Book Review: MacArthur’s Spies: The Soldier, the Singer, and the Spymaster Who Defied the Japanese in World War II
by David Ryan, Business, Science and Technology Department, Central Library
MacArthur’s Spies: The Soldier, the Singer, and the Spymaster Who Defied the Japanese in World War II
Peter Eisner
I got three passports, a couple of visas
You don't even know my real name
"Life During Wartime" –Talking Heads
I’m always interested in how people react in the face of war and the moral questions that follow such conflicts. Will they listen to their "better angels" and fight the good fight, pull the covers over their head and wait for the black clouds to pass, or will they work with the Devil?
Some have dubbed Manila the Pacific Casablanca, but there was nothing glamorous about the city, the oppressors, or the choices Filipinos had to make. MacArthur’s Spies by Peter Eisner is the story of Claire Phillips, an American of complex citizenship living in Manila during the occupation, who faced these moral options and chose to fight the good fight.
Phillips was not at first glance an obvious choice for a heroine. Even prior to the war she had been the type of woman who naturally adopted a secretive, deceptive existence. Peter Eisner points out that “throughout her life she changed her name so many times that even the FBI and the courts couldn’t keep up with her. She had been married at least three times in seven years,” but the number of divorces she filed is uncertain. She was not terribly creative with her numerous aliases; she tended to use variations based on the last name of one of her husbands and her first and middle birth names. (Claire Phillip’s known aliases: Clara Mabel De La Taste a.k.a. Clara Synder a.k.a. Clara Delataste a.k.a. Mabel C. Enette.) It’s possible that when living in Oregon she lied about her race in order to marry. However there’s no indication that she was an evil person committed to a criminal life. Why the quotidian deception about facts as basic as her name, race, and marital status? We may never know for certain, but there is no evidence that it was anything other than second nature to her. There are times in history that call for this type of nature.
In 1942 Manila was a city occupied by the victorious troops of the Rising Sun. Curfews, food rationing, and brutality at the hands of roving Japanese soldiers were the norm. There was precious little military intelligence concerning Manila flowing back to MacArthur. There was even less food, medicine, clothing, and compassion for the men and women in Japanese POW camps in the Philippines. Claire Phillips adopted yet another name, another persona, in an attempt to alleviate both situations. She opened a night club called the Tsubaki Club that catered to Japanese officers and Claire became “Madame Tsubaki.” Her hostesses would circulate through the club plying Japanese officers with alcohol while they themselves drank diluted cocktails, or lemonade. In between drinks and dances the young ladies would learn when units of the Imperial Japanese Navy were leaving port, and where ground unit commanders were moving. Phillips would collate the information in the early morning. Then through a complex series of cut-outs and couriers the information would make its way up into the jungle-covered hills where a man named Charles ‘Chick’ Parsons waited anxiously. Sometimes he waited for weeks.
Parsons, a U.S. Navy officer, had actually been in Manila when it fell to the Japanese, but in one of the more audacious lies of the Pacific war, he remained and passed himself off as a diplomat of Panama. The ruse worked long enough for him to transport himself and his family out of a Manila on a diplomatic ship. But once in America MacArthur insisted that Parsons return and supervise the growing spy ring and guerrilla movements growing from the remnants of the U.S. military, Philippine insurgents, and survivors of Japanese atrocities. When Parsons returned to the island, Claire Phillips was one of the intelligence assets he came to depend upon.
In addition to her intelligence work she also developed a clandestine ring of locals who smuggled in food, clothing, and basic medicines to the POWs languishing in the hellish Camp O’Donnell. When possible she even wrote letters to individual prisoners to bolster their spirits. One can only guess how many soldiers, marines, and civilians she saved with this improvised operation.
Very few of us are totally good or evil. This was true of Claire Phillips. But Peter Eisner shows us that regardless of what social or moral conventions she may have flaunted, she provided invaluable aid to General MacArthur and prisoners of war and that she, along with many others, fought the good fight.
Peter Eisner
I got three passports, a couple of visas
You don't even know my real name
"Life During Wartime" –Talking Heads
I’m always interested in how people react in the face of war and the moral questions that follow such conflicts. Will they listen to their "better angels" and fight the good fight, pull the covers over their head and wait for the black clouds to pass, or will they work with the Devil?
Some have dubbed Manila the Pacific Casablanca, but there was nothing glamorous about the city, the oppressors, or the choices Filipinos had to make. MacArthur’s Spies by Peter Eisner is the story of Claire Phillips, an American of complex citizenship living in Manila during the occupation, who faced these moral options and chose to fight the good fight.
Phillips was not at first glance an obvious choice for a heroine. Even prior to the war she had been the type of woman who naturally adopted a secretive, deceptive existence. Peter Eisner points out that “throughout her life she changed her name so many times that even the FBI and the courts couldn’t keep up with her. She had been married at least three times in seven years,” but the number of divorces she filed is uncertain. She was not terribly creative with her numerous aliases; she tended to use variations based on the last name of one of her husbands and her first and middle birth names. (Claire Phillip’s known aliases: Clara Mabel De La Taste a.k.a. Clara Synder a.k.a. Clara Delataste a.k.a. Mabel C. Enette.) It’s possible that when living in Oregon she lied about her race in order to marry. However there’s no indication that she was an evil person committed to a criminal life. Why the quotidian deception about facts as basic as her name, race, and marital status? We may never know for certain, but there is no evidence that it was anything other than second nature to her. There are times in history that call for this type of nature.
In 1942 Manila was a city occupied by the victorious troops of the Rising Sun. Curfews, food rationing, and brutality at the hands of roving Japanese soldiers were the norm. There was precious little military intelligence concerning Manila flowing back to MacArthur. There was even less food, medicine, clothing, and compassion for the men and women in Japanese POW camps in the Philippines. Claire Phillips adopted yet another name, another persona, in an attempt to alleviate both situations. She opened a night club called the Tsubaki Club that catered to Japanese officers and Claire became “Madame Tsubaki.” Her hostesses would circulate through the club plying Japanese officers with alcohol while they themselves drank diluted cocktails, or lemonade. In between drinks and dances the young ladies would learn when units of the Imperial Japanese Navy were leaving port, and where ground unit commanders were moving. Phillips would collate the information in the early morning. Then through a complex series of cut-outs and couriers the information would make its way up into the jungle-covered hills where a man named Charles ‘Chick’ Parsons waited anxiously. Sometimes he waited for weeks.
Parsons, a U.S. Navy officer, had actually been in Manila when it fell to the Japanese, but in one of the more audacious lies of the Pacific war, he remained and passed himself off as a diplomat of Panama. The ruse worked long enough for him to transport himself and his family out of a Manila on a diplomatic ship. But once in America MacArthur insisted that Parsons return and supervise the growing spy ring and guerrilla movements growing from the remnants of the U.S. military, Philippine insurgents, and survivors of Japanese atrocities. When Parsons returned to the island, Claire Phillips was one of the intelligence assets he came to depend upon.
In addition to her intelligence work she also developed a clandestine ring of locals who smuggled in food, clothing, and basic medicines to the POWs languishing in the hellish Camp O’Donnell. When possible she even wrote letters to individual prisoners to bolster their spirits. One can only guess how many soldiers, marines, and civilians she saved with this improvised operation.
Very few of us are totally good or evil. This was true of Claire Phillips. But Peter Eisner shows us that regardless of what social or moral conventions she may have flaunted, she provided invaluable aid to General MacArthur and prisoners of war and that she, along with many others, fought the good fight.
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