Zach Fredman and Judd Kinzley eds., "Uneasy Allies: Sino-American Relations at the Grassroots, 1937–1949" (Cambridge UP, 2024)

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Uneasy Allies: Sino-American Relations at the Grassroots, 1937–1949

Podcast: New Books Network
Host: Charles Coteo
Guests: Zach Fredman (Duke Kunshan University), Judd Kinzley (University of Wisconsin, Madison)
Air Date: September 16, 2025
Book Discussed: Uneasy Allies: Sino-American Relations at the Grassroots, 1937–1949 (Cambridge UP, 2024)

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Overview

This episode features a deep dive into the edited volume Uneasy Allies, as hosts Charles Coteo interviews co-editors and historians Zach Fredman and Judd Kinzley. The discussion centers on the grassroots, everyday experiences and relationships that shaped US-China relations during the Second World War and the Chinese Civil War (1937–1949). The guests highlight the importance of looking beyond high-level diplomacy to explore the networks and actors—from cryptographers and journalists to students and women—who played crucial roles in forging, complicating, and challenging the alliance between the US and China.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Purpose and Genesis of the Book

[02:24 – 03:51]

• The book originated from academic workshops where the editors noticed innovative research on US-China relations utilizing Chinese-language sources.
• Judd Kinzley emphasized the lack of scholarship that employed Chinese sources for this era, motivating the collection:

  “There was a lack of people using Chinese sources in many cases for US–China relations. … For us, that was something that was an exciting opportunity.” (03:19 – 03:51)

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2. Defining 'Grassroots' and 'Networks'

[03:58 – 07:17]

• The focus is on “actors who were not at the top” of decision-making hierarchies, such as rank-and-file soldiers, interpreters, hydrologists, and commodity producers.
• The editors aimed to spotlight the largest-ever direct engagement between Americans and Chinese, which has often been reduced in history to a few elite personalities.
• Many influential figures were “non-state actors” whose roles were later subsumed or regulated by the state after the war.

“The idea was to focus on different actors … that are not sort of the typical cast of characters that we tend to look at.” — Judd Kinzley (05:04)

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3. Intelligence and the Enigma of Herbert Yardley

[07:17 – 09:57]

• Yardley, a notable cryptographer, was hired by the Nationalist government after achieving fame (and notoriety) in the US.
• The Nationalists sought Yardley's expertise to counter Japanese signals intelligence.
• US authorities were reluctant to share intelligence with China, fearing Communist and Japanese infiltration and holding racialized suspicions toward Chinese officials.

“From the beginning, the Allies never really took Chiang into their confidence.” — Zach Fredman (09:25)

• US preferred limited and indirect engagement, often via “semi-state” or independent actors like Yardley.

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4. British and American Rivalry in Southern China

[11:28 – 12:48]

• The US held a skeptical view of the British role in China; FDR blamed colonialism for the war’s origins and opposed a postwar British empire in the region.
• American and British organizations (and even American agencies among themselves) often worked in parallel, rarely cooperating and frequently duplicating efforts.

“I think you could even make that argument about the various American intelligence agencies ... during the war.” — Zach Fredman (12:37)

• Notably, there were up to 14 different US intelligence agencies with overlapping missions in China.

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5. Gong Peng and Public Diplomacy

[13:13 – 15:32]

• Gong Peng, a Chinese Communist Party figure, worked in Chongqing as a PR expert, building deep relationships with American journalists and scholars.
• Her approachable style enabled effective CCP influence campaigns among key American opinion leaders, impacting US public perceptions of wartime China.

“She ends up having a really significant amount of influence over many of these [American] figures ... having very fond memories of Gong Peng, despite ... she is a Chinese Communist Party agent.” — Judd Kinzley (13:49)

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6. The China Institute in America & Cultural Diplomacy

[16:19 – 18:52]

• The China Institute supported scholarly exchange and Chinese students in the US, funded partly by Boxer Indemnity scholarships.
• Facing wartime funding shortages, it failed to secure Rockefeller Foundation support (which shied away from entanglements with the Nationalist government), but did receive funds from Henry Luce, a media mogul sympathetic to the Nationalists.

