 Out
of print at present, this book retains a timeliness. Sometimes
people email me, asking where they can get a copy. They can
sell for several hundred dollars on the used book market. All
I can say is try interlibrary loan if you don't want to spend
that kind of money.
Here are
two serious examples, and one amusing one. Where my father
says "the Communists" I think you can substitute
any fanatic extremists. Here he goes:
Whatever
PsyWar does, it certainly does not and should not increase the
bitterness of war. Fighting itself is the supreme bitterness.
Radio broadcasts and leaflets even in wartime only rarely should
promote hatred. The situation which the world faces is dangerous
because of technological development, not because of psychological
knowledge. PsyWar ranks as a weapon, but it is almost certainly
the most humane of all weapons.
Apart
from PsyWar, what military weapon destroys the enemy soldier's
capacity to fight by saving his life? PsyWar tries to bring
him over alive and tries to send him home as our friend. No
rival weapon can do this...
Since
1945, we Americans have written more, studied more, and talked
more about Psywar than have any of the other free peoples. This
is a hopeful sign. It can be read as an indication that the
American love of the gadget, the American quest for a novelty,
can be turned to the arena of the soul. The Communists are better
liars, better schemers, better murderers than we shall ever
be; they start off by being better fanatics. Is it not in the
American spirit that we should out-trick them, out-talk them,
and out-maneuver them?
OUR CHANGED WORLD AND CS/PMAL
From practically
the first minute that I heard the news on September 11, 2001,
I wondered what perspective my father would have had on it. I
pulled out my copy of Psychological Warfare and was drawn
towards a chapter that included mention of the future. He speaks
[1955 edition, page 285] of "the relief
[of tension] offered within each civilization by the opportunity
to discharge hatred against members of other civilization[s] instead
of recognizing self-hatred for the very real problem that it is."
He continues:
In
other terms, it is tough to be modern; the difficulty of being
modern makes it easy for individuals to be restless and anxious;
restlessness and anxiety lead to fear; fear converts freely
into hate; hate very easily takes on political form; political
hate assists in the creation of real threats such as the atomic
bomb and guided missiles, which are not imaginary threats at
all; the reality of the threats seems to confirm the reality
of the hate which led to it, thus perpetuating a cycle of insecurity,
fear, hate, armament, insecurity, fear, and on around the circle
again and again.
It
is possible, but by no means probable, that the rapid development
of psychological and related sciences in the Western world may
provide whole new answers to the threats which surround modern
Americans, including the supreme answer of peace as an alternative
to war or the secondary answer of victory in the event of war....
Too
specific a concentration on the problem of winning a war may
cause a leader or his expert consultants to concentrate on solutions
derived from past experience, therewith leading him to miss
new and different solutions which might be offered by his own
time.
My favorite bit from Psychological Warfare:
One day I
talked with someone who called to order a couple of the CS books.
He mentioned that he had worked in Korea and that his favorite
story about Paul Linebarger was the one told by J.J. Pierce in
his introduction to "The Best of Cordwainer Smith."
I looked
it up, and it reminds me so much of my father's way of thinking
that I'm quoting Pierce here: "While in Korea, Linebarger
masterminded the surrender of thousands of Chinese troops who
considered it shameful to give up their arms. He drafted leaflets
explaining how the soldiers could surrender by shouting the Chinese
words for 'love,' 'duty,' 'humanity,' and 'virtue'--words that
happened, when pronounced in that order, to sound like 'I surrender'
in English. He considered this act to be the single most worthwhile
thing he had done in his life."
Well, that
got me curious, and I pulled out my 1954 copy of "Psychological
Warfare," by Paul M. A. Linebarger.I didn't find that story
in there but here's one that he used to tell, and it always made
me laugh:
The
temper of the U.S. forces in Korea was demonstrated by a Reserve
sergeant who scarcely knew he was in the Reserves until he was
on a boat bound for Pusan. He was a practical man, anxious to
get home, but willing to do his share in this war as long as
he had to. He was given the assignment of testing the voice
plane of U.S. headquarters at Taegu. The loudspeaker was not
working quite right, and he was instructed to test the plane
at 500, 1,000, and 1,5000 feet.
The
plane flew low over U.S. Headquarters The roar of the engines
almost deafened everyone within the building, yet even above
the roar of the engines there could be heard the bone-chilling
hum of the silent loudspeaker--an immense magnification of the
noise one hears from a radio set which is turned on without
being tuned to a station. Everyone expected the sergeant to
say, 'This is the EUSAK voice plane testing; one-ah, two-ah,
three-ah!' "Instead the immense voice came through clearly,
through brick, and plaster, and wood, through air and trees.
It must have reached four miles. The gigantic voice of the sergeant
seemed to roar over half of South Korea as he said, 'Why--don't--you--imperialist--sons
o' bitches--go--back--to--Wall--Street--where--you--belong?'
It
was said that fifty colonels grabbed for their phones simultaneously,
but the purely American gimmick to the whole story lay in the
fact that the sergeant was not punished. No damage was done.
The Americans thought their enemies were funny or silly. We
had shown that we were not afraid of Communist ideas. Several
South Koreans told the author that they regarded the Americans
as inscrutable people indeed.
ATOMSK
 Atomsk
is an enjoyable spy novel that my father wrote under the name
of Carmichael Smith. It was published in
1949 by Duell, Sloan and Pierce. It's long out of print and recently
I made an ebook of it, which is for sale here
or on the one-page store. Last time I looked at the used booksellers
exchange, abe.com, they had three copies for sale: at $250, $450,
and $650!
I made Atomsk
into an instant download. See its page
for details.
 Ria,
by Felix C. Forrest, was published in 1947. It was a novel Paul
Linebarger wrote before he began his Cordwainer Smith era. The
book was out of print for years, and then was reprinted in 1987.
That edition is out of print as well, but some copies have turned
up and I usually have the book in stock. Here's
a page about Ria, with the first two chapters typed in.
Carola
was also written by Felix C. Forrest, and published around the
same time as Ria. (The bibliographers must know which was
first, but I don't.) I've never liked it. Again, the protagonist
is a woman.
Some of his political science
books and articles can be read at Questia.com,
a membership site that allows you to search it without being a
member.
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