost in thought.
And a few hours later—
The U.S. forces, led by the 84th Brigade of the 42nd Division under MacArthur, finally captured Sedan.
***
It had been a nerve-wracking night.
The look on that man’s face—he seemed ready to shoot someone at any moment. Honestly, I wouldn’t have held back either. A man with that much pride, after going through something like that…
Still, what surprised me wasn’t that he got angry—it was how he jumped straight to conspiracy theories. Is this what it looks like when a university professor believes in bizarre conspiracies?
The biggest problem with MacArthur, from what I’d seen, wasn’t arrogance or politics.
It was that he was simply too capable.
But he assumes others are at least, say, 0.7 MacArthur on average. If 0.7 MacArthurs were walking around everywhere, the U.S. would’ve conquered the world already.
When people call him arrogant all the time, I’m pretty sure this is why.
He meets someone with 0.3 MacArthur-level ability? Instead of thinking, “This person is just less capable,” he thinks, “They’re disrespecting me.”
No wonder his relationships are either worshippers or enemies.
He’s only ever walked elite paths, surrounded by equally elite people. He has no idea how unbelievably stupid some people can be at the bottom.
But I’m a bit different.
I come from the proud, tough Republic of Korea Army—where I’ve experienced every flavor of absurdity imaginable.
Soldiers who make you seriously question what the Military Manpower Administration was thinking when they enlisted them.
Superiors who make you wonder if they’re just incompetent—or secretly North Korean spies sent to sabotage things.
So I understand very well that there are people in this world whose stupidity defies imagination.
Just look at figures like Mutaguchi a few decades later—when incompetence crosses a certain threshold, it starts to look like some grand strategic trap to intelligent people.
And honestly—if you dress like that, I’d arrest you too if I were a soldier.
Those guys who captured MacArthur shouldn’t be punished—they should get medals. Either he was a sloppy spy or a man driven mad by war. Of course they had to bring him in.
“Do you think it was resolved well?”
“Hm?”
Haji suddenly spoke up.
“Well… someone like General MacArthur has a very… strong ego. Do you think he’ll forget this humiliation?”
“If he can’t forget it, we’ll make him want to forget it.”
“How?”
“Not sure if it’ll work, but I’ve got an idea.”
I should go visit Patton in the hospital.
If I tell him this story properly, he’ll laugh his head off—probably tear his stitches. And then I’ll get him to compose a nice little song.
After a few years of hearing ‘Mac who got arrested as a spy while wandering around in civilian clothes’ on repeat, even he’ll get embarrassed enough to keep his mouth shut. Yeah… I can’t wait to visit.
Anyway, enough about Mac. With someone like him stepping in, the fall of Sedan was only a matter of time.
Once Sedan falls—or honestly, whether it does or not—the war is over.
History may have changed slightly because of my involvement, but aside from shaving a few days off the German Empire’s lifespan, nothing major will be different.
What remains now is the long interwar period ahead.
The time for thinking about military achievements is over.
Now begins a completely new game—one that will decide the rest of my life.
“Haji.”
“Yes, sir.”
“What are you going to do after the war? Leave the army? Stay?”
“After the war?”
“Yeah.”
Haji hesitated, then shook his head lightly.
“I don’t know.”
“Yeah… figures. Who would?”
…Except me.