they are allowed to have all media access possible. >> why? >> because there will never be a time in their workplace they are cut off from those resources, so to test them by saying what can you remember from your head or memorize is not a test. the moment kids are in the have access to all the information so the question is how can you sort through the options in a limited timeframe isn't that the challenge of the workplace given all the options? how do you see through things? how do you analyze and make wise decisions given almost too many options? >> you end up with the question is technology [inaudible]

>> i guess we will come to see technology as like smartphones something every day. it's already moving into class, google classes. i think we will come to see it like a fork or spoon or pair of glasses. it won't be anything special but at this point it is so captivating and magical i think that we can ge give ourselves tt a little bolder lee and uncritical. so my book is an effort to push to just think and gain a little perspective and make sure that those tools designed to serve us or not enslaving us. >> so the book is a warning shot? >> i think that igod is a deep appreciation for the people that created these technologies. i appreciate how they'v they hae helped us manage abundance intod

too much but it is a chance to say the careful that you don't place too much faith in technology and too much magic is something that is really meant to serve us rather than drive us. igod is the name of the book how technology shapes our spiritual and social lives. craig detweiler pepperdine is the author. >> booktv is on facebook. like us to interact with booktv guests and viewers, watch videos and get up-to-date information, facebook.com/booktv. now on booktv encore booknotes. irish chain was on in 1997 to talk about her book the rape of nanking the forgotten holocaust of world war ii. the book documents the atrocities upon the people by the japanese military during the early years of world war ii.

this is about an hour.g >> cspan: author of the rape"te of nanking the forgotten holocaust of world war ii whentn did you first think about writing this for?think of >> guest: well, it goes back a long way. i mea n, i learned about thiss event when i was a little child but i didn't really think aboutk writing the book until i finished my first one ratherfinr thin and after i had attended a conference in california thatded was devoted to preserving the history of this event. >> cspan: what was the rape of nanking? >> guest: for the greatest atrocities. in december 1937, the japanese swept into china which was then nanking and was there for six to eight weeks they butchered, raped and tortured hundreds of thousands of chinese civilians. 300,000 people ultimately died during this massacre and they

raped and estimated 20,000 to 80,000 women during this period. >> cspan: way is. so did the later discovered between 20 to 80,000? >> guest: it's hard to ascertain between the numbers. women were reluctant to come out against the fact that the time. brian mack on page 59 there's a gentle man here. was he? >> guest: he was a doctor that back in 1937 he was one of the soldiers that committed atrocities. bria >> cspan: have you met him? >> guest: this was taken from an article that the story was so compelling that i had to put it in my book. >> cspan: before i read this tony would story it is. >> guest: are we talking about the story in the article itself? >> cspan: --

>> guest: he is a doctor now and he feels so terrible about what he did, so he has put pictures of some of the atrocities in the waiting room of his clinic so the patients of him could see what he did in nanking. >> cspan: iron member being driven on the truck piled through thousands and thousands of slaughtered bodies. while the dogs at the dead flesh as we stopped and pulled a group of prisoners out of the back than the japanese officer proposed a test of my courage. she spat on it and with a sudden swing brought it down on the neck of a chinese boy cowering before us. the head cut off and tumbled away as the body slumped forward with blood squirting into great fountains from the neck. the officer suggested i take it

home as a souvenir. i remember smiling as i took the sword and begin killing people. why did you put this in their? >> guest: i wanted to show people that -- a defeat for soldiers were implicated to commit violence. this isn't a story that was an isolated incident. this was happening throughout nanking committee and the massacre all the way up to the capital and they even held contests in order to desensitize the japanese soldiers from feeling reluctant in committing these atrocities. >> cspan: we have a picture here of the corpses along the river. where did you find this picture? >> guest: that one came from a

