Interview #29 Jenny Chan: Pacific Atrocities Education - Uncovering the Pacific War's Hidden Stories

Rick Barron (00:01)

Hi everyone, I'm Rick Barron, your host, and welcome to my podcast, That's Life, I Swear. 

My guest today is Jenny Chan. Jenny is a director at Pacific Atrocities Education, a San Francisco-based nonprofit dedicated to preserving and researching the overlooked and often uncomfortable truth of what happened during World War II and, more so, in the Pacific War.

Now her organization doesn't just document history.

It challenges us to question it, research it, and understand how the past continues to shape the world we live in today. Now, over the past decade, Jenny and her team have worked with hundreds of interns, survivors, scholars, and students to uncover stories rarely taught in textbooks, such as forced labor camps and forgotten resistance fighters. 

Also, to the ripple effects of political decisions that still echo across Asia today. 

Now, as I was exploring the website that Jenny's organization has pulled together, I came across one line that I found very powerful. Simple, but very powerful: Remember history to see the future. 

Think about that. 

In an era where headlines move faster than understanding, Jenny will remind us that context is not optional; it's essential. That research is not just about the facts, but about empathy, and that every action in history creates a reaction that shapes generations. 

That said, please join me as I have my conversation with Jenny Chan. 

Jenny, welcome to the show.

Jenny Chan (01:51)

Thank you for having me.

Rick Barron (01:52)

I've been looking forward to this conversation ever since I came across your website and I've been going through the pages, looking at all the updates that come to mind. It's what I found really fascinating: I used to create websites back in the day. So, looking at what you've created, that's a lot of work. That is a lot of work. But maybe for the benefit of the audience, could you kind of walk us through your background and where you are today with this organization?

Jenny Chan (02:27)

Yeah, so I founded this organization in 2014. So, it's been 10 years of this kind of website work and also updating from things that I have found in the National Archives. I started the organization because my grandma, when I was a kid, had always told me about World War II.

But then a little that I realized that Pearl Harbor and what she was describing were actually the same war. If you think about it, like eight hours after Pearl Harbor, Hong Kong was attacked. But in the West, we don't really learn about World War II in terms of like, in terms of the Pacific War. The Pacific War, we watched one movie on Pearl Harbor and then the rest is about Hitler. 

When I was a kid, I really loved anime and my grandma was, you know, every time I was watching anime, my grandma was very upset and I was thinking like, wow, you know, maybe she's a little bit prejudice against certain people and I don't know why I couldn't figure it out why. And after she died, we found the whole box of like military yen and like rice ration coupons. And that's when I realized that, okay, so like maybe what she was talking about, because that's when I saw physical proof and that's when I was like, maybe what she was talking about in terms of like the Japanese were these evil turnip heads who came over and like really were really brutal. Maybe there's some truth to that.

Jenny Chan (04:04)

And so then I started and after college I had this really boring job and I was reading more into World War II in Asia specifically, like The Rape of Nanking, The Rising Sun by John Toland and also like The Factory about Unit 731 and what I realized is that like the war in Asia was not was very brutal like what my grandma experienced is like very typical of an experience in Asia. 

30 million people died basically. That's like the lower estimate. And the higher estimate was 42 million. then I was after like finding all these facts, was like, maybe there's like a organization dedicated to researching and maybe I can be an analyst there. Maybe I can make some website for them.

Rick Barron (05:17)

So, you’re the founder of this organization or? Okay.

Jenny Chan (05:20)

Yes, I was a co-founder because I convinced my friend into it because I had no idea how to make websites and whatnot. And my friend has now moved on and working in AI industry. And yeah, so I was the co-founder and that's how that was the starting story.

Rick Barron (05:44)

So, when you were putting this website together and it, you know, that it takes a lot of work, you know, how to organize it, how to present it. What went on the whiteboard, so to speak, as to how you were going to design this site so that people not only read the information, looked at the pictures, but walked away with a feeling of, my God, I had no idea.

Jenny Chan (06:11)

Yeah, so in the beginning, I did more of oral history interviews because that was more accessible because it was still 2014 and a lot of survivors were still alive. And so, a lot of the beginning of those were more blog posts. And then we needed to drive traffic. And what is that thing called? It was not Reddit. It wassomething else. It was a forum that I posted about like I kind of compare the Yasukuni shrine which is like a shrine where Japan dedicated their wartime World War II like war criminals. They had like a shrine for that and I kind of compared it with like the Confederate flags and how America kind of certain places in America still kind of worship the Confederate generals and that got really heated. Disgust. That was on the Disgust forum. And then they even invited me to like start my own little sub channel and I was thinking, I don't really have time for that.

