 The National Broadcasting Company and its affiliated stations present the Pacific story. In the mounting fury of world conflicts, events in the Pacific are taking on ever greater importance. Here is the story of the Pacific and the millions of people who live around this greatest feat. The drama of the people whose destiny is at stake in the Pacific War. Here, as another public service, is the tale of the war in the Pacific and its meaning to us and to the generations to come. Chongqing, war capital of China. It is a simple matter of arithmetic. This is a Chinese scholar in a Chongqing dugout. The Japanese are dropping most of their bombs in the wrecked parts of the city. The Chinese scholar writes numbers on the card he holds in his hand. They have destroyed most of Chongqing, four-fifths of it, but they keep on dropping most of their bombs in the sections they have already destroyed. As he talks, the other Chinese in the dugout engage in pastimes to their liking. Some gossip, some talk about business. Chinese mothers talk about the problems of their everyday life, their children, their work. The peculiarities of the people who have come to make Chongqing China's wartime capital. It is a simple matter of how much it costs the Japanese to bomb us, against what it costs us to repair the damage. Most of their bombs are doing no good. That is wasted money. And how long can they go on like this? The Chinese of Chongqing know they are safe in their dugouts. When the bombing started in 1939, they set about queuing their dugouts out of solid rock. They made room for themselves and for their trucks and ammunition and their supplies. The bombs rained down and the Chinese wait. It is a simple matter of arithmetic. The bombs continue to fall and the top goes on. In this dugout, beneath 30 feet of solid rock, are dialects from every part of China. Canton, Shanghai, Beijing, Hong Kong, Tsingtao, Ningpo. In this dugout are government officials, military men, industrial managers, cullies, mothers, children. In the space of 10 years, the war has transformed Zhengjing from a city of a quarter of a million nestled in the hills of Sichuan to a seething city of a million, a humming metropolis. 10 years ago. Does the fog scare you? Makes me feel a little uneasy, knowing we're among mountains. Soon you will be able to see the city. Is there fog around Zhengjing, a good part of the time? About nine months of the year. I've been away from the city quite a number of years now, but I remember the fog. Oh, there's the river down there. Oh, there. That is the Yanxi. Mountains seem to rise up from it. Yes, and there is the other river, the Qilin. Oh, yes. Now you will be seeing Zhengjing very soon. We're starting to go down. Yes. Now, see the city down there on that commentary where the two rivers come together? I can just about make it out. Yes, now I see it. The old walled city of Zhengjing. You see, it's built right on that rock promontory above the two rivers. It's something like New York, between the Hudson and the East River. Yes, but it is in about the same latitude as New Orleans. And it seems to have most of its business buildings right down at the tip of the peninsula like New York. Do you know what the name Zhengjing means? No. It means happy again. Happy again. Yes, and this Sichuan province in which it is located, is called the Kingdom of Heaven's Bliss. Wonderful. Look at the boats down there in the river. There's always much river traffic at Zhengjing, and the waters are dangerous. I can see that. We will be down in a few minutes now, and then you will be able to see Zhengjing. The boat is like an eggshell in this river. And the boatmen of these sandpans are very competent. Look at that water rushing, whirling. The current is carrying us sideways. Well, I suppose sometimes these boats capsize. When they do, no one tries to save the people. I hope that boatman knows what he's doing. He has crossed many thousands of times. But when you cross here, you'll put your life in the hands of the boatman, as the river is half a mile wide here. But now, you see, the boatman is heading into the current again. I've never felt so helpless. As soon we will be across. You, you see that staircase from the river up over the promontory? Yes. Yes, it looks as though it's cut out of solid rock. It is. Solid rock. There seems to be hundreds of steps. You will be carried up them in a sedan chair. But do not be uneasy if the heels of the coolly in front of you are higher than your head. Let me shop there. Right down in the middle of the shopping district. Why not? It is as important to us as that drugstore there, and that moving picture