'China's World War II 1937 - 1945' is the telling of the story of the war's longest participant, a story seldom told from China's perspective. China suffered fourteen million casualties and 80 million refugees. The war was instrumental in assuring Chiang's defeat by Mao and continues to play a critical role in China's internal affairs and worldview today. As the Chinese Empire slowly fell apart in the 19th century, the Japanese transformeded themselves very quickly into a world power. They defeated the Russians after the turn of the century and occupied Korea, Formosa and parts of Manchuria. After WW I, Japan was awarded Germany's territories in China. The Japanese were in the throes of nationalistic aggression and felt they were entitled to dominate the weak Chinese landmass. They occupied Manchuria in 1931. The China that Japan attacked on July 26, 1937 was nominally ruled by Chiang and his Nationalist Party, but was still very much the fractured and war-lord dominated cauldron of chaos it had been for a century. Peking, Shanghai and Nanjing quickly fell to the Japanese onslaught, notwithstanding Chiang's alliances with the USSR and the CCP. To his credit, Chiang declared a war of national resistance and vowed to never surrender to the invaders. It was his belief that resisting the Japanese was what was needed to build a nation. In 1938 as Chiang retreated further south and west, he made an extraordinary decision. In order to protect his then-capital of Wuhan, he had the Yellow River dikes blown up in order to flood the valley and stop the Japanese Army. Wuhan was preserved for five months at a cost of 500,000 confirmed Chinese dead. By the time war broke out in Europe, most of eastern and southern China, home to most of its cities, infrastructure, wealth and population was in Japanese hands. The years prior to Pearl Harbor settled into a relatively quiet jostling for position and preeminence between the Nationalists in the southwest, the Communists in the north and the Japanese in the east. Mao slowly became the sole leader of the CCP and committed it to a policy of guerrilla warfare only. He did not believe in fighting pitched battles.
The Sino-American alliance was doomed from inception. Chiang expected massive amounts of American supplies, forces and treasure, while the US's only concern was that the three-quarters of a million Imperial soldiers stay in China. Joe Stillwell had visions of aggressive offensive actions, yet reported to the cautious defensive-minded Chiang. Chiang wanted to be a major player; for FDR and Churchill, China was a sideshow. Stillwell and Chiang despised each other and fought from day one until the bitter end. Mix in Chennault's bravado, hundreds of millions of starving Chinese, a rump failed state with no administrative capabilities, reduced Allied supplies when Japan conquered Burma, and a totally corrupt elite and you get some sense of the hopelessness in the theater. As the war progressed, Free China became a terrorist police state. The Japanese launched a major offensive, their largest of the war, in central China in May, 1944. Chiang and Stillwell bickered over the degree of each other's commitment to recapturing Burma and defending against the onslaught in China. FDR finally gave in and removed Stillwell from Chiang's command, in essence neutering Chiang as commander-in-chief of Free China. Three months later, he reversed himself and recalled Stillwell. The author contends that the bitterness and distrust still carries over to current US-Sino relations. The Japanese offensive petered out, but had very important long-term affects. The Nationalists were beaten down and were never able to recover. At war's end though, China itself was in unique position it had not been in for a century. It was fully sovereign. A sovereignty, however, on the verge of civil war.
Forty years ago, thanks to Barbara Tuchman's Pulitzer Prize winning 'Stillwell and the American Experience in China', I came to the conclusion that the man Vinegar Joe called Peanut was one of the most incompetent dictators we've ever allied with. This author presents a much more nuanced assessment. For all of Chiang's faults, Stillwell was not the paragon Tuchman presented. He was a headstrong prima donna, incapable of working with anyone, including Mountbatten and just about anyone else he came in contact with. That said, Chiang was clearly not up to the tasks he took on. His failure to lead the Nationalists has had a long term deleterious effect in China and devastating consequences for America. The adoration of the old 'China Lobby' for Chiang and the legacy of that lobby's impact on our foreign policy, even today, is a hard pill to swallow.
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