Jenny Chan (07:25)

And so, I didn't do that, but then I realized that like we can compare things like that. And so, to draw traffic and whatnot. And then I was thinking about like, what are things that I really want to do research on? So, I went into China and visited some of these comfort women who were basically like sex slaves in World War II.

I went to Shaanxi and interviewed them and then like took me two years to digest what they were telling me. And I wrote a book afterwards, like after two years. Unfortunately, by that point, most of them have already passed away. And so, I was doing blog posts about that. and then in 2018, I started doing more like primary sources, because it took me two years to digest what they were telling me and when we were posting on Instagram and whatnot, people would accuse me of being CCP and blah, blah. 

And so, I thought, well, then we need to find more, you know, Western documents of what had happened in World War II in Asia. And I realized that because the United States had occupied Japan, that the United States had kept a lot of the records during the occupation. So I started doing more research and digitizing and scanning and writing more blog posts that way. 

And then also having more resource pages that way. And we have scanned in the last like seven years, over a million pages from the National Archives. And then it started to be too much that even the website can't take it. And so then we started a subsequent thing on Omeka.

So, I started more research and digitizing and scanning and writing more blog posts that way and also having more resource pages that way. And we have scanned in the last like seven years over a million pages from the National Archives. And then it started to be too much that even the website can't take it. 

Rick Barron (09:24)

So going back to the Chinese women you were talking about, that must have been a very, I guess, know, absorbing, interesting, almost a very sad moment to be hearing their stories about what happened to them. What did you feel after you collectively pulled all this information together and hearing what they shared with you about what happened to them.

Jenny Chan (09:58)

Yeah, so it's, I feel like their suffering is more like a three-part tragedy. First, they were captured and they were basically used as sex slaves for these military people. Like this woman even showed me where she was captured. And it was like in a, it's not like an abandoned building, but you can just like feel the amount of suffering that she had gone through. And like every day she was being raped by like 10 to like 15 soldiers at the time. And it was like in 1942.

And afterward, when she was out, like her husband didn't want her anymore.

And this is like a time too that people really marry young. I think she was like 16. This is one of the women that I interviewed. She was like 16 when she was married and then like later, you know, after being captured and then like a whole year, then she was released and then her husband didn't want her anymore. And then she was kind of like ostracized by the town.

And she was then also pregnant. And then her mom was like, let's go to like the nearest like area where we can bury your child and then just forget about it. And so it's like, for me, took a lot for me to like absorb these stories, because it's like, it's part of China that I've never been to.

Jenny Chan (11:37)

They all had Mao in their living room. I grew up in the United States, I was taught that Mao was evil and whatnot. And then she was like, no, government has done a lot for me more so than people immediately next to me have done. And that's when I was questioning the narrative that I have been taught in the last, you know, decades of my life. And yeah, it took a lot for me to like also interview them too, because it shattered the narrative I had in my mind. And also, like hearing their suffering, it takes a lot to digest that kind of story.

Rick Barron (12:29)

I can only imagine. I mean, for this one lady you were talking about where she was constantly being raped at such a young age. I can't imagine what that does to the psyche of that individual. The raw emotions of wondering what's going to happen to me tomorrow and at the day after. Yeah, it's just.

Jenny Chan (12:51)

And she didn't talk about it for like the longest time because she had to move on with her life and she was being ostracized. And when you're being ostracized by your village, I think the last thing you want to talk about is your wartime experience. And that's why I think, you know, it's kind of been silenced for so long.

Rick Barron (13:12)

No, I can. I can understand that. Wow, that's and that's just only one of many stories that you are uncovering and your team now looking at your website. I see you've called out that you've interviewed as you already have survivors, students, scholars. But what caught me was the interns who come to work for you, and I think if they do it for free.

I'm not mistaken. And what's the process for training that individual to be an intern? And what did they do? What did they bring to the organization to help you guys out?

Jenny Chan (13:56)

So, some of the interns are paid by their college internship program and others get credit. And it's mostly for public history. So, they learn how to sort out archives.