theater. Well, yes. But do all those banners hung out in the street signify that something special is going on? No, they are just signed and flaked. The surprising contrast is to see all those neon signs mixed in with the old Chinese banners. Chongqing is becoming modern. You will see that some of our shops are as modern as those in your country. Yes. Yes, I've noticed that. This year, we have just put in electricity for life and part of a water supply system. And this year, we have built our first motor road. So recently? Chongqing is becoming more and more important commercially. Yes. I see that the movie houses are always full. Yes. We show American pictures and British pictures. And also, of course, we have our three Chinese legitimate theaters. And these we attend whenever business is not full. This was the Chongqing of 1934 and 35 and 36, a vigorous mountain city 1500 miles inland in the sleepy Sichuan province. A city with the deep stirrings of growth and enterprise. A city where lived blue-gound Chinese scholars, businessmen, warlords, now gone to seed, clerks, and throngs of teaming, slaving coolies. All this. But in 1937, the Chinese in Chongqing had something else to talk about. The Japanese have opened fire around Chinese troops at the Marco Polo Bridge on the outskirts of Bebing. This is what Generalissimo Zhong has said would happen. The war was far away, but the Chinese of Chongqing watched it spread. Now fighting has broken out in Shanghai. So when the Japanese will be driving into the provinces. All China now was reverberating with the mighty power of the Japanese invasion. Japanese troops were moving on Nang King, the seat of the government. And now communicates one after another came to Chongqing. November 12th, 1937, Shanghai has fallen. The Japanese are now in possession of the international city. November 15th, 1937. The Japanese are throwing their full force in the main attack against Nang King. November 20th, 1937. The Japanese have occupied Chu Chow and are advancing through Wuxi and Hang Chow. November 20th, 1937. The nationalist government has made an official announcement that the capital of free China is being moved to Chongqing. The Rocky Park Bound City perched on the cliffs high above the Yangtze and the Jialing River. Chongqing had become the capital of free China. Government officials and refugees poured in. They came up the river by boat, overland on foot, down through the skies by plane. The ancient walls bulged. The narrow streets were jammed. The population doubled. Treble. In Chongqing, it became easier to find a wife than a house. Chongqing became a steaming city of noises. Of newsboys screaming the names of their newspapers. Of barking dogs and chanting waiters. One ball of dumplings. Two sweet ones and two salty ones. One dish of fragrant beef. Of motor bus horn. Counted not because anyone is in the way, but because the driver likes to hear it. Brass bands playing onward Christian soldiers at the bargain sales. And the many with a waltz of wedding and funeral processions. Coolies carrying heavy loads and dodging through the crowds. Of merchants standing in their doorways calling out their wares and pausing to describe the passing scene. Ah, this widow on a foreign horse is all right. A foreign horse is a bicycle. And a pretty girl is often called a widow. The militia will meet tomorrow morning. The militia will meet tomorrow morning. The hairs are pointed by the police and soldiers reciting the guerrilla song. Nothing to eat. Nothing to wear. Cow shell. We have no shot. We have no shell. Through the streets surge Chinese and long blue gowns. Westernized Chinese from the port cities. Down river city people from Nang King and Hang Cao. Called by the Junginese outsiders. At night the neon lights glittered brightly along the banished streets above the milling crowds. Jung Cheng was changing from an ancient commercial river port to the capital of a fighting nation. And yet the greatest changes. Her greatest trials were yet to come. The Japanese bombers came. And beneath its explosions the old city of Jung Cheng began to disappear. But under it. In the cliff. In the hill. And a pledge won. Yes. Here. Everyone turned to viewing tunnels into the solid rock. To a marching cave. To burrowing out air raid shelters. Crew of black gunpowder was used for blasting. For two. The Chinese used anything that was cut into rocks. Everyone has an interest in some dugouts. Yes. We're building ours in the shape of a huge two-exit. That is wise. Ours will have two exits also. But we are building it with twists and curves for protection. You can't tell which way the bombs will come from. No. Some of the