japanese correspondent who took that picture printed in several other publications. so it's really -- that isn't the most gruesome picture. you may not want to show the audience some of the others that are in my book. >> cspan: we do want to show the pictures so that they can see, not the picture on the other side if we can pick it up, that picture right there. what's this? >> guest: the one on the right? that is a member of heads that have just been put out. this was the typical scene in nanking. beheadings, they would put heads up on posts like the picture underneath so that people could understand what it would be like if they continue to resist japan. >> cspan: and where was this done? >> guest: it was done throughout nanking but also

china actually. brian mack was was the history that they were in china in 1937 and in nanking? >> guest: in 1937 the japanese found an opportunity to promote war with china and it's called the mark opel low bridge incident and we probably don't have much detail, we don't have much time to go into that, but it escalated into a full-scale war, and the japanese invaded shanghai in the fall of 1937 and they had originally thought that the war would take place only three months they thought that they could conquer china in a matter of months but when one battle a loan in one chinese city dragged onto that, the japanese were anxious to i think make an example of the city. they were furious and frustrated and that is the mood of the soldiers were in as they marched

from shanghai to nanking. >> cspan: where is that in china? >> guest: in a band at the river. it's only a 2 miles away. shanghai would be on the coast of china and further in land and the city is right situated at the band of where the river courses to the north and then turns to flow towards the coast. so when the japanese swept towards nanking call they had to do was encircle it from three other directions because the river itself formed a natural

barrier. >> cspan: have you been to nanking? >> guest: several times. in the summer of 95 i was there for several weeks actually, just one time. >> cspan: what is your personal connection? >> guest: my father was born in that area. and my family actually, my grandparents used to live in nanking shortly before the massacre itself. >> cspan >> cspan: diva number the first time you heard about it? >> guest: i don't remember they must have been in grade school at the time and my parents were professors at the university of illinois that were telling me about the nanking massacre and they said that the killings had been so intense in

nanking that the river literally ran red with blood for days and they said that people were being accepted pieces -- hacked to pieces. it's hard for me to visualize and i wanted to learn more about it so i went to the local library to see if i could find anything about it, and there wasn't a single book in english. i couldn't find anything. >> cspan: but did you do next? >> guest: as a child i probably just forgot about it and i didn't think about it for another 20 years. the rate in nanking didn't intrude in my life until i was married and i was living in santa barbara and a film maker friend of mine told me that he had two friends who had heard that people were filming a documentary on the rate in

nanking, but they have problems appearing and funding for the distribution because the japanese influence in this country and that's what piqued my interest again. i located the filmmakers and talked to them and one of them who produced the documentary in the name of the emperor told me that there was considerable chinese activism on this event and that if i was interested i should contact this particular organization that is called the alliance for the preservation of the truth of world war ii and as it turns out, this particular organization was hosting a conference on the rate of nanking in december of 1994, so since i was in santa barbara and the conference was to be held i just drove up and attended the event. now, what i wasn't prepared for

was the fact they had poster size pictures of some of these atrocities and i was seeing these pictures for the very first time coming and i was -- virender i felt sick to my stomach. i really thought i would have to go home because i was so ill and i resolved to do something. this is so bad and yet no one had written a book about it, so i figured that it was time to take initiative. >> cspan: who is this woman appear? is she alive? >> guest: yes, she is. >> cspan: and what is the story? >> guest: in 1937, she was a teenage wife of a technician who had fled from the city of nanking on top of the train and she was left behind in the city and she ended up fighting off

three soldiers who tried to rape her. they stabbed her more than 30 times. >> cspan: where does she live now? >> guest: she lives in nanking. >> cspan: did you talk to her? >> guest: yes i did. i spoke to her for several hours and i felt like a time traveler because i saw this picture of her when she was still in he's teenager and when i met her face to face she was almost 80-years-old. >> cspan: what does she look like now? >> guest: she is very feisty, she's very strong. one of the strongest women i've ever met. she is -- she has so many wrinkles now that they've covered up the scars when she was younger the scars on her face were horrible. >> cspan: again, she was stabbed 37 times with bayonets. >> guest: that's correct. >> cspan: even under anything else about the story, where was she when she was stabbed?

