Description
“These beautiful days, I shall never forget them.” US Marine captain Evans F. Carlson wrote these words in his diary in January 1938 as he relaxed in a remote military headquarters of the Chinese Communist Party in northern China. Carlson was on an intelligence mission, and was the first U.S. government official to meet with the Chinese Communist Party leadership. His views on Mao and his comrades set a standard in Washington whose legacy is still being felt today.
Carlson’s assignment was to report on the Japanese invasion of China, and it took him from cities being bombed by the Japanese to the office of China’s then leader Chiang Kai-shek and on to a meeting with its future leader, Communist Party chief Mao Zedong.
And almost without fail, Carlson recorded his daily experiences in a set of small black notebooks. Carlson’s diary, transcribed here in full and enriched with historical research and Carlson’s official reports, provides a view of China’s resistance against Japan from both the commanding heights of leadership and the muddy action on the ground. It offers invaluable insights into the political currents of that era, but also shines a light on the relationship between the U.S. and the Chinese Communist Party which is still relevant today.
