PRESIDENT TRUMAN'S POLICY statement on June 27 heartened many Formosan leaders. For a moment it seemed that the United States was about to approach the Formosa problem with fresh ideas. The decision to neutralize the island - to cut it off from the continent - meant perhaps that its value as a forward oceanic base bad been realized and that henceforth it would take its place in line with bases on nearby Okinawa and Luzon. The President's allusion to Formosa's unsettled legal status raised a flicker of hope that it would come under the Allied Command at Tokyo or an American administration. Had not General Wedemeyer told the President there was reason to believe the "Formosans would be receptive toward United States guardianship and United Nations trusteeship"? There would be trouble with the Nationalists, of course, but in their state of total dependency this might soon be overcome by skillful diplomacy which would clear the way to develop Formosa's full potential in the Allied interest.
This was not to be. A propaganda campaign of unprecedented character and scale had been launched in the United States by the Nationalist Chinese. An alien group had determined to manipulate public opinion and to create irresistible pressures upon the Administration at Washington. If the policymakers there could not be forced to abandon the "neutrality" program then they should be forced out of office and an administration favorable to the Nationalists must be brought in. The Taipei Government, sustained by American grants-in-aid, subsidized the campaian directly or through public relations firms retained on contract.
A generation must pass and with it the principals who took part before the full significance and details can be established. For an intimation of the scale of operations and the methods employed the reader needs only examine sworn testimony presented before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations in 1963. [1]
In time Washington yielded perceptibly - or appeared to yield - to the pressures generated by this campaign. This shook the confidence of our major allies, lowered American prestige in international affairs and substantially weakened Washington's position as a leader in the United Nations. The bitter test will come in full-dress UN debates on China and the Formosa Question.
In 1950 the Communist threat to Formosa was very real. The invasion of South Korea startled a complacent America which had so hastily demobilized its soldiers in 1945, put its ships in mothballs and dismantled its great air fleets while a cynical Russia had steadily enlarged its military establishment and moved to subvert or overrun non-Communist nations everywhere. The Kremlin promised to "bury" the capitalist world.
Chiang wanted much more than a safe neutrality behind the U.S. Seventh Fleet. He held his regime together at Taipei only by promising an early return to the mainland but he knew that only an American force could put him there. He wanted first an American commitment to train, equip and transport Nationalist forces to the continent. If a landing could be made in force he could feel assured that he would not be left dangling on the edges of China. An American commitment to move him to the beachhead would involve a moral commitment to support him all the way into the heart of China.
How to persuade the American people that most vital interests were at stake in this? How to keep the money and arms flowing to Formosa in ever-increasing quantity? How to draw the American armed forces into battle with the Communist Chinese on his behalf?
We may doubt that American military leaders were deeply impressed by Chiang's record as a military genius or were particularly interested in his political ambitions, but his interests ran closely parallel to larger American military interests. It had to be assumed that there would be war with Russia and its satellites. In Asia Moscow was supplying arms, industrial equipment and technical advice to Communist China on a massive scale. It would be advantageous to destroy the new Peking Government before it could mobilize continental manpower, natural resources and industrial potential. It was highly desirable to build up a threat somewhere on China's flank to relieve pressure upon UN forces in South Korea. Under these circumstances it was not difficult for Taipei to get a hearing and to gain champions in the American military establishment despite the fact the President was striving to confine the "hot war" to the Korean peninsula.
Chiang wanted a "hot war" on the China coast and so, too, did a number of his champions in the American armed forces. They scoffed when warned that a brush-fire on the China coast could quickly become a conflagration involving not only China but Russia as well. As for local political conditions affecting Formosa's security as a base of operations they knew they could leave that to the Generalissimo; Formosa was governed under martial law and the island looked like an excellent source for manpower.
