Forgotten Ally: China's World War II, 1937-1945 (60 page)

I have waited long for vengeance—

At last I’ve had my chance

I’ve looked the Peanut in the eye

And kicked him in the pants.
¹⁶

The relationship between America and China had now become poisoned almost beyond recognition. In the eyes of many Americans, Chiang’s government was an ungrateful, corrupt state of secondary importance, a distraction at a time when the most important campaign of the Western European Theater—Overlord—was about to start. A diplomat at the US Embassy sent a dispirited assessment from Xi’an in October 1944: of the many American servicemen to whom he had spoken, “almost all [were] adversely and often bitterly critical of China and the Chinese.” Among the sights that had shocked them were corruption (including wives of high officials buying gasoline originally supplied under Lend-Lease agreements) and collaboration (as suspected spies for the Japanese were released without being properly questioned). The diplomat did admit that these views were combined with a more general dislike of the “dirt, disease, and squalor” of Chinese towns, and habits such as spitting in the street. He observed that many of the servicemen also admitted they had lost their sympathy for the Indian cause, having served in India itself and seen its realities close up.
¹⁷
Rice reflected with some prescience that, just as Americans who had occupied Germany after the Great War were sometimes more sympathetic to the Germans than to their own allies, the French, so Americans garrisoning a postwar Japan might find themselves comparing it favorably to China. “Certainly,” he wrote, “it will influence American public opinion in the postwar period.”
¹⁸

Yet at the same time the Chinese leadership had begun to regard the Americans as a burdensome presence, an ever-increasing number of troops who were not fighting within China, but who also refused to adapt to the reality that China was a state under siege. The US had begun to build up its military presence within China, as it was anticipated that at some stage, when the Nazis had been defeated, American ground troops would be needed there. Some 10,600 US soldiers were now based in Kunming, the capital of Yunnan province. In early 1944 War Minister He Yingqin cabled Yunnan governor Long Yun to ask him to increase the supply of beef for the American troops both in his own province and in India. Long Yun replied that “the American army in Kunming have been here over a year, and consume huge amounts.” He went on:

Since spring 1943, every single day the Americans have needed nearly thirty oxen every day, over 1,000 chickens, and several thousand eggs, not even counting pigs and sheep. The oxen that plough the fields have all been bought up. It’s been a huge and surprising expense . . . not only can we not supply India, but even supplying Yunnan will be a real problem.
¹⁹

Chiang himself intervened on the question later in the year, stressing that the Americans needed a much more meat-based diet than the Chinese to maintain their fighting capacity. Long Yun continued to point out that by requisitioning so many oxen for beef, there would be fewer left to till the land, which was essential if grain supplies were to be maintained. Nor could the supply of meat be supplemented with pigs and chickens; these animals were only raised in individual households, not on an industrial scale, and it would be very difficult to buy more of them.
²⁰
It was not unreasonable that the Americans wanted to give their troops a familiar diet that would keep morale high; but the cost to China was rarely acknowledged. In January 1945 there were 32,956 US soldiers in China, a number that had risen to 60,369 by August; over the period from November 1944 to May 1945 the cost of the (as yet noncombatant) American presence soared from 1 billion to 20 billion yuan per month.
²¹

Chiang may have been particularly irked to have to send messages about beef supplies for the Americans at a moment when he and his state were fighting for survival in the face of a Japanese onslaught. He believed that the Western Allies were once again dismissing his priorities, and those of China, to preserve their own interests. By forcing Chinese troops to participate in the Ledo Road campaign, the Allies had distracted attention from the real threat: the massive incursions into central China that came with Ichigô. Chiang was not overconfident that Stilwell’s recall would shore up his position: “Even if [the US] gives way now on the recall of Stilwell, they will still . . . hope to overthrow me.”
²²
The American general seemed oblivious to the damage that he had caused. He set to work on a plan for Communist troops to be brought into an overall national command structure in which they would report to Chiang through him. In return the CCP would receive five divisions’ worth of equipment and supplies, and the right to deploy troops north of the Yellow River.
²³

