Chapter 17 Chapter 17 Chiang Kai-shek and His Allies

A joint stabilization committee with American and British participation was proclaimed. Two years after the Stabilization Committee was established, convoys of supplies were plodding over the Himalayas, carrying tons and tons of notes printed abroad to fill the bottomless pit of hyperinflation. The Pearl Harbor incident had just ended China's isolation, and Chiang Kai-shek was about to help the two new allies, Britain and the United States. He made the same offer to President Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Stalin the day after the Japanese attack, suggesting an immediate joint military conference.

Stalin replied that Russia was not yet ready for a war in the Pacific; Roosevelt and Churchill agreed. The meeting was held in Chongqing on December 23, where a joint military commission was also established to coordinate East Asian strategy.General Archibald Wavell pointed out that as far as Britain was concerned, the first priority was to save Burma, when a Japanese attack on Burma was imminent.In the end, everyone agreed, and action was taken from it.The Burma Highway, reopened in October 1941, was indeed a life-and-death supply line for China, and the Generalissimo was anxious to keep it open.In addition to Burma and the land route through Russia, another bridge that China now has to the outside world is Hong Kong.

However, at this time, Hong Kong itself was under increasing pressure from the Japanese. In December 1941, Chiang Kai-shek proposed to send a large number of Chinese troops to help the British defend their direct-controlled colony.Although this suggestion was not accepted, he still dispatched a considerable force to attack the Japanese from the mainland side. It was a Don Quixote move, since the British had evacuated Kowloon on December 18 and Hong Kong had fallen on Christmas Day.The Chinese army under the leadership of Cai Tingkai (who fought against the Japanese in Shanghai in 1932) fell into the Japanese pincers and was gradually defeated by the Japanese from both Kowloon and Guangzhou.

Later, Chiang Kai-shek proposed to send troops to help the British in Burma.His proposal was again rejected, with the British concerned that the arrival of Chinese troops would damage relations with the Burmese.However, as the pressure from Japan mounted, the British changed their minds.In this way, the Generalissimo sent his Fifth and Sixth Armies to the Burmese front, where the Chinese Army fought the Japanese for the first time on February 16, 1942. About this time Chiang Kai-shek made an unannounced trip to India. His motives for this trip were manifold.On the one hand, he does hope to use his influence to turn Indian public opinion for the Allied cause.Because the prestige of the British Empire had dropped to a very low level at that time.Another, less altruistic but quite respectable motive was his desire to be a great Asian leader in the postwar world.Roosevelt thought the visit was a good idea, but Churchill saw it as an unauthorized interference.

This trip to India was very secretive, and the chairman and Mrs. Chiang did not announce the news until five days after they arrived in India. Soon they ran into a strange problem of etiquette.According to Chinese etiquette, the chairman should pay a visit to Gandhi's residence in Walta near Mumbai.But Indian custom required Gandhi to go to the guest's residence (this time in New Delhi) to meet, and the Governor-General asked to follow the Indian custom. The Governor-General of India at that time was Lord Linliango.The British ambassador to China, Archibald Clarke-Kerr, handed a letter from the governor to Mrs. Chiang, saying: If the Chiangs go to Volta, the governor will be politically awkward He sincerely hoped not to do so, and Prime Minister Churchill also sent a telegram to Chiang Kai-shek at this time, asking him not to go against the governor's wishes.Otherwise, he said, "our common desire to unite all of India to participate in the resistance against Japan may be damaged," and "may also inadvertently cause the effect of highlighting social differences at this moment when unity is most needed."

The Generalissimo graciously yielded to these simultaneous pressures, and Calcutta was chosen as the place of compromise talks.The leader of India traveled third class, and he endured the toil of the journey with the poor.The chairman was very moved when he learned of the incident, and then the two talked about uniting to deal with imperialism. On February 21, the last day of the visit, Madame Chiang broadcast an English translation of the Chairman's speech to the Indian people.Regardless of Britain's displeasure, he expressed the hope that India would gain autonomy as soon as possible, and at the same time called on the Indian people to wholeheartedly support the worldwide struggle against aggression.

Shortly after his departure, Gandhi and a number of other Congress leaders were arrested and imprisoned, as was often the case in their struggles with the British rulers. In order not to offend his former British master, the chairman asked President Roosevelt to mediate, but the president declined the offer. General Joseph Stilwell arrived in China's wartime capital on March 6, 1942, just days after Chiang Kai-shek's return to Chongqing, and a major dispute between China and the United States began. The debate between Stilwell and Chiang Kai-shek has been well documented in the United States, especially after the publication of Stilwell's scathing diaries.Therefore, we should bear in mind that China also has its own views on this.

