Subordinates have written of his condensing the struggle down to him against the Jap. Media reports may use third person but when MacArthur would be walking back and forth in the room talking, it was he against the Jap.
[2] Never gave public recognition to any to of his subordinates resulting in a MacArthur success.
Who aside from historians and history enthusiasts can name subordinates of Patton, Montgomery, Bradley, etc?
[3] Never took personal responsibility for any failures, blaming instead, the now named subordinates.
Did Montgomery ever take responsibility for Market Garden? Did Patton ever take responsibility for Task Force Baum? Did Bradley ever take responsibility for the Battle of the Bulge? Perhaps they did. If so, I must have missed it in their memoirs.
[1] MacArthur did use the third person describing himself.
[2] First, Patton was a subordinate himself. Bradley and Monty commanded the Army Groups. And quite a lot of people knew who Hodges, Gerow, Collin, and Creighton Abrams were.
[3] Compared to the December 7th-8th f*uck up, the screw ups at Bataan, the New Guinea campaign, Leyte [invaded for airfields that couldn’t be built because of the soil], and the almost wholely unneeded Southern Pacific campaign, Baum’s not much. As for the Battle of the Bulge, blame for that rests principally on Ike [unfamiliar with the sector, not convinced by junior G-2s and his J-2 that something was up]. Compare it to the run up to Kasserine.
And as for Monty, he’s the nearest thing to MacArthur there is. And I DESPIUSE Bernard Law Montgomery.