ABSTRACT
Historians of China often describe US- China relations in terms of four or five political eras, beginning with the establishment of economic relationships in the mid-to-late nineteenth century, through a post-1905 phase of political and ideological balance and counter-balance, to a Cold War era of official separation, and more recently, to a post-1978 era of growing business and economic interaction. The United China Relief (UCR) officers continued to fund Chinese students’ study in the United States throughout World War II, during which time ‘educational exchange between the two nations continued and even expanded’. The people of China were facing a civil war, involving a split of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from the Nationalists. Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek supported Chinese students’ overseas study in areas of technology and sciences yet mistrusted the work of the UCR because it was embedded in the American diplomatic services and did not provide even the illusion of being Nationalist-driven.