dugouts are being made at the bottom of the cliff. Some are being made off the stone stairway. Will there be room in your dugout to sit down? For some. But not for all. Three or four hours stand is a long term. Maybe in time we will be able to make it big enough. Some of the dugouts are being made with shafts branching off as in a mine. And that is what we shall do. The digging and stone cutting and blasting went on day and night until there was room for everyone in Zhongjing. Beyond that the Chinese continued to dig to make space for their belongings. For more than 1200 caves were dug into the sides of Zhongjing's Rocky Hill. During the summer the bombing season of 1939 and 1940 the Japanese bombed Zhongjing 162 times. We have become accustomed to spending part of each day in the dugouts. The Japanese keep on bombing. Soon they will be poor. The pace of the bombings was stepped up as the months went by. Attention Zhongjing. Attention Zhongjing. Three flights of Japanese bombers have just taken off from their air base at Hangzhou. Thirty-six bombers in each flight. Three flights of bombers have just taken off. By radio Chinese scouts at Hangzhou report to the air defense headquarters at Zhongjing. And immediately on the streets of Zhongjing... Qingbao! Qingbao! The red ball is being hoisted to the top of the pole. On a hundred tall poles in every part of the city a big red ball of oil-proof cloth is hoisted to the top. That means that the bombers will be here in about two hours. There is time to hurry through my work. Office workers, store clerks, factory workers. Scurrate to finish their work. Mothers feed their children an ample meal to fortify them for the long wait ahead. Attention Zhongjing. Three flights of Japanese bombers. Thirty-six planes in each flight are turning northward at this observation point. Turning northward. Three flights of Japanese bombers go. Chinese scouts in neighboring provinces report the change in course of the bombers. And in the streets of Zhongjing... They have lowered the red ball and are hoisting the green ball. The bombers are not coming to Zhongjing. The people of Zhongjing settle back into their daily routine. But the scouts, hundreds of miles away, posted at strategic points all over the countryside are alert. Attention Zhongjing. Attention Zhongjing. Three flights of Japanese bombers. Thirty-six in each flight are swinging southwest toward Zhongjing. Toward Zhongjing. Three flights of Japanese bombers. Immediately the order goes out through all Zhongjing. The bombers are heading here now. They are nearing the city. It is time to go to the dugouts. Now the long procession starts up the sides of the slopes or the dugouts. Workers, officials, professors, clerks, scientists, merchants, women, children. Let's us see what the scoreboard says. At each important intersection is a large scoreboard with a map of Sichuan province and the neighboring provinces. See, the planes are coming from the northeast. On the map are several model planes, passing there by the scorekeeper, who is in touch with the air defense headquarters. There are three red planes. This will be a big grade. A red plane means 36 bombers. A yellow plane, 27. A white plane, 18. A black plane, 9. This is the scorekeeper at the scoreboard. The long procession moves more briskly now. The time is getting short. The city is empty to blight. The streets stop moving. It becomes still. On the hilltops, watchers are scanning the skies with binoculars. The scorekeeper with his scoreboard at model planes runs for shelter. See, the bombs rain down, almost without letter for six days. For a hundred miles around, the explosions could be heard. At the end of each raid, the people came out only to see one red ball hanging from the signal poles. More bombers were coming. One raid lasted nine hours. The Japanese had been halted in their ground operations, and now are making an all-out effort to smash China by smashing Zhong Jing, by wiping it off the face of the earth. Where is what? This siege has cost the Japanese. A Chinese scholar, sitting on the bench in the dugout, points to figures on a piece of paper. They have used 360,000 gallons of gasoline, about 18,000 gallons of lubricating oil, and they have dropped 780,000 pounds of bombs on the city. Soon they will be poor. Children play games in the aisles, and vendors nudge their way through the crowds with their wares. Far back in the depths of the dugout, a patient flies on a makeshift operating table anesthetized scalpel. The surgery was underway in the hospital when the air raid signal came. Now it is being finished in the dugout. Each doctor, each nurse sees his job through. Whatever