In fact, the friction began with the multiple overlapping assignments that Stilwell brought from Washington.At the first meeting, he informed the chairman that he would command all American troops in China, Burma, and India (commonly referred to as "China, Burma, and India"), represent the U.S. government in all international war committees in China, and be responsible for dealing with China. Managed and supervised Lend-Lease supplies and other U.S. international aid programs, and was chief of staff to China's Supreme Commander, Generalissimo Chiang.In addition to these, he was responsible for the liaison between Chiang Kai-shek and General Wavell, who was then in command of British forces in Burma and India.As chief of staff to the Supreme Commander, Stilwell was to take orders from the Generalissimo.But in other respects, the president's order is naturally higher than Chiang Kai-shek's.

What particularly annoyed Chiang was that Stilwell also served as a Lend-Lease officer, so that he could withhold a shipment of aid to the Chinese military if he felt it was not in the interests of the United States. To make matters worse, China was not as "equal" as other countries when it came to Lend-Lease.Britain, Russia, and other recipient countries could use American aid as they saw fit within their own countries, and only Chiang Kai-shek had to present his requests one by one to General Stilwell. Apparently, this insulting rule was put in place by those in Washington who supported the Soviet Union and who did not want to give Chiang Kai-shek a veto to stop supplies to the CCP.

Even if Stilwell had been a perfect man of strategy and diplomacy, the situation was tricky enough, and he was not. In his express mail to Washington, the "thorny man" referred to the chairman as "peanut" (boring little person), "little rattlesnake" (quarrelsome person), but later people read from his diary It was also found that he referred to Roosevelt as an "old jerk" and gave many other well-known figures of the day his favorite insulting epithets. Moreover, he returned to China with a certain ambition, which he at first concealed but later flatly concealed, to replace Chiang Kai-shek as supreme commander of the Chinese army.

This desire was nothing more than a dream, which Stilwell should have clearly realized at the time. However, he only saw the weakness of Chiang Kai-shek's strategy, but he was extremely confident in his military genius. Chiang Kai-shek was not the only one who clashed with Stilwell, the other was Chennault. After the Pearl Harbor incident, Chennault was incorporated into the U.S. Army with the rank of Major General of the Air Force. The arrival of Chennault and his volunteers has greatly boosted the morale of the Chinese people. This "Flying Tigers" soon became a legendary figure. Before that, China was defenseless against Japanese air strikes, now they feel they are protected.Chennault's volunteers became the U.S. Chinese Air Force Task Force, which later became the Fourteenth Air Force. According to the strategic plan developed by Stilwell and Chiang Kai-shek, Chennault commanded a series of air bases in Hunan, Guangxi, and Yunnan. It was built with U.S. aid and supplies were airlifted over the Himalayas from India. Stilwell and Chennault had different views on where these airlifted supplies should be prioritized.Chennault wanted it for his air base, but Stilwell wanted it for training Chinese recruits in Ramgarh, India, and Kunming, Yunnan, which Stilwell expected to use to drive out the Japanese in Burma. Unlike Stilwell, Chennault got along well with Chiang Kai-shek. In a conversation with Eric Chou in Nanjing in 1947, Wu Tiecheng, then secretary-general of the chairman, talked about this rare harmonious relationship, and he listed some reasons. Chennault, he said, had shown no interest in Chinese domestic politics and had always respected Chiang Kai-shek.With rare exceptions, he only talks about the topics he knows best, Air Force issues.Another factor that facilitated the relationship between the two was that Chennault trusted the Chinese pilots he trained so much that he seldom criticized them.As a professional soldier, Chennault was highly appreciated by Chiang Kai-shek, because Chiang Kai-shek was also a professional soldier. On this level, Chiang Kai-shek also appreciated Stilwell's temperament, but this unilateral appreciation was not rewarded accordingly. Stilwell was primarily a field general, and one of the best of his kind in World War II.His first Burma campaign, which began in the first months of 1942, ended in a failed retreat in May.When he saw that evacuation