“The China Institute was seen to be much more politically engaged ... the Rockefeller Institute was less interested in getting involved in those thorny kind of politics … but Luce is much more clearly engaged ... and so is ... willing to get his hands dirty.” — Judd Kinzley (17:37)

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7. US Military Misconduct and Civil Society Reactions

[18:52 – 22:36]

• After WWII, US troops in North China became increasingly unpopular, particularly among students, due to violence, jurisdictional impunity, and perceptions of racism.
• During wartime, a common enemy obscured these tensions, which later fueled Communist propaganda and protests.
• Economic benefits from the US presence created supporters in local societies, but university students, initially more open to Americans, were radicalized by negative experiences and Communist infiltration.

“Students, I think, initially were a group that was more sympathetic to the American military presence ... A lot of these students and former students have a bad experience ... They feel like they're treated as second-class citizens by the Americans.” — Zach Fredman (20:53)

• Kinzley observes that the narrative of universal anti-American hostility was largely constructed by effective CCP propaganda, though debates about the US presence in civil society were genuine during the immediate postwar period.

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8. Hayden Boatner: An Overlooked Figure

[23:45 – 24:42]

• Boatner, a long-serving military officer in China, was largely sidelined in favor of elite-centric histories focused on figures like Stilwell but offers a window into broader US-China relations.

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9. “Jeep Girls” and Women’s Agency

[24:42 – 27:17]

• The historian Chunmei Du’s chapter examines the so-called “jeep girls,” young Chinese women who associated with US servicemen.
• The authors affirm the chapter’s success in restoring agency and voices to these women, who have often been subject to derogatory, male-dominated narratives.

“Chunmei did a really good job going through these sources to bring out these kind of female voices that usually aren't part of the narrative.” — Zach Fredman (25:14)

• The derogatory label appeared around late 1944–early 1945, at a time of economic crisis, and was linked to anti-American, anti-female sentiments.

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10. Aftermath: People-to-People Ties Post-1949

[27:17 – 29:08]

• With the PRC’s rise, almost all Americans depart China; grassroots US–China engagement sharply diminished.
• The Communist regime attempted limited personal outreach (such as children’s propaganda letters) but with little of the personal network activity of the wartime years.

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11. Comparing Historiographical Tone: Michael Hunt’s Cynicism vs. Uneasy Allies

[29:08 – 30:51]

• Charles Coteo notes the absence of a cynical tone in Uneasy Allies compared to Michael Hunt’s The Making of a Special Relationship.
• Kinzley attributes this to the difference in eras and context—Hunt was writing amid post-Vietnam skepticism of US foreign policy.

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12. Key Takeaways for Listeners and Readers

[30:53 – 32:53]

• Kinzley urges historians to focus beyond state actors, embracing semi-state and non-state actors to fully apprehend US-China relations.
• Fredman stresses the importance of engaging Chinese-language sources, noting that bestselling China books in English often ignore them:

  “Chances are, they're written by people that aren't engaging at all with Chinese language sources. So I think that's another important lesson of the book.” (32:36)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “The story about this period for so long was this really small cast of characters ... and of course, it was a lot more than just soldiers.” — Zach Fredman ([05:55])
• “The famous kind of story of US China relations is the conflict between Chiang Kai Shek and Joseph Stilwell ... we wanted to take the perspective down a level.” — Judd Kinzley ([03:58])
• “There are efforts by the US Government to try to ensure that things don't get too deep ... and often that entails working with men like Yardley who are not directly … employed by the US Government.” — Judd Kinzley ([10:00])
• “Students ... play this role in modern Chinese history from May 4 onward as kind of conscience of the nation.” — Zach Fredman ([20:53])
• “The power of the piece is ... she tries to find ways to express that agency, to show what these women were like, how they're making these choices.” — Judd Kinzley ([24:53])

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Suggested Listening Timeline

• Introduction & Book Origins – 01:36–03:51
• Why 'Grassroots' and 'Networks'? – 03:51–07:17
• Herbert Yardley & Intelligence – 07:17–09:57
• US vs. British in Southern China – 11:28–12:48
• Gong Peng’s Story – 13:13–15:32
• China Institute & Funding – 16:19–18:52
• American Troops and Local Reactions – 18:52–22:36
• Hayden Boatner’s Marginalization – 23:45–24:42
• “Jeep Girls” & Agency – 24:42–27:17
• Post-1949 People-to-People Ties – 27:17–29:08
• Historiographical Tone – 29:08–30:51
• Final Takeaway – 30:53–32:53

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Conclusion

Uneasy Allies offers rich, granular perspectives on the complexities of wartime US-China relations by excavating overlooked individuals and networks beneath the state level. In this interview, Fredman and Kinzley demonstrate the dynamic, multivalent, and sometimes conflicted ways ordinary people shaped international history. The episode is a valuable listen for those interested in foreign relations, grassroots history, and the social underpinnings of geopolitics.