And then they also learned to do background stories and background narrative of what had happened and research more into what had, like the untold stories of World War II. And so, I'll like to have feedback from professors who, because every spring we do kind of a partnership with USF with their public history internship class, and this is like the third professor I've worked with now. And it's always been very positive that our organization is actually talking about things that normal people have no idea. 

Like the narrative has no idea about what had happened. For example, this professor is very educated, but she had no idea why Japan was in Vietnam. And one of our research projects is about that, about the resource was in Southeast Asia and why Japan had to be in Vietnam for that. And so, an intern can also go through our resources that we have. For example, another intern looked through the Yokohama trial and learned about human experimentation that was happening with the POWs who were captured.

Jenny Chan (15:50)

And so she was writing blog posts and making videos on our YouTube channel for that it's a lot of analytical work as well, because you have to analyze like, what you know was happening and what would what the document was saying and also provide like background information of what was happening during this period of war was happening

Rick Barron (16:03)

Mm-hmm.

Jenny Chan (16:20)

So yeah, and I think students really like to collect facts and really analyze the situation and also like the historical context for themselves.

Rick Barron (16:32)

Sure. Now I would imagine you have requirements for someone who wants to be an intern. But do you take it to a degree where you have, I mean, such a passion for what you're doing that you want the intern to have that same passion? Like you're not just here so you can get credit. I want you to understand what you're going to be doing not only for us, but for people who will understand the real history that's been hidden for so many years.

Jenny Chan (17:05)

Yeah, yes. And I've had like past interns who are now professors. And one of the past interns like was very passionate about interviewing these people, these women in the central coast in California who moved here after World War II, but they were actually fighting in World War II. Like we normally don't think about women as fighters, but I guess this is March so we can talk about international women, you know, heroics. And what was interesting is that she did it also in the 2010s, so that these women were still alive, and she was able to go in and interview them, almost every weekend. She drove in, and she spent so much time with them that they were like they were then, like a kind of family. She was like, watching drama with them, and then be like, "so what were you doing at that age and whatnot?" And so then it became kind of like a community for her to even record these stories. had she not done that, those stories would have been lost because a lot of the family members didn't even know that grandma fought against the Japanese during World War II. And those are very powerful stories, not to just read, but also to record so that other people can know about what had happened.

Rick Barron (18:38)

Yeah, I think the recording I think is so valuable because you're actually hearing the voice of history that went through all this. And I have to wonder, well, let me ask you this question. When you started doing all this research and a lot of the work that the interns do, what did you come across that I guess surprised you, stunned you about I never had any idea that this took place during the second world war more so with Japan and China. What nugget did you find that my gosh, you know this story needs to be told, but I still can't believe I found this.

Jenny Chan (19:26)

I think that for me was actually post-war. know like, you know...the post-war situation was pretty nasty, I would say, in terms of politically. America knew what was happening. During the war, actually, it was probably before, in the 1930s, so Rockefeller Institute scientists alerted the OSS about how a Japanese scientist was trying to steal a strand of yellow fever.

And the guy's name was Naito Ryōchi. And then later I realized that he was like the second in command of Unit 731. And he figured out how to like powderize anthrax. And I still remember from like my childhood that like anthrax was like a hot topic. And so, when I was reading like these documents, I'm like, whoa, I didn't know that anthrax had like an origin of like World War Two and Unit 731. And this is where it came from. 

And then after the war too, even though the United States knew exactly what Japan was up to, they sent like three investigators to negotiate with these Japanese scientists who were basically like waging this biological warfare onto the world and they allowed them immunity. And they did their cover up for them. S

o, it's almost like they did their bidding for them and like what really shocked me is that like one of the investigators, who eventually was like, this is such valuable information that we cannot let our enemies have it. and whatnot. So then, the scientists worked at Fort Detrick at the time. And so, they acquired the finding for Fort Detrick. 

And lately I've been doing like some more research on 4D trick and scanning more of the documents and this is pretty dark and just like how Ishishiro was subcon... from unit 731 from Japan was subcontracting a lot of his biological like research out to like other universities, Fort Detrick started doing the same with a lot of the academics and whatnot. So then they will, academics will get like pieces of what they're researching, but they have no idea that will contribute to a bigger, broader piece of biological research. And so, after I realized that I'm just like, who, know that we have Geneva convention, but like, who is there to protect all of us for the next biological like attack or, know, whatever that could happen. So that got really dark for me. It's scary to think about.

