Soldiering through Empire
The publisher and the University of California Press Foundation gratefully acknowledge the generous support of the Ahmanson Foundation Endowment Fund in Humanities.
AMERICAN CROSSROADS
Edited by Earl Lewis, George Lipsitz, George Sánchez, Dana Takagi, Laura Briggs, and Nikhil Pal Singh
Soldiering through Empire
RACE AND THE MAKING OF THE DECOLONIZING PACIFIC
Simeon Man
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS
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University of California Press
Oakland, California
© 2018 by The Regents of the University of California
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Man, Simeon, author.
Title: Soldiering through empire : race and the making of the decolonizing Pacific / Simeon Man.
Description: Oakland, CA : University of California Press, [2018] | Series: American crossroads ; 48 | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017034917 (print) | LCCN 2017040995 (ebook) | ISBN 9780520959255 (ebook) | ISBN 9780520283343 (cloth : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780520283367 (pbk. : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Vietnam War, 1961–1975—Participation, Filipinos. | Vietnam War, 1961–1975—Participation, Korean. | Vietnam War, 1961–1975—Participation, Asian Americans. | Pacific Area—History—20th century. | United States—History, Military—20th century. | Imperialism—History—20th century.
Classification: LCC DS558 (ebook) | LCC DS558 .M33 2018 (print) | DDC 959.704/340973—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017034917
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Every effort has been made to locate and credit rights holders for images reprinted in this volume. Where none could be found, the source of the image in question has been cited.
For my parents
Contents
1 •Securing Asia for Asians: Making the U.S. Transnational Security State
2 •Colonial Intimacies and Counterinsurgency: The Philippines, South Vietnam, and the United States
3 •Race War in Paradise: Hawai‘i’s Vietnam War
4 •Working the Subempire: Philippine and South Korean Military Labor in Vietnam
5 •Fighting “Gooks”: Asian Americans and the Vietnam War
6 •A World Becoming: The GI Movement and the Decolonizing Pacific
Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Illustrations
2.Captured rebels of the Yŏsu-Sunch’ŏn rebellion, October 1948
3.Dr. Antonio Velasco of Operation Brotherhood tending to a patient in Bien Hoa, October 1954
4.A 25th Infantry Division soldier delivers “Helping Hand” gift to a Vietnamese child
5.Soldiers “going native” in Kara Village
6.Stanford Masui arrested at the Kahlia Road Sit-In, May 13, 1968
7.Map reprinted in Liberated Barracks, February 1972
8.Mike Nakayama speaking at Peace Sunday at the Biltmore Bowl in Los Angeles, May 16, 1971
9.Van Troi Anti-Imperialist Youth Brigade Burn Rising Sun Flag at Nisei Week Festival in Los Angeles’s Little Tokyo, August 20, 1972
10.Active-duty GIs and civilians march for peace in San Francisco, September 1968
11.Black GIs show support for Okinawan base workers’ strike in 1971
Acknowledgments
I could not have written this book without the support of many generous people. First, I thank my teachers in the American Studies program at Yale, where this project got its start. I am most grateful to have learned so much from Mary Lui. Mary contributed more to this book and to my growth as a scholar than anyone else. She read drafts carefully and offered critical feedback at every stage, and has been a source of genuine encouragement throughout the process. She is the best model for the kind of generous scholar and mentor that I hope to be. Thanks to my dissertation co-chair, Matthew Frye Jacobson, for his enthusiasm for this project and his sharp interventions, professional advice, and generous spirit. Thanks to Michael Denning for helping me think outside the disciplines and for encouraging me to find my voice as a writer. I learned from a remarkable group of faculty members in those years. Thanks to Stephen Pitti, Alicia Schmidt Camacho, Lisa Lowe, Joanne Meyerowitz, Seth Fein, and Hazel Carby. None of this would have been possible without Moon-Ho Jung, who first introduced me to Asian American history and encouraged me to go to graduate school. Moon taught me the nuts and bolts of doing archival work, and taught me to never settle for the easy answer. I’m grateful to have him as a mentor and an ally.
An Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Fellowship allowed me to spend two years at Northwestern University in the American Studies and Asian American Studies programs. Thanks to Ivy Wilson and Carolyn Chen, the two program directors, for making my time so enriching and productive. Numerous people improved my work through conversations and commenting on early drafts of my writing. Thanks to Kathleen Belew, Martha Biondi, Gerry Cadava, Joshua Chambers-Letson, Daniel Immerwahr, Sylvester Johnson, Jinah Kim, Andrew Leong, Beth Lew-Williams, Linde Murugan, Shalini Shankar, Nitasha Sharma, Liz Son, Ji-Yeon Yuh, and James Zarsadiaz. The manuscript workshop Carolyn organized for me came at a critical time in my revision process. I thank Mark Philip Bradley, Jodi Kim, and Ji-Yeon Yuh for their careful reading and generous engagement with the book’s first draft. Mike Amezcua and Mireya Loza are two of my favorite people who made Chicago feel a little more like home. Thanks to