Transcript

[Judd Kinsley]

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[Marshall Poe]

This is Marshall Poe. I'm the founder and editor of the New Books Network. And if you're listening to this, you know that the NBN is the largest academic podcast network in the world. We reach a worldwide audience of 2 million people. You may have a podcast or you may be thinking about starting a podcast. As you probably know, there are challenges basically of two kinds. One is technical. There are things you have to know in order to get your podcast produced and distributed. And the second is, and this is the biggest problem, you need to get an audience. Building an audience in podcasting is the hardest thing to do today. With this in mind, we at the NBM have started a service called NBN Productions. What we do is help you create a podcast, produce your podcast, distribute your podcast, and we host your podcast. Most importantly, what we do is we distribute your podcast to the NBN audience. We've done this many times with many academic podcasts, and we would like to help you. If you would be interested in talking to us about how we can help you with your podcast, please contact us. Just go to the front page of the New Books Network and you will see a link to NBN Productions. Click that, fill out the form, and we can talk. Welcome to the New Books Network.

[Charles Coteo]

Good day. Welcome to New Books in History, a podcast channel, New Books Network. My name is Dr. Charles Coteo. I'm a host on the channel. And today we have with us two historians who are the editors of a volume of essays titled Uneasy Allies, Sino American Relations at the Grassroots, 1937-19 Point, 1949, published by Cambridge University Press. And the two historians we talked with today are Zach Fredman and Judd Kinsley. Zach Fredman is is a associate professor of history at Duke Unchea University. I hope I pronounced that correctly.

[Zach Fredman]

Duke Konsha.

[Charles Coteo]

Thank you. And Judd Kinsley is professor in the Department of History at University of Wisconsin, Madison. Welcome, gentlemen.

[Zach Fredman]

Thanks. Thank you.

[Charles Coteo]

Why did you see the need to publish this book of essays.

[Zach Fredman]

It's a good question. Judd and I initially met at a workshop on Chinese history at the University of Cambridge, I think, in the summer of 2017, and realized there were a lot of people doing interesting work on US China relations in the 1930s and 1940s of a really wide range of areas as well, so different specialties in history. And I think this was kind of at the tail end of a period of relative openness in China for being able to do archival research. I think, unfortunately, we're kind of past that today. But we just decided to get a group of people together that were working on this time period, engaged in Chinese language sources, and see what would happen, and so organized a conference that became a series of conferences that have eventually resulted in the book.

[Judd Kinsley]

I think that's something just to add on to what Zach said, which I don't disagree with anything in terms of his narrative here. I think the important thing that we noticed was just to emphasize the lack of people using Chinese sources in many cases for US China relations. Zach's book is a great example of this. But there are people who are doing US China relations, but many of them are not necessarily using Chinese sources. And so I think for us that was something that was an exciting, exciting opportunity, which is why. Why we. One of the reasons why we thought this might be worthy of a volume.

[Charles Coteo]

In the context of the period discussed in the book. What do you mean exactly by the terms grassroots and networks?

[Judd Kinsley]

I guess I could. I could take this. I mean, I think that this is something that Zach and I talked about a fair amount. But the idea of grassroots here is to focus beyond the sort of top level players who were engaged in forming US China relations in 1940s. And I think the reason for thinking more about the grassroots in particular was to out of a belief that for a lot of people who were a lot of scholars who were doing work on US China relations, a lot of them were focused really heavily on kind of the interpersonal dynamics and the relationships between high ranking leaders within the United States or in China. And so the famous kind of story of US China relations is the conflict between Chiang Kai Shek and Joseph Stilwell. This story has been told in many different ways and with different emphases for 80 years now. And so the idea was to focus on different actors who were engaged in this larger process of grassroots or process of engagement that's not just focused on these old characters that we know a lot about, but rather to try to take the perspective down a level to think about some of the actors who were engaged in this process of connecting the United States and China, but are not sort of the typical cast of characters that we tend to look at. So for that, we ended up finding a number of people or a number of scholars who are doing interesting work on people who are not at the top. Some of my own work looks at people who are producing various goods that were crossing the Pacific. Zach talks about officers who were engaged in illegal activities. In many cases, we're not at the top. Other people are dealing with kind of hydrologists, lower ranking soldiers, and these kind of figures who we think are really important in forming US China engagement, but have not really been covered by scholars in the past.

