Book description
As a five-feet-three-inch hunchback who weighed about 100 pounds, Homer
Lea (1876-1912), was an unlikely candidate for life on the battlefield,
yet he became a world-renowned military hero. In the Dragon's Lair: The
Exploits of Homer Lea paints a revealing portrait of a diminutive yet
determined man who never earned his valor on the field of battle, but
left an indelible mark on his times. Lawrence M. Kaplan draws from
extensive research to illuminate the life of a “man of mystery,” while
also yielding a clearer understanding of the early twentieth-century
Chinese underground reform and revolutionary movements. Lea's career
began in the inner circles of a powerful Chinese movement in San
Francisco that led him to a generalship during the Boxer Rebellion.
Fixated with commanding his own Chinese army, Lea's inflated aspirations
were almost always dashed by reality. Although he never achieved the
leadership role for which he strived, he became a trusted advisor to
revolutionary leader Dr. Sun Yat-sen during the 1911 revolution that
overthrew the Manchu Dynasty. As an author, Lea garnered fame for two
books on geopolitics: The Valor of Ignorance, which examined weaknesses
in the American defenses and included dire warnings of an impending
Japanese-American war, and The Day of the Saxon, which predicted the
decline of the British Empire. More than a character study, In the
Dragon's Lair provides insight into the establishment and execution of
underground reform and revolutionary movements within U. S. immigrant
communities and in southern China, as well as early twentieth-century
geopolitical thought. Lawrence M. Kaplan is the historian for the U.
S. Missile Defense Agency.
