by Frank McLynn
Chapter Sixteen
pp. 386–411
• 1. Graham Peck, Two Kinds of Time (Boston, 1950), pp. 417, 450, 476, 514, 533–4; T. White & A. Jacoby, Thunder out of China (NY, 1946), p. 197. • 2. Hollington Tong, Dateline China (NY, 1950), pp. 242, 247–50. • 3. Mountbatten Diary, p. 121. For Madame Chiang’s departure see New York Times, 30 November, 11 December 1944. • 4. See Frank McLynn, Fitzroy Maclean (1992), pp. 158–63. • 5. C.F. Romanus & R. Sunderland, Stilwell’s Mission to China (Washington DC, 1953), pp. 302–3. • 6. Barbara Tuchman, Sand against the Wind (1971), p. 463. • 7. MP, iv, p. 387; C.F. Romanus & R. Sunderland, Stilwell’s Personal File (1976), v, 1913–18. For the Dixie Mission see John Service, Lost Chance in China (NY, 1974), esp. pp. 179–81, 196–7; David D. Barrett, The Dixie Mission: the US Army Observer Corps in Yenna, 1944 (Berkeley, 1970). • 8. For Wallace see John Maze & Graham White, Henry A. Wallace: His Search for a New World Order (S. Carolina, 1995); John C. Culver & John Hyde, American Dreamer: The Life and Times of Henry A. Wallace (2002). For details of the Wallace mission see Henry A. Wallace, The Price of Vision: The Diary of Henry A. Wallace 1942–1946 (Boston, 1973), pp. 349–51; Owen Lattimore (with Fujiko Isono), China Memories (Tokyo, 1990), p. 186. • 9. Lattimore, China Memories, op. cit., pp. 181–6. Service made four valuable points: 1) The USA had spoiled China with an open-ended Lend-Lease cornucopia. The Stilwell approach of provisional aid was the correct one. 2) It was vital to recognise other elements in China such as Madame Sun Yat-sen and the Communists. 3) Washington should stop lying about Chiang and the KMT – by this date essentially irrelevancies anyway – and educate US public opinion towards a realistic assessment of China: Joseph W. Esherick, Lost Chance in China: the World War Two Dispatches of John S. Service (NY, 1974), p. 153. Above all, secret service collusion between Tai-li and the Secret Service US Naval Group China under Commander Milton E. Miles should be discontinued. Miles, who later had a nervous breakdown, was a maverick operator who got across Wild Bill Donovan and worked as his own spy network: Milton Miles, A Different Kind of War (Garden City, NJ, 1967), pp. 115–16; Michael Shaller, The US Crusade in China, 1938–1945 (NY, 1979), pp. 248–50. For Donovan’s activities in North Burma see MP, iv, pp. 498–9. • 10. Herbert Feis, The China Tangle (Princeton, 1953), pp. 145–51; Claire Lee Chennault, Way of a Fighter (NY, 1949), p. 266. For the Chennault exaggerations see MP, iv, pp. 256–7. • 11. Samuel Rosenman, Working with Roosevelt (NY, 1952), pp. 438–9; Eugene L. Rasor, The China-Burma-India Campaign 1931–1945 (1998), p. 39; Ke-Wen Chang, An Encyclopedia of Chinese History, Culture and Nationalism (1998), p. 332. • 12. Tuchman, Sand against the Wind, op. cit. • 13. New York Times, 9, 21 June, 22 August, 6 October 1944. • 14. Jon Latimer, Burma. The Forgotten War (2004), p. 338. • 15. Tuchman, Sand against the Wind, op. cit., p. 468. • 16. Ibid. • 17. White & Jacoby, Thunder, op. cit., pp. 181–3; cf. MP, iv, p. 503; C.F. Romanus & R. Sunderland, Stilwell’s Command Problems (Washington, 1956), pp. 316–28, 371–4. • 18. Tuchman, Sand against the Wind, op. cit., p. 458. Chennault’s complaints to Marshall are at MP, iv, p. 475. Yet even he admitted the heavy loss of