[Zach Fredman]

Yeah, I think one thing that really stood out to us to build on what Judd was saying was this was the time, probably the largest ever engagement between Americans and Chinese that happened in China. He had more than 120,000 soldiers, American soldiers, deployed to China in the fall of 1945. This is more than the number of Americans living in China in the 2010 census. And yeah, the story about this period for so long was this really small cast of characters. Chiang Kai Shek, Joseph Stillwell, a few other American commanders. So this story of this largest ever engagement between Americans and Chinese have been reduced to this story largely about this contentious relationship between just a couple of people. And of course, it was a lot more than just soldiers, as Jud says, and yeah, to build on networks. Another thing that was interesting that we discovered through the project was a lot of these people were non state actors who did things during the war that then these roles were later sort of subsumed under the state. And after 1945, these relationships continue, I think more with the United States and the regime that flees to Taiwan. Relationships continue, but very much now under the aegis of the state.

[Charles Coteo]

The first article in the book, Herbert Yardley and the Grassroots Origins of Sino American Wartime Intelligence Corporation discusses the contribution of Yeardley to the beginnings of signal intelligence in the Nationalist. In Nationalist China. Why exactly does the Nationalist government need assistance with signals intelligence? And why did they decide to hire Yardley in particular?

[Zach Fredman]

Excited? Take this one. Yeah, I mean, so Yardley was this. This fascinating character. He was this cryptographer in the US military during and after World War I. And he'd actually cracked the Japanese codes ahead of the Washington Naval Conference, where they're talking about, you know, limiting numbers of surface ships, and found himself out of the job after a while. I think a Secretary of War that came in famously said, gentlemen, don't read other gentlemen's mail. I can't remember the name, but Yardley Stimson, actually. Stimson, okay. And then Yardley, he had issues. Yardley was. He was a womanizer, he was a gambler. So to support his habits, he wrote a book about his experience. And somebody in the Nationalist government read this. And they're dealing with Japanese at the time, you know, particularly Japanese air raids on these cities in southwestern China where the Nationalist government had fled. And so they brought Yardley over to set up a cryptanalysis program.

[Charles Coteo]

And why did Yardley leave the employee of the prc?

[Zach Fredman]

Well, he never was in the employee of the prc. So this happened, you know, before the People's Republic of China was. Establishes some.

[Charles Coteo]

I meant the mental error. I meant actually then why did he leave the Nationalist regime in Chungking?

[Zach Fredman]

You know, it was. He was disappointed with the. The conditions of his employment. I think his employers were disappointed with some of his personal habits and yeah, some. Some close calls with these bombing raids. And then, you know, what Yardley was doing, I think never really pleased the American authorities either.

[Charles Coteo]

Now, why were the Americans reluctant to share signals intelligence with the Nationalist government?

[Zach Fredman]

I think a few things here I think come up. One is they didn't trust the Nationalist government. I think they were worried about the Nationalist government being penetrated by Communists, being penetrated by Japanese intelligence. And I think there's the racialized element there as well. From the beginning, the Allies never really took Chang into their confidence, was never invited to participate in the highest levels of planning and decision making during the war.

[Judd Kinsley]

I would add just very briefly here is that. And this is sort of a larger theme of many of the chapters or many of the essays in the volume is that there was a certain amount of reluctance on the part of the United States government to get too heavily in a state to state way with the Chinese government. There's sort of a fear that there would be a kind of a mission creep if the United States does become more engaged with China, more of an investment, more of a commitment to supporting China, you know, is in the mid-1930s. But even. And after the war with Japan, there's a real fear of getting involved in a war. So there are efforts by the US Government to try to ensure that things don't get too deep. And often that entails working with men like Yeardley who are not directly. Who are not employed by the US Government, maybe have had some relationship to the US Government in the past. So I think that this is sort of a larger theme that we see across many of the chapters of the United States government, largely trying to hold back Chinese efforts to engage the United States and the United States government in particular. And as a result, there's this outreach to, you know, grassroots actors, to semi state or often non state actors who are connected to the United States government and have some level of expertise in the audience.

[Charles Coteo]

I'm sorry, go ahead.

