I. Search for Primary Sources
On June 1st, on my way to Eisenhower Library at Abilene, KS by taking the I-70 highway, I stopped at Independence, MO, where the Truman Library is located. Although this visit was not listed in my research plan, I spent half a day in its reading room and went over six folders kept in two boxes: Harry S. Truman Presidential Library, White House Official Files OF-471B, Box 1499 and 1500. The folders are primarily about the issues regarding the prisoners of war in the Korean War during the peace negotiation between the United Nations and China. The materials in Truman library will fall into two categories. The first one is about the servicemen’s family’s questioning about the rationale of the “voluntary
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After leaving Truman Library, I proceeded to Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library as planned on June 2nd. When making the plan, I significantly underestimated by reading speed. As a result, even I went over much more folders than planned; it only took me three days in this library. Here is a list of the boxes I have consulted during the first week of June:
DDE Library, White House Central Files, Official Files, 1953-1961, Box 87, 88
DDE Library, White House Central Files, General Files, Box 227, 228, 686, 937, 1285
DDE Library, White House Central Files, Alpha Files, Box 2503, 3197
These eight boxes contain the missing members of the armed forces during Eisenhower’s presidency, as well as prisoners of war and memorials. These boxes keep letters between family members and the White House shortly after the Korean War (up to 1961). Most of them are the families’ cry for returning their relatives, though most of them still remain missing today. An interesting phenomenon is that the words of these families gradually developed from begging to furious, then to sarcastic. The family members also launched a campaign by sending back medals or personal artifacts of their sons or husbands to “remind” the president of the missing servicemen and to criticize the governments’ contact with the Soviet and China. The Box 1285 holds the government policies in dealing with a nascent family organization which mobilized several hundreds of families to Washington, DC and urged the
This investigation will evaluate the question, to what extent did the United States of America commit war crimes against Japanese civilians and POWs during their Pacific campaign in World War II? This question is important because it raises present day controversy that the United States did not commit war crimes, when evidence may prove otherwise. The scope of this investigation focuses on the United States entry into World War II and the events during the war, specifically the war with Japan in the Pacific during 7 December 1941 – 2 September 1945. One method used during this investigation will be the analysis of the non-fiction book Anguish of Surrender by Ulrich Straus. The source will be used to see evidence about the
Roger Daniels’ book Prisoners without Trial is another book that describes the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II. This piece discusses about the background that led up to the internment, the internment itself, and what happened afterwards. The internment and relocation of Japanese-Americans during World War II was an injustice prompted by political and racial motivations. The author’s purpose of this volume is to discuss the story in light of the redress and reparation legislation enacted in 1988. Even though Daniels gives first hand accounts of the internment of Japanese Americans in his book, the author is lacking adequate citations and provocative quotations. It’s
The research question that will be addressed is: Why did Mao decide to intervene in the Korean War (1950-53)? As far as the scope is concerned, I will be looking at the three major reasons behind Mao’s intervention in the war: Mao’s need of Soviet support, apprehension of American aggression, and his obligation to help North Korea. Thus, to achieve accuracy and depth in my research, I used relevant secondary sources such as books written by reputable authors with expert knowledge in history of modern China such as Spence, Fenby
"To what extent can the Korean War be regarded as a Cold War proxy war?"
Located on the third floor of the National Museum of American History, "A More Perfect Union" documents the forced relocation of thousands of Japanese Americans during World War II. The exhibit focuses on the violation of constitutional rights that occurred during this process. The purposes of this review are as follows:
War can be loud and visible or quiet and remote. It affects the individual and entire societies, the soldier, and the civilian. Both U.S. prisoners of war in Japan and Japanese-American citizens in the United States during WWII undergo efforts to make them “invisible.” Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken hero, Louie Zamperini, like so many other POWs, is imprisoned, beaten, and denied basic human rights in POW camps throughout Japan. Miné Okubo, a U.S. citizen by birth, is removed from society and interned in a “protective custody” camp for Japanese-American citizens. She is one of the many Japanese-Americans who were interned for the duration of the war. Louie Zamperini, as a POW in Japan, and Miné Okubo, as a Japanese-American Internee both experience efforts to make them “invisible” through dehumanization and isolation in the camps of WWII, and both resist these efforts.