Christian America was an easy target for Taipei's propagranda. China's conversion had been an American dream for a century and there was a deep emotional attachment to China mission programs. Churches in every township in America offered ready-made and inexpensive vehicles for the dissemination of news concerning the leading Christian family in China. Missionary societies were active in parishes across the land already persuaded that a victory for Communists in China meant a triumph for the anti-Christ in Asia. Best of all, from Taipei's point of view, church membership and mission support involved Democrats and Republicans alike and an appeal could be made to pacifists as well as to the most militant patriots. If the enslaved Chinese people could be freed, mission work could be resumed.
The most important propaganda prize lay in the Congress and the organized political leadership of America. Congressmen who voted on grants-in-aid were also in powerful position to influence the Administration. They were at this period peculiarly vulnerable. They had to respond to the pervading sense of America's military insecurity vis-a-vis Russia; they could not ignore the argument that Chiang had a ready-made military establisbment and was passionately eager to use it in defense of Freedom.
The domestic political situation was open for exploitation. The Democratic Party had been in office since 1933; the "Ins" were solidly entrenched and the "Outs" were desperate. President Truman's victory in 1948 left the Republican Party in disarray; repeated Democratic victories had demonstrated the extraordinary lack of Republican appeal on the usual campaign issues. The "Aid Chiang" debate came along as a godsend. It had distinct advantages, for it enabled the Republicans to charge that Democratic reluctance to increase aid and use Chiang suggested pro-Communist sympathies in the State Department. This was "evidence" that Communists were about to subvert the Government and destroy the American Way of Life. Anyone who opposed massive aid for the Generalissimo must be a fool blind to the Communist threat, a definite security risk, or a member of a Communist apparatus. A second great advantage rested in the distance at which Formosa lay, an island about which the American people knew nothing. This explains the success of the "Senator from Formosa" whose constituents at home could not hold him responsible if things went sour on that distant frontier.
The United States was saturated with propaganda but as we wade through samples of it in review we notice what great pains were taken to smother criticism of Formosa's internal administration and to divert American attention from the great majority of the population. Nothing is said of Formosan appeals for intervention in 1947 and the March uprising is dismissed briefly as the work of Communists and pro-Japanese elements on the island. Nothing is recorded of the Formosan desire to be cut off from continental China nor of the fruitless effort within the island to secure Formosan representation at all levels of government. The "Free Formosans" in exile at Tokyo are traitors deserving death.
The Communist invasion of South Korea in 1950 revealed one of the larger policy errors of 1945. Because there had been no reservation of Allied interests in Formosa pending a general postwar settlement in Asia or a satisfactory treaty, nothing could be done there without the consent of the Generalissimo.
There was now let loose in the United States a flood of propaganda designed to convince the American public that Chiang had a powerful military force ready to strike into the heartland of China. The public was allowed to guess whether "potential strength" meant strength in being (men well armed and well organized but not yet tested in the field) or whether this meant strength which might be developed from Formosa's man-power resources. As the military arguments were elaborated, apparently three stages of action were foreseen - first, the island would be prepared to defend itself from Communist attack and invasion; secondly, Chiang would lead his "powerful striking force" to the mainland opening a second front; and thirdly, the United States would become involved and take over the operation.
It was proposed to base this grand strategy on an island landmass of less than 14,000 square miles in area (two thirds of it rugged mountain hinterland) served by two small ports of embarkation with minor subsidiary anchorages. Across the channel lay a continental landmass approaching 4,500,000 square miles in area. Formosa's population in 1950 was about 8,000,000, bitterly divided. No layman knew the approximate strength of Chiang's Nationalist Army, but the American public was assured that it was nearly first-rate and ready to go. Defense came first. One widely published report said in part, "U.S. military men believe that a Red invasion can be turned back by the U. S. Seventh Fleet together with the Nationalist Army of about 500,000 men who have been licked into shape by VMI-trained General Sun Li-jen." This is a sample of the propaganda spread abroad at a time when professional military estimates at Tokyo and Washington placed the number of effective Nationalist troops at about 50,000 men, enough (with Seventh Fleet support) to repel a Communist cross-channel invasion but with nothing to spare for continental ventures. We need not belabor the point; a significant number of prominent American military leaders were convinced that Chiang's forces must be used, that Formosa when prepared to defend itself must become a base for active attack. The only way to force the President's hand was to convince the public that a powerful and eager ally was being willfully neglected. On April 7, 1951, A. J. Liebling wittily examined the extraordinarily varied and extravagant claims which were then being published, summing them up in the New Yorker magazine under the supremely appropriate title "The Rubber-type Army." It was no laughing matter for the Administration, however. The Formosa Problem had become an explosive issue.
