FORGOTTEN
ALLY: CHINA'S WORLD WAR II, 1937-1945 (Boston, etc.; Mariner Books,
Houghton,
Mifflin, Harcourt, c. 2013)
By
RANA MITTER
Rev.
by Hugh Murray
What's
wrong with this book? In the Index one can find a listing for Chiang
Kia-shek's “paranoia over Soviet Union,”(p. 431) but there is
nothing in Mitter's Index concerning the assassination plots against
Chiang by the chief US military leader in China during most of WWII.
General “Vinegar” Joe Stilwell's plots included having Chiang
jump from an airplane with a defective parachute or have him die from
food poisoning with a botulism that would not show in an autopsy.
These “plans,” even though not implemented, should have been
included in the book. Also missing is the comment to Stilwell by the
beloved Pres. Franklin Roosevelt concerning the Chinese leader, “If
you can't get along with Chiang and can't replace him, get rid of him
once and for all.”(Richard Bernstein, FP, 3 Sept. 2015)
Mitter has truly mistitled his book: The Forgotten Ally,
should have been The Betrayed Ally. And Mitter wrongly
concluded that different approaches and policies were “character
driven squabbles [which] would lead to one of the postwar tragedies
in American politics: the sterile debate on 'Who Lost China'”(Mitter,
354)
What
makes Mitter's book so important is that he is so representative of
the mainstream history establishment. A professor of History and
Politics at Cambridge U. in England, Mitter's volume will become the
quick reference work on WWII China for many years. But his Leftwing
bias is so clear and evident, yet so ubiquitous in academe that he us
unaware of it and how it distorts his history. I hope to expose some
of his biases.
There
is a strong argument to be made that American “aid” to the
Republic of China during WWII was destructive to Chiang and his
Nationalist government, - that Roosevelt and Gen. George Marshall
were willing to sacrifice China to entice Stalin to join the war
against Japanesean. China, like Poland and eastern Europe, would be
served to the Soviets by the West. The big difference, the Soviet
troops were in Poland and eastern Europe, so the West “gave” the
Soviets what they had already conquered. In China, FDR and Marshall
were willing to give Stalin what his troops had not won, inviting
them in at the war's conclusion.
In
the 1930s Marshall had risen quickly in the US Army, being promoted
over more senior officers. His work with the depression program, the
Civilian Conservation Corps, had gone well, and he rose in the ranks.
In part this may have been because his politics were more amenable
to the Roosevelts, for in the US, the elected officials are the
ultimate authority. Marshall served a stint in China, where he
disliked the Nationalist regime, and so did his protege, Joe
Stilwell.
In
1927 Chiang had turned against his allies within the Nationalist
Party, and sought to destroy his erstwhile Communist colleagues.
Simultaneously, Chiang was also fighting against local war-lords,
trying to unify the nation. In 1931 the Japanese invaded several
northeastern provinces, and established a puppet state to represent
the Manchu minority, restoring the last Chinese emperor, Pu Yi, as
the head of the new nation of Manchukuo. Chiang was too weak to do
much about that or further Japanese inroads into northern China. In
1937 a minor incident on a bridge outside of Beijing with shots fired
between Chinese and Japanese soldiers escalated. This time Chiang
did not yield, and the 2nd Sino-Japanese War had begun.
The
Imperial leaders of Japanesean were furious that China refused to
follow the rising sun in its determination to expel Western
colonialists and oppressors from Asia. Japanesean attacked Shanghai
in the largest battle since the 1916 Battle of the Marne of WWI.
China still would not surrender. Japanesean decided to be ruthless
in its next major campaign, known today as “the Rape of Nanking
(Nanjing).” Chiang was basically alone in his fight. He had had
help from German military advisers, but in time they were recalled as
Germany, Italy, and Japanesean joined in an anti-Comintern Pact.
Stalin provided some minor help, and in the 1939 undeclared war –
USSR and Mongolia vs. Japanesean and Manchukuo, the Soviets quickly
smashed the Japanese defenses, and peace was restored.
Chiang
was basically alone in trying to stop the Japanese with regular
armies. The communists were limited to the north or their center in
Yenan. They could only use guerrilla tactics against the Japanese.