In June 1950, 90,000 soldiers from the communist Korean People’s Army crossed the 38th Parallel into South Korea. The most important reason for a military response from the US was the document NSC 68, which stated that they must meet communism wherever it arises. Due to this document, it was the US assumption that the invasion on South Korea was not a Civil War due to the events in Korea, and the permanent divide in 1948. However, there was also US domestic policies, and Truman’s fear of being accused of being ‘soft on communism,’ as well as the US based organisation, the UN, which was a new institution, which Truman had to support. Furthermore, containment in Europe and Asia and the
War can be loud and visible or quiet and remote. It affects the individual and entire societies, the soldiers, and the civilians. Both U.S. prisoners of war in Japan and Japanese-Americans citizens in the Unites States during WWII undergo efforts to make them “invisible.” Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken hero, Louie Zamperini, like so many other POW’s, is imprisoned, beaten, and denied basic human rights in POW camps throughout Japan. Miné
“By 1953, the American government was reeling from the Korean War stalemate, the ever-more successful communist-led Vietnamese struggle to end French control of their country, Soviet nuclear arms development, the discovery of communist
The topic I choose to right about is the internment of Japanese Americans during WWII. The question that I intend to answer today is: The Constitution guarantees American citizens no imprisonment without due process of law, yet has been violated by the federal government in at least two American wars. How did the government justify interning Japanese-American citizens in World War II? In order to understand why this happened we have to first look at what happened. We are going to look at a couple things in this paper: The Executive Order of 9066 and Korematsu v. United States (1944). As well as we are good to look at just why the U.S. decided to not give these people the basic
In World War II, 75 years ago devastation occurred to our country. This was the day of the bombing of Pearl Harbor, and the start of a war that will forever change our country. After chaos calmed down in the community our government decided to create Internment Camps. These camps were made for the removal of all Japanese descent people in the United States of America. Some people think that this was justice being served. That our own citizens were also traitors, who would betray us at any time. But others, say that this was wrongful, that this wasn’t justice, but pure cruelty. This essay will explain, why these dreadful camps were indeed wrong. Not only because it brought innocent people out of their homes, but because they were treated like America wasn’t their home, because of the internment camps, innocent families and children thought that they couldn’t do anything to stop the things that was happening around them. The war.
Shaffer, R. (1999). Opposition to Internment: Defending Japanese American Rights During World War II. Historian, 61(3),
In February of 1942, during World War II, President Roosevelt yielded to the favored judgment of the people. Roosevelt would sign the executive order to relocate all Americans of Japanese ancestry to concentration camps, which would be persistent for two and a half years. The government’s point of view and Mrs. Yoshiko Uchida’s point of view concerning the Japanese American internment camps are immensely dissimilar. Uchida was a Japanese American writer who experienced that of an internment camp during World War II. The government had expected the interns to make the camps rather self-sustainable with no help from them whatsoever.
On October 3, 2017, at approximately 1430 hours, I, Luis Monroy and Luis … went to the Special Collections and Archives, located at the library of California State University Los Angles. Upon our arrival, we contacted the staffs who help us with our investigation. It should be noted that the staff was friendly and helpful at all time. Luis and I chose to do our research on World War II. The stack of information that was given to us contained various documentations informing us about World War II. We were able to go thru all the documents. Unfortunately, due to the time limit that we had, we had to rush our investigation. We also took photographs of the documents in order to make the Collaborative Primary Source Essay easier.
The author of the article DIFFICULT DECISIONS DURING WARTIME: A LETTER FROM A NON-ALIEN IN AN INTERNMENT CAMP TO A FRIEND BACK HOME is Frank H. Wu from San Francisco, CA. Wu is a highly distinguished man who has been a Chancellor and Dean of University of California Hastings College of Law since before 2014. The reason for him writing this fictional letter, was to raise awareness of the concentration camps that were placed here in the United States to hold American people of Japanese heritage. The Japanese Americans were placed in camps because of their threat to the American people and the possibility of them turning on their neighbors. Apart from being a Chancellor and Dean, Wu, has written books over being a yellow man in a white and black