2 - The China tangle

Summary

The delays the first Thai group encountered in leaving the USA and crossing the broad Pacific were just the first of a series that would frustrate them and their American sponsors. They would discover that the Americans and their hosts – first the British in India, then the Chinese – had divergent interests and perspectives and were only, as the late Christopher Thorne so aptly put it, “allies of a kind.”

The British and Americans, representing democracy and liberal capitalism and sharing a common language and culture, seemed natural allies. Thus, like the Russians in the alliance against Germany, the Chinese often saw themselves as the odd men out in the Asian–Pacific war. Aware of this, President Roosevelt sought to stand apart from the British by adopting a conspicously anti-imperialist stance, a position that reflected his own view of European colonialism as exploitative and anachronistic.

Roosevelt's anti-imperialist position enjoyed widespread support at home. Despite their nation's empire building on the North American continent and beyond, Americans believed that their revolutionary heritage and enlightened policies set them apart from Europeans. In particular, they saw the American promise of independence for the Philippines – a decision in part based on the economic concerns of domestic sugar producers and the desire to shed a burdensome defense commitment – as the appropriate model for the other colonial powers in Asia.