“John Birch Society Song” -- Chad Mitchell Trio
“Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues” -- Bob Dylan
On 28 May 1918, as the Great War relentlessly continued its culling of a generation grown far too accustomed to blood and mud and trenches and rats, a child was born to American parents on the southern slopes of the Himalayas. George and Ethel Birch were Presbyterian missionaries serving in what was then the British Raj. Their son they named John Morrison Birch. The name was to become far more famous than would the man.
George and Ethel Birch returned to the United States two years after the birth of their infant son, and he would be raised and educated in a strict Fundamentalist Baptist tradition. We can see in the young man a reflection of what the organization bearing his name would become. "He was always an angry young man, always a zealot," recalled a college classmate. As a student at Mercer University, a young John Birch added his efforts to those of like-minded fellow students seeking to identify and root out those professors lacking sufficient theological purity. He and 12 other students formally accused five Mercer professors with holding religious opinions heretical to the Baptist creed. The charges were dismissed, and, unsurprisingly, Birch was an unpopular man on campus despite his graduating at the top of his class.
George and Ethel Birch returned to the United States two years after the birth of their infant son, and he would be raised and educated in a strict Fundamentalist Baptist tradition. We can see in the young man a reflection of what the organization bearing his name would become. "He was always an angry young man, always a zealot," recalled a college classmate. As a student at Mercer University, a young John Birch added his efforts to those of like-minded fellow students seeking to identify and root out those professors lacking sufficient theological purity. He and 12 other students formally accused five Mercer professors with holding religious opinions heretical to the Baptist creed. The charges were dismissed, and, unsurprisingly, Birch was an unpopular man on campus despite his graduating at the top of his class.
Since childhood, he had desired to follow his parents’ calling as a missioner. And so, in 1940 John Birch found himself in China on behalf of the World Fundamental Baptist Missionary Fellowship.
Following his famous bombing raid over Tokyo in April 1942, Lieutenant Colonel Jimmy Doolittle of the United States Army Air Corps bailed from his doomed B-25 over China, the flyer and the missionary had a chance encounter. Birch helped Doolittle and his crew find safe passage to the self-promoting Colonel Claire Chennault, commander of the Flying Tigers, a contingent of American aviation volunteers fighting to stymie the Japanese invasion of China. After hearing Doolittle speak of the assistance rendered by Birch, Chennault offered the young missionary a commission. He had need of a Mandarin Chinese-speaking intelligence officer with knowledge of the country.
Birch was, by all accounts, a remarkably capable officer. He proved apt at spycraft. The young officer managed to construct an effective and extensive network of agents while simultaneously pursuing his missionary calling. His skills were such that he, unwillingly perhaps, was tasked to perform missions for the Office of Strategic Services, the World War II precursor of the Central Intelligence Agency. His commitment to combatting the two threats, Japanese invaders and the Communist Party, he recognized as endangering the China he loved was total. Birch was both passionate and bold in his duties, so much so his fellow officers feared it might lead to his undoing. A contemporary comment in the diary of a superior officer presciently observes, "Birch is a good officer, but I'm afraid is too brash and may run into trouble."
And he did.
Birch was, by all accounts, a remarkably capable officer. He proved apt at spycraft. The young officer managed to construct an effective and extensive network of agents while simultaneously pursuing his missionary calling. His skills were such that he, unwillingly perhaps, was tasked to perform missions for the Office of Strategic Services, the World War II precursor of the Central Intelligence Agency. His commitment to combatting the two threats, Japanese invaders and the Communist Party, he recognized as endangering the China he loved was total. Birch was both passionate and bold in his duties, so much so his fellow officers feared it might lead to his undoing. A contemporary comment in the diary of a superior officer presciently observes, "Birch is a good officer, but I'm afraid is too brash and may run into trouble."
And he did.
Captain John Birch
United States Army
28 May 1918 to 25 August 1945
On 14 August 1945, the Empire of Japan surrendered. The United States hoped to use the Japanese troops still in China to forestall any territorial gains by Mao Tse-tung’s Communist followers. Occupying Japanese troops were instructed by the American victors to remain in place until relieved by Nationalist troops loyal to Chiang Kai-shek, even in nominally Communist regions. The Communists, naturally unhappy with this settlement, continued fighting to dislodge the invaders. Those former American allies now working with the hated Japanese occupiers were now viewed with suspicion at the least and sometimes outright hostility.