Lincoln's troubles with defiant Civil War generals pale beside President Truman's difficulties with the "activist" military leaders for whom MacArthur set the pace with a perfect sense of drama and timing, and with passionate, moralistic rhetoric. He wanted a second front to divert pressure upon his forces in Korea. Americans were encouraged to believe that failure to win a quick victory there might be attributed to politicians in Washington who refused to use every resource available to them. The important visitors who passed through Headquarters at Tokyo were flattered with private conversations and "confidential briefings" which did not remain confidential very long
We remember that on June 29, 1950 - two days after Truman "quarantined" Formosa - the Generalissimo grandly offered to send 30,000 men to Korea and that the joint Chiefs of Staff at Washington decided the risks were too great. They notified MacArthur of their decision. This meant a great loss of face for Chiang.
To soften the blow and to make his own position clear MacArthur found time to fly in person to Taipei. There, on July 31 before the news cameras he kissed Madame Chiang's hand in a gallant fashion and then behind closed doors conferred with the Generalissimo. He brought assurances that military advisors and weapons would soon be flowing to Formosa. On the next day, August 1, he flew back to Tokyo.
Months later MacArthur was sacked by President Truman because of his arrogant defiance of Presidential policies concerning Formosa. Since the President had refused to let him bring Chiang into the Korean War and the war was not won, the General had to convince the American public that a great military asset - the island of Formosa - was being neglected.
He was asked to address the Congress and to testify before the Senate Committees on the Armed Forces and on Foreign Relations. What he said there was important, for despite his conflict with the President it had to be assumed that he knew well the conditions prevailing in vital areas of his command and in Formosa. What he said would be listened to with the closest attention and - for the most part - would be taken at face value.
Here is a brief quotation from his testimony before the Senators in which he set forth what he claimed to be his observations during an overnight visit - his only visit - to Formosa.
I superficially went through Formosa. I was surprised by the contentment I found there ere.
I found that the people were enjoying a standard of living which was quite comparable to what it was before the war. I found a financial system which at that time was about as sound as anything in the Far East except Japan. I found representative government being practiced.
In one legislative group I went into, I found of the 21 people there were 19 elected Formosans. I went into their courts. I found a judicial system which I thought was better than a great many of the other countries in Asia.
I went into their schools. I found that their primary instruction was fully on a standard with what was prevalent in the Far East. I was surprised.
I found many things I could criticize, too, but I believe sincerely that the standard of government that he [Chiang Kai-shek] is setting in Formosa compares favorably with many of the democracies of the world. [2]
This was very personal and very authoritative but by any normal standard these were gross misrepresentations of fact. From the use of the personal pronoun "I" no less than seventeen times in twelve compact sentences one suspects that General MacArthur was at the moment concentrating more on the drama of his position rather than on the accuracy of his report. In any case the General had had a busy day on Formosa; the Senators were not reminded that these remarkable activities had been crowded into one overnight stop involving also ceremonial entertainment and important conferences.
Close scrutiny suggests that these remarks were carefully calculated to counter all questions concerning the internal situation. They reflected underlying concern with the unsatisfactory relations between the mainland refugees and the Formosans and some concern that word of the true state of affairs may have reached Senatorial chambers. Coming from General MacArthur, however, these assertions had to be taken at face value. No later reports on conditions within Formosa from official or private sources could be expected to outweigh the General's testimony.
