By September 1955, three months into their relationship, Gary began to introduce Nellie to his colleagues as his girlfriend, but she wasn’t happy about the slow progress. It had taken her some trouble to persuade her parents to consider a Chinese man for a prospective son-in-law. They didn’t like Gary that much; not only was he too starchy but he also had an unclear background. Worse yet, he didn’t belong to a church. He’d told Nellie that he had no family in China anymore and had only a cousin in Hong Kong. Now that her parents had finally given the green light, why was Gary so hesitant about popping the question? It was so tiresome having to come up with plans for every weekend and holiday. Nellie believed that together they could make an outstanding couple. She’d be a good wife and they would raise husky sons. Time and again she hinted they should get engaged, the sooner the better, but Gary didn’t want to rush.
“Give me some time, please,” he said one day on their drive back from shopping. He was steering with one hand.
“Tell me, what part of me d’you still have doubts about?” She stared at him from the passenger side.
He didn’t turn to her but felt her eyes boring into his cheek. He said, “Not because of that, I’ve told you so many times.”
“Then because of what? What’s there to worry about? You’ve no parents to ask for permission and no siblings to consult. I can’t see why you’re so wishy-washy. Tell me the truth, am I not good enough for you?”
“Please don’t get fired up like this.”
“You can’t dump a girl after sleeping with her, you know. It’s not like in China or Japan.”
“I am serious about us. Just give me a couple of weeks.”
She sighed. “Guess I’ve gotta bite the bullet.”
“If that’s too hard on your teeth, you don’t have to do it.”
“Gimme a break!” She swatted his shoulder, and they both laughed.
A few months back he had applied for a green card so that he wouldn’t have to get his visa renewed every year, which he’d heard could be a hassle. Also, the U.S. permanent residency would make it easier for him to travel abroad. His plan was to get naturalized as soon as possible so he’d be able to access more-classified documents at his agency. By doing this, he also meant to take a part of his life into his own hands, to have some legal protection here. There was no telling what might happen between the United States and China, and the two countries were likely to have another military confrontation, probably somewhere in East Asia. If that happened, his higher-ups might not call him back in the near future.
He had constantly agonized about that possibility, which seemed unavoidable in light of some recent events. In January 1955, the People’s Liberation Army had launched a massive attack on the Yijiangshan Islands, off the Zhejiang coast. It was a coordinated operation of the air force, the navy, and the infantry — the first in the PLA’s history. The overwhelming forces crushed the Nationalist defenders and wiped out the whole regiment deployed on the islands, whose commander, Colonel Shengming Wang, fought with his men doggedly and in the end blew himself up with his last grenade. Tactically Gary believed the Communists had scored a complete victory, but politically it was a disaster. Within ten days of the battle, the U.S. Congress passed the Formosa Resolution and granted Dwight Eisenhower the power to protect Taiwan and its adjacent islands against invasion from the People’s Republic of China. The legislation made the liberation of Taiwan much more difficult, if not impossible. From now on, the PLA would have to fight the U.S. forces if it attempted to cross Taiwan Strait. That would be unimaginable, given that the Chinese air force and navy were both in their infancy. Eisenhower even declared that he might authorize the use of nuclear weapons if necessary. In response, China’s premier, Zhou Enlai, claimed that the Chinese people were not afraid of atomic bombs and would continue to confront the American imperialists. Gary saw the attack on the Yijiangshan Islands as a political mistake that had widened the gulf between Taiwan and the mainland. While the hostility between China and the United States was escalating, he felt plunged into deeper isolation. In his heart he couldn’t stop blaming the Chinese Communist leaders and generals, some of whom he believed were too shortsighted. “What a bunch of idiots!” he’d say to himself.
Since the early summer of 1955, he had noticed a spate of documents from Taipei that touched upon the role of General Sun Lijen, who had been the commander of the Nationalist land force in Taiwan. Gary was fascinated by this man partly because Sun and he were fellow alumni, both having attended Tsinghua University, though the general had been many years ahead of Gary. At college Sun had played basketball and even joined China’s national team briefly. Then he went to Purdue on a scholarship, majoring in civil engineering. After earning his BS, he worked in a New York architecture firm for a short while. Later he enrolled at Virginia Military Institute (class of 1927) and studied military science for two years. He then returned to China and served in the Nationalist army, in which he rose rapidly through the ranks.
He fought numerous victorious battles against the Japanese and the Communists. Among Chiang Kai-shek’s generals, Sun was the most capable, feared by the Red Army and dubbed the Eastern Rommel by Joseph Stilwell, the U.S. commander of the China-Burma-India Theater during the Second World War. But Sun was isolated in the Nationalist army, whose generals were mostly graduates of the Huangpu Military Academy, which Chiang Kai-shek had once headed. Owing to Sun’s American background, Chiang had never trusted him and, in the summer of 1954, removed him from the command of the army and appointed him a staff general in the president’s cabinet without any commanding power.
Through translating some reports and conversations, Gary suspected that Chiang Kai-shek might have begun purging Sun Lijen, who was suspected of attempting a coup to seize presidential power and to set himself up as a U.S. puppet. Groundless though the accusation might be, Sun was fired in August 1955 and soon placed under house arrest. Gary could see that the CIA might actually have engineered the alleged conspiracy, though he wasn’t sure how deeply Sun had been implicated. His instinct told him that Sun’s career might be over. If so, Chiang’s army would be weakened considerably, if not in disarray. He checked out the documents concerning General Sun’s situation, telling the clerk in charge of classified materials that he had to translate parts of them at home. That was common among the translators when they had to work late into the night. Gary took photos of many pages about Sun’s case, believing these were significant intelligence.