But Chiang insisted that Stilwell must go. On September 25 his official request for the general’s recall was transmitted to Washington.
²⁴
On October 5 Roosevelt and Chiang had one of the frankest exchanges in their relationship, unusual for these two politicians who specialized in trying to avoid verbal confrontation rather than invite it. (Roosevelt’s words were in fact written for him by Marshall.) “I must state my surprise and regret at the reversal of your agreement of August 12th to accept Stilwell for the command of all forces in China,” wrote Roosevelt. The president warned that he felt the situation in China, post-Ichigô, had become so dangerous that he would rather keep the United States out of any command structure on the ground at all. But because the maintenance of Hump tonnage was so important, the situation demanded that “Stilwell be placed in direct command under you of the Chinese forces in Burma and of all Chinese ground forces in Yunnan Province.” Roosevelt did concede that Stilwell should not remain Chiang’s chief of staff or have direct authority over Lend-Lease. (Chiang was well aware that Stilwell’s control of Lend-Lease explained why so little of it was available to the Chinese during Ichigô.) But Roosevelt ended on a note of warning: “I feel that should we remove Stilwell from the Burma campaign the results would be far more serious than you apparently realize.”
²⁵

Stilwell himself knew that his recall was in the air. By now his comments on Chiang Kai-shek seemed to imply that there was almost no chance of the two of them cooperating: Chiang, in Stilwell’s view, was “responsible for the major disasters of the war,” had “spoken contemptuously of American efforts,” and “will not make an effort to fight seriously.” Stilwell was also disgusted by Roosevelt, who he felt had not backed him up: “F.D.R. proceeds to cut my throat and throw me out . . . They just can’t hurt me. To hell with them.”
²⁶
Then on October 7 Stilwell had sight of Roosevelt’s message to Chiang, which he thought “rather encouraging.” He was particularly pleased about the comment recommending against removing him from Burma (“a stiff one on the end,” as he described this parting shot).
²⁷

Chiang did not share Stilwell’s assessment of the message from the American president. He sent back his reply through Hurley. Chiang was still willing to give command to an American officer, but it had to be “one in whom I can repose confidence, and must be capable of frank and sincere cooperation.” Chiang was unequivocal: “General Stilwell has shown himself conspicuously lacking in those all-important qualifications.” He concluded by making his request crystal clear: Chiang wanted Stilwell recalled, immediately.

There was a sting in the tail. Chiang had given Hurley a more informal note which was supposed to make his justifications—in particular, Chiang’s lack of trust in Stilwell’s military judgment—clearer to Roosevelt. “General Stilwell and I have never agreed about the Burma campaign,” Chiang declared. He understood the importance of reopening land communication across Burma. But he was adamant that it could only be achieved with amphibious support in the south of Burma, as had been proposed at Cairo, and then reversed after Teheran. “A limited offensive in north Burma” alone would be “more costly than could be justified by the results and might even be exceedingly dangerous.” When Stilwell had proposed just such an offensive in the summer of 1944, and Chiang had demurred, Stilwell had suggested that “China would be suspected of wishing to withhold any real contribution to the Allied cause.” So Chiang had in the end consented, letting troops trained at Ramgarh in Bihar province, eastern Burma, be used in the campaign for the Ledo Road. Stilwell had then demanded that more Chinese reserves be sent into Burma, and had commandeered Hump tonnage to use there.

In Chiang’s view, these actions had a direct consequence: “the Japanese took advantage of the opportunity thus offered to launch an offensive within China attacking first in Honan [i.e., Henan] and then in Hunan.” The Burma campaign had sucked away both men and supplies. Stilwell had displayed “complete indifference,” despite the fact that the Nationalist armies in east China faced six times the number of forces that Stilwell had to cope with in Burma. Chiang’s most pointed accusation was that Stilwell had refused to release Lend-Lease supplies even when they were readily available in Yunnan. Chiang argued that only a minuscule number of arms had been released for China’s use: “60 mountain guns, 320 antitank rifles, and 506 bazookas.” As a result, he declared, “we have taken Myitkyina, but we have lost almost all of east China, and in this, General Stilwell cannot be absolved of grave responsibility.” Chiang went on to express dismay at the implications of the message from Roosevelt that Stilwell had rudely delivered. He rejected the idea that China was in danger of fundamental collapse, and found it objectionable that Roosevelt should suggest withdrawal of aid from China precisely
because
it was in trouble. Hurley forwarded the note with his own, blunt comment: “Chiang Kai-shek and Stilwell are fundamentally incompatible. Today you are confronted with a choice between Chiang Kai-shek and Stilwell.” Adding that there was no other Chinese leader who could offer what Chiang could, it was clear what choice he thought Roosevelt should make.
²⁸