his planes during I-CHIGO (Chennault, Way of a Fighter, op. cit., pp. 287–92). • 19. SP, p. 282. • 20. MP, iv, pp. 472–3; Romanus & Sunderland, Stilwell’s Command Problems, op. cit., pp. 367–9; Tuchman, Sand against the Wind, op. cit., p. 259. • 21. SP, p. 288. • 22. C.F. Romanus & R. Sunderland, Time Runs Out in CBI (Washington DC, 1959), p. 57. • 23. Peck, Two Kinds of Time, op. cit., p. 498; for White see Joyce Hoffmann, Theodore H. White and Journalism as Illusion (NY, 1995). • 24. SP, pp. 291, 295, 296. • 25. Ibid., pp. 292–3. • 26. Ibid., p. 292. • 27. Stilwell’s comments on this are at ibid., p. 296. For Churchill’s comments see The Second World War (1950), v, pp. 600–1. For the Auk’s refutation see John Connell, Auchinleck (1959) p. 743. • 28. SP, p. 304. • 29. Philip Ziegler, Mountbatten (1985), p. 284. • 30. SP, p. 310. • 31. See, for instance, the letter Mountbatten sent Stilwell from London on 14 August (WO 203/3331). • 32. MP, iv, pp. 417–18; Romanus & Sunderland, Stilwell’s Command Problems, op. cit., pp. 309–10. The quotation is from Eric Larrabee, Commander-in-Chief (1987), p. 572. • 33. Tuchman, Sand against the Wind, op. cit., p. 470. • 34. Ibid. • 35. Ibid., p. 471. • 36. This is admitted even by Chiang’s most ardent defender: Jay Taylor, The Generalissimo (Harvard, 2009) pp. 278–80. • 37. MP, iv, p. 510. • 38. Ibid., iv, pp. 500–7; Romanus & Sunderland, Stilwell’s Command Problems, op. cit., pp. 374–8. • 39. Romanus & Sunderland, Stilwell’s Command Problems, op. cit., p. 472; SP, p. 296. • 40. Larrabee, Commander-in-Chief, op. cit., p. 568. • 41. The standard account of Hurley is Patrick D. Buhite, Patrick J. Hurley and American Foreign Policy (Ithaca, NY, 1973). For some anecdotes about him see John Pen La Farge, Turn Left at the Sleeping Dog (NM, 2006), p. 103; T. Christoper Jesperson, American Images of China 1931–1949 (1999), p. 136; Arnold A. Other, Another Such Victory. President Truman and the Cold War 1945–53 (NY, 2002), p. 311. • 42. MP, iv, pp. 544–5, 554. • 43. Ibid., iv, pp. 563–6. • 44. Tuchman, Sand against the Wind, passim. • 45. SP, p. 290. For the Hurley mission in late 1944 see Lattimore, China Memories, op. cit., p. 85; John Paton Davies, Dragon by the Tail (NY, 1972), p. 342; White & Jacoby, Thunder, op. cit., pp. 199, 208–11, 249–52; Michael Schaller, The United States and China in the Twentieth Century (NY, 1979), p. 99; Jonathan Fenby, Chiang Kai-shek: China’s Generalissimo and the Nation He Lost (NY, 2004), p. 438. • 46. Carolle J. Carter, Mission to Yenan. American Liaison with the Chinese Communists 1944–1947 (Lexington, KT, 1997), p. 23. For the so-called Dixie Mission see Wilbur J. Peterkin, Inside China 1943–1945: An Eyewitness Account of America’s Mission to Yenan (Baltimore, 1992); William P. Head, Yenan! Colonel Wilbur Peterkin and the American Military Mission to the Chinese Communists 1944–1945 (Chapel Hill, NC, 1987). • 47. SP, p. 300. • 48. Ibid., p. 299; Tuchman, Sand against the Wind, op. cit., p. 482. • 49. Tuchman, Sand against the Wind, op. cit. • 50. SP, p. 303. • 51. Ibid., p. 300. For Hurley’s very strong pro-Chiang position see Lohbeck, Patrick J. Hurley op. cit., pp. 285–6. • 52. SP, pp. 303–4. • 53. Webster, Burma Road (2004), pp. 275–6. • 54. C.T. Liang, General Stilwell in China (NY, 1972), pp. 176–7. • 55. Romanus & Sunderland, Time Runs Out, op. cit., pp. 