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Another group was headed by Captain Roger Cheng, an electrical engineer and the first Chinese Canadian officer in the Royal Canadian Corps of Signals. Roy Chan, Louey King, Norman Low and Jimmy Shiu served with Cheng. They were dropped into Borneo to make contact with Dyak indigenous peoples who lived deep in the jungle. Louey King recalled: “While in the jungles of Borneo we lived on crocodile meat, monkeys and wild pig. It was incredibly hot and steamy there: often over 45°C. I was shot in the leg in a skirmish.”
In August 1945, Captain Cheng’s group joined a British team gathering information about Japanese troops and prisoner-of-war camps, where about 25,000 British POWs were being held. The Americans dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima the day the men arrived in Borneo. Cheng and his men helped transfer British POWs to Australia after Japan surrendered and came up against Japanese units that refused to surrender.
Several Chinese Canadians stayed in Southeast Asia well into the fall of 1945. They assisted with liberating prisoner-of-war camps, preventing revenge massacres, and maintaining order and security during the chaotic post-surrender environment.
Its covert missions were based in Japanese-occupied Southeast Asia, where orders were to support and train local resistance movements to sabotage Japanese supply lines and equipment.
While Force 136 recruited mostly Southeast Asians, it also recruited about 150 Chinese Canadians . It was thought that Chinese Canadians would blend in with local populations and speak local languages. Earlier in the war, many of these men had volunteered their services to Canada but were either turned away or recruited and sidelined. Force 136 became an opportunity for Chinese Canadian men to demonstrate their courage and skills and especially their loyalty to Canada.
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Another group was headed by Captain Roger Cheng, an electrical engineer and the first Chinese Canadian officer in the Royal Canadian Corps of Signals. Roy Chan, Louey King, Norman Low and Jimmy Shiu served with Cheng. They were dropped into Borneo to make contact with Dyak indigenous peoples who lived deep in the jungle. Louey King recalled: “While in the jungles of Borneo we lived on crocodile meat, monkeys and wild pig. It was incredibly hot and steamy there: often over 45°C. I was shot in the leg in a skirmish.”
In August 1945, Captain Cheng’s group joined a British team gathering information about Japanese troops and prisoner-of-war camps, where about 25,000 British POWs were being held. The Americans dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima the day the men arrived in Borneo. Cheng and his men helped transfer British POWs to Australia after Japan surrendered and came up against Japanese units that refused to surrender.
Several Chinese Canadians stayed in Southeast Asia well into the fall of 1945. They assisted with liberating prisoner-of-war camps, preventing revenge massacres, and maintaining order and security during the chaotic post-surrender environment.
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