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TOKYO -- If you are looking for an Asia-angle omen to help choose a
U.S. Presidential election winner, there is the coincidence that three
recent candidates have been victims of enemy action in the Pacific.
Two of them were elected President.
John F. Kennedy, who was 35th President , serving from 1961 until his
assassination in 1963, was a U.S. Navy PT boat commander in the U.S.
Navy 1941-45. His PT 109 was rammed by a Japanese
destroyer in the Solomon Islands.
George H.W. Bush, 41st President, was a U.S.Navy pilot in World War II
and shot down by Japanese gunners near the Bonin Islands.
A third U.S. Presidential aspirant-- so far unelected and battling
uphill to get nominated-- to be hit by enemy action was John M. McCain, the
Arizona Senator.
His U.S.Navy -jet was struck by North Vietnamese fire over Hanoi and
McCain spent five-and-one-half years in various prisoner-of-war camps and
was tortured. He still has physical scars from those days, notably he
cannot lift his arms over shoulder level.
What about mental or psychological scars?
Much has been made of so-called "brainwashing" and mind-bending
pressures employed by Communist armies, terrorists, espionage masterminds
and some intelligence agencies. This cerebral tampering is supposed to
trigger behavioral changes and specific responses to subliminal code
words.
The most memorable work of fiction wherein an American military man is
captured, tortured and much later turns up in an American Presidential
campaign, was the 1958 Richard Condon novel "The Manchurian Candidate."
In it, a fictitious American prisoner Sgt. Raymond Shaw is programmed
by Chinese captors to influence a U.S. Presidential election of the
future when he is "fed" certain keywords.
A motion picture of "The Manchurian Candidate" in 1962 caused even more
controversy than the book. John Frankenheim was the director of the film
which starred Frank Sinatra, Laurence Harvey and Angela Lansbury.
A paperback reprint in 1988 sold out.
Psychological and behavioral studies in the past 30 years have pretty
much discredited
the brainwashing concept. There is little evidence to indicate that a man
can be programmed through external stimuli, like a modern Pavlov's dog,
to do another man's bidding. Even hypnosis could
be said to have a "statute of limitations."
So there is scant chance that a real-life "Manchurian Candidate"
could work his way into the political process and follow directions from
a devious third party.
What about the opposite? Would a tortured prisoner have residual
feelings of vengeance and revenge and seek retribution toward former
captors?
History suggests that incarceration has a thoughtful, intensifying
effect that tends to galvanize the strong points of character. In Asia,
there are the examples of Korea's Syngman Rhee and Kim Dae-jung and
Vietnam's Ho Chi Minh.
James Bond Stockdale, a U.S. Navy pilot who like McCain was shot down
over North Vietnam and was imprisoned, has written several books on his
experiences. Two were published by the Hoover Institution in 1993:
"Thoughts of A Philosophical Fighter Pilot," and "Courage Under Fire:
Testing Epictetus's Doctrines in A Laboratory of Human Behavior."
Stockdale claims that McCain's character was improved in the crucible of
prison and that he would make a fine candidate, capable of withstanding
intense pressures.
McCain's main battle this week in seeking the Republican nomination
seems to be against that peripatetic foe known as "momentum."
From the point of view of demographics and sheer voter numbers down
the road, a Bush-McCain ticket is looking more and more attractive.
Edward Neilan (eneilan@crisscross.com) is a veteran journalist, based in Tokyo, who covers East Asia and writes weekly for World Tribune.com.