[Zach Fredman]

Yeah. Of course, Yardley comes over before Pearl harbor as well, so. Yeah, get further in the war. Then you look at other elements of intelligence cooperation when the US Military is over there.

[Charles Coteo]

In the article dealing with the decline of the British influence in the southern Chinese area, what was exactly the American government's opinion of that British position both before and after Pearl Harbor?

[Zach Fredman]

Why don't you take this one, Judd?

[Judd Kinsley]

Yeah. You want to take this?

[Zach Fredman]

Yeah, sure. Yeah. I mean, they. The Americans, I think, never, never really had a very high opinion of the British role in China. I think they, particularly under Franklin Roosevelt, he saw colonialism as a root cause in the war and did not want the British to be able to maintain their empire after the war and retain that kind of suspicion of British motives. And then, of course, you get down to a lower level. A lot of officers in the US Military, from Stilwell, a theater commander on down, also had a relatively low opinion of their British counterparts. And I think that feeling towards Stilwell definitely was reciprocated.

[Charles Coteo]

Would it be true to say that American and British resistance organizations in South China operate along parallel lines which rarely converged?

[Zach Fredman]

I think you could even make that argument about the various American intelligence agencies that operated in China during the war.

[Charles Coteo]

They operate along parallel lines which really converge in terms of.

[Zach Fredman]

Yeah, and there were a lot of rivalries, overlap. I mean, I think it was a total of 14 different American intelligence agencies operating in China over the course of the war. You know, with the. With the strongest rivalry, I think, between the one that was associated with the US Navy, the Sino American Cooperative Organization, and then other agencies like the OSS or. Or parts of the US army, in.

[Charles Coteo]

The article titled Gong Pang, I hope I'm pronouncing that correctly. And Sino, American public diplomacy in wartime. Chung King, you tell the audience, who exactly was Gong Pang and why was she so important in individual wartime China?

[Judd Kinsley]

I could take this one back. So Gongpang was. Gongpang was a. Connected to the Chinese. Chinese Communist Party, and it was essentially a spokesman PR person who was working for the Chinese Communist Party based in Chongqing. And what makes her case particularly interesting was the depth of her connections to American media figures. So she had really deep kind of personal connections to many of these figures during the war through her contacts in Chongqing. And again, she was working for the Chinese Communist Party, working very closely with Zhou Enlai as a Chinese Communist Party representative. But sort of the success of her, her mission was not just in kind of spouting propaganda, but in developing really personal connections with many American media figures who were shaping public consensus on the war in China, on the Chinese Communist Party, on the Republic of China, Chiang Kai Shek's regime. And so she ends up having a really significant amount of influence over many of these figures. And they talk about, you know, Theodore White or John King Fairbank, many of these sort of lions in the field or in, in kind of the American media or scholarly landscape. And thinking about China, they end up, you know, having very fond memories of Gong Kwang, despite the fact knowing that she is a Chinese Communist Party agent, she clearly is an influencing public opinion in the United States and as it ends up being very successful. So I think that the idea here is thinking about Gongpeng as a very different kind of figure than what we might consider to be kind of a larger propaganda apparatus in the Chinese Communist Party. And so to kind of looking at different ways of thinking about pr, I think, and looking at her as emblematic of a different kind of approach to engagement with the American media and with the American public more generally. Mint is still $15 a month for premium wireless. And if you haven't made the switch yet, here are 15 reasons why why you should. One, it's $15 a month. Two, seriously, it's $15 a month. Three, no big contracts.

[Zach Fredman]

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[Judd Kinsley]

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[Zach Fredman]

About sharing their New York Times accounts.

[Judd Kinsley]

My name is Dana. I am a subscriber to the New York Times, but my husband isn't. And it would be really nice to be able to share a recipe or an article or compete with him in Wordle or Connexions.

[Zach Fredman]

Thank you, Dana. We heard you introducing the New York Times Family subscription. One subscription, up to four separate logins for anyone in your life. Find out [e-mail] family in the article.

[Charles Coteo]

Titled the China Institute in America and the Politics of China's cultural diplomacy. Can you tell the audience what exactly was the China Institute and why was it important in the time period of your book?

[Zach Fredman]

Want me to take that one?

[Judd Kinsley]

Sure, yeah, if you're ready for it.