Meanwhile, seven days after MacArthur's dramatized one day visit his Deputy Chief of Staff (Major General Alonzo Fox) flew in from Tokyo to assess Chiang's military needs. With him was a Survey Group which had orders to have nothing to do with the State Department's representatives on Formosa. This was one of many gestures to make it clearly understood that the Supreme Commander dissociated himself from the policies of the Truman Administration with regard to Formosa. The Chinese saw where their interests lay.
Three days after General Fox appeared Mr. Karl Lott Rankin flew in from Hong Kong to take up duties as Charge d'Affaires at the American Embassy, Taipei. His memoirs, published in 1964 under the title China Assignment, reflect the difficulties and embarrassments arising from this obvious division of American policy and representation on the island.
On May 1, 1951, Major General William C. Chase established himself at Taipei as Chief of "MAAG," the Military Assistance Advisory Group which henceforth dominated American activities on the island. It grew steadily larger until thousands of American military men - advisors and their aides were present, sent there to build up defenses and to prepare for the war in China which might become necessary any day.
General Eisenhower's victory at the polls in 1952 was a resounding victory for the Nationalists. Now all the fabulous Republican campaign promises - or some of them, at least would be made good. The need for administrative "reform" undertaken to please Washington in 1950 now lost its urgency. As Eisenhower prepared to enter the White House the publisher of Time, Life and Fortune, visiting Taipei, let it be known that General Eisenhower might soon "de-neutralize" Formosa, ending the quarantine upon Nationalist action in the Straits. A week before the inauguration at Washington General Chase at Taipei met correspondents at a grand military review to say "I make no promises and no prophecies, but I think business will pick up next year--and I think you know what I mean." [4]
The new President prepared to announce Chiang's "unleashing" in his first State of the Union message, but before it could be delivered the press was allowed to learn that the Seventh Fleet would be withdrawn from the Straits. The wraps were off. It now remained for the world to see what Chiang would do with his new freedom.
Hailing Eisenhower as a "statesman of towering stature" and noting that his inaugural address "breathed like a living thing with the spirit of justice and righteousness" Chiang praised the decision to de-neutralize Formosa as "not only judicious, but militarily and morally sound." [5] The Promised Land was just around the comer.
But there it stayed; Chiang and his splendid striking force, refurbished by MAAG and now unleashed, failed to leap across the Channel. He had promised so often to "go it alone" if only the Americans would permit him. But there was the small problem of naval transport, air cover and the need for massive logistic support. In every New Year's address to the people of "Free China" from 1950 until 1965 and on innumerable less festive occasions the Generalissimo continued to promise action which would liberate the mainland "soon."
The American Military Aid Advisory Group remained at Taipei; Parkinson's Law was at work; long after the Nationalist forces were reorganized and prepared to defend Formosa they continued to grow. American military advisors and supplies poured in until the island nearly foundered under the weight. By 1961 it was reported that Chiang had a military establishment of about 250,000 men, all said to be eager to recover the mainland. But by that time the aging mainland Chinese soldiers were being replaced by Formosan youths. At last the great majority of conscripts were Formosan natives, and for them the mainland is a foreign country in all but name. The total Nationalist Government budget for 1961 was $375,000,000 of which no less than three fourths was spent to maintain this economically unproductive striking force. Of the total Nationalist budget no less than $250,000,000 was supplied by the American taxpayer.
At the end of the Formosa's Republican Decade Chiang's military establishment as a defensive force was too big for little Formosa, and as an offensive force was much too small for a significant continental campaign. Nevertheless the physical foundations had been laid for an important base. If the need to occupy it should arise it could be taken over by the United States. Provided, of course, it had not been handed over to Peking through direct negotiation.
General MacArthur spent one night at Taipei but managed to see everything on Formosa. The State Department's representative flew in to settle at Taipei, stayed seven years and managed to see considerably less.
