Dedicated WWII SACO vets, the Rice Paddy Navy

Photos from W. Elsworth Smith (Smitty), SKD1c, USN, taken in India and China during the last months of WWII, 1945. Chinese-American interactions during World War II shaped both American and Chinese attitudes toward each other and continued to influence the relations between the United States and "the two Chinas" after the war. The Sino-American Cooperative Organization (SACO) operated in China jointly along with the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), America's first intelligence agency and forerunner of the CIA. SACO was commanded by General Tai (or Dai) Li, head of the Chinese Nationalist's secret service, and USN Captain Milton E. Miles, US Naval Group China, and was structured around about 2500 sailors and Marines training and operating with Chinese guerilla forces. Among all the wartime missions that Americans set up in China, SACO was the only one that adopted a policy of "total immersion" with the Chinese. The "Rice Paddy Navy" operated in the China-Burma-India theater, advising and training, forecasting weather and scouting landing areas in anticipation of potential US landing, rescuing downed American flyers, and intercepting Japanese radio traffic.