Rebecca Nedostup talk, “War Being” in Mid-Twentieth Century China and Taiwan

Need to watch this video sometime.

I don't know if it's my computer or their set-up, but the audio is terrible.

[Update 10/31/24: Uh oh...]

'Tis the season (evidently) to buy books, even if I don't have time to read them

Just picked up (well, was sent) a new book from the University of Washington Press on the CIA and the Asia Foundation, a Cold War-era nonprofit/CIA front (that is now evidently not funded by the CIA, I guess). The book is Cold War Deceptions: The Asia Foundation and the CIA, by David H. Price. 

One thing I'll be reading this book for is how it extends or differs from Emma North-Best's long article on the CIA and the Asia Foundation on the MuckRock website. I remember reading that article a few years ago after I came across a 1951 letter from Philip Horton, assistant editor of The Reporter, to Allen Dulles, who was "Deputy Director for Plans" at the CIA at the time (if Wikipedia is correct). 

In the letter, Horton quotes a letter he had received from Kerr (who was at the Hoover Library at the time), in which Kerr criticized the Committee for a Free Asia (the precursor to the Asia Foundation). Kerr reported on a visit to Hoover by CFA president George H. Greene, Jr.* (not sure what his first name was). Kerr continued, 

Either the management is extraordinarily naive, or they assume us to be so. The line will be almost unmodified extension of the Voice of America or U.S.I.S. propaganda. "Tell the Asians how wonderful life is in America, how good our institutions are, and how very very wicked and dangerous the Communists are." There is heavy emphasis on the latter approach, with  little ready response to our questions concerning positive content. It was freely admitted that China is the primary concern. Chiang is to be neither praised nor condemned. "Counterpart Committees" will be set up overseas, operating under guarantees that the local government will not influence nor affect the content of propaganda. It was asserted that such a condition was expected to obtain in Formosa, which is to be a principal base of operations. 

It has been pointed out to the representatives of the Committee that (1) most Asians are tired of hearing how good we are, and the history of our representative institutions has little bearing on their problems, for the conditions surrounding their evolution cannot be duplicated in Asia; (2) most non-Chinese Asians fear a strong China, whatever its political orientation, and will hardly respond with enthusiasm to a rally in support of "anti-Communist government" for China, especially if it means support for the Nationalists; (3) Formosa cited as an example of "Free Asia" would be damaging nonsense. 

Those of us who talked with Greene have a troubled sense that the Administration may have decided to switch to all-out support for the Nationalists, hopefully trusting that Chiang may be thrust aside, and that the Committee not only has the State Department's blessing in this attempt to sweeten the picture, but is most actively setting it up. Each of us asks the other if at any point the [China] Lobby may be putting up funds. Odd to conceive, but not impossible in Washington. 

Actually, if the thing were worked out on a realistic appraisal of the American position in Asian eyes, it could do an enormously important job, unhampered by red tape.

Wonder if this letter helped get Kerr in any trouble with the government... 

*All you had to do was look in the index of the book you just bought, Jon... 🙄

Another new (new new new!) book in the former native speaker's library

I just got my copy of Kim Liao's Where Every Ghost Has a Name: A Memoir of Taiwanese Independence, which came into print (or "dropped," as the youngsters say) a few days ago. I read a little of it on the Amazon website (as much as I could) while I waited for the hardback copy, and I can't wait to read it. I'm going to put it next on my list after finishing Anru Lee's Haunted Modernities. (Interestingly, Lee has a blurb on the back of Liao's book.) 

I'm especially interested in seeing how Kim Liao treats the relationship between Thomas Liao and his family and George H. Kerr. I realize that, as K. Liao says, this is a work of creative nonfiction, so some of the conversations between the characters are reimagined, but I want to see how her perspective on Kerr compares to my own perspective.

Kim Liao is coming to Northeastern in October, so I guess I'd better get going on reading her book!

Update on new (academic) year's resolutions

I'm happy to announce that I've chosen the first book that I'll be reading on the train to school, starting on Tuesday (I'm sure all of my reader was dying to know): Haunted Modernities: Gender, Memory, and Placemaking in Postindustrial Taiwan, by Anru Lee. 

I mentioned back in May that I had started to read the book shortly after I received it, but then, between teaching two summer courses and getting a book review and some other writing projects done during the summer, plus preparing for my honors course, I just didn't have time to get back to it. I really have enjoyed it so far, though, and I'm looking forward to getting back to it. Maybe I'll write a few notes about it once I finish.