Formation | 1946 January 1950 |
---|---|
Founder | J. B. Powell, Helen Loomis |
Founded at | New York City |
Headquarters | New York City |
Location |
|
Chairman President | Alfred Kohlberg |
President | J. B. Powell, Clare Booth Luce, William Loeb III |
Vice President | Helen Loomis |
Alfred Kohlberg, Freda Utley, Irene Corbally Kuhn, Max Eastman, Walter H. Judd, William R. Johnson, Isaac Don Levine, David Prescott Barrows, William Henry Chamberlin, George Creel, Roscoe Pound | |
Key people | Alfred Kohlberg |
Affiliations | Plain Talk magazine, American Jewish League Against Communism |
The American China Policy Association (ACPA) was an anti-communist organization that supported the government of Republic of China, now commonly referred to as Taiwan, under Chiang Kai-shek. [1] [2]
On July 17, 1946, [2] J. B. Powell, correspondent, and Helen Loomis, missionary teacher, founded the American China Policy Association (ACPA). Alfred Kohlberg, a leader in the China Lobby joined as chairman [3] shortly thereafter to promote American interests by promoting the Republic of China under Chiang Kai-shek and the Kuomintang as a counter to Soviet and Chinese Communist support. [1] (Another source says that Kohlberg established ACPA. [2] )
In 1947, co-founder J. B. Powell died, succeeded by Clare Booth Luce (wife of Henry R. Luce) as president for one year, then by newspaper publisher William Loeb III. [1]
In 1949, when the Chinese Communist Party seized full control of mainland China and established the People's Republic of China, the ACPA accused the United States Department of State of "losing China." ACPA supported its allegations with copious literature: letters, pamphlets, brochures, press releases, and book reviews. Kohlberg's name went on most of those publications. [1]
ACPA obtained two US Army intelligence reports, which it reproduced via "photolithography" and made available to the press; these documents showed numerous errors and omissions by the State Department. [2]
Directly and through ACPA, Kohlberg criticized US President Harry S. Truman and US Secretary of State George C. Marshall. [2]
During the Korean War, ACPA advocacy "effectively changed" America's orientation with regard to Communist China. [1]
ACPA's board of directors included:
Another person associated with ACPA was Edna Lonigan. [2]
Chiang Kai-shek was a Chinese politician, revolutionary, and military leader who served as the leader of the Republic of China (ROC) and the Generalissimo of the National Revolutionary Army. He held these positions in mainland China from 1928 until 1949, when his nationalist Kuomintang (KMT) party was defeated in the Chinese Civil War by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)—thereafter, he led the remnant of the ROC government on the island of Taiwan until his death.
The Kuomintang (KMT), also referred to as the Guomindang (GMD), the Nationalist Party of China (NPC) or the Chinese Nationalist Party (CNP), is a major political party in the Republic of China, initially based on the Chinese mainland and then in Taiwan since 1949. It was the sole ruling party in China during the Republican Era from 1928 to 1949, when most of the Chinese mainland was under its control. The party retreated from the mainland to Taiwan on 7 December 1949, following its defeat in the Chinese Civil War. Chiang Kai-shek declared martial law and retained his authoritarian rule over Taiwan under the Dang Guo system until democratic reforms were enacted in the 1980s and full democratization in the 1990s. In Taiwanese politics today, the KMT is a centre-right to right-wing party and is the largest party in the Pan-Blue Coalition. The KMT's primary rival in elections is the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and its allies in the Pan-Green Coalition. As of 2023, the KMT is the largest opposition party in the Legislative Yuan. The current chairman is Eric Chu.
Soong Mei-ling, also known as Madame Chiang Kai-shek or Madame Chiang, was a Chinese political figure who was First Lady of the Republic of China, the wife of President Chiang Kai-shek of the Republic of China. Soong played a prominent role in the politics of the Republic of China and was the sister-in-law of Sun Yat-sen, the founder and the leader of the Republic of China. She was active in the civic life of her country and held many honorary and active positions, including chairwoman of Fu Jen Catholic University. During World War II, she rallied against the Japanese; and in 1943 conducted an eight-month speaking tour of the United States to gain support.
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Henry Robinson Luce was an American magazine magnate who founded Time, Life, Fortune, and Sports Illustrated magazines. He has been called "the most influential private citizen in the America of his day".
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Owen Lattimore was an American Orientalist and writer. He was an influential scholar of China and Central Asia, especially Mongolia. Although he never earned a college degree, in the 1930s he was editor of Pacific Affairs, a journal published by the Institute of Pacific Relations, and then taught at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, from 1938 to 1963. He was director of the Walter Hines Page School of International Relations there from 1939 to 1953. During World War II, he was an advisor to Chiang Kai-shek and the American government and contributed extensively to the public debate on American policy in Asia. From 1963 to 1970, Lattimore was the first Professor of Chinese Studies at the University of Leeds in England.
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The Liaoshen campaign, an abbreviation of Liaoning–Shenyang campaign after the province of Liaoning and its Yuan directly administered capital city Shenyang, was the first of the three major military campaigns launched by the Communist People's Liberation Army (PLA) against the Kuomintang Nationalist government during the late stage of the Chinese Civil War. This engagement is also known to the Kuomintang as the Liaohsi campaign, and took place between September and November 1948, lasting a total of 52 days. The campaign ended after the Nationalist forces suffered sweeping defeats across Manchuria, losing the major cities of Jinzhou, Changchun, and eventually Shenyang in the process, leading to the capture of the whole of Manchuria by the Communist forces. The victory of the campaign resulted in the Communists achieving a strategic numerical advantage over the Nationalists for the first time in its history.
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Alfred Kohlberg was an American textile importer. A staunch anti-Communist, he was a member of the pro-Chiang "China lobby", as well as an ally of Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy, a friend and advisor of John Birch Society founder Robert W. Welch Jr., and a member of the original national council of the John Birch Society.
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