by David Rooney
Then he wrote to his wife:
‘OFFICE OF THE COMMANDING GENERAL, AMERICAN ARMY FORCES, CBI: LETTER TO MRS STILWELL
Got some paper at last, so now you can see what a big shot I really am. Actually, it’s all wind. This is just a side show, and I’m beginning to wonder if any life can ever be pumped into it. You can imagine the continuous struggle to overcome the inertia of centuries, and battle the jealousies of Chinese officialdom. That ought to be spelled Official-dumb. You know the type of gangster that gets to the top here, so I won’t go further into my troubles. But it’s a hell of a way to fight a war, from my point of view, and it makes me feel like a complete slacker. Now if I were in addition a slicker, I might make some headway.
This was the start of a period when Stilwell travelled constantly between Rangoon, Delhi, Chungking and Kunming, the main base for the supplies flown over the Hump. His personal aircraft was an aging DC3, and in this he flew over the Hump to the air bases in Assam and from there another thousand miles to Delhi. From Delhi he made frequent onward trips to the great base at Ramgarh, where over 8,000 Chinese soldiers were being trained and equipped for the reconquest of Burma. To carry out his multifarious responsibilities he also had to visit Karachi, the main port for military material brought by sea from the USA.
The training camp at Ramgarh, which lay about 40 miles from a major British base at Ranchi, brought Stilwell once more into close contact with Slim. Slim referred to ‘our old friends the Chinese’, remembering perhaps the help he had received from General Sun and 38 Division in the desperate fighting around Yenangyaung. Slim admired Stilwell’s determination and his indomitable will. Few people – American, British or Chinese – really believed that an effective fighting force could be created from the Chinese troops at Ramgarh, but Stilwell was achieving it. Grave difficulties faced him. The Indian authorities were apprehensive about the presence of 8,000 Chinese troops in Bengal, and the Chinese leadership – notably Chiang and Chennault – continued to demand a massive build-up of aircraft for bases around Chunking and strongly opposed the priority given to the idea of the reconquest of northern Burma and the opening of the Burma Road. Stilwell bluntly refuted this argument by pointing out that occupying forces could only be driven out by ground troops and not by aircraft. Slim wrote:
Stilwell was magnificent. He forced Chiang Kai-shek to provide the men; he persuaded India to accept a large Chinese force, and the British to pay for it, accommodate, feed, and clothe it. The American Terry Command’ then flew thirteen thousand Chinese from Kunming over ‘The Hump’, the great mountain range between Assam and China, to airfields in the Brahmaputra Valley, whence they came by rail to Ramgarh. This was the first large-scale troop movement by air in the theatre and was an outstanding achievement. The young American pilots of the Hump should be remembered with admiration and gratitude by their countrymen and their allies.*
To make his command effective, Stilwell kept his main HQ in Chungking, under Brigadier General Hearn, and a second HQ under General Sibert in Delhi. Brigadier General McCabe commanded the Ramgarh Training Centre, and Brigadier General Bissell, who had been in Chungking with Stilwell, commanded the Tenth Air Force. Despite a clear command structure, Stilwell still faced formidable problems – notably of supply. Most supplies came across the Pacific from Los Angeles. Bombay was the best port, but it was constantly clogged up with British shipping and war supplies. Calcutta was much closer both to Ramgarh and to the Hump airfields in Assam, but it too was clogged up and was under frequent threat of Japanese air raids. Karachi had advantages but was separated from Ramgarh by the whole width of India and a hopelessly inadequate railway system. The Indian railways were unable to cope with the huge volume of traffic needed to build up Stilwell’s forces and the whole of the British Fourteenth Army.
One of Stilwell’s really great achievements, and one that is often overlooked, was the astounding success of the training regime at Ramgarh which he personally set up and, initially, supervised. The two Chinese divisions that had escaped to Imphal – 38 and 22 – were reconstituted. The men were well fed in a well-organised camp, given medical care and received regular pay – something they had never before experienced. Under American instructors running a crash programme the Chinese soldiers made remarkable progress, particularly in the difficult process of converting from infantry to artillery. Slim noted that ‘Everywhere was Stilwell, urging, leading, driving’.
