Question number get there as many as time allows and to purchases and financial contributions to make help ensure the future of the independent bookstore. We appreciate your support now and always. As you may have experienced the last few weeks if we do have technical issues we will resolve them quickly thank you for your understanding. In the New York Times bestselling author winning the National Critics circle award, award, and the Catherine Porter award the American Academy of arts and letters. They will be discussing his latest book that is described as a colorful we creation of definitive history. The Seattle Times calls is a blend of history and memoir with the Bigger Research efforts. That makes baseless essential reading for anyone trying to grapple with the Affairs Since the end of world war ii. For happy to have them here tonight. The floor is yours. Thank you and its almost as much fun as being in Harvard Bookstore. And we have this kind of conversation a number of times but three kinds of books one is the photo be a list prose about small things that then also childlike but very grown up. There is a special category of what is to say nonfiction the polemical history it is a method of how to describe the anti imperial anti churchill not the grand scope over the universe it is intimate and at the center to be incredibly selfconscious modern consciousness and the nightmare world and this genre is my favorite with the pacifist history of world war ii and incredibly moving book and the way he went about it. Having said all that as a detective story but also at the highest level. And all the great writers. Thank you for tuning in its amazing that these can happen and those that are here i am so happy that you are here. The Harvard Bookstore is one of those places and edmunds father and son down in the basement it is a place that has a particular flavor and then i was trying to write but it just occurred to me that since i didnt know about everything that happened a long time ago because the documents were withheld we would write about what was happening a long time ago. Instead of having one timeline of the early cold war of harry truman, korea, china, a gathering sense of suspicion and paranoia but also wanted to write about my own life and make sense of that early. That my wife and i got to rescue. Since the day before. And then we got through to difficult dogs the day before. So it is a book about trying to write a book about what happened a long time ago. A lot of stuff. That George Cannon of the cold war and truman was more involved than he suggested later he had been. And later we heard about Henry Cabot Lodge but and then to see covered on the time magazine. And postwar and entering formally consciously. M those fascinating characters of time. And it was very intense and to the people he admired he would give a pipe and a tremendously powerful figure at mit and in charge of the atom bomb project but also the biological warfare project. Thats where it began in world war ii. After the war was over he stayed on in government. And to decide what was important to wrap up the Germ Warfare Program in the United States to triumph over the numerical superiority of the russian army into may question plant sick and russian people second it was a bad idea. Was it explicit we cannot beat them on the ground and have Something Else . That was a refrain repeated over and over by secretaries of defense all the people in the pentagon. And to have the chinese armies and the russian armies and then to come up with a smarter solution with a new kind of weapon because 1949 the russians had developed the atomic bomb. And those that seem to be in the offing. It especially became ari some when the korean war itself started it was not call the war by harry truman on those that are meeting in the pentagon and then in the south and then there is a polarization in the United States became involved in the civil war and korea. And plans and schemes and worries with the evil empire of russia that became specific especially when the United States started losing and the russian tanks were better than the american tanks. Certain questions started to be asked. So what do we have in our arsenal to win the apocalyptic war around the corner . There are two very specific questions so do they put all the bugs and chemical agents together . Did they actually ever have a serum . Did they ever use it . They never quite denied they wanted to find something. They always denied they never use it also china eventually accused the United States of planting smallpox during that war. And then to get to that fundamental question do we have an do we use it . The short answer is yes. The chinese and the north koreans and then to do casually one day when americans fled to the south of korea after a massive diffie after the chinese counterattack the americans had left behind diseases. They said thats ridiculous and silly and then of course several months later called the korea and hemorrhagic fever and its a series of dots along the 38th parallel. And then there is a massive propaganda battle and that battle and that the individual airplanes to drop insect bombs. And the very rural areas of china near the korean border and that is a slightly different answer hinges on the books title is called baseless because operation baseless is the name of a topsecret air force program to perfect biological and chemical weapons at the earliest possible date and a project that spraying to motion on emergency basis as the korean war got bigger and everything got worse and korea. And with deny all built into it. That these are baseless charges and the expectation was that these particular weapons were used with a biological weapons because they were happening. I want to quote your man because the United States and that there is no evidence and then you spoke to the ex marine who was there. And then he had a new disease of hemorrhagic fever that was carried again but there was no history in korea until it was used as a germ weapon. And thats pretty close to the horses mouth. And a guy that woke up with a fever one day and korea and medevac out by helicopter and was put in the unit like on mash tv show. He went to had three and worked his way through and miraculously survived and the diagnosis. Hemorrhagic fever that spontaneously happened and tried his