In his memoirs Mr. Rankin notes that he never became a controversial figure; he served at Taipei throughout the McCarthy Era when every dispatch from the field was scrutinized by pro-Chiang Senators eager to "prove" communistic sympathy in the State Department. He was compelled to be circumspect; his reports therefore have a certain noteworthy blandness.
As Chief of Mission he supervised at least fourteen agencies having to do with support for the Formosan economy and the Nationalist military effort. Thousands of Americans were scattered over the island in excellent positions to report to, or through, the Embassy. A generous sampling of Mr. Rankin's own reports, notes and private letters appear in his volume, China Assignment, which runs to 343 pages. They are full of advice to the military on how to run the war in Korea and how to strengthen the military posture vis-a-vis the Communists in China, and there is even a note that Baedeker's Travel Guide for 1909 awards two stars to Yosemite National Park.
But we look in vain for a report on Governor Wu's administration, his attempts at political reform and his struggle to oppose Chiang Ching-kuo's Gestapo. The attempts on Wu's life are not noticed, and the Governor's name does not appear in the Index. It does appear once in the text, however, for Mr. Rankin felt called upon to chide the Governor for failure to notify him of Senator Knowland's arrival at the Taipei airport. General Sun Li-jen made the Index when he told the Ambassador that an invasion of South China would require American logistical support and United States naval and air cover, and once again in a notice that after Sun had been cashiered he appeared to be living contentedly in Taichung, tending his rose garden.
Military preparedness in "Free China" involved questions of internal security -not least among them the question of Formosan loyalty to the Nationalist regime and readiness in crisis to make a sacrifice on behalf of the American military interest. We look for Index references to the Formosan people; under "Formosans (Taiwanese, or Chinese born in Taiwan)" there are two page references, and only two, both to the same paragraph from a report to Washington. Here the distasteful word is placed in sanitizing quotes - "Formosans." Elsewhere in the text there are at least five un- indexed references to "Taiwanborn Chinese," "native-born Chinese," and "Chinese native to Taiwan." This is rather as if we were to refer to "America-born Anglo-Saxons" or "Canada-born Englishmen." On page 202 all caution is thrown to the winds in a note sent to Washington; here the distinction is boldly drawn with an observation that of all the people of Chinese race on Formosa, approximately 98 per cent are actually called Formosans, and that the majority were born under the Japanese administration. Furthermore it is admitted that the Formosans are better physical specimens, have superior education, and enjoy higher living standards than the mainland Chinese refugees. On another page there is raised the ugly question of popular support for the Chiang Government with the suggestion that the Generalissimo had better prove that be enjoys popular support on the island before he sets out to retake China. Noting the surpassing skill with which Communist states arrange spectacular mass demonstrations, Mr. Rankin incautiously hints that there may exist on Formosa a harsh and oppressive police system.
These remarks in the Embassy's reports to Washington are more than offset by enthusiastic references to Free China as a genuine democracy, a "rallying point for all freedom-loving Chinese" and an island which had attained a degree of law and order "probably unequalled elsewhere in Asia, yet without significant restrictions of freedom of movement." Other freedoms are not mentioned.
One reviewer of these memoirs suggests that the Ambassador may have stayed too long on Formosa and become "too much at home in the old tiger's lair," and that by the end of his assignment Mr. Rankin rather fancied himself not the American President's ambassador at Taipei but rather Chiang's representative at Washington. Of later Embassy reporting to Washington perhaps the less noticed the better, for on excellent authority it is said that one of Mr. Rankin's successors ordered the Embassy staff to avoid association with Formosans and above all - to avoid listening to Formosan complaints.