Chiang's army might delay the Nipponese invaders, but the
Nationalists were not as well equipped, or trained, and they usually
succumbed. Finally, some Nationalists, fed up with the loss of life
and lands, decided for an alternative approach. Wang Jingwei, had
once been the number 2 man to Sun Yat-sen, leader of the Chinese
Revolution that had overthrown the Qing Dynasty in 1911. In 1940
Wang and several other prominent Chinese, left Chunking, the new
evacuated Nationalist capital, for Hanoi, Indo-China (then under the
Vichy French, collaborating with the Axis). From there they flew to
Japanese occupied cities and soon established a collaborationist
regime in Nanjing. For them, the fight against Japanesean was over.
The fight against the West and the communists would continue. With
the defection of these Nationalist leaders, Chiang was even more
alone.
That
changed in December 1941 when the Japanese attacked Hawaii. America
entered the war. Chiang had an ally. Or did he? FDR's favorite
Gen. Marshall appointed Joseph Stilwell to be the US military attache
to China, and Stilwell was suddenly 2nd in command of the
Chinese army. Although Stilwell had not been know for his
generalship, he took some of Chiang's best-trained troops on a risky
venture in Burma, and then abandoned them! Stilwell turned up in
India and appeared before the newsreels. Chiang's troops were not
trained for the jungle warfare where Stilwell had led them. There
were serious losses by the Allies there, Chinese, Indian, and British
troops. Soon Stilwell complained that Chiang was not fighting the
Japanese, but instead keeping his troops for a later conflict against
the communists. But some of the troops about whom Stilwell
complained were in areas where they were also holding important
junctions threatened by the Japanese. Mitter fails to ask a very
basic question about Stilwell, - was he an enemy of the Nationalist
Government?
Mitter
writes: “During the summer of 1943 Stilwell fantasized about taking
command of all Chinese troops, including the Communists, with Chiang
and the Nationalist military leadership left as ciphers only.”(302)
Note, he does not mention the Red leaders as ciphers. Was Stilwell
and enemy of the Nationalists?
An
answer to that question might be gleaned by reviewing a hand-written
letter Stilwell sent to a friend on 6 April 1946. By then, WWII was
over, Stilwell was in the US, and the Soviets had taken Manchuria at
the end of the war as agreed to at Yalta by FDR and Stalin. The
Soviets expropriated much portable, industrial material back to the
USSR and later would give many confiscated Japanese weapons and some
American lend-lease supplies to the Chinese Communists entering
Manchuria. Both the USSR and the USA recognized the Nationalists as
the official Republic of China, and America tried to get Nationalist
(KMT) troops to Manchuria before the Reds got there. The Soviets
blocked some American ships from the ports, but eventually the KMT
troops disembarked and won some, and then some more of the cities of
Manchuria. Suddenly there was open civil war between the Reds and
KMT. The Reds were not nearly as well trained at this point, and the
KMT was winning victory after victory when Stilwell wrote the letter.
He wrote: “Isn't Manchuria a spectacle? ...It makes me itch to
throw down my shovel and get over there and shoulder a rifle with Chu
Teh.” (Barbara Tuchman, Stilwell and the American Experience in
China, 1911-45, p. 527) Chu Teh was then the military leader of
Communist forces. He would later command the Chinese “volunteers”
who crossed the Yalu River to drive the Americans from North Korea.
Tuchman adds that the Stilwell letter was published in the newsletter
of a pro-communist journalist in January 1947. (Tuchman, 527, ftnote)
Sen. Joseph McCarthy, in his book critical of Marshall, reported
that the same letter was also published on 26 Jan. 1947, in
photostat, in the New York Daily Worker (organ of the
Communist Party, USA). (McCarthy, America's Retreat from
Victory, p. 62)
Stilwell
did not take his rifle to Manchuria in spring 1946, and he died a few
months later. However, Gen. Marshall came to the rescue of
Stilwell's communist friend. “Both Nationalist armies combined to
take Szup'ing and push north...in June 1946...Only another cease-fire
order on 6 June – agreed to as a result of great pressure from
Marshall and later described by Chiang as his 'most grievous mistake'
– saved Lin Piao's [communist] headquarters and permitted the
central Manchurian front to stabilize...for the remainder of
1946.”(Edward L. Dryer, China at War, 1901-1949, pp. 324-25)
At the same time that Americans were demanding Communists be
excluded from the governments of Italy and France, Gen. Marshall was
demanding that Chiang form a coalition government that included the
Reds. Marshall threatened to cut off all American aid if this were
not done. Neither Chiang nor Mao really wanted a workable coalition.