Rick Barron (22:27)

Going through your website, mean, it's kind of a good segue. I came across the story about Unit 731. You kind of touched on that. Could you explain it to the audience what that was all about? Because it was very frightening.

Jenny Chan (22:48)

Yeah, so Unit 731 was this biological weapons lab that was happening in Occupy Manchuria.

It wasn't so the guy who started it, Ishii Shirou was actually like a, would call if he was alive today, I'll call him a technocrat to be honest, because he was, he was reading the Geneva Convention and he thought, if germ is so powerful that, you know, people are going to that people need to write rules about it, then we need to harness it so then Japan can become a world power. 

So, he kind of saw it as like a kind of a tech tool. And he also knew that in the Russo-Japanese War, the reason why Japan was going down so fast was because of clean water issue. And so he actually created this water filter. And he and he had a demonstration to the emperor and he basically peed in his water filter that he produced and he drank his own pee that was filtered and the emperor was so impressed that he immediately gave funding to this guy. 

So at first he started his lab in Tokyo but then he knew that if he was going to continue this in Tokyo some even though that he had the emperor blessing he's going to find out people are going to find out sooner than later and open popular opinion would drown him so he already knew what he was doing is so bad that like he can't do it in his own country. So, when Japan took over Manchuria, he thought, wow, this is like my perfect opportunity to do this kind of work. It's there because it's more remote. No one's ever going to find out. 

And so let's go move my lab there. He took like a summer trip over there, like a summer road trip over there. And he first established it in this like factory.

But during the Autumn Moon Festival, his guards were drinking so much that some of the prisoners got out and he was thinking, well, if I get found out here, then popular opinions will also go into drowning me. So, he found another more secret location and installed his brother as the prison guard. And so, he took over this one village, evicted all the villagers out, built buildings around it so then he can do his human experimentation.

He also had these anti-testing grounds where he would tie prisoners to the stakes and test his flea bomb. He was producing flea bombs with plague and whatnot. And he was also incentivizing villagers to breed rats. He would pay people for rats so then he can get more fleas to produce more flea bombs. And even after the war, you can see that when like Sandra Murray was like interviewing him. He was Marie Sanders. Yeah, I think so. That's his name. 

He was basically saying like, yeah, in the beginning of my testing, used to use steel and then I realized that the steel doesn't shatter. So then I ended up using like porcelain to make sure that these like flea bombs would actually shatter and the flea can actually spread the plague. And like that kind of detail was kind of sickening, to be honest, because it's just like, okay, this guy not only figured out like how to produce these kinds of weapons, he's actually trying to figure out the most effective way to disseminate and distribute this weapon. And what was also sickening is that they kind of just saw other people that weren't Japanese as like test subjects. Then they were calling them like marutas, so like logs, because they were so desensitized about what was happening to these people. Like experiments, if you go look at like their, the reports that later for Dietrich obtained, like the plague, for example, when they were testing the plague, their samples, like the N, H from like three-year-old to like 81-year-old. 

So, it's like alot of young or old, they don't care. They just wanted to see how the plague would react to people's bodies. And so, it's a lot of disturbing things that was happening at that time. And after the war, the Soviets were doing August, Operation August storm, and they stormed into Manchuria. Like a lot of the scientists did not believe that was happening. But Ishishiro was like burning down all of the evidence, then took some key documents with him. 

And a few of the scientists actually got caught by the Soviets. For the Khabarov trial, I cannot pronounce Russian words. So, bear with me here, Khabarov trial. But then the West called it communist propaganda and never really acknowledged it. Like I believe that the Soviet Union also then started doing their own biological research as well because they took a lot of, like in 1974 in the Soviet Union, there was an anthrax leak because they probably took the results from Unit 731 scientists that they took as prisoners and tried to produce those results as well.

So yeah, it's like what I was saying earlier about like biological weapon. I don't think anyone's protecting us from it.

Rick Barron (29:02)

Do you find that what, as you're going through all this research and that's, that's a fascinating story. I'm sure there's a lot more to, to share on that, but do you find that where you look, we are today versus those who went through all of this, that, you know, these survivors are now starting to disappear, you know, they're passing away. So that said, how do you go forward?

Once you know that, well, there's only like one or two here, one or two there, do you just start going through documents, letters, and try to piece a story together? I would imagine that's a lot of work.