the circumstances, they'll lie where buildings once stood. Bits of stone structures point upward like tortured wounded stumps. There are no streets. Only acres of desolate destruction. Fires blaze. The hospital is gone. Yes, and my shop is gone again. My home was over there somewhere. I wonder where it was. Fields of wreckage. And out of this wreckage, new shops are improvised. And outside the city walls, hidden among the hills, new buildings go up. My new shop would be better than my old one. Will you build it three stories high again? No, this one would be just one story. But it would be a better shop. More compact and more efficient. You were put up new neon lights? Oh, not until the war is over. They are too expensive. Besides, the electricity is needed in the war plans. But the new shop would be better decorated than the old one. Modernistic. That is good. What will you do with the rest of the space on your lock? It is already rented out. A fruit stall on one side of me and a flower stall on the other. Everyone is busy. We have received more than 2,000 new business applications. And they keep coming in. The bombings went on. But they brought more work for everyone. Building and construction firms could not handle all their work. More builders, more experts in construction came. Nations, earth workers, carpenters, bamboo workers, tile workers. Experts came to handle communication. Well, the telephone exchange is safe here in this dugout. Our problem is to get the rest of the equipment that we need. And do you need that to operate? Oh, we've got to have it. You see, the equipment we rescued from Wu Chang, Nang Cao, and Nang King will work well enough. But we've got to get the cables. Yes. The cables, the ones that came from the United States. Down at Rangun. But the problem is to get them up here. Now let us see. The cables are 600 meters long. Yes. And they're too heavy to put on one truck and bring in over the Burma Road. How much would each cable weigh? I'd say seven and a half tons, maybe a little more. Seven and a half tons. Suppose we cut them in half. Cut them in half? Why, there are 500 pairs of wires in each cable. They could be cut in half and brought over the Burma Road in sections. And then we could splice the wires together here. Splice 500 pairs of wires in each cable? Well. And besides, even half of a seven and a half ton cable would be too great a risk to bring over the Burma Road in one truck. Well, it took a long time to get those cables made in the United States and a long time to get them even to Rangun. Suppose the cables were cut into thirds. Could a truck carry that much? About two and a half tons. Well, yes. But if we cut each cable into three sections, that would mean as we... I would arrange to have them cut and brought here in sections. We can then rejoin the 500 pairs of wires in each one and solder them together again. Now it was 1941. By mid-year, the government had entrenched itself in Zhengjing. From Zhengjing, every aspect of the war was watched, directed. Japan sent more and more fleets of bombers, plunged deeper into Chinese territory, set up Wang Qing Wei as the head of the Chinese puppet government in occupied China. Berlin and Rome recognized the Wang regime and Zhengjing promptly broke off diplomatic relations with them. China was standing more alone now than ever. This was a year of trial for China. But soon she would have allies. After Pearl Harbor, military alliance with the unified command should be set up by all the democracies. This was the Zhengjing press. 11 Chinese newspapers and the Hangkou Herald. An English-language journal exiled from Hangkou. Real unity can only be achieved by working together. The United States and England and China should work out a grand strategy against Japan. In faraway Washington, D.C. and London, important communications were received from Zhengjing. Look at this. Here's a message from Zhengjing, from Generalissimo Zhengkai Sheikh. He proposes a meeting in Zhengjing to discuss a unified war strategy and asks that the United States and Britain send representatives. On December 22nd, 1941, two weeks after Pearl Harbor, giant air transports rode off the mountains wheeled down through the fog of Zhengjing and landed. Oh, there is General Sir Archibald Wavell. Oh, yes. He is Commander-in-Chief in India. He looks very grim. Yes. And there is Major General George Brett. He looks as if he had come here for business, too. He has. He is of the United States Air Force. Do you recognize any of the others with them? No. They must be members of the General's fast. This is a great day for China. It is a great day for all democracies. General