Marshall then did cut off all aid to the KMT, the official
government of China. Marshall, who was then Pres. Truman's Special
Envoy to China would boast, “As Chief of Staff I armed 39
anti-communist divisions, now with the stroke of a pen, I disarm
them.” (McCarthy, 90) With Marshall's friends in the US State
Dept., Chiang was unable to get the proper license to purchase
ammunition or weapons in the US. The State Dept. got Britain to fall
in line, so Chiang could get no ammunition or replacements or new
weapons. Marshall did more to harm the KMT. When Gen. Wedemeyer was
suggested as the new Ambassador to China, Marshall received word from
Zhou En Lai, the representative of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)
in many negotiations. Zhou objected to Wedemeyer, and Marshall then
withdrew support for the general. Instead, John L. Stuart was
appointed Ambassador to the Republic of China. Stuart had been a
missionary, a university professor, a man who had called for the
removal of Chiang, and a teacher of Zhou En Lai. So the new
Ambassador to Chiang was a man more sympathetic to the radical rebels
than to the official government of China. Marshall had a lot in
common with Stilwell.
Though
the KMT had been winning the civil war in China when Marshall first
imposed the embargo, as the year went by, the Reds, with help from
the Soviets, began to push the the KMT back from what Dreyer
considered its high point with the capture of Yenan in March 1947.
(Dreyer, 319) Meanwhile, China became an issue in American politics.
While a big “Get America Out” rally in California featured labor
leader Harry Bridges, Black singer and celebrity Paul Robeson, and
Hollywood actors like Edward G. Robinson, the newly elected
Republican Congress had other ideas. It passed legislation to
provide considerable funds to the KMT. Left-wingers and Soviet
agents in the Treasury Dept., Commerce, and State, obstructed and
delayed delivery of the aid until it was too late. When US
Ambassador to China Patrick Hurley had resigned in November 1945, he
warned that “a considerable section of our State Dept. is
endeavoring to support Communism generally as well as specifically in
China.” (Tuchman, p. 523-24). Gen. Wedemeyer, who succeeded
Stilwell, reported that the KMT could win the civil war with American
help, but as this contradicted Marshall's view, the Wedemeyer Report
was suppressed for several years. Gen. Claire Chennault, who led the
Flying Tigers in China, had worked well with Chiang, and was critical
of the communists and of Stilwell. The left wing had been extremely
critical of the US during the Spanish civil war for not aiding the
Republic against the rebels of the Falange, because the Republic was
the legitimate government, - the left now reversed itself, demanding
no aid to the legitimate government of China, Chiang and the KMT.
Mitter dismisses these debates as personality squabbles, which led to
the horrors of McCarthyism. Mitter accuses Hurley and the right wing
of distortion (370), and concludes that the civil war “went badly
for the Nationalists in large part because of Chiang's ...
judgments.”(369) Observe Mitter's non-judgmental phrase, “...when
the Korean War broke out in 1950.”(371) I would argue the question
as to whether China became Communist or Nationalist was a major one,
and there is good reason to suspect deception and treason in the
American community led to the betrayal of Chiang and the victory of
Mao.
Mitter
describes how Chiang in 1937 was the recognized leader of China –
recognized even by Stalin's USSR. Mitter notes how the early years
of war in China received world-wide publicity. The Spanish Civil War
was still on-going, and suddenly there was another war against cruel
imperialism. If Guernica became a symbol for the world of the
horrors or war, soon that picture was to be joined by newsreels of
bombing when the Japanese invaded Shanghai, and even more so ,
Dec.-Jan. 1937-38 when Japanese troops were given free reign to loot,
rape, and kill in Nanking, the city that had been the capital of
Chiang's China. Although Mao in his out-of- the-way Yenan hoped to
use guerrilla tactics, Chiang, with difficulty, maintained a regular
Chinese Army to fight the Japanese invaders, even if they were
usually loosing ground and battles.