Jenny Chan (29:45)

Yeah, that's what we started doing. we went through like the Oklahoma trial and we realized that like one of the POWs who was actually captured by the Japanese were also used as human experimentation. I think I mentioned that earlier. 

And like one of the grandnephew actually wrote me a on the contact us page, like wrote me a whole like thing saying that like this guy was one of the three in his family, one of the three siblings in his family and the war basically took away one third of his family. Yeah, and so like that really became more humanized for me. 

It's quite, I think it's about like, even though that the stories have been so silenced for so long, there were humans that were being impacted by these stories. And there were definitely like, people who were affected by these consequences.

Rick Barron (30:49)

Going back to the interns for a moment and what you've been sharing with me, I have to imagine that they are finding similar stories, gathering the research, putting it in order such that it can be displayed either on your website or through presentations. Did they ever talk to you in private about what they found, and more so, being absolutely stunned that we aren't taught any of this in the classroom?

Jenny Chan (31:26)

Yeah, and it's quite interesting how certain interns take it. It depends on where they're coming from. And more so recently, I realized that a lot of young people really don't trust the government anymore, especially like realizing the cover-ups and also like, you know, what the American government has been kind of doing for the last decades. And it's very sad in a way. For example, one of our interns was very shocked because her father was actually served in the Navy and she had no idea about World War II in the Pacific.

And then she was talking to him about like how this B-29 pilot was then used for human experimentation. Like he removed, his lung was removed and then they can like see how long he can last without his organs. And this was like done in front of like college settings. It was like a college campus lecture. And at one time, because Ishii Shiro was such a successful man that he got so much money from the emperor that everyone looked up to him everyone wanted to do human experimentation in Japan. And after the war, they kind of just put his like death, they didn't say that he died on human experimentation table. They said that he was one of the death toll from Hiroshima POW camp. That finding was very shocking for one of my interns. was like, wow, there's a lot of cover-ups about. We don't know the history that was. We actually don't know history at all. We think that we are... They tell in a way, in a lot of ways, they don't tell the story that actually happened. They just kind of summarize in history classes and you learn like one incidence and another incidence but you're not told about the whole story and the events that actually happened.

Rick Barron (33:45)

What do you think because there's so much to cover?

Jenny Chan (33:53)

I thought and also political agenda because the Cold War was coming and we needed Japan as an ally to fight China. so that was so you can't say that. Like, for example, when I went to school, I knew that Japan was friends with Germany, but I had no idea what they did in World War Two.

Rick Barron (34:21)

Yeah, and imagine there's probably stories out there that we will never know. You think about that. Now, is there the website that you have, do you have a building where people can come in and see displays of the work that you do?

Jenny Chan (34:42)

There's so much. I think if I print, that's going to be hard on printing calls. also, yeah, I think, but if we have funding for it, I'll definitely want to have some kind of exhibition in the Bay Area to talk about what we are actually doing.

Rick Barron (35:06)

That's good question or thought, because I was thinking about that. What we've been talking about, what your interns have been finding. Do you often maybe take time to have a location where you kind of give a presentation about what you do and what you find through your research? And I think more so I'm curious about the reaction of the audience that hears all this. I mean, how do they receive it? How do they come back to you and say, where else can I find this information? Has that ever happened? Will you do that?

Jenny Chan (35:49)

Yeah, so we have a pretty active YouTube channel Pacific Front Untold. James Bradley also comes on. He wrote the Flags of Our Fathers and he also comes on and talk about his like research and his research process when he was writing his books and whatnot. We also talk about like what we've been researching on like for example, The Quantum Army, which is another chapter of history that I can't believe no one ever wrote about, at least in English.

And Chinese, I don't think it's like too many books out there for that either. It's basically how Japan planted a false flag event in Manchuria, which led to Japanese invasion of Manchuria. It was like a big incident in 1931 on September 18th.

And the League of Nations eventually condemned Japan for it. But then in 1933, Japan just walked out of the League of Nations and said that, we no longer remember. And that kind of gave Hitler and Mussolini, like Mussolini and Hitler saw that and was like, oh, we can just do that. I didn't realize that we could just do that. And so then when you like shift the date of like World War II to like 1931 or like when 1933, when Japan just walked out of League of Nations, then you no longer see Japan as a sideshow of World War II. And that's what we've been talking about on our channel for Pacific Front Untold and also some of our other research on there.