During August 1942 Stilwell shuttled between Ramgarh and Delhi, constantly dealing with problems. Of necessity he had to make decisions while he was on the move between his different HQs, and this inevitably created some confusion and contributed to the criticism that he was not a good administrator. The arrest of Gandhi in Delhi on 9 August followed by serious riots highlighted the issue of internal security, as did the ominous first signs of the devastating famine in Bengal. In Ramgarh Stilwell drove things forward, but there were frequent clashes between Chinese and US instructors, who generally disliked the posting to Ramgarh. Stilwell intervened and supported the British when they insisted that the pay they provided should be given directly to the soldiers. The Chinese custom had been for the general commanding a division to receive all the pay for the division, and this he rarely passed on to the troops.
While Stilwell was busy in Ramgarh and Delhi, serious discussions took place between Roosevelt and Marshall. Currie had returned to Washington, where he suggested that things would be easier if Stilwell, with his abrasiveness, was removed. Roosevelt considered the idea and sounded out Marshall. He was contemptuous of Currie and resolutely backed Stilwell as the only person likely to gain any effective military action from Chiang in return for the colossal Lend–Lease supplies.
Stilwell’s diary and letters for August 1942 continued to mix serious comments with the trivial: he had to change his glasses; the country was flooded by the monsoon rain; anti-British disturbances made travel dangerous; he had had no letters for two months – ‘perhaps they are going by sea via Russia’; and there were tigers on the rifle range at Ramgarh. In a letter to his wife he wrote:
I have now arrived at the pinnacle of social success, having been entertained at lunch by the Viceroy himself. I am all in a dither over it. I took Dorn along and he made some good remarks about it. Nobody dared to open his trap at the table so it was up to me and the Vicey to keep the conversation going. They must be after something because Wavell also had me to lunch. He was not at all upstage, but he’s not what you call animated – in fact he impresses me as being a tired old man. Very cordial and probably tied down with instructions from London …
Make the most of Carmel … If I could get some new teeth and eyes and some hair dye, I wouldn’t look a day over seventy.
After his August activities in Ramgarh and the high-level discussions in Delhi, Stilwell flew to Chungking to report to Chiang. He brought with him many photographs of Ramgarh, the camp and the training activities. Chiang was impressed and the atmosphere was cordial, but even so Stilwell could barely hide his frustration. ‘He was much pleased with it. Why shouldn’t he be, the little jackass. We are doing our damndest to help him and he makes his approval look like a tremendous concession.’ Having gained Chiang’s approval of the Ramgarh centre, Stilwell then had to gain agreement to the next part of his strategy – to fly large numbers of Chinese soldiers to Ramgarh using the empty aircraft that had brought supplies over the Hump to Kunming. Chiang agreed, and the first troops were flown down in October 1942. Thereafter the American air service returned over the Hump with an average of 500 men per day. This was one of the earliest large-scale troop movements by air and is a tribute to Stilwell’s vision and determination.
During this visit, although he obtained Chiang’s agreement to the large-scale transfer of Chinese troops for training at Ramgarh, he still had to fight hard on the wider – and as he saw it, crucial – issue of concentrating thirty effective, well-armed and well-trained divisions at Kunming as the nucleus of the Chinese forces ready to take par
t in the recapture of Burma and the reopening of the Burma Road. He was able to advance his side in the game of double-bluff by hinting that the American war department was seriously considering stopping all military supplies unless China actively pursued the thirty-division proposal. He even proposed specific units that he thought should be chosen for the training.
The background to the discussion of the thirty-division plan was the 300 divisions, or four million men, in the Kuomintang army. In practice these were mostly half-starved peasants with no equipment or training and who were badly led and not fit for military activity. Stilwell had witnessed this when he was military attaché in the 1930s, when he compared Chiang’s troops adversely to the Communists. He had noted that for every battle casualty in the Kuomintang army, nine deserted or died of disease. The thirty-division plan was put forward even before Pearl Harbor, but Stilwell was aggressively determined to make it a reality. The real crux of the military situation in China was, to Stilwell’s constant frustration, the ineptitude of Chiang’s troops and the fact that he had almost no influence over the warlords and the 300 divisions they controlled. Chiang frequently made agreements with Stilwell or with Washington, but he rarely had any effective way of carrying them out. He made promises to one after another visiting American dignitary, who were taken in by his charm – and particularly Madame’s – and went back to Washington wondering if part of the problem in Chungking was, perhaps, Stilwell.