The brutal war had taken its toll on Birch. A man always on edge had been pushed even closer to the precipice. By the time of the Japanese surrender, he, like so very many other survivors of that awful war, was paranoid and very possibly suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Birch’s state of mind and the volatile tensions born of the terms dictating the Japanese surrender would prove fatal.
The brutal war had taken its toll on Birch. A man always on edge had been pushed even closer to the precipice. By the time of the Japanese surrender, he, like so very many other survivors of that awful war, was paranoid and very possibly suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Birch’s state of mind and the volatile tensions born of the terms dictating the Japanese surrender would prove fatal.
Shortly after the surrender, a 27-year-old Captain Birch was tasked with leading a mixed force of eleven Americans, Nationalist Chinese, and Koreans on an intelligence-gathering mission in the city Xuzhou, a strategically situated transportation hub within the coastal province of Jiangsu. The goal was to assess the functionality of roads and railways. Additionally, he was to recover any useful documents that might have been abandoned by the defeated Japanese forces. Birch’s mission was complicated by the fact that Communists and Japanese troops were still fighting in the province.
On 25 August 1945, Birch and his men encountered a Communist patrol. The Red soldiers ordered Birch’s force to surrender their weapons. Accounts of events conflict, but it seems clear that Birch refused to give up his sidearm and insulted the Communists soldiers. Shots were fired. Birch was killed and a Nationalist aide wounded. A Communist soldier then mutilated Birch’s corpse. His force was taken captive.
On 25 August 1945, Birch and his men encountered a Communist patrol. The Red soldiers ordered Birch’s force to surrender their weapons. Accounts of events conflict, but it seems clear that Birch refused to give up his sidearm and insulted the Communists soldiers. Shots were fired. Birch was killed and a Nationalist aide wounded. A Communist soldier then mutilated Birch’s corpse. His force was taken captive.
General Albert Wedemeyer, commander of all American forces in China, immediately lodged a protest with Red Army Commander-in-Chief Zue De upon learning of Birch’s death. Mao Tse-tung himself intervened to reduce tensions. Birch’s men were freed, and the Communist leader personally apologized to the American general. Mao’s efforts availed nothing, and the meeting ended acrimoniously when Wedemeyer informed Mao that US forces would be freely deployed in Communist-held territory without first notifying Communist leaders.
Over 400,000 United States servicemen gave their lives in World War II. Captain Birch would have remained but one more forgotten name in that grisly butcher’s toll had it not been for American entrepreneur Robert Welch, Jr., manufacturer of terrific candies and terrible politics.
Robert Welch, Jr.
1 December 1899 to 6 January 1985
Like Birch, Welch was fierce and doctrinaire in his anticommunism. Indeed, anything less than full agreement with Welch was tantamount to supporting the unseen Reds somehow secretly dominating the world in which we lived. Welsh had discontinued his studies at the United States Naval Academy and Harvard Law School after finding the instructors politically suspect. Clearly, Welch needed some means of combatting the unseen Communist conspiracy infiltrating every aspect of American society.
On 9 December 1958, Welch and eleven other similarly minded men, all individuals of influence and wealth, gathered in Indianapolis, Indiana and formally founded the John Birch Society. Welch had read of Birch’s death some five years earlier. The vagueness, the “fog-of-war” confusion obscuring the precise circumstances of Birch’s killing lends itself well to conspiracy theory, and Welch excelled at finding conspiracies. Birch was, in Welch’s worldview not merely among the last American causalities of the Second World War. Rather, he was the first American failtality of the Cold War. In fact, Welch thought it possible that since the same international conspiracy dominated both Communist movements and the American government, was it not possible that the Chinese soldiers who killed Birch acted on the behalf of American officials eager to eliminate a potential threat to their nefarious schemes? His was the perfect namesake for this new organization, and Birch’s still grieving mother readily agreed to the use of her son’s name.
Jimmy Doolittle, drawing on his wartimes memories of Birch, insisted the late missionary and soldier "would not have approved" of his name being linked to this new extremist organization. Birch’s parents, who presumably knew their son’s mind better than did his former acquaintance, thought otherwise. But we will never be sure. After all, who can know the mind of the dead?
Still, despite a peak membership of between 60,000 and 100,000 Americans in the mid-60s, it is difficult to comprehend how any rational individual could take the society’s more outrageous claims seriously. And most Americans did not. Welch explained the public’s rejection of his vision by dividing US citizens into four groupings: "Communists, communist dupes or sympathizers, the uninformed who have yet to be awakened to the communist danger, and the ignorant."