[Zach Fredman]

Yeah, I could start. So it is an institute devoted to supporting scholarly exchange, supporting Chinese students in the United States. What's important here is in the 1920s, 1930s, Chinese students are one of the largest groups in the United States. Part of the Boxer Indemnity paid for scholarships to support Chinese students in the United States. And yeah, there was huge motivation even throughout the war to be able to come to the United States. They motivated Chinese interpreters who worked alongside US Forces with promise that the best interpreters would be able to go to graduate school in the United States after the war. So, you know, and I think there we saw relevance to, in this chapter, to the more contemporary period with larger numbers of Chinese students in the United States, you know, since the early 1980s down to the present.

[Charles Coteo]

And why was the China Institute unable to get serious Rockefeller money, but did it get some money from the media mogul Henry Luce?

[Judd Kinsley]

I think part of the challenge, and I think what Jeong Yunxiu was kind of pointing to in this book was sort of the, you know, the difficulties of the China Institute in engaging in a moment when the Chinese government doesn't necessarily have the resources to support the institute to undertake the kind of programmatic things that it was had been doing in the past. You know, as Zach was kind of pointing to, ultimately they are kind of forced to grapple with a larger funding landscape that requires them to form new kinds of connections with American funding agencies. So things like the Rockefeller Institute is not, to some extent. I mean, the China Institute was seen to be much more politically engaged, much more closely connected perhaps to Chiang Kai Shek's Nationalist Party regime. The Rockefeller Institute was less interested in getting involved in those thorny kind of politics which are already emerging by the latter years of the war. Someone like Luce is a very different kind of figure. And Luce is much more clearly engaged in thinking about supporting Chiang Kai Shek and the Nationalist Party regime, and so is maybe more. More willing to get his hands dirty in investing in these kinds of organizations that are seen to be more politically motivated.

[Charles Coteo]

I'd say in the article dealing with the politics of occupation in post war China. Why exactly did the American forces located in North China become so unpopular so quickly?

[Zach Fredman]

A pick in this chapter looks at patterns of misconduct by American personnel. I think you saw these kind of patterns happening during the war. American Forces in China are protected by a jurisdiction agreement that gives the US Military sole control over all criminal jurisdiction. Matters involving American soldiers. And soldiers behaved badly. There was a lot of violence, a lot of alcohol fueled violence, a lot of racist violence. But during the war, you had this common Japanese enemy holding people together. After the war, you no longer had that. And these patterns of misconduct became something the Chinese Communist Party was able to use to exploit resentment against the US military and turn it against the Nationalists during the Chinese Civil war.

[Judd Kinsley]

I'd say as an aside, I make a plug for Zach's book the Tormented alliance, which really gets into a lot of this sort of these kind of tensions that emerge, particularly after the war. I mean, those tensions were already there beforehand, but after the war, as Zach says. So the lack of a common enemy that then makes many Chinese on the ground sort of question what the role of these American soldiers was. In a moment in which seemed to be the emergence of kind of political lines and simmering near civil war, what's the role of these US soldiers, particularly immediately after the war? And I think that's a. Why should we have to deal with sort of these problems that many of these guys are, these guys are bringing? And I think again, this is something that Zach talks about a lot in.

[Charles Coteo]

His book in the same article. Why were students the group most opposed, it would appear to the American military presence in North China. Were there any supporters of that American presence at all in civil society?

[Zach Fredman]

Yeah, I mean, there's definitely supporters. I mean, for one thing, the Americas are a financial lifeline for a lot of people and similar patterns that you would see in the Cold War. Around US military bases in places like the Philippines and South Korea, you have whole economies that spring up to cater to American military personnel. People also in the government as well, different parts of the government are supportive of that relationship. I think students, they play this role in modern Chinese history from May 4 onward as kind of conscience of the nation. And so students, I think initially were a group that was more sympathetic to the American military presence. They're the ones that get recruited to be the interpreters for American soldiers. A lot of these students and former students have a bad experience for a lot of reasons that I get into more in the book that Judd talked about than this current one. You know, the Nationalist government, the lacks of ability to keep these soldiers paid and fed. They feel like they're treated as second class citizens by the Americans. So there's already some resentment here. And also the Communist Party was very effective, I think, at infiltrating and being able to take control of student movements, particularly in these cities in formerly Japanese occupied areas like Beijing and Qingdao. So by the time, you know, you have this, this Shenzhong rape case that, that Chun Meidu talks about in her chapter, you know, the party is ready to, to exploit this anti American resentment and take charge of what becomes a nationwide protest movement in the article.