>> guest: she was in the international safety zone that was organized by the foreigners of nanking to protect them from the japanese and we will probably talk more about that later but at the time the soldier had his eye on her when he went down into the basement where she was hiding and he tried to rape her but she would prevent being raped, so luckily she was bigger than he was so that when he lunged when he came for her she ripped the bayonet from him and she threw her back against the wall and started grappling with him and she ended up using him as a human shield against the other soldiers trying to stab her and protect him but she was using him as a shield to prevent from getting slashed. >> cspan: out of she survive?

>> guest: just barely. one bayonet stab her right in the stomach and she eventually lost her baby, but she fainted and she was almost buried alive by her family that didn't realize she was still alive but someone noticed the bubbles of blood frothing from her mouth and they rushed her to the hospital where the american doctor robert wilson saved her life. >> cspan: now, she's now 80 sh0 some-years-old. when you talk to her how many times did somebody ask about this over the years? >> guest: i think other reporters have talked with her. i'm not really sure. >> cspan: you talk about your dad being born near there. what about your grandparents? >> guest: my mother's parents were in nanking in 1937. my grandfather actually was in the city as the japanese were bombing it into this just an

incredible story of how they were almost separated forever during the chaos and the mass evacuations. >> cspan: i read the story that was more aboubut was more . >> guest: when the fighting in shanghai escalated, it became clear to my grandfather that his wife who was then a young woman in her 20s wasn't really safe and he didn't want her to be in the city foa city where the jape bombarding the hospitals and schools and so he sent her to the home village near the city and when he went back to visit her in the village and journeyed back he didn't realize the entire capital was moving in my hand and by his particular unit was leaving and he had to get the word to my grandmother to

join him in another city so they could leave that whole region. they were to meet because i think in the railroad tax as he waited for her she waited for four days and he didn't know that it was just taking a long time because the railroad had been bombed out and everyone was trying to get out of there, so he waited and waited and eventually it got to the -- it got to the point that he really had to make a choice. he would either leave the city and leave and maybe never see his wife again or he could wait for his wife and his daughter and then meet up with them but missed the boat out of the

region knowing that that area would be overrun by japanese soldiers. and he was so desperate right when he turned to leave he screamed out her name. he screamed about and in one last it happens that my grandmother was in there and she stuck her head out and yelled back and it is because of that cry they were reunited because otherwise my mother would have never been born and they never would have seen each other again. >> cspan: when did they leave china? >> guest: they didn't leave until shortly before the 1949 communist revolution. so, that would have been sometime in the 1940s. >> cspan: are they alive? >> guest: unfortunately both have passed away. my grandfather lived up to the 94-years-old. he passed away in 1993 coming and my grandmother died this last summer. it's very unfortunate she didn't

get to see the publication of the book. >> cspan: did you talk about the materia material into the? >> guest: my grandfather because he was a poet and an artist and a book author and he'd written about some of this in his biography but i did have a chance to interview my grandmother as well before she died. >> cspan: where did you grow up? >> guest: illinois where my parents were professors. >> cspan: how long did you live their? >> guest: exactly 20 years. my father was offered a position i guess when i was about one. i went to school there at the university and left i think at age 21. >> cspan: ar >> cspan: or they stole their? >> guest: they are. >> cspan: where did you go when you left? >> guest: i worked briefly as a reporter at this usaid press delet--associated press and then hopkins university writing seminar program where i received my masters degree then i got married and moved out to california where my husband is