Throughout September 1942 Stilwell continued to wrestle with the intractable issue of the thirty Chinese divisions. He had a lengthy discussion with senior Chinese General Liu Fei about the future role of the Chinese forces in Burma. Liu suggested that China would put between five and ten divisions into Burma provided that there were six British or American divisions. Then three Chinese armies would hold two Japanese divisions at Lashio while the Americans and British engaged the other eight Japanese divisions. He explained that the Chinese could not attack because they had no planes or guns, and that if they did attack the Japanese could send ten divisions and hundreds of aircraft and all would be lost. The Chinese would attack when the Japanese were heavily engaged elsewhere and only if they were sure to win. Liu argued further that one-third of all Kuomintang forces were needed to face the Communists in the north. This detailed discussion, which Stilwell dismissed as pure crap, does go some way to explaining the hopeless position Chiang felt he was in and why he appeared to renege on all his promises.
In these discussions Stilwell clashed once again with General Lo, who had been with him during the retreat from Burma and was to come under his command at Ramgarh. Lo brought up the issue of pay for the soldiers at Ramgarh, which was provided by the British, and argued strongly that all of the 450,000 rupees should be paid to him. This was bluntly refused. After discussion with another senior and influential Chinese commander, Stilwell wrote: ‘He makes inaction a virtue by proving conclusively the impossibility of action.’
Towards the end of September, Stilwell received Washington’s formal reply to the Three Demands. This agreed to increase the number of aircraft and the tonnage flown over the Hump, but it stated that no American divisions would be sent to Burma. Stilwell wrote, ‘It amounts to doing nothing more than at present. I suppose I am to kid them into reorganising the Army.’ The depth of Stilwell’s frustration was shown by his final comment. Forces for Burma ‘will be the Ramgarh detachment, the Tenth Air Force, the Yunnan mob and a limited British detachment. In other words, what we have got. How very generous. Oh yes, a guy from operations will come out and show us how to do it.’
At the end of September, after a gap of many weeks, the post from home turned up. Soldiers on active service, from privates to generals, long for letters from family and friends. Stilwell was overjoyed, but the mail did not bring good news for some. In a field hospital in Burma a wounded man received a letter from his wife saying that she had gone off with another man. He shot himself.
Stilwell replied to his wife. ‘Just rereading the Feast of Letters. Boy did I get some letters. I’ve read it all three or four times already and it helps to offset the manure pile.’ He replied with questions about his son Ben’s fishing, his daughter Alison’s art exhibition and his dog Garry. He felt that his letters must be as dull as dishwater, and merely remarked on the weather, but he passed on the news that Dorn, who the family knew, had been promoted to full colonel.
Occasionally Stilwell’s diary contained several paragraphs on a particular topic, as if he wanted to clarify his thoughts. On 5 October 1942 he wrote, ‘Troubles of a peanut dictator,’ and outlined the serious problems which Chiang faced in his relations with the governors of the different Chinese provinces, who were also commanders in charge of the province and controllers of the local division. ‘So the Peanut lays off and waits. The plain fact is that he doesn’t dare to take vigorous action … Why doesn’t the little dummy realise that his only hope is the 30-division plan, and the creation of a separate, efficient, well-equipped, and well-trained force.’ When he wrote this Stilwell had just received a report on the effect of the Japanese retaliatory attack on southwest China after the Doolittle raid on Tokyo. He noted scathingly that the so-called reconquest of the area the Japanese had occupied was merely Chinese troops re-occupying it after the Japanese had left. They had wrecked the buildings, destroyed the paddy fields and carried off all metal, from railway lines to cooking pots. ‘Peanut directed operations from Chungking with the usual brilliant results.’