best to explain to himself as a young man in korea and a number of men and those who died but hemorrhagic fever is still a problem in korea and by japanese germ experts and was purified and intensified and then miraculously it appears. Somewhere in november 1950 and 1 of the victims was tom kennedy. Just a little bit of japanese background i know only because of all good people basically about this tokyo trials of war crimes that never took place we know about the nuremberg trials there was to be a matching pair in tokyo we were left out because we be called on the carpet because of nagasaki and hiroshima but there was no question that the japanese have dropped all kinds of evil on china in the thirties before the world war but they were the World Leaders of this technology in part of this story is the United States caught on and using the japanese in some fashion. And they did a beautiful job to tell the story and it was indispensable book. Im sorry she has gone. And the wife who is also a major figure in this book because they are both so important. What she chronicled other people have talked about to have as many japanese as possible the work times trial should take place so they held their own work crimes trial it is the appalling book its an absolute transcript and the japanese scientist said it was an amazing book actually so the russians were upset and worried and frightened of the United States and meanwhile it had teams of experts interviewing all the japanese savants of biological weaponry to figure out how best to take what they had learned so its priceless to their way of thinking. And i go back to camp dietrich and they are further perfected and intensified. That is the flow. And then with the china virus. And that while may be the american so what is possible in the manipulation of the coronavirus . Even now since you finished your book . The history of germ warfare of american scientists getting sick from their own weapons it is a constant the National Institute of health who decides he will study because its a very dangerous disease so take it to the National Institute of health and people get sick and a person dies. It is a refrain in the history of American Laboratory science. So the first thing you want to ask did the husband do it but the first thing always is the unexplained exotic disease you always want to look to see if there is a laboratory. I do not think the chinese are involved are and an evil plan to cook up a germ weapon. They are very concerned about getting a lucrative vaccine for the viruses. And all of the american laboratories were doing the same kind of work the National Institute of health was paying the chinese. The fact is a could of happened in a laboratory but the first thing is to ask the people in charge to open their freezers and notebooks and explain what happened and that hasnt happened. As i digress, this is a historical inquiry so if you just read a paragraph on page 225 you talk about your method your house and your dogs and your wife. There you are. Why do you write these books . The end title of the chapter it is entitled by a day of the week and i had just sat down and half revealed my theory about what happened with a mysterious that fall from the sky. Every day i tried to write something so the next day starts the edges are blurred and their bits of recorded truth like pieces of thin ceramic. Its raining on tax day i lay awake thinking about japans rice crop. And then to come back downstair downstairs. You do some of your best wor work. [laughter] what do i really want from a book . Truth in every paragraph and surprises and a sense that everything is not hopeless and we can do better and a sense that life is a complicated mixture of emotions and consistencies. Life is a sandwich. I want to simulate the pleasure of eating a sandwich. And then i have to get to this. When i woke up hours ago now i reached out with my hand one of the dogs had scooted up so he was sleeping between us. My hand found his pot and i held it for a while i felt his pop pads. And then to imagine why. And then thats what you grab all of us at 4 00 oclock in the morning and it so much that we know. And it our heads around it. And will trump rebound . But you are groping for all of us and i love it. But and with that grotesque machine and the American Life in government to kill people. And at the same time like a lot of us you are madly in love with this country. In the context of all the craziness. And i would have to find one. So while we find the page number, the thing that excited me that there is a bad review out there. But is there . And im trying to say and then to have the person that is researching the past with all the minor trivial ups and downs mapping itself onto the quest to find out the momentous rules and the two timelines and then to add the genuine proof historians are not robust i am not a professional historian and there are times when you feel and sometimes to be out of your depth that you cannot find your way through them. Of confusion and grief and frustration are part of the process to have that soundtrack with a larger account of what happened. And go from the nightmare to the dreamscape. And then to carry on to page 332. And then i worked myself up. And then comes kennedy and operation mongoose appointing Henry Cabot Lodge Ambassador Lodge is filled with the petulance in saigon from june 1964. It would help if there were some screams from North Vietnam there must be 100 different ways to make them scream on rockets on the pretext of returning fire. One is redacted he uses the word scream four times in one telegraph. And then the gulf of tonkin and the war is in a new phrase things to his decisions delighted about the bombing. Anything that flies on anything that moves said kissinger delaying nixons orders. And says i believe in the history of the United States sometimes. Im not saying as a general rule every day of my life but i dont believe this place has any sort of moral standing in the world it is a source of disruptions i understand theyve done that good things like toasters and cars and locomotives and songs bridges, sunglasses, topiary, ds , corn maze speeches, ad campaigns, youtube videos, the new yorker is a Great American achievement, no question. We always go back to mid century new yorker but operations thinks this homegrown plan