working. >> cspan: where do you live now? >> guest: sunnyvale california which is the heart of silicon valley. >> cspan: use it in the book the japanese have never apologized for this. >> guest: that's correct never officially apologized. >> cspan: like? >> guest: i think there's really no reason for them to do so unless they were pressured to do so. >> cspan: why hasn't someone pressured them to do so? you compare it to what the germans have done. >> guest: i think demographics has something to do with it. some of the activism behind the events was fairly new but the cold war has a large role in the violence of the japanese and the chinese and the americans on this issue. after the communist revolution, neither the prc were d'argo c. wanted to pressured japan to pay operations and apologize because both of them needed to japan as

an ally against each other to be needed at japan as an economic and political reason and the united states .-full-stop japan as its ally of in the communism in asia. >> cspan: in 1837 how many people live in nanking? >> guest: before some of the evacuations about a million people. >> cspan: what was the relationship in china and japan was going on in the world and what was their relationship? >> guest: in 1937? is by that point were intense. in the summer of 1937, japan had attacked shanghai. the war had already broken out. for hundreds of years it wasn't

something that just started in 1937. there is a long history of animosity. >> cspan: what is the reason? >> guest: reason for? >> guest: animosity. i don't know if we have enough time to go into this, that there has already been the war between is the first sign i japanese war and there had already been numerous attempts by the japanese to carve up parts of china. they had already seized by the 1930s. >> cspan: what is it the japanese character that led to this kind of slaughtering blacks would you find in this process? i assume you ask people about that. >> guest: it's very complicated. another historian sai said tryio

peer into the japanese mind is like trying to stare down a cold. it's very difficult often to find out the motives. i would say that if you are looking at the soldiers themselves you will find that many of them have been so brutalized before the massacre that the nanking massacre was an episode in which much of the pent-up frustration that they had experienced had exploded. they were systematically hazed for years. you have to imagine just how intense the japanese military experience was. he had to end her getting

sloshed around by the japanese officers. i mean, there were japanese soldiers being forced to wash their underwear. they were treated almost as subhuman in their own army and asked that ha have been suggestd that those that had the least power and had become the most when they do gain some chance to unleash the frustration that was thought up inside. >> cspan: how much discussion have you had with the japanese people about this event? >> guest: i had the opportunity to talk to a group of japanese students were studying in san francisco. and they were absolutely shocked to find out what happened. i mean, they had been kept in the dark about this all their lives. they said that the textbooks contained only one line on the massacre that was referred to as the incident, and i remember

that when i showed them some of the photographs one woman burst into tears, so it's clear many of the japanese people to this day don't really know what happened. i mean, the ignorance in japan on this event and on other atrocities is appalling. if you look -- i talked with a college professor in japan and he said that when he mentioned to his students and remember these are college students that japan had been at war with the u.s. many of the students asked him which side one. so in other words they are not being talked about this in school and the ministry of education has for decades censored this event and others from their textbooks. this has been the subject of a 30 year lawsuit between the japanese government and famous

historian. >> cspan: >> cspan: is there a chinese holocaust museum? >> guest: there is a nanking museum. it has a big number 300,000 inscribed but that's about it. i've met people in los angeles that are interested in building a chinese holocaust museum. >> guest: you said the house of representatives got into this? >> guest: that's something different. that is the bill. >> cspan: i mean into this whole issue. >> guest: that's right. william who is a democrat from illinois introduced a bill in congress that calls for the japanese to officially apologize to the world war ii victims and pay reparations and the rate of nanking is only one aspect of the bill. there were many other atrocities such as the korean comfort women

issue, the medical experimentation the japanese had conducted including without anesthesia and american and chinese prisoner of war. the baton death march. there are so many instances of wartime atrocities mentioned in his bill and they have more than 30 supporters in congress. >> cspan: what was the killing contest you mentioned earlier? >> guest: there were two lieutenants who wanted to see who could kill 100 chinese first into the japanese media covered this as if it were some kind of a sporting event and wendy reached the 100 mark an they had lost count and figured let's just do this to 150.