In
December 1941 the Japanese did not simply attack Pearl Harbor; they
attacked the (American) Philippines, British Hong Kong, the Dutch
Indonesia, Siam, the Malay States, the “Gibraltar of the East”
Singapore, and Burma. By February 1942, all of SE Asia was
controlled by the Japanese or their allies. How could Chiang receive
any American supplies? Either on a Burma road (which was soon closed
because of the Japanese), or by air over “the hump,” the
Himalayas.
The
Americans also supplied Chiang with two military figures – one of
whom proved disastrous; the other helpful. “Vinegar” Joe
Stilwell was theoretically 2nd in command of the
Nationalist Army, directly under Chiang. Stilwell quickly developed
a contempt for Chiang whom he called “the peanut” in his diaries.
The other American advisor, who unlike Stilwell, stressed the role
of air power in the war was Gen. Claire Chennault, whose Flying
Tigers would become legendary in the Asian war. Because the
Japanese' occupation of coastal China now extended to all of SE Asia,
Chiang's Nationalists were isolated; getting supplies to them was a
major problem. Of course, after Pearl Harbor, Germany had declared
war on the US, and Gen. Marshall and the American leadership decided
Europe would be the primary target, so most supplies and lend lease
materials would be headed for Britain or the USSR rather than China.
Stilwell was in charge of US lend-lease to China, which he used to
force Chiang to do as the American general wanted. In many ways
Stilwell (and perhaps Marshall and FDR) viewed Nationalist China more
as a satellite than as an ally. Mitter concluded that FDR's
appointment of Stilwell in China would lead “to the four-year duel
between Chiang and that American general...”(242) In the clashes,
although “Stilwell had no previous direct experience in
generalship,...he had a powerful friend in George C. Marshall.”(250)
On 6 February 1942 Marshall sent a message to China – “American
forces in China and Burma will operate under Stilwell's
direction...but Ger. Stilwell himself will always be under the
command of the Generalissimo [Chiang].” (250) Stilwell thought
that meant he was in command.
In
the spring 1942 Stilwell engaged in a battle for Burma. As things
went badly, he ordered the Chinese troops under his command to
withdraw to India. Chiang was appalled that a foreign commander of
Chinese troops would send them to another country rather than back to
China. Chiang counter-manded Stilwell's orders. Then Stilwell and
his small entourage arrived at Imphal, India, where he was
interviewed by American journalists. Chiang was aghast that
Stilwell, the commander, would abandon his troops. Many of those
“best” Chinese troops became lost in the thick Burmese jungles,
and lost to later fighting in China. Even Stilwell had described
this as a “risky” adventure (255); Mitter writes of this episode
as “the Burma debacle.”(260) Not only did China lose access to
supplies when the Japanese captured and retained the Burma Road, but
Stilwell's “highly risky gamble was much more likely to fail than
to succeed. It led to the death or injury of some 25,000 Chinese
troops along with over 10,000 British and Indian troops (with only
4,500 Japanese casualties). Retreat might” have saved many for the
defense of China.”(260)
Again
and again the Nationalists are depicted as incompetent and corrupt,
and Mitter, either quoting Western observers or adding his own
judgment, reinforces these negatives. For some Westerners, Chiang
Kai-shek became “Cash my check.” Others found Chiang personally
honest, but one who allowed corruption in his Army. Zhisui Li
trained as a physician in the West, but with his wife was
enthusiastic to return to the new China with his wife in 1949. On
the way back, they stopped in Hong Kong where a friend introduced
them to a man, reputed to be a high CCP official. The friend told Li
to give a gift to the official for “a smooth return...you might
land a good-paying job in a medical college in Beijing...give him a
Rolex watch...” The idealistic couple refused to give a bribe.