Rick Barron (37:25)

Where do you I mean you've been at this now. He said you started in 2014 so we're 12 years. Where do you want to take this? What's the next level? I mean you've what you've done so far. Have you ever thought of like? You know, and really to. Amplify this even more so. Let's see if we can do the following. Have you? Given that any thought?

Jenny Chan (37:48)

Yeah, I would want our YouTube to be more popular and also maybe we can get a building for an exhibition or museum in the Bay Area especially to do that kind of dialogue that you've been talking about and also show these exhibitions that have been happening historically and so then like we can show a more wholesome picture of history.

Rick Barron (38:20)

Yeah, because I think your goal of the organization, if I understand correctly, is to bring awareness to the atrocities that were committed, but things that have happened that people had no clue to. I think that kind of goes back to your slogan, well, not slogan, but your statement where you said to remember history, to see the future. And I think a lot of people miss that.

There's that saying, well, history will often repeat itself. And I think it's because what people don't understand or not aware of as ugly as it can be. And when I see what's happening in the world today, it's like, are we ever gonna learn? Because we just seem to be repeating the same mistakes over and over and over and with different players.

Jenny Chan (39:14)

Yeah, and it's also interesting because for me, I feel like what a lot of the geopolitical tension that is happening today in Asia also stemmed from World War II. Like 1945 was not a liberating moment. It was just a moment where, as you can see, a lot of Southeast Asian countries tried to decolonize and then China had a civil war. And so then also there were a lot of historical scars that were happening. Like I was mentioning earlier, Japan has a Yasukuni shrine where they worship war criminals from World War II. 

And Kishi Nobusuke was actually one of the war criminals who was even taken out of the Sugamo prison by the United States. And Eisenhower funded him to become the prime minister of Japan with the and he founded the LDP party which is still the ruling party today and his grandson was Shinzo Abe and Kishino Busuke had written a lot of the policies that enabled Japan to make Manchuria their so-called utopia. One of his phrases that he liked to use was like, Chinese people are like toilet water and Japanese people are the pure water and you cannot co-mingle the two. 

And so you can actually even see that policy at play at Unit 731 because there were two incinerators. One is for if the Japanese scientists somehow die doing human experimentation, like sometimes scientific experiments backfire. And the other one is for the general like victim incinerator. And so yeah, we really need to learn history to, you know, to not repeat the past mistakes.

Rick Barron (41:10)

Hmm gosh. What struck you the most though during the time you've been putting all this effort into this organization? Again, I look at the website periodically to see if there's new information. But. What have you learned about yourself along the way as you've been going collecting all of this? Key information history in trying to as best as you can talk to as many survivors as possible before they're gone.

Jenny Chan (41:50)

I learned that I was very naive. There was so much work to be done. And that like, you know, it's very hard.

Two, for people who have heard about it for the first time, have to say that young people are more 
 open-minded than other people who have already established a narrative in their minds. For example, last year, I had a group of high school students who reached out to me to enroll in National History Day about Unit 731. They had heard about it on our website and I was very surprised to hear that they heard about Unit 731 from our website. Winning the first prize in New Mexico in the state competition. And yeah, and I learned that like history is often cherry picked by like politicians who want to use a certain part of history to prove their point, but then they will never tell you the whole comprehension.

Rick Barron (42:59)

Hmm.

Jenny Chan (43:00)

Like the whole full story is like, you know, we never really learned in American history that America was a imperial power in a sense, because Teddy Roosevelt even handed Korea to Japan. And that started a lot from Treaty of Portsmouth. And so then when we learn about like Japan had colonized Korea, only realize we don't realize America's involvement. 

And it's also very fascinating to me that, like, certain interest groups and certain politicians would want to cherry-pick it in a way that, like, America would look good, or like there are certain countries that will look good. And the reason why I started doing all these primary sources is because a lot of these people you know, they start fighting a war on social media and they will accuse and start projecting like this is false, this is incorrect and whatnot. 

And so that's why we need to use that kind of primary source documents to show that what we're talking about is not hearsay, not what was not conspiracy theory is actually true. That's what happened. And I learned to also like document a lot better in terms of like finding sources in terms of like trying to actually fact check and prove what had happened. Yeah. And it's also very hard to like find information about Teddy Roosevelt that's kind of like incriminating. 