In the twenty years since surrender I have talked with scores of Americans who have been involved in the Formosan problem either at Taipei or at Washington. These conversations have left me with a profound impression that we are over- confident, that we flatter ourselves to think that Chiang is a willing puppet or, if a reluctant dragon, at least one who has become so dependent upon the United States for goodwill and military supply that in crisis he will always do our bidding. But if Americans at Taipei flatter themselves that they successfully "manage" General Chiang Ching-kuo by indirection, they should remember the sacking of the American Embassy on May 24, 1957. The official story of that strange affair is retold by Ambassador Rankin. The unofficial story has been retold by Captain William Lederer (USN, ret.) in A Nation of Sheep and by Formosans publishing at Tokyo.
On the night of March 20 an American Army sergeant shot and killed a prowler discovered in his garden at Taipei. An American military court tried the case, acquitted the sergeant on May 23, and flew him out of the island. The victim was described as a minor employee in a Chinese government agency and a reserve officer. In time-honored Chinese custom his widow demanded "consolation money" which was not promptly forthcoming. On the day following the acquittal (May 24) she took up a position in front of the American Embassy gates to scream hysterically that she had been denied justice. This, too, is a time-honored Chinese custom. According to the official story her noisy clamor attracted a crowd, the mob spirit took over, a stone was thrown, and soon the crowd poured into the Embassy compound. The American flag was torn down, cars were overturned and the offices were sacked. Some local employees and American officers were injured before they could retreat from the premises. The rioting began about one-thirty in the afternoon and continued with brief lulls until well after nightfall. Files were broken open, cipher books and coding equipment were tossed about, and confidential and secret papers were strewn through the building.
After many hours of uninterrupted rioting Chiang Ching- kuo's security forces took over the gutted Embassy. Ambassador Rankin returned from Hong Kong during the height of the riot. He visited the site during a lull in the affair but was asked by the Chinese to leave the premises; for they anticipated further violence. When he returned soon after daylight next morning, accompanied by Embassy officers, he was gratified to find the Chinese had been so helpfully attempting to restore order to chaos and to sweep up some of the debris within the building. Approximately fourteen hours had elapsed. The ladies of the American community promptly volunteered to assist in sorting scattered file materials. Some 90 per cent were recovered. No classified materials "of consequence" were missing and enough of the cryptographic material was recovered to satisfy the Ambassador that the codes were intact. Prompt official protests brought equally prompt apologies and indemnities.
The unofficial accounts add disturbing detail to this story and raise troublesome questions. According to Captain Lederer certain Chinese and Formosans and some foreigners had been warned of possible trouble days in advance. It is maintained that the dead "minor official" was a Major in one of Chiang Ching-kuo's secret organizations and that other members of Chiang's organizations were identified as ringleaders whose faces appeared in news photos made during the riot. The screaming widow is alleged to have been provided with a prepared text which she obligingly read into a recording apparatus conveniently at hand when the riot began.
Behind all this lay the odd circumstance that so spontaneous a riot took place precisely on the day when Madame and the Generalissimo were far away at a mountain retreat, the Ambassador was not on Formosa and the chief officers of the Army administration were across the channel on the offshore islands. In a city notorious for its elaborate secret services and policing agencies -all under Chiang Ching-kuo - why was a riot such as this permitted to go unchecked for hours? And why was not a strong police cordon established around the premises, leaving only Americans or Embassy employees to handle scattered cryptographic materials and secret papers? Was someone seeking for documents recording American views on the internal situation or confidential notes which might incriminate anti-Nationalists in communication with the Embassy?
It is not possible to discuss the American idea of "Free China" without touching on the delicate subject of missions and upon the projection of the Chiang Family as great Christian leaders. [7]
Ambassador Rankin notes in China Assignment that the number of missionaries present on Formosa in 1950 was about thirty, and that it had risen to seven hundred in 1957. He observes that they were welcomed not only because of the benign influence they had upon the Chinese Government but also because of "evident international political advantages to Free China in cultivating the Christian Churches while the communists were persecuting them." It must be presumed here that "benign influences" upon the Chinese Government is a delicate allusion to Chiang himself.