354–60, 394–8. • 56. SP, p. 299. • 57. Liang, General Stilwell, op. cit., pp. 24, 50, 64, 77. • 58. Tuchman, Sand against The Wind, op. cit., p. 489. • 59. Romanus & Sunderland, Stilwell’s Command Problems, op. cit., p. 429. Feis, China Tangle, op. cit., pp. 222–63. • 60. Ronald Lewin, ‘World War Two. A Tangled Web’, Journal of the Royal United Services Institute 127 (1982), p. 19. • 61. Larrabee, Commander-in-Chief, op. cit., p. 574. • 62. White & Jacoby, Thunder, op. cit., pp. 187–8. • 63. Ibid., pp. 190–4. • 64. Tuchman, Sand against the Wind, op. cit., p. 489. • 65. MP, iv, pp. 585–6; also Romanus & Sunderland, Stilwell’s Command Problems, op. cit., p. 546. Hurley naturally wanted to shield Chiang from the full blast of FDR’s invective: Lohbeck, Hurley, op. cit., pp. 292–3. • 66. Liang, General Stilwell, op. cit., pp. 239–41. The receipt of the famous telegram has often been described as Chiang’s greatest humiliation. See White & Jacoby, Thunder, op. cit., pp. 220–1; Fenby, Chiang Kai-shek, op. cit., pp. 428–9; Feis, China Tangle, op. cit., p. 189. • 67. Taylor, Generalissimo, op. cit., p. 289; Romanus & Sunderland, Stilwell’s Command Problems, op. cit., pp. 443–53. • 68. SP, pp. 305–6. In his rage Chiang threatened to have Stilwell assassinated: Taylor, Generalissimo, op. cit., p. 289. • 69. SP, p. 305. • 70. Ibid. • 71. Ibid., pp. 307–9. • 72. Tuchman, Sand against the Wind, op. cit. • 73. The most detailed study of FDR in the 1944 elections is Samuel Rosenman, Working with Roosevelt (NY, 1952). • 74. SP, p. 310. • 75. Romanus & Sunderland, Stilwell’s Mission, op. cit., p. 278. • 76. Tuchman, Sand against the Wind, op. cit., pp. 499–500. • 77. Henry L. Stimson & McGeorge Bundy, On Active Service in Peace and War (NY, 1949), pp. 303–4, 535–6. Stimson thought Stilwell’s subsequent dismissal a bitterly unjust outcome:
Feis, China Tangle, op. cit., pp. 194–5. Marshall prepared a draft signal to Chiang, dated 16 October 1944 (MP, iv, pp. 627–8), which, while accepting Stilwell’s withdrawal, nonetheless slapped the generalissimo down when he claimed that Stilwell was unsuitable for the proposed new command. He also added that the charge that Stilwell had lost eastern China was absurd. As for the attack in northern Burma, that was a joint decision by the US president and the British prime minister. He also warned Chiang that Stilwell’s dismissal would adversely affect the reputation of the Kuomintang in the USA. Needless to say, FDR himself altered the minute, heavily diluting the doughty defence of Stilwell. The final version appears in Romanus & Stilwell, Stilwell’s Command Problems, op. cit., pp. 460–2, 468–9. • 78. For the protracted negotiations see Tuchman, Sand against the Wind, op. cit., pp. 498–500. • 79. SP, pp. 312–15. • 80. For these two see M. Boatner, Biographical Dictionary of World War Two (Novato, CA, 1996), pp. 549–50, 608–9. • 81. SP, p. 283; Allen, Burma, op. cit., p. 387. As Webster (Burma Road, op. cit.) rightly remarks, what kind of man would call his autobiography Wedemeyer Reports!, complete with exclamation mark? • 82. Albert Wedemeyer, Wedemeyer Reports! (NY, 1958) pp. 65–7. • 83. MP, iv, pp. 578–9. • 84. See Time, 13 November 1944. • 85. Tuchman, Sand against the Wind, op. cit., p. 467. • 86. Lara Tyson Li, Madame Chiang Kai-shek, op. cit., p. 258; Sterling Seagrave, The Soong Dynasty (NY, 1986) pp. 