“THE AX FALLS,” Stilwell wrote on October 19. “I am ‘recalled.’” The next day, at 5:00 p.m., Stilwell had one final meeting with the “Peanut.” Both sides mouthed the necessary hypocrisies: Chiang claimed that he regretted everything that had happened, and Stilwell asked him to remember that he had only ever acted for “China’s good.” Chiang offered Stilwell the Grand Cordon of the Blue Sky and White Sun, the highest honor that China could offer a foreigner: Stilwell declined it (“Told him to stick it up his ___!”).
²⁹
Four days later, on October 24, Stilwell took off for Delhi. He would never again set foot in China.
³⁰

The bad blood between Chiang Kai-shek and Joseph Stilwell was the most colorful and ultimately the most public face of Sino-American discord during the wartime alliance. But it was only part of a series of misunderstandings that dogged the war in China, from turf wars over intelligence to arguments over financial assistance and troop commitments. The personal clash between Stilwell and Chiang was important, but it should not distract attention from the wider strategic decision that Marshall and the other Allied leaders had made at the start of the war: China was not going to be a major theater of war in the Allied effort.
³¹
This was perfectly understandable, but it could hardly be expected that the Chinese should consider themselves expendable. By creating a fiction that Chiang had to fight to show his value to the alliance, the Allies allowed the relationship between the US and China to erode. Rather than trying repeatedly to take Burma, a target of dubious value, it would have been perfectly reasonable to let Chiang use his limited resources to defend China, even if, in publicity terms, it appeared that China was not playing an active role in the wider war effort. It would also have been better, had Winston Churchill been willing, to use Chiang more as a credible envoy to other non-European peoples, a genuine symbol of nationalist nonwhite resistance who could have challenged Japanese pan-Asianism and communism alike. Instead, Chiang’s regime was made complicit in thankless and overly ambitious goals, giving the impression that China’s own aims and priorities always had to give way to those of the Western Allies and the USSR. The seeds were sown for mistrust between the US and China that would continue after the eventual Communist victory in 1949. Even today, the state of US-China relations shows that those wounds are a long way from being healed.

Meanwhile, the Japanese Ichigô advance continued to drive onward through south-central China. The atmosphere in the Nationalist zone became feverish as the prospect of a Japanese victory seemed suddenly more likely. In Guilin in November 1944 Graham Peck sensed a shrill hysteria. The city was like “a floating amusement park, adrift in a stormy sea,” populated by swarms of refugees. The railway station was full to bursting with people fleeing the city, running from the oncoming Japanese assault as fast they could be transported further west.
³²
The city fell on November 24, and the Japanese onslaught moved yet another step closer to Chongqing. The war that had turned into stalemate might suddenly be resolved with violent swiftness.

Chapter 19

Unexpected Victory

U
NLIKE F.D.R.’S PREVIOUS THREE
campaigns, the result of the 1944 presidential election was hard to predict. A dynamic reforming Republican governor, Thomas E. Dewey of New York, seemed to have a plausible chance of deposing the aging and ailing president. Now the Stilwell crisis had contributed to the already feverish atmosphere around the election. By having to recall Stilwell, American policymakers in China seemed to be at the beck and call of an ally who—thanks in part to “Vinegar Joe’s” supporters in the press—was now considered an unworthy partner for the United States. Brooks Atkinson of the
New York Times
returned from China ready to report the story. He had already composed his text by the time he evaded military censorship on a stopover at Cairo, keeping his draft in his jacket pocket while his bags were searched. Even back home in the US his story was stopped by censors once again, until on October 31 Roosevelt personally approved the lifting of the ban on the story. Atkinson’s article was devastating. It suggested that Stilwell’s recall was “the political triumph of a moribund anti-democratic regime,” and described Chiang Kai-shek as running a government that was “unenlightened, cold-hearted,” and “autocratic.” Above all, the article accused Chiang of a “basic unwillingness” to fight the Japanese.
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