Sir Archibald Wavell and Major General George H. Brett went immediately to Generalissimo Zheng. Zhengjing and all the world waited. All knew that out of this historic meeting would come a declaration of joint action against Japan and the creation of an Allied War Council in Zhengjing. With this event, Zhengjing took its place along with Washington, London and Moscow as a nerve center in the war. The commercial river town of a few years before became a household word throughout the world. Zhengjing became a world capital. Rather, it is like Washington. Newspaper men came from all over the earth. Well, there's a regular diplomatic corps here. Well, what do you expect? I've seen at least four embassies. And how many legations are there? Hey, there are nine embassies here. American, British, Soviet, Belgian, Dutch, Polish, Norwegian, Mexican and Turkish. And there's a flock of legations beside that. I'd say the world was pretty well represented here. No, this is no second-class war over here. This is it. From the days when Zhengjing first became the capital of China, the press had been represented here. News services were established. Now the ranks of correspondence grew in proportion as Zhengjing became important. Correspondents took up residence to inform the world of what was happening here. The world began to hear about not only the incessant bombings and the political developments, but of the life in Zhengjing. So this is the Chinese New Year, eh? Yep, bombings are known. They go on with their anniversaries and festivals. Look, in the midst of all this love, they build those bamboo arches covered with evergreens over the streets in this section. Yes, and see, they even decorate the arches with limbs. When you think that these things will be blown to people, the next bombing, you will wonder why they do it. Well, this as much as anything else shows the spirit of the Chinese. Yeah. There must be half a million people taking part in this celebration. At least that. And pretty soon they'll be coming down under these bamboo arches with their dragon parade. They'll be pretty bad as a chap. Bombers should catch all these people in the streets. Oh, they won't catch them. The warning signal service is on the alert for hundreds of miles around Zhengjing. These Chinese figure they can't keep their bombers away so they might just as well go on with their celebrations as usual. This is the attitude of the charity staff. The bombers keep coming back. Patiently, good-humidly, the people of Zhengjing walk to their dugouts and wait. You see, if it were not for the bombing, we would not have new roads. This is the Chinese scholar, figuring with his pencil on a piece of paper. The bombs widen the street. They level the ground. So now we have wide roads, tying together all parts of the city. Further back in the dugout, doctors and nurses are again working over patients from the hospital. Children are playing in the aisle. Cookies, unworthy. Cookies, unworthy. Vendors are peddling their wares. The Chinese scholar goes on. The Japanese are wasting their bombs. It is a simple matter of arithmetic. We have 17,000 business houses still doing business in Zhengjing. And many of these are new ones. He scarcely raises his voice above the din of the bombing. And this year, we are building a new stadium here in Zhengjing. It is going to be a big one. It will have a seating capacity of 30,000. And there will be standing room for another 50,000. Reconstruction, even as the bombs are falling. Yes, it's going to be a first-class stadium. And it will be fitted out for athletic contests of all kinds. There will be a standard running track in courts for old ball games. And there'll be a swimming pool cut out of the solid rock. Lay low, lay low. They're coming out. They are coming. As you say, the stadium will not only be used for athletic contests, but for reviews. Yes, we will have many uses for it. Have been listening to the Pacific Story presented by the National Broadcasting Company and its affiliated independent stations as a public service to clarify events in the Pacific and to make understandable the cross-currents of life in the Pacific Basin. A reprint of this Pacific Story program is available at the cost of $0.10. Send $0.10 in stamps or a coin to University of California Press, Berkeley, California. We repeat, send $0.10 in stamps or a coin to University of California Press, Berkeley, California. The story is written and directed by Arnold Marquess. The original musical score was composed and conducted by Thomas Peluso. Your narrator, Gain Whitman. This program came to you from Hollywood. This is the National Broadcasting Company.