412–13; Hannah Pakula, The Last Empress (2010), pp. 504–8. • 87. MP, iv, p. 631. • 88. There was a particularly lucid, incisive and passionately pro-Stilwell article in the New York Times, 31 October 1944. • 89. Tuchman, Sand against the Wind, op. cit., pp. 507–9. • 90. Ibid., p. 467. • 91. Mountbatten Diary, pp. 147–8; Ziegler, Mountbatten, op. cit., pp. 284–5. • 92. Connell, Auchinleck, op. cit., p. 777. • 93. DIV, pp. 281, 383–4. • 94. Ronald Lewin, Slim. The Standard Bearer (1976), pp. 141–2. • 95. Louis Allen, Burma. The Longest War 1941–45 (1984), p. 367. A G-2 was an officer belonging to Military Intelligence at the division level or higher. • 96. Lewin, Slim, op. cit., p. 142. • 97. The phrase is Barbara Tuchman’s (Sand against the Wind, op. cit., p. 531). For a defence of Stilwell on the above lines see David Rooney, Stilwell the Patriot (2005). • 98. F. Dorn, Walkout. With Stilwell in Burma (NY, 1973). • 99. Pakula, Last Empress, op. cit., p. 485. • 100. Thomas Moor & Carl F. Feifler, The Deadliest Colonel (NY, 1975), pp. 145–6, 184, 193; cf. Maochun Yu, OSS in China. Prelude to Cold War (Yale, 1996), p. 113. Some have alleged that Feifler devised the plan on his own and then unjustly implicated Stilwell as ‘legitimator’. His motive was that he detested Wild Bill Donovan and wanted to achieve an exploit that would blow Donovan out of the water. It is known that he angered Donovan by reminding him that he came under Stilwell’s command. • 101. Stimson & Bundy, On Active Service, op. cit., pp. 303–4, 535–6. • 102. Larrabee, Commander-in-Chief, op. cit., p. 578. • 103. Forrest Pogue, George C. Marshall. Organizer of Victory (NY, 1973), pp. 354–5. • 104. Thompson Parrish, Roosevelt and Marshall. Partners in Politics and War (NY, 1985), pp. 443–4. • 105. To my mind the prime offender is Jay Taylor. His pro-Chiang excesses can be seen at all stages in his book, but there is a particularly shaky defence of Chiang’s almost psychotic changes of mind at pp. 249–52 of Generalissimo, op. cit. Taylor actually gives the game away by the tell-tale phrase ‘to conjecture’ on p. 250. • 106. SP, pp. 348–9.
Chapter Seventeen
pp. 412–445
• 1. T. White & A. Jacoby, Thunder out of China (NY, 1946), pp. 190–3. • 2. Albert Wedemeyer, Wedemeyer Reports! (NY, 1958), pp. 301, 305. • 3. C.F. Romanus & R. Sunderland, Time Runs Out In CBI (Washington DC, 1959), pp. 52, 165. • 4. Wedemeyer as good as admits this himself: Wedemeyer Reports!, op. cit., p. 291. • 5. DIV, pp. 395–6. • 6. Jon Latimer, Burma. The Forgotten War (2004), p. 378. • 7. DIV, pp. 397–400. • 8. Ronald Lewin, Slim. The Standard Bearer (1976), p. 210. • 9. R. Callahan, Burma 1942–1945 (1978), pp. 156–8. • 10. WO 203/298. • 11. DIV, p. 393. • 12. Lewin, Slim, op. cit., pp. 209–13. • 13. DIV, p. 401. • 14. T. O’Brien, The Moonlight War (1987), pp. 169–73; G. Hartcup, Camouflage (Newton Abbot, 1979), pp. 115–16; S.W. Kirby, ed., The War against Japan (1961), iv pp. 501–5. • 15. J.H. Williams, Elephant Bill (1950), p. 279. • 16. DIV, pp. 404–6. • 17. Louis Allen, Burma. The Longest War 1941–45 (1984), pp. 399–400. • 18. Lewin, Slim, op. cit., p. 217. • 19. Allen, Burma, op. cit., p. 416. • 20. DIV, p. 398. • 21. Ibid., pp. 401–2. • 22. Ibid. • 23. G. Evans, Slim as Military Commander (1969), p. 190. • 24. Kirby, ed., War against Japan, op. cit., iv, p. 177. • 25. Ibid., iv, p. 