[Judd Kinsley]

One thing I think it's worth, we're thinking about in some ways is that this sort of narrative of this is kind of building on Zach's point, but this narrative that there was sort of widespread discontent with the US Government is something, is more a product, I think, of Chinese Communist Party propaganda. But there was a real active civil society debate, particularly in the months immediately following the war. So I think that it's not, you know, it's not the sort of necessarily a widespread opposition to U.S. forces or to the alliance, alliance with the United States, although that, it does start to kind of move in that direction later. But I think initially, I mean, this is a moment of kind of the larger debate that's happening in China and there are plenty of people who are supporting the US Government, plenty of people who are quite skeptical of the Chinese Communist Party. But, but that sort of, that kind of the knife's edge that, that's balanced on in 1945 begins to, to tilt as, as the years pass and as several, you know, prominent incidents. Shenzhong rape of tilt that balance by, you know, in the years after. The years and months after 1945 in.

[Charles Coteo]

The article on Hayden Boatner, why exactly did Boehner almost become completely written out of the history of Sino American relations?

[Zach Fredman]

Yeah, that's a good question. I think part of it is the focus on Joseph Stillwell. I think that's probably the biggest part of it, I would say, you know, this, this concentration on people at the very top and. Yeah, I mean, Boatner, you know, we think it was unfortunate this has been the case. I mean, he's somebody who has this really long history in China. You know, he spent a lot of time there before the war, he's there during the war. He's one of the, one of the longest serving officers. You know, somebody that's close to Stilwell but then still continues on after Stilwell leaves and then, yeah, I mean, also, you know, continues in the military into the, into the Korean War. So he does, I think, offer this lens to look at Zionist relations across the mid 20th century.

[Charles Coteo]

In the article dealing with the cheap girls in post war China, would it Be true to say that the author of the article gives agency to the young women in question?

[Zach Fredman]

Yeah, absolutely.

[Judd Kinsley]

I think there's no question about that to me. I mean, I think the power of the piece is what Thunmei is trying to do in this piece, I think she does it remarkably well, is to try to find ways to kind of help express that agency, to show what these, you know, what these women were, what they were like, how they're making these choices. And I think that's what's really, really powerful about the piece.

[Zach Fredman]

Yeah, this was a pretty unique moment in that immediate post war period, like, particularly in Shanghai, where there's this degree of press freedom in China that didn't exist during the war under the Nationalists, that didn't exist in the end of the Civil war or after 1949. And Zhimai did a really good job going through these sources to bring out these kind of female voices that usually aren't part of the narrative. That certainly wouldn't be there when you're looking at state level sources or military archives.

[Charles Coteo]

And when exactly do we know when the term jeep girls became a term of derision, if not worse?

[Zach Fredman]

Late 1944, early 1945. And it sort of comes at a time when China is experiencing its worst inflation in the Second World War, in the wake of Japan's Ichigo campaign that sends a lot of refugees fleeing to cities like Chongqing, Chengdu and Kunming and southwestern China. So ever more people becoming dependent on the US military for a livelihood and a lot more women involved with American servicemen. So when the, when the term first comes out in the papers, it comes out in newspapers and police reports in late 44, early 1945. And it puts women in these two categories. They're either cheap girls, you know, respectable women being kidnapped by Americans in their jeeps and taken off and raped, or they're like, you know, prostitutes and women, you know, selling out the country for money, for US dollars. And what Chume does is really shows that it was a lot more complicated than this. Like we did. We, we would like. She gives voice to these people in these, in these male dominated narratives that emerge in 44 and 45. You know, adds the actual voices of the women that went through this to complicate that narrative that we see earlier.

[Charles Coteo]

How do grassroots people to people networks evolve in the aftermath of the fall of the Nationalist regime and the triumph of the PRC in 1940?

[Judd Kinsley]

You say after 1949? Sorry, to be clear, yes, yes, with.

[Charles Coteo]

The fall of the Nationalist regime.