>> cspan: you've got the actual newspaper? and you can see over here the numbers 105 and 106. >> guest: they were running neck to neck. that was published in the japanese newspaper. >> guest: that's right this was something the japanese people knew about at the time. >> cspan: who was conducting a contest? who was challenging and whose idea was that? >> guest: i'm not really clear on the details of this, but this is not ethical. this is what is happening throughout the nanking. >> cspan: they said the japanese turned murder into a sport and the japanese in the background here is the photograph right there. where do you find all of these photographs? >> guest: many of the photos were either collected by the nanking government for the war crime tribunals against the japanese after the war, but sometimes the japanese slitters

themselves took these pictures. when i talked with one of the survivors come he remembered that as he stood on the edge watching all the japanese chop off heads and throw them to the side one person was keeping count, keeping score and the other one was laughing and taking photographs. there is an incredible story about how the 16th of reps eventually made its way from the photoshop to a toilet until it finally ended up in the archiv archives. was it a tough position to put them in the? >> guest: i was very concerned some of the books. the pictures would result in the book being banned from school libraries. but i had numerous discussions

with the people at harpercollins and with other historians and friends and to some people insisted that i put them in anyway uncensored becausanyway s history. this was the truth. >> cspan: what is this photograph over here? >> guest: that is of a woman that was a rape victim being forced to pose next to a japanese soldier naked. they found these photographs in the wall of some of the japanese soldiers. sometimes the people in the local photograph would make copies because they knew how important they were. >> cspan: on the other page -- >> guest: i still have problems looking at it. she had been in field after she was raped. >> cspan: and where did you find this? >> guest: this came from china. it came from the chinese archives. >> cspan: into the photograph

above is? >> guest: that is the photograph of a woman that had been gang raped and as you can see she's been tied to the chair so she could be raped whenever the soldiers were in the mood for it. and again i have a hard time even looking at these pictures. >> cspan: what is the purpose of putting them in the buck than if you decide -- what was the conversation like between you and the publisher? >> guest: there were people in the publishing house that had problems looking at the pictures. in the end, we decided that it was important for people to see what they were capable of doing. and it was a tough decision. and i may catch a lot of criticism for it, but i don't think that people will realize just how brutal the japanese word until the city's pictures. >> cspan: ie would say things like what is your proof that

this actually is something that is caused by a japanese soldier. >> guest: there are thousands of pages of primary source documents on this event in for different languages described with words these very pictures and many of the pictures didn't come from japan and china. >> cspan: the one at the top. the bayonet. >> guest: these are pictures of the japanese and they are doing it for practice. they are using life prisoners as practice. and as you can see the, the chie has been blindfolded he's been stabbed repeatedly and this is

happening even after he's dead. >> cspan: this photograph? >> guest: several being buried alive as the japanese soldiers watch. brian mackie also told a story where there were some chinese victims up to their heads and german shepherds -- >> guest: tear them apart. brian mack did you have pictures of that? >> guest: though. thank god. >> cspan: hell did you find out? >> guest: it came out of the archival documents, so it came out of the descriptions that i found in china. i have so many facts on these atrocities they had to miss the computer database for them in order to keep them in order. we had that much evidence.

>> guest: i started compiling the information probably in january or february of 1995. >> cspan: i noticed as late as august, almost the end of august. >> cspan: hell were you able to publish it that close? >> guest: we had to publish this at the last minute. we were working right down to the last minute on this book. it was a very tight schedule. >> guest: harpercollins themselves as you know has been through some difficulty and they eventually carried more than 100 contracts and there were some delays in the process, but that was okay because that gave me an opportunity to put in some other information that should have

gone in the book. i located the family halfway through the project so this was an ongoing process. >> cspan: did you talk to his daughter or granddaughter? >> guest: i tracked down the family when the book was almost finished, so yes the revisions were made after the last minute. >> guest: he was the head of the nazi party but he was also the head of the international safety zone's committee which is that group of about 24 nurses that created a two and a half square mile area for the refugees. they told japanese this area was

awful and they had to see the refugees and protect them. >> cspan: you have a letter dated 1888 and it's signed by john. >> guest: that letter went to hitler. brian mack white? >> guest: he was hoping to stop the atrocities by in forming the highest levels. he may have been a little naïve that he really thought perhaps the germans would pressure the japanese to stop the killing so what he did is a 1938 when he went back to berlin, he brought with him a copy of the film of the massacre and he took footage of some of the atrocities. actually he is the gentle man on the other side of the page. the picture that's a little lower on the page.