was clearly inevitable, he didn't even bother to notify the Chairman. Instead, he sent two telegrams to his assistant in Chongqing, General Magruder, saying that his troops had been dispersed into small units and could no longer be regrouped, and that he would withdraw them from Burma and drive to India.Beforehand, the Chairman of the General Assembly issued an order that in case of failure, the Chinese army would withdraw to Myitkyina in northern Burma and return to China from there. Without consulting Chiang Kai-shek, Stilwell revoked this order and ordered the Chinese army to withdraw. into India. As soon as he heard Stilwell's order, the chairman immediately sent a telegram to General Du Yuming, the commander of the Chinese Fifth Army in Burma.Despite Stilwell's pessimism about concentrating troops, Du Xingming managed to muster three divisions.They successfully blazed a path back home.Stilwell was very annoyed by this, and when he returned to Chongqing, he wrote a letter to Generalissimo Chiang, saying that Chiang Kai-shek should not directly contact his generals. The strange thing is that, as a China hand, Stilwell was so stupid that he ignored the morale of Chinese soldiers.The Chinese army has always had such a tradition: "When the Chinese army has nowhere to go, they will never lower their personality and hide abroad." Although Stilwell was not the most popular of President Roosevelt's gifts to Chiang Kai-shek, there were other things to be thankful for.The most popular piece was the $500,000 loan in early 1942. Chiang Kai-shek was in New Delhi at the time, and the president sent him a telegram reporting the good news. The telegram said: "The heroic resistance of the Chinese army against the vicious invaders has won the highest praise from the American people and all peace-loving people." I also said a lot of words.The very happy Chiang Kai-shek called back and said: "Your farsightedness and sagacity in the world's greatest crisis are worthy of the envy of all real politicians." The second article of the loan agreement reached on March 8, put The final repayment period was postponed until after the war on the condition that it "conforms to the common interests of the United States and China and is conducive to the establishment of permanent peace and security in the world." Then, the British immediately brought in a loan of 50 million pounds.A joint stabilization committee with Americans and Britons was proclaimed. In describing these things, Tang (that is, Hollington Tang. A translator) said: "The purpose of joint cooperation is to build China's currency on a solid foundation in future wars." But this is completely utopian. When Stilwell arrived in China, the United States and the United Kingdom announced loans to China. At this time, inflation in China was already very serious. Stilwell was shocked by the phenomenon that "coolies have 50 yuan with them".As the war continued, the currency continued to depreciate.In the end (according to Huaihe and Jacobi's records), a month's income could be spent in one party. In order to ensure the survival of ordinary people, the government provides them with monthly rations of rice, cloth, cooking oil, salt and fuel at frozen prices. Two years after the Stabilization Committee was formed, convoys of supplies were plodding over the Himalayas carrying tons and tons of foreign-printed notes to fill the bottomless pit of hyperinflation. However, money is not the only goal that Chinese people pursue in life, and "face" is more important to them. On October 10, 1942, the "Double Ten" anniversary, the chairman announced the most face-saving event for Chinese people since the 1911 Revolution.He announced that the United States and Great Britain had renounced the extraterritorial rights granted to them by those notoriously "unequal" treaties.The United Kingdom and the United States did not give up these powers out of compulsion. In this sense, the major concessions made by China's two allies can be said to be voluntary, but they did not propose them on their own initiative. At first, they advocated a decision after the war.However, Chiang Kai-shek pointed out to them that an earlier announcement would have the effect of encouraging the Chinese people, and taking this into consideration, Britain and the United States made concessions. While Chiang Kai-shek emerged as a leading figure among the allies at war, Mao Zedong assumed overall leadership of the Chinese Communist Party. The "United Front" of the Kuomintang and the Communist Party finally broke down in early 1941. Among them, the decisive event was the "New Fourth Army Incident" in