The projection, in America, of Chiang as a great Christian leading a crusade against the Anti-Christ in Asia is an old, familiar and privileged theme. That is to say one does not question the Generalissimo's sincerity. The stories of his conversion are many and varied but all agree that it was one of the conditions laid down by the old matriarch of the Soong family before she would consent to the marriage of her daughter Mei-ling to the rising General Chiang.
When the Generalissimo accepted Christ there was great rejoicing in every parish in the United States. It was believed that this would have tremendous consequences for mission work throughout China and speed realization of the American dream that Chinese life everywhere would be reorganized according to Christian and American ideals. At the time of the marriage and the conversion the Soongs were the leading Christian family in China, and when it saw fit to ally itself with the most powerful general and chief political figure in the State all things, in time, seemed possible.
The Generalissimo and Madame Chiang have probably been spoken of, read about and prayed for in every missionary society and evangelical church in the United States. The warmth of this emotional approbation carries over easily into any political consideration of support for Nationalist China. The Party cannot be too bad if the Leader is a devout Christian and the Government cannot be too oppressive if it is guided by Christian hands. This was the background against which the Chiangs were elevated to heroic stature in time of war and revolution.
An appeal for the Christian leaders of China reaches all political groups in the United States. A review of press records over the years suggests that whenever a major China Aid measure is about to be brought before the American Congress a selection of stories reaches the American press concerning the Chiangs' rich spiritual life. Undoubtedly they regret this public intrusion upon their privacy.
The stories have a pattern. Favored correspondents who have been invited to breakfast sometimes have to wait until the Generalissimo has finished his morning meditation and devotions. Under these circumstances the story theme becomes "austerity." One fortunate correspondent managed to obtain a picture of the Generalissimo in sober scholar's gown holding an open text identified in the caption as a selection of Methodist "thoughts for the day." By chance the Generalissimo happened just then to be standing before a large statue of Jesus of the Sacred Heart, the well-known Catholic devotional figure.
Occasionally the Generalissimo does speak of the meaning of Christianity for China and of his concern for the native Christians of Formosa. One example will suffice. It is a quotation from a Christmas season broadcast, we are told, and appears in the official China Handbook 1953-54 (pp. 478-479). We learn that the Generalissimo
. . . exhorted the people of Free China to do their utmost to save their fellow countrymen and the Christians on the mainland by leading them out of the night and through the bitter winter by the strength of their own faith, "They must hold the shield of Love," he continued, "wear the armor of freedom, and God's sacred sword of Truth to fight Satan and to bring Jesus Christ's glory and happiness."
General Chiang Ching-kuo has followed the example of his father and with his Russian wife and children is said to have become a devout Methodist. They have been seen attending a church service and the General, it is reported, has been observed carrying a dog-eared Bible with him on his travels.
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1. [U. S. Govt.] U. S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations: Hearings. 88th Cong., 1st Sess., Activities of Non-Diplomatic Representatives of Foreign Principals in the United States, Part 7 (March 25, 1963) (pp. 677-825); Part 10 (July 10, 1963, pp. 1425-'518), passim.
2. [U. S. Govt.] Congressional Record, "Hearings before the Senate Committee on Armed Services and the Committee on Foreign Relations" (82nd Cong., 1st Sess. 1951), "Military Situation in the Far East," P. 23.
3. Karl Lott Rankin, China Assignment (Seattle, Washington, 1964), 343 pp.
4. China Handbook 1953-54 (Taipei, 1953), "Chronology of Major Events (1911-1953)," P. 478.
5. Ibid., pp. 481-482.
6. Mark Mancall: "Too Much at Home in the Old Tiger's Lair," New York Herald Tribune Book Week (Nov. 15, 1964), p. 6.
7. On the missionary background of Chiang's appeal to Americans see especially Harold Isaacs, Images of Asia: American Views of China and India (New York, 1962), pp. 1.24-148.