The enigma that was 'Vinegar Joe'

Winning hearts and minds

General Stilwell (right) eats an open-air breakfast at a crude table in northern Burma in March 1944. Provided to China Daily

"The skills taught at the rehabilitation camps included tinsmithing, sewing, carpentry and such," said John Easterbrook, pointing to a photograph in which Stilwell, hat in hand, is seen talking with a group of Chinese soldiers, most of whom are on crutches after losing limbs.

According to Ge Shuya, a historian who specializes in the CBI Theater, the criticism Stilwell received both in life and death - among other things, he was condemned for being too harsh on US soldiers and refusing to evacuate some deemed unfit to fight - can partly be explained by his determination to win the hearts and minds of the Chinese soldiers.

"Stilwell understood the Chinese mentality well enough to know that to become the true leader of those soldiers, he would have to fight alongside them and demonstrate a high level of fairness toward everyone, Americans and Chinese, which he did," Ge said. "In the battle for Myitkyina, the Burmese city-cum-airfield, Stilwell insisted that the US soldiers stick with their Chinese counterparts to the end. That meant four protracted months of hard, bloody fighting during the monsoon season."

It was at Stilwell's insistence that the "Ledo Road" was built between 1943 and 1944 to link the southwestern city of Kunming, Yunnan Province, with Assam in India and reopen China's overland supply route, which had been cut by the Japanese in early 1942.

The project was controversial, and contributed to a widely publicized dispute between Stilwell and his CBI subordinate, Claire Chennault - commander of the "Flying Tigers" squadrons of US pilots that operated in China, who was promoted to the rank of lieutenant general just days before he died - who was convinced that aerial assaults would be enough to overpower the Japanese.

"Keeping in mind that the Ledo Road was officially opened in January 1945, just seven months before the Japanese surrender in August, it's true that it never really delivered the tonnage of supplies envisaged. But in the process of forcing this route through northern Burma, Stilwell had helped to train and equip 30 Chinese divisions, many of which later fought the Japanese elsewhere in China," Ge said. "Stilwell was always an active proponent of the improvement of the Chinese army."

However, by the time the Ledo Road - later renamed Stilwell Road by Chiang Kai-shek - was opened, the general had already been recalled to the US by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

"When he arrived in the States, Stilwell was met by two army generals who told him not to talk to reporters," said John Easterbrook, referring to his grandfather's criticism of the corruption and exploitation he had witnessed in the Chinese Nationalist Party. Many observers believe that the growing antagonism between Stilwell and Chiang was partly responsible for the US general's recall.

A continuing legacy

Even so long after Stilwell's death, John Easterbrook said his grandfather's legacy is still palpable in the family.

"I still have some pieces of Chinese furniture and porcelain that he brought back to the States in the 1920s and 30s," he said. "There's also a Japanese machine gun from World War II. It turns out that he and his father-in-law invented the mechanism for the gun and patented it in the US, before it was stolen by the Japanese."

In 1980, during one of his many trips to China, John Easterbrook met a man who had been Stilwell's escort in the late 1930s. "He told me they were driving in a car when a Japanese warplane suddenly appeared," he said. "There was a house nearby and the escort told the general, 'Let's get into the house, but my grandfather simply replied, 'Get out of the car and get into the ditch!' So they jumped into a nearby ditch. The Japanese plane flew over them, dropped a bomb, and demolished the house."

Bernard Martin, a 93-year-old US veteran of the battle for Myitkyina who attended the photo exhibition in Beijing, said: "General Stilwell was a very hard commander, but it took a leader like him to push us hard to get the job done. He took a licking when he first went into the jungle and lost 90 percent of his men. He told what was left of the troops that it wouldn't happen again, and he kept his promise. Yesterday, we all hated him, but today I revere the man."

Ge, the historian, believes that feeling is typical of people who knew Stilwell. "The Chinese veterans that fought under Stilwell and spoke to me over the years invariably remembered him wearing battered army fatigues and carrying a carbine. He was one of them," he said. "For me, the 'tragedy' of Stilwell, who was forced to leave the CBI on the cusp of the Allied victory, lies in his being a soldier and a general, instead of a politician."

In one of the photographs at the exhibition, Stilwell is shown eating breakfast from a crude table in the open air in northern Burma. Wearing gaiters and without decorations or insignia on his uniform, nothing about the man suggests glory.

Yet, if not being allowed to continue with his improvements and witness the defeat of Japan first-hand came as a disappointment, Stilwell had good reason to feel content. During an interview in June 1944 he told a journalist, "If I can prove that the Chinese soldier is as good as any Allied solider, I'll die happy", according to John Easterbrook.

Before he left China for the last time, Stilwell wrote a letter to his subordinate Pan Yukun, commander of the 50th Division of the Chinese Expeditionary Forces, in which he stated: "I hope you will forget any misunderstandings and clashes of opinion we may have had, and think of me as your friend, and a friend of China."

Contact the writer at zhaoxu@chinadaily.com.cn

Yang Wanli contributed to this story.