[Judd Kinsley]

That's not exactly something we cover in our book, but just to take a quick stab at. And I'll let Zach take a little bit more because I mean, I think one of the things that Zach does again in his book the Tormented alliance is to kind of talk a little bit about the 1950s. A lot of the opportunities for grassroots, as you say, people to people engagement between the People's Republic of China or the Chinese people more generally, generally, and the US Government, it diminishes pretty significantly. All of those, you know, 120,000Americans based in China, almost without exception, have to leave by the outbreak of the Korean War or around the time of the outbreak of the Korean War. And so those opportunities for engagement are relatively slim. It's not to say that there is no engagement. And much of that is an attempt to sort of. There is an attempt to, to construct new propaganda apparatus that will allow for certain elements of people to people engagement. Something that Jack talks in his book on some of these kind of adoptee letters that they're sending back to, back to the United States in which young children are writing about the situation in so called new China after 1949, attempting to create personal connections. But there's, but those opportunities are pretty small and pretty slim. And so there are attempts to do it. I would argue that they're not particularly successful in the way that some of these people to people engagements are during the wartime period.

[Charles Coteo]

Reading the book put me into mind of a book which I have not really read since graduate school. So we're talking about almost 35 years ago. And that was Michael Hunt's the Makings of a Special Relationship. What brought to me, to my mind to this book of Hunt's was the fact that the tone of, if you remember, I'm sure you both read his book of that particular volume of Hunt's was very. The tone is very cynical and sarcastic in terms, particularly in terms of Hunt's view of American policy vis a vis China. It's noticeable by its absence that this particular type of tone is almost completely non existent in your book. Why is that?

[Judd Kinsley]

I mean, I guess I'll speak a little bit to the tone. I mean, I think that to some extent that what Hunt is responding to is maybe a cynicism that's coming out of the kind of, in the wake of the Vietnam War, sort of a cynicism about US Policy in general. And I think that, I mean, I hadn't thought a lot about that tone in particular and I don't necessarily think it was conscious instructions by Zachariah, as the editors of this, to suggest that people not write with that kind of tone. But my guess is, and Zach, I think as a US Foreign policy historian might be able to speak to this more clearly than me as a modern China historian. But my guess is that this is sort of a product of its. The Hunt book is a product of its time, I mean, as ours is as well. And I think maybe that sort of skepticism comes through in Hunt's volume and he feels the need to be a bit more strident and direct in his critique. I don't know, Zach, I'd be curious to know how you think about that.

[Zach Fredman]

No, I think that's a really good answer.

[Charles Coteo]

If you wanted people to take one thing away from your book, what would it be?

[Judd Kinsley]

Maybe we could both go about. I guess what I'll say is, the first thing that I would say is to think if we're thinking about US China relations too, not just to focus on the grassroots, but to focus on. Focus on non state or what we call in the book semi state actors. I mean, I think that these are people that for a long time have been sort of written out of this larger history of US China relations. It's not to say that people, they don't exist. I mean, I think Hunt does talk about these sort of missionaries and other actors who are connected to the state, but not directly. But I think that in order to fully understand the US China relationship, we have to focus on non state actors, because in many cases, the US Government empowered these figures, the Chinese government empowered these figures. And so I think that's sort of how I think about the larger implications of the book is to think calling for people to look beyond state actors. It's difficult, and I think because of the fact that the state tends to have the best archive. So if you're basing your research on state archives, you tend to be highlighting state actors. And so I think it's more of a challenge in many cases to focus on semi state or non state actors. But I think it's particularly in the context of US China relations. It's a worthy challenge because I think that a lot of the real action, particularly from the 1920s into the 1940s, is happening outside of the state and outside of state efforts. And so if we want to understand that relationship and all its nuance, I think we have to focus outside of the state.

[Zach Fredman]

Yeah, great. Great answer. And I'll add to that, to build on what you said about Chinese archives is.

[Judd Kinsley]

Yeah.

[Charles Coteo]

To be.

[Zach Fredman]

Be engaged in those Chinese language sources. I still think if you're probably to look at the bestselling books on China on Amazon today, I bet chances are they're written by people that aren't engaging at all with Chinese language sources. So I think that's another important lesson of the book.

[Charles Coteo]

On that observation, I would like to thank you very much, gentlemen, for being so kind as to speak with us today. This is Charles Gatillo. You'll be listening to New Books in History, a podcast channel, New Books Network. Thank you gentlemen, very, very much.

[Judd Kinsley]

Thank you. Thanks for taking the time. Martha listens to her favorite band all the time, in the car, gym, even sleeping. So when they finally went on tour, Martha bundled her flight and hotel on Expedia to see them live. She saved so much she got a seat close enough to actually see and hear them. Sort of. You were made to scream from the front row. We were made to quietly save you. More Expedia made to travel Savings vary and subject to availability. Flight inclusive packages are atoll protected.