186; Allen, Burma, op. cit., pp. 403–5. • 26. Allen, Burma, op. cit., pp. 409–11. • 27. DIV, p. 418. • 28. Robert Lyman, Slim, Master of War (2004), p. 247. • 29. Malcolm Page, KAR. A History of the King’s African Rifles and East African Forces (Barnsley, 1998), pp. 160–3; DIV, pp. 422–3. • 30. James R. Penn, Rivers of the World (Santa Barbara, CA, 2001), p. 115. • 31. DIV, pp. 409–10. • 32. Ibid., p. 415. • 33. Kirby, ed., War against Japan, op. cit., iv, pp. 184–6. • 34. DIV, p. 415. • 35. Ibid., pp. 420–1. • 36. C.L. Proudfoot, We Lead (New Delhi, 1991), pp. 85–8. • 37. DIV, p. 421. • 38. Ibid., pp. 433–6. • 39. Michael Roberts, Golden Arrow (1952), p. 76. • 40. Lewin, Slim, op. cit., p. 221. • 41. G. Evans, The Desert and the Jungle (1959), p. 141. • 42. J. Nunnelly, ed., Tales from the Burma Campaign 1942–45 (Petersham, 1998), pp. 87–8. • 43. Evans, Desert and the Jungle, op. cit., p. 146. • 44. J. Thompson, The Imperial War Museum Book of the War in Burma 1942–1945 (2002), pp. 298–302. • 45. Evans, Desert and the Jungle, op. cit., p. 151. Evans, who went up in a plane to reconnoitre, narrowly missed being shot down. • 46. B. Prasad, ed., Reconquest of Burma (Delhi, 1958), ii, pp. 286–8. • 47. DIV, p. 429. • 48. Lewin, Slim, op. cit., pp. 221–2. • 49. George MacDonald Fraser, Quartered Safe Out Here. A Recollection of the War in Burma (1995), pp. 35–6. • 50. H. Smaule, Spearhead General (1961), pp. 351–2. • 51. Miles Smeeton, A Change of Jungles (1962), pp. 89–90. • 52. The history of tank warfare in the Burma campaign almost merits a study to itself. There is copious material on the use of heavy armour in the period January–April 1945 in WO 203/1795 and 203/354. • 53. DIV, p. 442. • 54. Ibid., p. 443. • 55. Ibid., pp. 442–3, 446–7. • 56. For a complete description of the battle see Smeeton, Change of Jungles, op. cit., Allen, Burma, op. cit., pp. 436–9. • 57. J.P. Cross & B. Gurung, eds., Gurkhas at War (2002), p. 99. • 58. Allen, Burma, op. cit., pp. 439–40; DIV, p. 451. • 59. DIV, pp. 452–4. • 60. A. Brett-James, Ball of Fire (Aldershot, 1951), p. 402. • 61. Lyman, Slim, op. cit., p. 251. • 62. DIV, pp. 456–7. • 63. Allen, Burma, op. cit., p. 450. • 64. Ibid., p. 454. • 65. Ibid., p. 407; DIV, p. 469. • 66. Compton Mackenzie, All Over the Place (1949), p. 110. • 67. John Masters, The Road Past Mandalay (1961), p. 308; Prasad, ed., Reconquest of Burma, op. cit., ii, p. 354. • 68. DIV, p. 469. • 69. Prasad, ed., Reconquest of Burma, op. cit., ii; pp. 354–9; Kirby, ed., War against Japan, op. cit., iv, p. 299. • 70. Prasad, ed., Reconquest of Burma, op. cit., pp. 361–3. • 71. Latimer, Burma, op. cit., p. 395. • 72. E.K.G. Sixsmith, British Generalship in the Twentieth Century (1970), p. 290; J. Gooch, ed., Decisive Campaigns of the Second World War (1990), p. 168. • 73. Lewin, Slim, op. cit., pp. 214–15. • 74. For Terachi and Meiktila see ibid., p. 216. On Slim as military genius: ‘In so defeating the Japanese Slim earned a Chinese accolade, for Sun-Tzu would surely have recognised him as a “heaven-born captain”’: ibid., p. 213. • 75. DIV, p. 447. • 76. Ibid., pp. 410–11, 413, 416; Lyman, Slim, op. cit., p. 245. • 77. Lewin, Slim, op. cit., p. 217; Lyman, Slim, op. cit., p. 245. • 78. WO 203/866. See also C.F. Romanus & R. Sunderland, Stilwell’s Command Problems (Washington, 1956), p. 299. • 79. Latimer, Burma, op. cit., pp. 359–73; Allen, Burma, op. cit., pp. 456–8. • 80. DIV, p. 462. • 81. Herbert Feis, The China Tangle (Princeton, 1953), p. 275; White & Jacoby, Thunder, op. cit., p. 260; Don Moser, China, Burma, India (VA, 1978), pp. 190–1. • 82. Romanus