January 1941.on this incident.The propaganda machines of the two sides are still arguing to this day, while the truth is more murky. At that time, the New Fourth Army had been fighting south of the Yangtze River not far from Shanghai. In September 1940, He Yingqin, Chiang Kai-shek's chief of staff, ordered the New Fourth Army to move to Jiangbei, and then cross the Yellow River to cooperate with the Eighteenth Route Army (the Kuomintang's name for the Communist Party's Eighth Route Army) to seize new strongholds. The Communists hesitated, partly because it was too dangerous to cross the Yangtze River under Japanese firepower, and partly because they had their own plans. They wanted to establish a new operational strategy in the Nanjing-Shanghai-Hankou triangle south of the Yangtze River. The base area (Hankou here should be Hangzhou—translator). Chiang Kai-shek extended the transfer deadline to December 31, but the New Fourth Army remained where it was. Suddenly, Xiang Ying, the chief of staff of the Communist Party, secretly led his troops to move south. On January 4, 1941, the New Fourth Army exchanged fire with the government's 14th Division, which had an overwhelming strength.What happened afterwards is not clear.What is certain is that Xiang Ying was killed, and Ye Ting, the commander of the New Fourth Army, was injured and imprisoned.The Communists lost about 1,000 people. On January 17, Chiang Kai-shek ordered the disbandment of the New Fourth Army.The Communists ignored the order and reorganized the New Fourth Army under the same name, replacing the original army with seven divisions.For several weeks, Communist propaganda lashed out at the KMT for disbanding the New Fourth Army, pointing to the decision as part of a plan by the "pro-Japanese faction" to sign a peace treaty with the Japanese and join an anti-communist pact. On March 6, Chiang Kai-shek wrote a long letter to the National Political Council, accusing the Communist Party of being dishonest, and added the following paragraph, which was not entirely true: I don't need to declare that our government's only concern is to lead the whole country to fight against the Japanese invaders and eliminate traitors and traitors. It has absolutely no intention of "suppressing the Communist Party" by force.The government doesn't want to hear the kind of ominous words that are now a relic of Chinese history.They are expected to obey orders, to renounce attacks on their comrades-in-arms, and to cease all provocative actions; in this way, the government will consider them as much as possible. In the past, Chiang Kai-shek once said in private: "The Japanese are a disease of the skin, while the Communist Party is a disease of the heart." Even after the "New Fourth Army Incident", the relationship between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party continued. On March 28, 1942, Zhou Enlai and Lin Biao (who was a student of Chiang Kai-shek at the Whampoa Military Academy) put forward four demands in the name of the Communist Party: 1. Recognize the legal status of the Communist Party of China nationwide, but at present there is only limited tolerance. 2. Official recognition of the administrative bodies in the "liberated" areas. 3. Expand the Eighth Route Army from three divisions to twelve divisions. 4. Allow the newly organized New Fourth Army to stay south of the Yellow River until the end of the war. Chiang Kai-shek rejected these demands, but a year later, they were made again. The New Fourth Army incident was followed by growing anti-Chiang movements in cities such as Guilin and Kunming.At that time, the Guilin government under the chairman of the committee was headed by Li Jishen. In this way, left-wing writers and playwrights originally based in Hong Kong gathered in Guilin. Li Jishen is willing to provide protection for these cultural refugees. He finds jobs for them and gives them financial support.At that time, Ouyang Yuqian was leading the Provincial Academy of Drama and Art, and he had previously participated in the National Revolutionary Government of Fujian Province.Under his direction, plays with anti-government themes have achieved great success.Although these repertoires did not name Chiang Kai-shek, the audience knew that he was the target.People see the shadow of Chiang Kai-shek in characters such as Qin Shihuang and Zeng Guofan—the former is the first emperor of the Qin Dynasty, and the latter is a nineteenth-century military statesman whom Chiang Kai-shek admires very much.Magazines that made no secret of their anti-Chiang stance have sprung up like mushrooms after rain. However, it was the