And people would ask me questions like, Oh, what do you think? Like, do you think Japanese people need to apologize to Chinese people? Blah, blah. Are you Japan bashing? Why are you guys doing that? And I was, I mean, you would never ask Holocaust Center why they're talking about the Holocaust, right? Like, you would never. And like the Nazis, I mean, Germany have acknowledged their past. But the fact that like, Japan and Germany have taken such a different approach in their encountering the past is very shocking in a way.

Rick Barron (45:21)

So, the interns that I mean, imagine it's like a revolving door, but as they, they leave, do they ever share with you what they got out of this? And yeah, I'd be curious to know. I mean, is there like a theme? It's like, okay, everyone seems to agree that this is what they have learned and what they're going to take away. What's, what is that?

Jenny Chan (45:53)

One of my interns who interned for me last summer said that he was embarrassed about what the United States was doing after figuring out like Unit 731 and trying to get it for Dietrich and whatnot. And basically it's like a lot of like emotional damage because they unlearn what they have taught from the narrative. Yeah.

Rick Barron (46:20)

That's true. No, it's I think to you, you call out, you know, how politicians will cherry pick stories and how we seem to have a perception of what this another country is about. And you look at like Mao back in China during that time period and you get a perception here in the United States classroom. 

But then as you grow up, you begin to realize, well, wait a minute, I never lived there. I don't know what have caused them, the Chinese, to kind of take this path to rebuild themselves. And why do people, you know, support Mao? But I think until you live it, you taste it, you visualize it, then and only then can you truly say, now I understand. 

And what I've been led to believe, isn't what I thought it was. And I think that's what you're discovering now. As you go down these many roads to gather information from those who are still surviving. And I think that as you say, these young kids are kind of, they're more open-minded. I think for them, I think they're going to get a lot out of this because it makes them understand.

Jenny Chan (47:22)

Right, exactly.

Rick Barron (47:45)

Don't believe everything you hear and read, particularly when you hear it on social media, because everything gets so distorted. By the time it gets handed down from one social media site to another, the story has been completely, you know, obliterated.

Jenny Chan (48:02)

Yeah. And also, does a lot for like survivors to talk about those kind of stories or like people who have experienced it. One of the survivor, Jean B that I talked to, from World War II, she survived World War II in China and she was then, later she became like a math professor at Sonoma State University. So her story is incredible. 

She lost her brother and it used to be that like, she told me that she never talked about it when she was younger and her late husband brought her to like watch a World War II movie and she was crying so hard that he had to carry her from the theater back to the car because she couldn't even get out of the seat because she was thinking about her own war and how she survived.

I have been bringing her to talk to my interns about her experience and the first time she was crying so hard I was thinking like, my God, I don't know what to do. And last year we had a conference and she just dropped like one tear about what had happened. And so in a way I think she's healing too.

Rick Barron (49:13)

Hmm yeah, probably still healing to this very day. I sometimes wonder how individuals back thenhad the means to survive. You know, it's like, how many days can I take of this? And you just don't know just how strong the human will can be. It's, I mean, there's a lot of stories out there that you're finding a lot of stories you'll never find. 

I just think if, if there was one strong point to convey to the audience, just listening, this podcast, what would you want to understand about what your mission is and what you're trying to make people understand in terms of what has happened in the history that we don't know and how that is something we need to bear in mind as we go forward today.

Jenny Chan (50:17)

I think that people need to question what they learn in school or on social media or like what happened in places and just don't trust the media about don't take the word for it. For example, you know, people were talking about the Iranian revolution and whatnot. 

And it got me really one started wondering about what had happened before even the revolution. And I'm not like pro regime or whatever. I have no skin in this game, except I'm kind of worried about the petrodollar. But then I realized that what had happened is that they had installed the last shot.

Teddy Roosevelt's grandson overthrew democracy in Iran in 1953. And so, they tell you about certain things, but then they don't tell you about the story that had happened before that. And then they continue using the same headline telling you that they must restore democracy and whatnot, and then gets us into a whole political mess. So definitely, question and look into what happens in the world or, know, and basically think about the things that they're not telling you. 

Rick Barron (51:13)

Yeah, that story about Roosevelt, I heard about that on the news a couple of days ago because the anchor person was calling out, so how do we get here? Well, to explain how we got here, let's go back into history that led to where and what we're seeing today. And it was an eye opener because I think

Like what happened back in, I think it was in seventies when Iran stormed a U S building during Jimmy Carter's presidency and they took all the prisoners. And he was saying, this was, the consequence of what happened back then to what is happening that back in the seventies. So, you know, history is history, but sometimes history will come alive to say, okay, now it's our turn to tell you how we feel because of what happened in the past. 