& Sunderland, Time Runs Out, op. cit., p. 141; Kirby, ed., War against Japan, op. cit., iv, p. 194. • 83. Webster, Burma Road, pp. 318–19, 324–7. • 84. E.L. Fischer, The Chancy War (NY, 1991), pp. 49–60; O.C. Spencer, Flying the Hump (TX, 1992), p. 174. • 85. DIV, pp. 443–4, 464–6. • 86. W.S. Churchill, Second World War (1950), vi, p. 535. • 87. Mountbatten Diary, pp. 168–77. The flight over the battlefield was typical Mountbatten: ‘Beneath was a most inspiring sight – an army in hot pursuit of a beaten enemy … Down the river Chindwin an endless stream of DUKWs and other crafts were carrying soldiers; along the track on the river bank lorries and motor vehicles of all types were ploughing on in an endless stream like the traffic leading to Epsom on Derby Day. Alongside them marched the infantry in single file, interspersed with mule trains. It is just one vast forward surge, and one of the most exhilarating sights I have ever seen’: Philip Ziegler, Mountbatten (1985), p. 288. • 88. Mountbatten Diary, p. 186. • 89. Ibid., pp. 192–3; DIV, p. 444. • 90. Ziegler, Mountbatten, op. cit., pp. 293–4. • 91. Mountbatten Diary, pp. 193–4. • 92. Romanus & Sunderland, Time Runs Out, op. cit., pp. 324–5. • 93. Ziegler, Mountbatten, op. cit., pp. 293–4. • 94. Lewin, Slim, op. cit., p. 228. • 95. DIV, p. 482. • 96. Allen, Burma, op. cit., p. 454. • 97. DIV, pp. 470–2. • 98. Ibid., pp. 473–4. • 99. Ibid., pp. 474–5. • 100. Lewin, Slim, op. cit., pp. 231–2. • 101. Mountbatten Diary, p. 181. • 102. Lewin, Slim, op. cit., p. 233. • 103. Allen, Burma, op. cit., pp. 582–4. • 104. Latimer, Burma, op. cit., p. 407. • 105. Lewin, Slim, op. cit., pp. 232–3. • 106. DIV, p. 487. Slim was told by Mountbatten at Monywa on 19 March that DRACULA would go ahead, but Leese then spent 11 days dithering over the details. Finally he refused to authorise certain airborne troops whose participation was essential for success. Mountbatten had to fly to Calcutta in person to reprimand Leese and countermand his orders: Lewin, Slim, op. cit., p. 231. • 107. DIV, pp. 488–9. • 108. Ibid., pp. 489–92. • 109. WO 203/53. • 110. Allen, Burma, op. cit., pp. 464–7. • 111. DIV, p. 496. • 112. Ibid., p. 497. • 113. Lewin, Slim, op. cit., pp. 233–4. • 114. Kirby, ed., War against Japan, op. cit., iv, pp. 249–50. • 115. DIV, p. 499. • 116. Prasad, ed., Reconquest of Burma, op. cit., ii, p. 402. • 117. WO 208/1057. • 118. Allen, Burma, op. cit., pp. 477–8. • 119. DIV, p. 504. • 120. Lewin, Slim, op. cit., p. 234. • 121. DIV, p. 505. • 122. Thompson, Imperial War Museum Book of the War in Burma, op. cit., p. 383. • 123. Though the trope was originally used about Slim’s dash south to Rangoon: Masters, Road Past Mandalay, op. cit., p. 312. • 124. DIV, p. 506. • 125. For the discussions see Allen, Burma, op. cit., pp. 481–4. • 126. DIV, pp. 504–5. • 127. Lewin, Slim, op. cit., p. 236. • 128. DIV, pp. 510–13. • 129. Latimer, Burma, op. cit., p. 422. • 130. The entire story is told in Allen, Burma, op. cit., pp. 488–534, and at greater length in his Sittang. The Last Battle (1976). • 131. Lyman, Slim, op. cit., p. 254; Lewin, Slim, op. cit., p. 210.