underground Communist Party that really gave Chiang a headache.For example, Ms. Yang Gang, Sa Kongleo, and Jin Zhonghua were all frequent guests at the cocktail party hosted by the US Strategic Intelligence Service and the US Consulate in Guilin. Later, in 1949, Ms. Yang became the vice-chairman of the Foreign Policy Committee of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Communist Party of China, Sakong became the vice-chairman of the National Minority Committee of the State Council, and Jin Zhonghua became the vice-mayor of Shanghai.In 1942, they worked tirelessly to win over the Americans, a job the party asked them to do on the principle of an "international united front." In Kunming, Southwest Associated University and Yunnan University became sanctuaries for anti-Chiang and Communist sympathizers.Although the Democratic League did not openly operate until 1946 when the National Political Consultative Conference was held, they were already very active in Kunming in 1943. Some leaders of the Democratic League were giving lectures in Kunming at that time, and after the founding of the People's Republic of China, they appeared in Beijing again.Among them was Luo Longji, who later served as the Minister of Light Industry in Beijing, and Wu Han, who later served as the deputy mayor of Beijing. His play "Hai Rui Dismissed from Office" became the fuse of the 1966 Cultural Revolution. Other members of the Democratic League in Kunming were Wen Yiduo and Li Gongpu; both of them were later assassinated by Kuomintang agents. Long Yun, governor of Yunnan Province, was a former warlord. He either expressed tolerance or deliberately ignored the NLD's activities among students.Later, he also appeared in Beijing as a "democrat".In Southwest Associated University, people first used posters to express their dissatisfaction and criticism of the Kuomintang government. Although these articles did not directly attack Chiang Kai-shek, they strongly criticized the entire Chongqing government and Chiang Kai-shek’s trusted subordinates. In Chongqing, the Strategic Intelligence Service (later renamed the US Intelligence Service) employed many leftists.These people played a considerable role in propagating the darkness of the Nationalist government, as diplomats and foreign journalists used it as an important source of information. In April 1941, after the Soviet Union and Japan signed the neutrality treaty, the Japanese immediately began their infamous "Three Alls Policy" (that is, kill, burn, and rob). Their immediate target was the Eighth Route Army, and under these circumstances Mao was forced to reduce the Communist Army's assaults on the plains of northern China, withdrawing its forces to the plateaus of Shanxi and the hills of Shandong. From February to September 1942, Mao Zedong launched a rectification movement in Yan'an.From then until the spring of 1945, he systematically rebuilt the organizational structure of the entire party. While Mao Zedong was consolidating his power in the North, Chiang Kai-shek's regime was in decline. The Generalissimo himself became more assertive and inaccessible, and government officials had to wait weeks to see him, and after all the hurdles had been cleared, to see if Madame Chiang was in the mood. As the president of the Kuomintang, Chiang Kai-shek actually holds supreme power. He can manipulate the Executive Yuan, hijack the Legislative Yuan, and bypass the Judicial Yuan.In fact, these institutions are just decorations. He had his own system. According to this system, he assigned government affairs to three people: Chen Lifu was in charge of party affairs, He Yingqin was in charge of military affairs, and Kong Xiangxi was in charge of practical government affairs.Each of these three men represented a faction, because the secret of Chiang Kai-shek's tactics was to use different factions that were opposed to each other. It is generally accepted that of the three confidantes of the Generalissimo Chiang, the most conspicuous was Chen Lifu (who was still a prominent figure, albeit in advanced age, when I met him many years later in Taiwan).He has appeared in this book.He had the elegance of a dignitary: his hair was gray, which was premature for a Chinese, but his eyes were dark and piercing.He resolutely upholds Chinese traditions and Confucianism, and believes that Chinese culture is supreme.No one doubted his intelligence and energy. As secretary-general of the Kuomintang, Chen Lifu was a strong man in wartime China.He is the nephew of Chen Qimei, Chiang Kai-shek's early protector. He and his elder brother Chen Guofu are both Chiang Kai-shek's