Like Taft, Welsh was a devoted isolationist. Not only did he deplore US membership in the United Nations, he also condemned the creation of Nato. He even broke with the vast majority of Republicans in condemning American intervention in Indochina. If the world were, as he believed, under the domination of International Communism, we could only further its aims by making common cause with other nations. No, our safety depended on our retreating to and protecting the political purity of Fortress America.
What just what conspiracies did Welch and the John Birch Society wage war? A hodgepodge of hobgoblins threatened their world. Obviously, Franklin D. Roosevelt had foreknowledge of the impending attack on Pearl Harbor, nevertheless allowed it to precede so as to trigger US entry into World War II. In doing so, FDR was “used” by Communists, but the culpability of his successor Harry S. Truman ran deeper still. Welch explains: "[w]ith his knowledge and acquiescence as the price he consciously paid for their making him President."
What just what conspiracies did Welch and the John Birch Society wage war? A hodgepodge of hobgoblins threatened their world. Obviously, Franklin D. Roosevelt had foreknowledge of the impending attack on Pearl Harbor, nevertheless allowed it to precede so as to trigger US entry into World War II. In doing so, FDR was “used” by Communists, but the culpability of his successor Harry S. Truman ran deeper still. Welch explains: "[w]ith his knowledge and acquiescence as the price he consciously paid for their making him President."
The Society’s most vicious venom was often reserved for Welch’s fellow Republicans, most especially Dwight Eisenhower. Any federation of True Believers will always regard heretics as more contemptible than nonbelievers, and Birchers were no exception. Welch would never forgive the GOP for their betrayal of the last two pure Republicans: Robert A. Taft and Joseph McCarthy. How could the Party for reject Taft -- Mr. Republican himself -- in the 1952 presidential primaries in favor of the more moderate and internationalist Eisenhower lest some unseemly influence be present? And the assist given by Eisenhower and the Party in McCarthy’s 1954 political self-immolation offered even greater proof of Communist duplicity. There could be no possible excuse for Eisenhower’s conduct in Welch’s opinion: "The role he has played, as described in all the pages above, would fit just as well into one theory as the other; that he is a mere stooge or that he is a Communist assigned the specific job of being a political front man." Again, when enumerating the crimes of first FDR and then Truman, Welsh reserves the most damning commentary for the sole Republican of this unholy trinity: "In the third stage, in my own firm opinion, the Communists have one of their own actually in the Presidency. For this third man, Eisenhower, there is only one possible word to describe his purposes and his actions. That word is treason." Later in a letter, Welsh would opine, "For the sake of honesty, however, I want to confess here my own conviction that Eisenhower's motivation is more ideological than opportunistic. Or, to put it bluntly, I personally think that he has been sympathetic to ultimate Communist aims, realistically willing to use Communist means to help them achieve their goals, knowingly accepting and abiding by Communist orders, and consciously serving the Communist conspiracy for all of his adult life."
Chief Justice Earl Warren,
an Eisenhower Nominee and Architect of the Landmark
Brown v. Board of Education Desegregation Decision,
was a Primary Target of the John Birch Society
The scope of the International Communist Conspiracy adjusted to the changing times. For example, Racial issues were not on the Society’s radar at the time of its founding, but that quickly changed as the Civil Rights movement blossomed. The Society ensconced its opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 in respect for States’ Rights and the Tenth Amendment. But soon, rather than simply threatening the delicate Constitutional sensibilities of Birchers, the struggle for racial equality became a new front for International Communism: "For the civil rights movement in the United States, with all of its growing agitation and riots and bitterness, and insidious steps towards the appearance of a civil war, has not been infiltrated by the Communists, as you now frequently hear. It has been deliberately and almost wholly created by the Communists patiently building up to this present stage for more than forty years."
Do I even need to add that water fluoridation is a Communist plot?
It need not be said that the John Birch Society captured the attention of more than a few musically gifted satirists. My favorite of tunes mocking Welch’s creation comes from the typically clever Chad Mitchell Trio.
“John Birch Society Song” -- The Chad Mitchell Trio
Oh we're meeting at the courthouse at eight o'clock tonight
You just come in the door and take the first turn to the right
Be careful when you get there, we'd hate to be bereft
But we're taking down the names of everybody turning left
Oh we're the John Birch Society, the John Birch Society
Here to save our country from a communistic plot
Join the John Birch Society, help us fill the ranks
To get this movement started, we need lots of tools and cranks
Now there's no one that we're certain the Kremlin doesn't touch
We think that Westbrook Pegler doth protest a bit too much
We only hail the hero from whom we got our name
We're not sure what he did, but he's our hero all the same
Oh we're the John Birch Society, the John Birch Society
Socialism is the ism dismalist of all
Join the John Birch Society, there's so much to do
Have you heard they're serving vodka at the W.C.T.U.