Jenny Chan (52:36)

Yes, and also if you think about it too, a lot of countries make their policy based on historical trauma, for example.

China had gone through a whole century of humiliation. They were addicted to drugs. The West basically carved them up like melon. And so when they're trying to like drum up their military and trying to have more defense power, they're doing it because of their historical trauma that they've lived through and their historical memory. They want to make their country stronger so that they can protect its citizens so that they don't have to repeat the century of humiliation again. And so, I think a lot of it, we need to learn history to understand the context.

Rick Barron (53:18)

Absolutely. So, Jenny, this has been a very eye-opener for me to be honest with you. I have been going through your website and been looking and listening to some of the videos and some of the content that is on there today, but hearing a little more in depth insight as to what it takes to pull all this together to tell the story. 

And I guess to tell the real story. know, hey, everything you see in the history books is kind of a little bit glossy, but you know, you need to kind of peel the skin of the onion to see there's another story here that you've not been told that led to what you've been reading and understand that while you may look at something negative, there was a reason why it happened. 

And I think people need to understand that to your point. you don't remember history, you know, we're just going to be spinning our wheels here and it's, never going to learn. 

So, I usually end the show with what I call speed round questions and it is half five, but I'd like to see if I can get some answers from you. 

What was the best live concert you ever attended and why?

Jenny Chan (54:41)

When I was younger, liked OK GO. Don't know if you know of the band OK GO. Their concerts are very fun. They have a lot of like colorful like display in the background. Think that was the best like one of the best live concert I've attended.

Rick Barron (54:56)

How long ago was that?

Jenny Chan (54:59)

At least like, let me think about it, 15 years ago. It's not the same as like going to an Ed Sheeran concert and you're seeing like the stadium and whatnot. Like, I don't like stadium concerts because I think they're less like, you know, less, you get to interact less.

Rick Barron (55:03)

Hahaha

Rick Barron (55:17)

Okay, here's one. This might be good question for you. What do you wish you had more time to do?

Jenny Chan (55:25)

To travel actually. I wish I had more time to travel and like see different perspectives. I used to travel quite a lot, a lot more. And I used to be willing to credit card turning and so I have all these points.

Rick Barron (55:27)

Really?

Jenny Chan (55:42)

So, I can like travel four times and I feel like back in the day cost of living was lower too and like the dollar was way stronger when I was traveling and yeah, I wish I had more time to do that

Rick Barron (55:55)

Is there a particular country or countries you'd like to see or if you had the time to like I'm gonna go there right now?

Jenny Chan (56:02)

I kind of want to see Cambodia. I've been looking at like the architecture and whatnot. I find it very fascinating.

Rick Barron (56:11)

What was your first paying job?

Jenny Chan (56:13)

I was a student ambassador at the Young Museum to cut basically it was to, for me, I just find that it was very good because I get to like skip class and do an art lecture for like elementary school students and I got paid for it. So that was actually a really great job.

Rick Barron (56:29)

Hahaha

Rick Barron (56:38)

Okay, next question. With all the interns that you've met, you got to know them a lot. But if they were to work together and wrote a book about you, what do you think that title would be?

Jenny Chan (56:56)

The Silences. Silences of like stories are not told and yeah I'm trying to dig it out and talk about those stories.

Rick Barron (57:09)

Okay, okay, I like that. Okay, last question. Now, what would you do if you knew, what would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?

Jenny Chan (57:20)

Get people to understand history and not incidences, actually the whole story of what happened and effects and consequences of actions.

Rick Barron (57:34)

Hmm. I I'll have to ask you what would be your last parting thought, but I think that captures it right there. Now I think this was, as I said, a very insightful discussion, lots to learn here. And I will be providing the website for Jenny's website and the organization, their YouTube account. But I really invite you to please go to the website. 

There is so much information there. Again, \very insightful things I had. I didn't even have a clue as to what was happening or what had happened during that time period of the Pacific war and Japan and the Chinese. So please, I invite you to go see it. think you're really, you're going to learn a lot and much more. 

So, Jenny, I thank you very much for taking the time to meet with us and sharing your story. And I can't wait to start promoting this site because I think we can all learn a lot from it. And to my audience, I thank you very much for joining us and we'll talk to you soon.