subordinates. In this way, he has become a high-ranking figure. The two brothers hold the so-called CC Department (Central Club).The two brothers successively held some important positions.Such as the director of the Internal Security Bureau (Central Statistics Bureau), the organization minister of the Kuomintang, etc.Alone or in partnership, they have wreaked havoc on the Communist Party and various other alien forces. Chen Lifu was not only eight years younger than Chen Guofu, but also healthier than his tuberculosis brother, and he also served as Minister of Education for a while.He is a defender of "purity of mind" His ruthless guards, sending suspicious students or professors to jail or execution ground, never show mercy. But the Chen brothers are very strict with themselves, and they have no personal corruption, because they are interested in power, not money. General He Yingqin, who had been Minister of Military and Political Affairs for 14 years, naturally led another powerful faction, the junta.Had this faction been united it could have been stronger than it is at present.General Ho represented the older generation of military bureaucrats who kept Chiang Kai-shek in power.But within this faction there was also a younger faction, the Central faction, more loyal to Chiang Kai-shek than the older generation, and determined to sweep away the corruption and incompetence that had hindered the war of resistance.These young people are called the Whampoa Clan, and the most famous of them is General Chen Cheng, one of the most striking figures in contemporary China. An effective land reform program.Standing just over five feet tall, with a diminutive but energetic build, he quickly became a popular Chinese officer among Americans stationed in China.He graduated from Baoding Military Academy in the 1920s and was a young Whampoa priest under Chiang Kai-shek. The other members of the Whampoa Department all graduated from there when Chiang Kai-shek was the principal of the Whampoa Military Academy. In 1944, under strong pressure from the United States, He Yingqin was replaced by Chen Cheng as Minister of Military Affairs. He Yingqin was a round-faced, muscular and humble man.He was a symbol of the corruption and incompetence of an army in which large pensions for fallen soldiers went straight to the pockets of local commanders while enlisted soldiers starved. Premier and Finance Minister Kong Xiangxi represents yet another faction, the powerful Song family.He married Soong Ailing, Madame Chiang's domineering sister, and he became a powerful figure automatically.Outspoken and friendly, bespectacled and with a cropped mustache, he was as adept at amassing money for himself as he was at destroying the country's. Perhaps his greatest feature is his innate family background, he is the seventy-fifth direct descendant of Confucius. White and Jacobi cite a friend of Kong Xiangxi who said that ninety percent of the talk about Kong Xiangxi is false, but adds: "The other ten percent are worse than what the talk says." worse." It is often said that the success of Mrs. Kong's speculative business was due to her possession of secret information on stock exchanges that could only have come from her husband, who held an important government position. No one has come out to deny this statement, and no one has said it is slander. Since most of the tax officials collecting grain tax in rural areas took the tax revenue as their own, Kong Xiangxi's consistent method of solving various government financial problems was to print more money. On the day of the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, prices were 2,500 times higher than when the war broke out. Despite this, there is still a large amount of U.S. dollars stored in Chongqing. This is because Kong Xiangxi insisted that Americans only exchange one U.S. dollar for 20 yuan in Chinese currency. , and finally up to 800 yuan. Within the Kuomintang, there were other factions as well as some prominent individuals. One of America's favorite factions is the political science department (政学科——translator), whose members are technocrats with modern ideas (though that term didn't exist then).Many of them have studied in the United States or Japan, most of them can speak English, and they are determined to make their country a technologically advanced and efficient industrial country. Within this faction, two stand out: Sun Ke and Song Ziwen.As the son of the father of the 1911 Revolution, Sun Ke is sacrosanct.As a scholar and a reformer, he has the courage to speak out, but he has no personal desire to make a clean break with the KMT and recruit another