he shot scenes from the man came tnankinghospital and it hospital and it was this film that was reproduced in the shanghai and they made several copies. john took one of the copies and also kept binaries of the massacre and photos along with him to berlin and he sent a copy of the film to hitler and he was hoping to make some kind of change bu that the net result of sending the film was a visit from the gestapo. they came to his home and arrested him and interrogated him for hours and eventually they forced him to promise they

would ever speak about the atrocities again. >> cspan: where is the film? >> guest: that's a good question. we are trying to -- the film is available in the united states. several copies were made. to this day they are not sure. >> cspan: if you saw the film, what would you see in the atrocities? >> guest: you see people being led away by the japanese soldiers. you have to remember he couldn't just stick the camera up right in front of their faces. this had to be done secretly. so you could see some footage that is found through maybe a crack in the door or in the window and you would see the

crowds of chinese being taken away. and the most gruesome images come from the hospital where there are victims who had escaped being burned alive and people who had been slashed with a nx. dmx. there's one picture where one's woman's head is about to fall off. it's very grotesque. depending on how you pronounce this, who is she? >> guest: a japanese better than of the rape of nanking. and he's still alive and in japan right now. >> cspan: and you corresponded with him? >> guest: that's correct. >> cspan: how did that work wo, how did you find an? >> guest: i have to track them down and i think a journalist is actually the one that gave me his address. and i wrote a letter to him. i had it translated into japanese and he responded almost

immediately and i had the later translated back into english. he sent me copies of the diaries and he also answered that request and i had posed to him. i was trying to understand that the state of mind that he was at the time. brian macklin did you learn from him? >> guest: the japanese soldier really have to see the chinese s subhuman before they could kill them. he depicted the chinese in his diary as animals or insects. >> cspan: >> cspan: right about that in thabove that inthe buck, you cao context the veteran officer named speedy 11 transformed the youth to killing machine. and i want to read what you have. where did you find that? >> guest: that was in the secondary sources that came from

the book. >> cspan >> cspan: you scoop water from the bucket and then poured over both sides of the plate and he raised the sword in a long arc behind the prisoner he steadied himself, legs spread apart and cut off the man's head with a shout. the head of the more than a meter away and blood sprayed into fountains and into the holes. it was so appalling i felt i couldn't breathe. >> guest: it would depend on the individual but i don't know what they would think. but i think i personally think they have a moral responsibility to come to grips with this. japan as a nation could move forward until they meet this squarely in the face. >> cspan: even according to your testimony, they don't know about it. >> guest: but there are those that do and i are a member talking to some japanese that

immediately denying and they don't want to believe it, so it's very hard to know exactly how they are going to react. >> cspan: will your book be published in japan? >> guest: i am not really optimistic that it will be. that perhaps some kind of small radical publisher was again risk and put it out. >> cspan: from what you know, what would happen if they tried to be sold over in japan? >> guest: i don't know but i will tell you that they've come out to apologize for his role in the massacre he has faced countless death threats and many of the journalists that have written about this in japan have either been ostracized or d use even for gravity have some classes on because they have run into these kind of threats.