After some problems upon entry to the Peoples Republic of China, Li
eventually became the personal physician to Mao. “In 1956, when I
told Mao the story [about the request for a bribe], Mao laughed
uproariously. 'You bookworm,' he chided me. 'Why are you so stingy?
You don't understand human relations. Pure water can't support
fish.'”(Zhisui Li, The Private Life of Chairman Mao, p. 41)
It appears that the corruption denounced by leaders of the CCP in
recent years began at the birth of the PRC with Mao's attitude.
As
in other theaters of fighting in WWII, the changes in the popular
image of Chiang would follow the pattern of another leader who
fought against both Axis aggression and communism. On 25 March 1941,
Prince Paul, Regent of Yugoslavia, agreed to adhere to the
Tri-Partite Treaty, effectively bringing his nation into an Axis
alliance. Because many officers
were Serbs and opposed to the Germans, they staged a coup on 27
March. Hitler, preparing for his Operation Barbarosa against the
USSR, did not want an anti-German Yugoslavia behind his lines. On 6
April 1941 Germany invaded Yugoslavia and was soon joined by
several Axis allies. By mid-April, Yugoslavia had surrendered.
Later that same month, Draza Mihailovic, an officer, gathered others
together to begin a resistance to German occupation. Only after the
Germans attacked the Soviet Union 22 June 1941 would any communist
think of forming an underground against the fascist occupation and
collaborating governments in the now dismembered Yugoslavia. The
leader of the communist partisans was Josip Broz Tito, and he and
Mihailovic forces at first agreed to cooperate. However, when
sabotage provoked massive retribution by the Germans, Mihailovic's
Chetniks were opposed to large-scale sabotage, except under special
circumstances. Tito was for it. By year's end, there were
skirmishes between the Chetnics and the communists.
Yugoslavia,
unlike some European nations, was a multi-ethnic state with simmering
feuds and hatreds. With defeat, Serbia was reduced in size; an
independent Croatia created; and parts of the Yugoslavia were
occupied by Hungarians, Italians, and others. There were Slovenians
and Muslims, and Jewish and German minority groups. Mihailovic and
the Chetniks did at time collaborate with the puppet government in
Serbia; sometimes, Tito's Partisans also collaborated. However, more
important for the future of both Tito and Mihailovic were some of the
personnel of Britain's MI6 and the newly formed American Office of
Strategic Services (the American intelligence agency). At the
decoding area in Benchly Park in the UK, we now know several
important figures were Communists and Soviet agents. Also, in the
rush to create an American agency, Bill Donovan was chiefly concerned
about recruiting people opposed to fascism, rather than worrying if
they might have far-left backgrounds. With the help of Communist and
Soviet agents inside Britain's MI6, and similar agents inside
Donovan's OSS, soon MI6 and the OSS were reporting that Tito's
partisans were doing all the fighting in Yugoslavia against the
Germans and fascist collaborationist regimes, while Mihailovic either
did nothing or was himself collaborating. When Mihailovic's
guerrillas did fight, the MI6 crowd attributed such resistance to the
Reds. The stage was being set for the betrayal of Mihailovic; by
early 1943 Churchill, believing the distorted MI6 reports, gave up on
Mihailovic, and at war's end,when Tito and the communists came to
power, Mihailovic was executed. Many said that was a political
decision of the court. In 2017 a Serbian court quashed the treason
conviction of Mihailovic. Others maintain that was a political
decision.
So
initially, Mihailovic is portrayed as a national, patriotic hero
fighting against the German oppressors. But when the communists
backed Tito, a change in reporting about Mihailovic occurred.
A
similar pattern can be observed in the treatment of Chiang and Mao.
At first, Chiang is hailed as the Chinese leader standing up against
brutal, Japanese aggression. But then he is portrayed as corrupt,
inefficient, unwilling to fight the Japanese, always in retreat. By
contrast, Mao was building a new egalitarian society where everyone
pulled together for the same goals; and his forces led guerrilla
campaigns against the Japanese and collaborators. Dreyer argued
years later that all hoped to avoid battle with the Japanese, but all
had to fight them if and when the Japanese attacked. But only the
Nationalists maintained an army of 4 million to oppose the Japanese.