group of his own.Although he was the head of the Legislative Yuan (the British called it chairman), he was no match for the party machine run by Chen Lifu; Chiang Kai-shek, afraid of hearing enlightened speech, often refused to see Sun Ke for months on end. Soong Ziwen, who served as foreign minister from 1942 to 1945, received the same treatment.He's also a high-ranking figure who dares to speak his mind boldly.However, the chairman prefers submissive people, and Song Ziwen seldom likes him. Unfortunately, Song Ziwen is often compared with Kong Xiangxi as another Kuomintang to be blamed, but in fact the two men were very different.Although Song Ziwen also made a fortune, unlike his brother-in-law, he made his fortune through vigorous corporate capitalism, which simultaneously created wealth for the country and employment opportunities for tens of thousands of people. It is its army that has most discredited the Kuomintang.Wealthy kids can escape military service for a fortune that goes to officials who sell their exemptions. The poor children of the same age were forcibly arrested by the arresting team, tied together, and taken to serve as soldiers. Some newly recruited soldiers died before reaching the designated troops.White and Jacoby cite some dire numbers about China's troop presence in Burma. A troop lost 30 percent of its strength during a march of 500 miles, and of those who survived were considered stronger, 15 percent were diagnosed with tuberculosis by an American doctor.In addition to tuberculosis, dysentery, malaria, scabies, beriberi and parasitic diseases, together with typhus and influenza, claimed many lives.The vast majority of patients do not receive medical attention.Generally speaking, there is only one Chinese doctor in a division.But venereal disease, one of the major diseases in Western armies, is absent here, probably because soldiers are too weak; Things were bad enough at first, but as inflation picked up momentum, things took a turn for the worse, and in the autumn of 1939 Eric Chou served as an interpreter for the Military Council for a while with the honorary rank of major. His monthly salary is 60 Chinese currency.At that time, a pair of shoes was sold for 80 yuan. By 1943, the price of a pair of shoes was about 900 to 1,200 yuan, but the salary of the major did not increase. In this, and in many other respects, Yan Xishan, the "model governor" of Shanxi Province, set an example that no one was willing or able to follow. In 1939 (according to his memoirs), he led 300,000 troops into the western mountains of Shanxi Province. "It's almost barren. The locals are extremely poor...". In June 1940, he instituted a system of in-kind agricultural taxes and introduced rationing of food and other necessities among the military, civil servants, and schoolteachers. At least in the area under his jurisdiction, the army can eat well. In the summer of 1941, the central government called on the whole country to learn this practice, but the Kuomintang officers who only wanted to satisfy their selfish desires still only cared about filling their own pockets. General Feng Yuxiang, who believed in Christianity, also had a good reputation for being sympathetic to soldiers. He described such an incident: Once he went to a place, the local governor was there to welcome him, but the locals surrounded them.They pleaded with Feng Yuxiang: Their children (there were eight or nine hundred of them) had been drafted and were on their way to training camp.But the magistrate asked these new enlisted soldiers to take off their cotton-padded jacket uniforms before setting off.Locals shouted, "They'll freeze to death on such a cold day!" Feng Yuxiang intervened on their behalf, and finally the local governor sent men in padded jacket uniforms to chase after the ranks of recruits who had set off two hours earlier. Feng Yuxiang then mentioned the following incident: The next day, I went to inspect the troops stationed at Baishiyi.The regimental commander there showed me the roll of soldiers.I found out that it was full last week, but now each battalion is missing thirty or forty men.I asked him the reason for this, and the regiment leader replied: "When the recruits came out of their homes, they had nothing to eat along the way. Once they got here, they ate and drank so much that they strangled themselves to death."But in reality, they were starved to death. Another time, at Shapingba, fifteen miles from Chongqing, the Christian general asked a regimental commander where his sick and wounded were.The regimental commander took him a few miles away to a mountain village where there