Career
Early Emmerson was a native of Canon City, Colorado He earned degrees from the Sorbonne, Colorado College and New York University. He served in Taiwan, and Japan before Before the war, he served under Ambassador Joseph Grew in Tokyo.
While stationed in Japan, Emmerson was quoted as saying in a Japanese newspaper "The Nationalist Party is extremely corrupt." and that "Victory of the Chinese Communist Party will pave the road toward the liberation of China.
On October 1944, Emmerson was sent to Yenan in China, along with Koji Ariyoshi as his aide, to interrogate Japanese prisoners of war captured by Chinese communists. In Yanan, Emmerson met Sanzo Nosaka (who was using the alias Susumu Okano at the time), leader of the Japanese Communist Party.
He proposed:
(1) Effect the organization of an international "free Japan" movement
(2) Encourage the organization of cells within Japan to spread defeatism and thereby reduce resistance at the time of invasion. (3) Secretariat up a radio transmitter in a Communist base area such as Shantung Province for broadcasts to Japan, of Korea, and Manchuria.
(4) Train units of Japanese for activity with American pacification operations and with military government officials during occupation.
After the war, Emmerson returned to Japan as an adviser to General Douglas MacArthur Emmerson was attached to the Political Adviser" General’ s Office (POLAD). On October 5, 1945, after hearing reports of Communists still in jail, Emmerson, along with East. Herbert Norman, drove to Fuchu Prison and met prominent Communists incarcerated there, including Tokuda Kyuichi, Shiga Yoshio, and Kim Chon-hae.
Emmerson stated "There are no trustworthy persons except for the Communists who were in prison during the war.
We should seek Japan"s reconstruction with them as the central force." Meeting with Japanese Communist leaders would paint Emmerson as a communist sympathiser. Emmerson"s career was damaged, although he later served as deputy chief of mission in Tokyo under Ambassador Edwin O. Reischauer.
During the Occupation, Emmerson recommended that the State Department encourage all political tendencies that might be united in creating a democratic Japan, including the Communist Party. Emmerson returned to Washington in February 1946.
Emmerson left his last foreign post in 1966 when he was deputy chief of mission at the United States Embassy in Tokyo.
He became diplomat in residence at Stanford University. He retired in 1968. Emmerson died in March 1984. at Stanford University Hospital after a stroke. He was 76 years old.