Well you've heard about the agents that we've already named
Well M.C.A. has agents that are flatly unashamed
We're after Rosie Clooney, we've gotten Pinky Lee
And the day we get Red Skelton won't that be a victory
Oh we're the John Birch Society, the John Birch Society
Norman Vincent Peale may think he's kidding us along
But the John Birch Society knows he spilled the beans
He keeps on preaching brotherhood, but we know what he means
We'll teach you how to spot 'em in the cities or the sticks
For even Jasper Junction is just full of Bolsheviks
The CIA's subversive and so's the FCC
There's no one left but thee and we, and we're not sure of thee
Oh we're the John Birch Society, the John Birch Society
Here to save our country from a Communistic plot
Join the John Birch Society, holding off the Reds
We'll use our hands and hearts, and if we must, we'll use our heads
[Background]
O beautiful, for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain
America, America
[Spoken]
Do you want Justice Warren to be your Commissar?
Do you want Mrs. Khrushchev in there with the DAR?
You cannot trust your neighbors, or even next-of-kin
If mommy is a Commie then you gotta turn her in
Oh we're the John Birch Society, the John Birch Society
Fighting for the right to fight the right fight for the right
Join the John Birch Society, as we're marching on
We'll all be glad to see you when we're meeting in the John
In the John, in the John Birch Society
Bob Dylan too turned a sarcastic eye on the John Birch Society in a song that became a source of controversy and television history. In preparation for his scheduled appearance on the very popular Ed Sullivan television variety show in 1963, Dylan auditioned the song for the host. Sullivan was delighted. The following day when he appeared at the studio for the telecast, Dylan was greeted by CBS executives forbidding him to perform the song on live television. With Sullivan’s support, Dylan walked. CBS also yanked the song from Dylan’s upcoming album. Unsurprisingly, the spillover from CBS heavy handedness only made Dylan and the song his detractors found so offensive ever more popular.
“Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues” -- Bob Dylan
Well, I was feelin’ low down and blue
I didn’t know what in the world I wus gonna do
Them Communists they wus comin’ around
They wus in the air
They wus all over the ground
They wouldn’t gimme no peace . . .
So I run down most hurriedly
And joined the John Birch Society
I got me a secret membership card
I got me a secret membership card
And started off a-walkin’ down the road
Yo-boy, I’m a real John Bircher now!
Look out you Commies!
Look out you Commies!
Now we all agree with Hitler’s views
Although he killed six million Jews
It don’t matter too much that he was a Fascist
At least you can’t say he was a Communist!
That’s to say like if you got a cold you take a shot of malaria
Well, I wus lookin’ everywhere for them Reds
I got up in the mornin’ ’n’ looked under my bed
Looked in the stove, behind the door
Looked in the glove compartment of my car
Couldn’t find ’em . . .
I wus lookin’ high an’ low for them Reds everywhere
I wus lookin’ in the sink an’ underneath the chair
I looked way up my chimney hole
I even looked deep down inside my toilet bowl
They got away . . .
Well, I wus sittin’ home alone an’ started to sweat
Figured they wus in my T.V. set
Peeked behind the picture frame
Got a shock from my feet, hittin’ right up in the brain
Them Reds caused it!
I know they did . . . them hard-core ones
Well, I quit my job so I could work all alone
Then I changed my name to Sherlock Holmes
Followed some clues from my detective bag
And discovered they wus red stripes on the American flag!
That ol’ Betsy Ross . . .
Well, I investigated all the books in the library
Ninety percent of ’em gotta be burned away
I investigated all the people that I knowed
Ninety-eight percent of them gotta go
The other two percent are fellow Birchers . . . just like me
Now Eisenhower, he’s a Russian spy
Lincoln, Jefferson, and that Roosevelt guy
To my knowledge there’s just one man
That’s really a true American: George Lincoln Rockwell
I know for a fact he hates Commies cus he picketed the movie Exodus
Well, I fin’ly started thinkin’ straight
When I run outa things to investigate
Couldn’t imagine doin’ anything else
So now I’m sittin’ home investigatin’ myself!
Hope I don’t find out anything . . . hmm, great God!
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