Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping (pronounced Shee Jin-ping) is scheduled to visit the United States in mid-February, 2012, returning Vice President Joseph R. Biden, Jr.'s August 2011 visit to China, which Xi hosted. The fact that Xi is the heir apparent to China's current top leader, Hu Jintao, who is scheduled to retire in the coming year, makes this more than an ordinary vice presidential visit. Xi's trip is designed to help him build relationships with American policymakers and legislators and introduce himself to the American business community and the American people on the eve of his becoming China's top leader. As important to the Chinese side, the trip could also play an important role in helping boost Xi's stature back home, where he is so far known as much for having a famous father, early Communist Party revolutionary Xi Zhongxun, and a famous wife, military folk singer Peng Liyuan, as for his own achievements.

U.S.-China economic ties have expanded substantially over the past several years. China is now the third largest U.S. trading partner, its second largest source of imports, and its fourth largest export market. However, U.S.-China commercial ties have been strained by a number of issues, including a surging U.S. trade deficit with China, China's refusal to float its currency, and failure to fully comply with its World Trade Organization (WTO) commitments, especially its failure to provide protection for U.S. intellectual property rights (IPR). This report explores these issues in detail, especially concerning the lack of protection for U.S. IPR.

Letter from Corporal Park B. Fielder to his family, on February 6, 1946. He complains of the routine of his days, and mentions his anger at the easy treatment of Japanese war criminals coming to Shanghai for trial.

Transcript of an interview with Thomas "Tom" Peay, a rancher and Army Air Forces veteran (Air Transport Command), concerning his experiences in the China-Burma-India Theater during World War II. Peay discusses his enrollment in the Civilian Pilot Training Program, 1942; tenure as a primary flight training instructor of Aviation Air Cadets, Harmon Training Center, Ballinger, Texas, 1942-43; Air Ferry Command, 1943; induction into the Army Air Forces, 1943; assignment to the Air Transport Command, 1943; stationing at Tezgaon-Kurmitola, India, 1944; flying C-109s loaded with gasoline over "The Hump" into China; weather problems over the Himalaya Mountains; and his separation from the military, 1946.