to kill 5 million human beings and civilians is too awful to think about. You have to read the book to find out what it was. Thank you. Thank you for the nohitters on that list. What could be more beautiful. [laughter] when you get into the zone and the sounds of the baseball hitting is just so much conviction it is so american. How do we reconcile these things . We dont. We had so many good conversations over the years and a lot of them it isnt simpleminded but very appreciative and graceful one that he talked about the character theres a lot of things in common and what the hell is wrong with his first but also leading to the point what you just said is there anything more glorious even in poetry . And ever in our lifetime was there a more moving part . And also carmichael and george gershwin. Im a gershwin. As a lyricist we read wonderful poetry. And the boy nick baker and was conflicted shall we say. Lets learn more about nick baker. Sometimes writing a book first of all, yes to all that you are saying about the song lyrics in poetry and the american and inventiveness in the comedic playfulness which carries on now in hiphop there is tremendous ingenuity displayed, the slight of mouth happening very characteristic of this real american originality of inventiveness with rhyme and metric sophistication continues. Its not as if we are looking back at a landmass. Is happening and we are in the middle of it. In the entity of it. But as far as what i like to do i want to write about happy people and books that are evidence why it is worth good and living in these chasms open up in history they are unpleasant and unfortunate and terrifying and then the cold war immediately followed and i sometimes think its my job to write about those things to figure out a way by understanding them making them less distracting to get back to writing about why straws float or whatever tiny thing thats part of the delicate texture of the resistance which is what i have been drawn to. So this fabric of a lived life and thats whats important. But sometimes there is a crack or a fissure that opens in front of you like a disaster movie. What is it cracks a piece of history that so awful you cannot ignore it. Sometimes i write a book about that to make a bridge beyond it. I remind people listening and watching you are invited to submit your own questions for nick baker to answer. You can also submit the answers. [laughter] we have two questions. What part of you allows you to write books that slow down time and action and so extremely . And now your protagonist you like to seeing a song im in the barn in the afternoon its been bothering me for years what is the tune . How does it go . That is a friend of the question. Im in the barn. Im in the barn. Them in the barn in the afternoon. Thats the way it was. The first question, how do you write books that slow down time . Everybody who writes a book tries to slow down time somehow. If you take something and lifted up and think about it and turn it around its a momentary parenthesis built around that object or social moment and that transaction but it is a slowing down of time there is little birthmarks or semicolons or dashes. These are ways to take your overly eager mind to put on a track to say think along of this with me slowly and its almost inevitable if you write a sequence of words that other people have to follow, they are slow down because we actually are very good at parallel processing. Im just doing what everybody wants to do but maybe i do it a little more and dispense with the other stuff and the larger spine of a plot and leave the worm trails of the thoughts that i have had. Who taught you . Who does that . How multilevel . The person who first did it for me, i audited a class and i was in high school and one of the stories in the textbook and practically every paragraph had this moment and then and described room and thats a realize normalcy and this guy and in of the suspense writers were able to do. So he has faults in a rainstorm reaching a certain tree and people who followed from him. And he learned a lot from preuss to learned a lot from George Elliott in the 20th century and one of the beautiful things is it is the century observation. It seems mysteriously to have happened easily in the United States. Next question. The was sponsored virtually every city in north korea why was it hard to have the biological weapon . The Bombing Campaign was unsuccessful even though every single village not only bombed but burned it did not succeed because the north koreans escaped by living in caves and they spent years in the caves. And the chinese were assisting them. So the final effort was to frighten the chinese and make them go away by dropping the leaflet moms dropping in sex and the chinese made very detailed accounts of the insects. My suspicion is that happened but they say they were doped with diseases was falsified. And its the deception operation and undeniable effort and to discourage and terrify and cause unhappiness the area of china right on the border of korea thats for these events happened. And thats what it happen. So under Douglas Mccarthy the japanese knowhow in germ warfare. That the name is assassin in chief or something. I want to Say Something about steve can serve. Its difficult to deal with the cold war make it clear. This is what he has done. One after another. Exactly. So one book after another he is a master quote or which is another talent people dont understand how important it is. They are things you can quote but if you choose the right one the paragraph sets it is moved along that comforted learning has happened. Why is kissinger still alive . You dont need to answer that. Next talking about floating strives. The paper straw and the pizza package. What is funny about trying to slow time down which i tried to do with huge paragraphs of description one was a footnote about the floating straw. Some straws float and some do not its like the hot air blowing in the restroom. Really cracks there is nothing more to be said. Time marches on that there is a political element so the floating straws of today . I have very little experience. Its hard to go to a restaurant. I love the idea to levitate your liquid to your mouth like an elevator. But i like to rescue everyday life from done neglect from every day and rescue the idea something