don't forget a japanese right-winger shot the mayor in the back simply because he said that he thought he had some responsibility for the war. >> cspan: 1989. >> guest: that's right. so, we have a country that is living in denial and i will be honest with you i am completely appalled that more people don't know about this atrocity because if you look, 300,000 people died in nanking. 300,000 people might not seem like a huge number until you place it in the context of world war ii history. 300,000 deaths is greater than the deaths from hiroshima and nagasaki combined and it's also greater than the combined civilian deaths of several european countries for the

entire duration of world war ii. so in other words if you add up the number of civilians who died in england, france and belgium that still waitin wouldn't be ay people who died in nanking which is one chinese city in six to eight weeks. in the end, more than 19 million chinese people perished. 19 million were killed. >> cspan: what do you want to do with this? >> guest: i want the whole world to know what happened. i want the entire world to know the truth. >> cspan: how far are you willing to take it? >> guest: i think just writing the book is the biggest step for me. i think i've done my part just laying down the facts for people to read.

>> cspan: and also in the book, you have some americans. one in particular is robert wilson. it >> guest: robert wilson was a missionary doctor and he was the only surgeon in nanking during the great massacre. >> cspan: what role did he play? >> guest: he was the person who ended up having to stitch up the survivors that came into the hospital from the dns woes bayonet bounds. he was working night and day and it's incredible what he was able to do. >> cspan: what was the valid? >> guest: the international safety zone was two and a half square miles in the city which the foreigners had marked off with red flags and it was in area they claimed the japanese were not permitted to enter and they tried to come a year now,

they just part of the chinese there. many of them with only the clothes on their back just a game for a place to sit down so that they could be facing the japanese. >> cspan: how many people were inside the? >> guest: hundreds of thousands. one actually said 300,000. one of his own members said 300,000. >> cspan: utility story about how they would come in and the japanese would come in. how did they find them when they took off their uniforms what was the technique they used to find him? >> guest: what they did is they would search their hands to see if they had any calluses from handling guns. they also searched their backs to see if there were backpacked marks and even their feet were signs is marching into that way they were able to find out who had been former chinese soldiers

and they systematically marched them out and shot them. >> cspan: was there a trial of any kind? >> guest: the biggest one is the international military tribunal for the far east and that was held in japan and it resulted in some of the war criminals being hanged. >> cspan: is that everything that happened in world war ii that happened at the tribal? did it cover everything? >> guest: they were trying to cover everything. but they also had a local trial, too. it went on for several months. it was mainly these were held immediately after the war. >> cspan: and that was held in nanking? >> guest: the international tribunal was considerably

longer. it went on for years. >> cspan: how much publicity was there either in japan or -- -- >> guest: there was considerable publicity. i think it was the longest trial in history commander they had hundreds of reporters. it was well publicized. >> cspan: utility story about matthew perry and how the americans opened up japan to the outside world. how did that work? >> guest: what he decided to do with the japanese ignored. he decided that the best way to deal with them was to them into submission. he went right up to one of the

ports and strolled into the capital with some very aggressive looking men and terrified the japanese at the time. this was the first time they had ever even seen a steam power. one historian said that it would be to really understand the pressure the japanese were under it would be like in an announcement may be on cnn that we have some weird looking aircraft headed towards earth. that is how shocked they were. >> cspan: this was july of 1853. is that the first time japan had ever seen an american? >> guest: probably the first time any of them had. they decided they would try to learn from them because it was obvious that they were lagging

in technology they had to learn to build up their military. >> cspan: what happened to the country? >> guest: the country did precisely that. there was the restoration. they built up a very strong military and begin. did they talk about that when they went over their? it's actually very interesting that you've asked me that because many of the officials that i've met are sympathetic to the history. many of them he have even had relatives who died during the japanese war but at the same

time, i think they are reluctant to endanger the trade relations to japan to the political and diplomatic relations. so, the prc as they may have mentioned before has the activists have tried to promote this event for most. >> cspan: you say there are a number of lessons. this is one i want to ask about. another lesson is to be gleaned from power and genocide. those that have studied the patterns of the killings through history have noted that the sheer concentration of power in government is lethal and the unchecked power to make the atrocity like the rape of nanking possible. what would you say then about the chinese concentration of power in the government? >> guest: it's a dangerous situation because to this day it's still a solitary in regime