Early in October Stilwell made some barbed comments about the visit of Senator Wendell Willkie, whom Roosevelt had defeated in the last election and was thought likely to be the next president. The Chiang’s turned on all their charm, and Willkie was treated to a constant: programme of visits and entertainment. He was even lodged in a Chinese house instead of the American embassy. ‘Keep him well-insulated from pollution by the Americans. The idea is to get him so exhausted and keep him so torpid with food and drink that his faculties will be dulled and he’ll be stuffed with the right doctrines.’
Willkie was renowned for his uncritical acceptance of prejudiced views, and Stilwell was forced to watch as brilliant military displays with guns, tanks and aircraft, with fit, well-equipped troops, were laid on for the visitor. Willkie was convinced that China was a noble and powerful military ally. He commented that militarily China was united under able generals and the army knew what it was fighting for. ‘Crap’, thought Stilwell. Willkie did not see the pathetic and emaciated men who were often sent from Kunming to Ramgarh.
Stilwell fumed at the sycophantic attentions the Chiang’s paid Willkie. He realised that their motives were to gain support for Chennault’s plan (and, incidentally, rid themselves of him, Stilwell) and to obtain ever larger supplies of American aircraft and crews. They hoped that their influence on Willkie would help to sidetrack Stilwell’s firm resolve to reform the Chinese army. To Stilwell’s disgust Willkie, who pointedly ignored him, clearly fell for Madame’s charm and invited her to make a goodwill tour of the USA. He felt that Willkie was completely sold on Chiang Kai-Shek and Madame, and on 7 October he wrote: ‘Willkie off thank God. Hardly spoke to me. Utterly indifferent.’ Stilwell’s future might well have been adversely affected when Willkie returned home and wrote a book, One World. Full of praise and admiration for the wonderful leadership of Chiang and Madame, it sold a million copies.
* The Peanut, usually with the addition of adjectives, became Stilwell’s normal way of referring to Chiang.
* C. Romanus and R. Sunderland, Stilwell’s Mission to China, Center of Military History, Washington, 1953, p. 183.
* This acronym, well known to most British soldiers in Burma, meant ‘situation normal, all fouled up’.
* Slim, Defeat into Victory, p. 144.
CHAPTER 6
Regrouping
When Stilwell and Slim reached the relative security of the British base at Imphal in May 1942 and Stilwell started his prolonged efforts to cajole Chiang Kai-Shek into taking effective action
, both were assisted by the monsoon which, more than any military force, stopped the Japanese advance.
As early as June Slim took command of the British XV Corps at Barrackpore, a large military base near Calcutta. The Corps consisted of 14 Division, based at Chittagong, and 26 Division in the Barrackpore–Calcutta area. Slim was as eager as Stilwell to recreate an effective fighting force, but he had other responsibilities as well. The Japanese had advanced well into the Arakan north of Rangoon (see map on p. 48) and were close to Imphal and Kohima, so Slim’s first priority was of necessity the defence of Bengal against further enemy advance. The combined Japanese naval and air forces had played a crucial role in the capture of Singapore and Malaya and the elimination of British naval power in the Bay of Bengal, and one of Slim’s most urgent responsibilities was the defence of the Sunderbans – the mangrove forest-covered approaches to Calcutta on the Ganges delta – and Calcutta itself from likely Japanese attack.
While Stilwell continued his impatient criticism of the Limeys and their inadequacies, Slim faced mounting difficulties. In August 1942, Gandhi launched his so-called non-violent campaign to remove the British from India, a movement which, as has been seen, had the sneaking admiration of Stilwell, Chiang and others. The non-violent element was short-lived, and during 1942 Gandhi’s followers made ferocious attacks on railways, bridges, signals, stations and trains. The widespread attacks on trains frequently resulted in all Europeans being taken off the train and hacked to death. Another racial element now appeared. A large percentage of railway staff were Anglo-Indian (i.e., people of mixed race) who were not popular with the average Indian, and they suffered disproportionately in the attacks. At this time Slim had to deploy 57 battalions – the equivalent of four or five divisions – on internal security, with much of that effort directed at defending the railways. He also had to consider whether the Indian campaign against the railways was linked to a further Japanese advance.