is not more over talked about man sex. On than sex but this is the rescue there were two nice historians from toronto. And they were such wounded man because of this process. And i thought they had written a good and useful book. What motivated me was to rescue them and one of them died before i finish the book and while i was writing the book the other one died. But always i want to bring something out, the wayside wildflower of noticed life and put a frame around that. As part of the sandwich. You can make a sandwich out of anything. [laughter] all you need is the crunch and cold and warm and incompatible layers and you have the sandwich joy. Mine dont have meat anymore. I made potato sandwiches. To put them in a band with some mustard that the complete sandwich experience can you please speak the freedom of information act for that transparency. And an impulse then your book dont you say everything over 70 should be released. If you say redaction the fundamental frustration the whole time i was writing it i was waiting for a set of documents to be released. Maybe it will happen the former senator from colorado he and mondale were the last two survivors of the committee but they on earth allied of evil stuff. And it has to be put out. But at the very moment we are i in, President Trump likes to say you dont know about it. I can declare a national emergency. Gary hart says we damn well better find out and talk about it. What are the secrets . Were running out of time. But first i want to credit your friend alexander who told me 35 years ago if you want to see a real writer go get mezzanine by nicholas and baker he was right. He read all of your books and getting to know you. I want to say i have learned a huge amount from you. Every time we talk i feel im closer to understand myself and the outside world. Thank you. One tiny victory. Here is a redacted copy that i dealt with for ten years. Very important document from 1949 a plan of how to deceive somebody but it is blacked out. Now this mysteriously appeared in the mail the very same document two weeks before it went to print. The National Archives somehow got the pentagon to release this and it is the beginning of the biological weapons arms race between the americans and the soviet union they will deceive the soviet union thinking that americans have come up with the super toxic germ weapon and once they do that the russians will waste their efforts to build the same weapon. One crucial document that his personality and. And as a result worth it. Well. There is news. Is important. I think it is important. Posted on twitter because it is important, youve got to posted on twitter. Ms. Baker. Thank you. I think we had to say thank you especially to the Harvard Bookstores welcome our hostess back. Say good night. Thank you so much chris. Thank you. Thank you both so much. Thanks to all of you out there to first meeting this evening with us. You can learn more at the lincoln her chest. It tore at harvard. Calm once is closing spring up on behalf of our source here, thank you both have a good night. Keep reading. Everybody please be well. Thank you very much. Thank you very much everybody take care. Heres a look at some Publishing Industry news. Author and journalist died last week at the age of 83. Dana, she was a contributor to vanity fair new York Magazine as well as the other 17 books. Include arrest selling title passages that was published in 1976 and sold 10 million copies. The New York Times reports and an already busy fall publishing season has gotten more hectic. Due to the lack of capacity, the nations to largest book printing companies. Biopsy printing filed for bankruptcy in april. The others up for sale. Books that were delayed due to the coronavirus pendant, compete up with titles that were already scheduled for the fall season. In the news, bestselling french economist thomas has refused to edit portions of his latest book, capital and ideology. To make it available for the chinese market. He says that basically wanted to cut almost all parts referring to the contemporary china. In particular can to inequality and obesity in china. Also the news, and to be books and reports that book sales dropped 8 percent for the weekend ending august 22nd. Adult nonfiction books continue the positive sales trend up just over 9 percent. In miami book fair, has announced it will be a virtual festival for the first time in its history. Other events will be held from november 15th to the 22nd. I will include more than 250 authors. The Books Program director lindas in person to online event, telling the miami herald i feel like i am building the bridge across the grand canyon as im walking. Its like for the bar down, take a step, put the next four down and take a step. It is a work in progress. Book tv will continue to review new programs and publishing news. You can also watch archive programs anytime, apple tv. Org. Host when you read the things that were said about thomas jefferson, you dont save as an agent of the french government. Sounds a little reminiscent doesnt bring the things that were said about abraham lincoln, things that were said about fdr, that he wanted to be a dictator. So just kind of come with the territory but i think it trumps case, at least in the modern political, postworld war ii, i never seen anything like it. Sunday noon eastern on in depth. Along to our conversation with author and faith and Freedom Coalition found a row this books include awakening, active faith is most recent book, forgotten country. Joining the conversation with your phone call, facebook comments, text and tweets. Much book tvs into sunday noon eastern on cspan2. Youre watching book tv, on cspan2. Every weekend with the latest nonfiction books and authors. Cspan2, created by americans Cable Television company, is a Public Service and brought you today by your television provider. Book tv continues now on cspan2. Television for serious readers. Host rob smith is with us this morning and is also author of a book always always a soldier. What is this book about. Rob this book is about my story being born of a lower middleclass in ohio basically joining the military 17 years old. To get a chance to see the world, to get a chance to do a lot of Different Things but its a journey about surveying in the
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