and its -- if you have these kind of conditions in place come and atrocity like the rape of nanking can happen again. >> cspan: what did they think when you went to china in 1995, did they know what you were doing? >> guest: in 1995 no, they didn't. he and i was a little concerned when i went back because i had just written the book which is an unauthorized biography of the father of the red chinese missile program and so i knew plenty of people had been kicked out of china for promoting the history of the rape of nanking so i knew there was a good chance that i myself might be interrogated. >> cspan: did they know who you were? >> guest: they didn't. all they knew as i was is i war out there speaking information. >> cspan: what does your husband to? >> guest: he's an electrical

engineer in silicon valley and he's been incredibly supportive of the project and my career. >> cspan: user that you live in a sunnyvale in silicon. it seems like there was somebody in the bucket was living in sunnyvale. was it somebody that -- >> guest: it turned out that there was a paramedic this is somebody when he was living in nanking back in 1937 he was a little boy that volunteered to help the chinese army working as a paramedic at the time. sheer coincidence. >> cspan: in the book you talk about how in the beginning of "the rape of nanging" an incident that 60,000 people were killed to? >> guest: that must be the move would amount to massacre. >> cspan: " that? >> guest: what they'd have done is they kept the tens of

thousands of civilians in the camps and then eventually after keeping them dehydrated and starved. what is your sense of what would lead a human being to do this kind of thing? >> guest: i think that people are much were capable of creating these atrocities then we would think and if you are conditioned to believe that what you're doing is the right thing if the murder becomes a holy one, then it would be easy i think to convince people that not only what you're doing is wrong, that it's sanctioned by god and it's the only right thing that you can do. >> cspan: have you talked at all about rwanda?

>> guest: actually in this book is mentioned just briefly but i would say when i was listening to the school looking at a news account, i felt like i was reviewing my own archival documents again. some of this and other '80s rear hunting. stories about women who have been raped by soldiers and now they are going to carry an enemy soldiers baby into these dilemmas that were so painful to me when reading them because i kept seeing the same story over and over again. >> cspan: italy story about a woman to this day who won't get hurt real name. i can't remember exactly what it is that you eluted with them. what was it some of the rapes have happened but eventually children were born? >> guest: there were many born as a result of this rape and lewis smith said there were

thousands of the children being smothered to death or drowned because very few. killing your own baby or raising a child that you can never love and i'm sure that a lot of women couldn't make that choice at the same time there were thousands committing suicide in the city throwing themselves to drown. >> cspan >> cspan: how interested have you found americans in the story? >> guest: i'm surprised at the response. it's overwhelming. it seems to me that almost everyone i've talked to is interested and they are shocked that they don't know about this. >> cspan: why don't we know about it in the united states? >> guest: i sometimes wonder if it is maybe demographics. it's really stunning to me that

i really don't know the answer to that question. i hope it's simply it was just a lack of interest maybe there were not enough chinese and japanese experts immediately after the war. in the conspiracy with the japanese to cover up their own dealings so there are many political reasons why something like this wouldn't be told. >> cspan: what is that moment anin here that you talked about when fdr had -- 30 seconds or 30 minutes? >> guest: 3 30 feet of the film. as you know they had bombed the uss into some americans have died as a result of the bombing and the japanese leader on trade to excuse the bombing by saying it was a cloudy day or we

couldn't see clearly that this wasn't an american ship. there were the two newsreels men aboard. they were swooping down to death level to shoot at the passengers and it's clear from anyone that looks at the footage that the japanese could see the flags that were painted on the back were flying overhead. specifica requested that this footage be the president specifically requested that this footage be removed before it was shown in american theaters. .. probably because they didn't want to jeopardize any kind of settlement that they wanted to make with japan. >> we're out of time. this is our guest book jacket

"the rape of nanking" and our guest has been iris >> but after his plane crashed in may 1943.