Mitter even acknowledges that Chiang's armies held down about 500,000
Japanese troops who might have been assigned elsewhere.(379) such as
a major invasion of India. Others place the number of Japanese
stuck in the China quagmire at 700,000 to a million; it was a war
that Japanesean simply could not seem to win because of the
resistance by Chiang.
Mitter
includes discussion of the repression in China under Wang's
Axis-Nationalist regime in Nanjing; Chiang's anti-Japanese regime in
Chunking; and Mao's communist territory in Yenan. In war time, of
course, the first two imposed repression. Here's how Mitter
describes what was occurring in Yenan: “The communist terror was
different. The purpose...was not to line anyone's pocket. Rather,
it envisioned – and achieved – one clear aim: it would bring
together radicalized ideology, wartime isolation, and fear to create
a new system of political power. The war against Japanesean was
giving birth to Mao's China.”(295) The History Channel in 2017
showed a special on Mao which provided an example. After arriving in
Yenan after the Long March, Mao had posters announce requests for
criticism. Next day, some critics posted their views on the wall.
Mao found the author of the main critique, had him arrested. Mao
then watched as the man's knees were bent in various, unnatural ways,
meant to cause as much pain as possible. Mao did not touch; just
watched. Additional pain was inflicted upon the critic. Eventually,
the fun was over and Mao had the victim killed. Thus, Mao was
forging unity among the radicals.
In
WWII America was clearly more interested in defeating Hitler and
fascism in Europe, deeming them a greater threat than Imperial
Japanesean. The US and Britain had much in common, and when FDR and
Churchill met in the Atlantic, sailors of both nations sang Christian
hymns, shown in newsreels, reinforcing the common bonds. There were
no similar bonds with Stalin's USSR. But like Churchill, FDR would
make a deal with the devil to defeat Hitler. Lend lease and military
supplies were sent to Britain and the Soviets while American
servicemen in the Pacific might be 3rd on the priority
list. We did not want Britain or the Soviets to collapse.
But
we did not want the Republic of China to collapse either! America
sent Stilwell to be the number 2 military figure in the Republic of
China! We were turning Chiang's China into a satellite. Could you
imagine Roosevelt sending an American general to be the number 2
military figure in Stalin's USSR? Although we were giving much more
to Stalin, Americans could not even stop when American aid was being
re-labeled in the USSR so it appeared to the recipients as Soviet
home aid. Stalin was given a free hand. FDR's Administration even
asked Hollywood to produce films sympathetic to Stalin, so “Mission
to Moscow” and other films glorifying Stalin's Soviet empire were
produced.
Even
if the remarks by FDR to Stilwell, to get Chiang to do what we want
or eliminate him- even if this conversation were another Stilwell
fantasy, it would not alter the way the US treated the leader of the
Chinese Republic. China was snubbed as a satellite, and as the war
wore on, and the influence of the left-wingers in the American
bureaucracy waxed, their smearing of Chiang prepared the way for the
disarming of the KMT and the victory of the communists in 1949.
After
four years of fighting the Japanese alone, with America as a new
ally, Chiang was left to deal with an inept general who recklessly
wasted Chinese troops on ventures that weakened China and permitted
Japanesean to launch a major assault into China in 1944. There is
also good reason to believe leftists and communists were inside
American intelligence organizations working inside China, providing
information to the “peasant rebels.” So “hero” Chiang of
1938 was transformed into the corrupt, inept, un-willing-to-fight the
Japanese, fascist-tainted Chiang of the mid-1940s. That is why
Chiang deserved to abandon Chinese claims to Outer Mongolia (which
was by then the Soviet satellite of Mongolia), and deserved to have
the Soviets plundering Manchuria at the end of WWII. And of course,
that is why Chiang did not deserve any weapons for his KMT during the
civil war against the peasant reformers of Yenan led by Mao.
Like
others, I think Chiang with American help could have defeated the
Communists in the civil war following WWII. Deception and treason
crippled Chiang's chances to win. The results – China under
Chairman Mao for decades with millions of Chinese starved, tortured,
or executed. And the other legacy of that era – the Kim Il Sung
dynasty in North Korea. What a legacy of the Left?