were more than twenty sick soldiers. Feng Yuxiang wrote: I went in and found these poor young men running a fever.They lay on the door panels that had been removed to serve as beds, with hay under them.I touched their foreheads and asked them if they had taken medicine or had any water.These innocent young men cried.They said: "Since we got sick, no one has come to visit us. We can't even drink a sip of boiled water." Oppressed by their superiors, the Kuomintang troops in turn oppressed the villagers they encountered.Even putting aside a thousand other reasons, this alone can explain why the Communist army finally won.They made the peasants feel that the PLA needed them and gave them a purpose to fight for.Generally speaking, once a soldier of the Communist army puts on the uniform, he can refrain from rape, robbery, debt, and help farmers harvest food.This contrast is very obvious. Chiang Kai-shek is indifferent to these sufferings of the people, unless someone mentions some specific cases to him, then he always loses his temper.He became more and more isolated from the world.The reason why he has become so unapproachable has something to do with his authoritarian style and withdrawn temperament. During the four months from November 1942, Chiang Kai-shek took advantage of the long gap between Mrs. Chiang and her sister and niece's visit to the United States to write a book.The book was printed at high speed with absolute priority and was published in Chongqing on March 10, 1943. The book titled "The Destiny of China" is clearly a reflection of Mao Zedong's "On New Democracy" answer. Mao Zedong's book, published in January 1940, applied Marxism-Leninism to the Chinese situation.It is often said that Chiang Kai-shek's book was ghostwritten by a former secretary and former professor, Tao Xisheng, who played an important role in the drafting of the book anyway.But it is likely that most of the book was dictated by Chiang Kai-shek.In any case, Chiang Kai-shek is fully responsible for the content of the book and is very proud of it. This book is Chiang Kai-shek's elaboration of his basic political thoughts, and it was praised in Chongqing as the most important book since Sun Yat-sen's "Three People's Principles".Although there was a serious shortage of paper at the time, the book had 200,000 copies printed in its first run, and it had been reprinted more than 200 times by the end of 1943. "The Destiny of China" soon became a must-read book in Chinese schools and universities, all military officers, civil servants, and all students of the Central Political Training Institute and all members of the Nationalist Youth League. Not long after, Chiang Kai-shek released a much shorter book, "Chinese Economic Theory".同样，这本书至少有一部分是由陶希圣代笔的，但是许多经济方面的专业内容则出自一位姓陈的经济专家之手。 在这两本书里，民族主义的调子很重，其中《中国之命运》 比《中国经济学说》更甚。蒋介石把中国的问题毫无例外地归咎于外国列强的掠夺和不平等条约的危害。而《中国经济学说》的主要目的则是根据孙中山的教导找出一种中国式的解决经济问题的办法。 围绕这两本书，有一些有意思的事。其中之一便是主要的捉刀人陶希圣的身份。在1934年至1937年之间，他在北京大学任中国社会史教授，还担任过北平师范大学的讲师。1928年，他给蒋介石当过一段秘书，后与汪精卫结为密友，并和他一起逃到了日本人那边。但是，陶希圣后来和汪精卫闹翻，带着汪与日本人签订的一份秘密协定，逃到了香港。 他回重庆被看作是忠实的表现，在那里他住在蒋介石当时的秘书陈布雷的家中，与委员长关系密切。 更奇怪的是，《中国之命运》这本书竟没有英译本。本来宣布译本准备在1943年四、五月间出版。但是，几个月甚至几年过去了，仍不见英译本。 最合适的解释是，英译本的出版计划取消了，因为重庆方面已及时发现这样做不合适，当时国民党的宣传机器正在为蒋介石树立一个伟大的民主领袖的形象，如果在这个时候，让西方的英语读者看《中国之命运。》这本书，那就会对公众舆论起到相反的作用，尤其是在美国。因为这本书的调子从头到尾都是反西方、反自由的。 这样就出现了一个奇怪的现象。当《中国之命运》在中国发行高达1百万册并成为必读书时，国民党的审查机关却在外国记者的电文中删去了一切有关此书的内容。 到了1946年1月份，六位国会议员想要国务院自己翻译的这本书的译本，结果他们遭到了拒绝，理由是该书属于“绝密” 文件，《中国经济学说》就是这个月在纽约的共产党“前线” 杂志《美亚杂志》上发表的，并附有一篇由美国左翼作家菲利浦·贾菲写的评论。贾菲于1947年将蒋介石这两本书的英译本合编在一起并加了注释。 然而在1943年，广大的美国公众都不知道蒋介石并不是人们听说的那种伟大的民主领袖。 在蒋夫人访美期间，她给许多人作了演讲，赢得了人们的爱戴，征服了美国的公众。但是在私下，接待过她的人都不喜欢她那种专横的作风。害怕受她“美色诱骗”的罗斯福答应了她要更多飞机的蛮横要求，下令在试飞结束前就马上提供柯蒂期—赖特公司生产的C一46飞机。这种飞机有好几架都在喜玛拉雅山坠毁了。 蒋夫人不在时，重庆传出了委员长与一位姓陈的小姐的风流韵事，说陈小姐与委员长同床共枕，还为他做他爱吃的浙江家乡菜。 这种流言没有依据，但却使蒋介石火冒三丈，在他夫人回来之后，他召集了外国记者、内阁部长、以及工作人员，申明他那高尚纯洁的一夫一妻的爱只属于他的合法配偶，并断然否认了有关他不忠的传言。 这件事发生在1943年3月间，当时国民党的军队正遭受着灾难性的失败。但是，委员长申明自己清白的消息却一连几天压倒了有关战况的报道。据怀特和雅各比的说法：“只要提出要求，就可以从政府那里得到委员长辟谣的抄件”。 总的来说，蒋夫人对美国进行的长时间的访问，为重庆政府赢得了一场宣传上的重大胜利，紧接着舆论界就把蒋介石宣扬成一个战争时期的主要领袖。1943年10月，盟军最高司令、东南亚战区总司令、海军中将路易斯·蒙巴顿来到了重庆。他带来一封温斯顿·丘吉尔写的介绍信，信中称蒙巴顿与他有二十五年的老交情。蒙巴顿外貌英俊，极具魅力，有着非凡的外交天赋和杰出的战略才能。 根据芭芭拉·塔奇曼的尼载，他送给蒋夫人一个上面用宝石镶着她的名字缩写的卡蒂尔梳妆盒，并在委员长面前说自己是个比较年轻的指挥官，渴望“吸取委员长的丰富经验”，这样一来，他很快就博得了蒋夫人的欢心，他此行的目的是和蒋委员长及马歇尔的个人代表B·B·葫墨维尔一起商讨缅甸以及其他抗日战区的战略问题。 然而，蒙巴顿一来就卷入了蒋介石和史迪威的纠纷之中，因为他到重庆时正好碰上罗斯福听信了中国政府和陈纳德将军的抱怨，已作出决定将史迪威召回国。 蒙巴顿可不喜欢这样做，他不想失去一位对中国有如此广博的知识的同事，也不愿和一个水平不如史迪威的继任者凑合。 蒙巴顿对史迪咸说，他可以留下来继续工作，条件是只要他向蒋介石道歉认错。虽然心里窝火，史迪威还是听从了蒙巴顿的建议，向蒋介石赔了不是。委员长宽厚地接受了他的道歉，两人很快就和解了。 紧接着，蒋介石在战时国际事务中的影响发展到了一个高潮。 11月份，他作为三巨头之一与罗斯福总统和邱吉尔先生一起参加了开罗的首脑会议。 他是以中华民国总统的正式身份参加此会的，在此之前，他已于10月11日宣誓就职，接替8月1日去世的原总统林森。 三位领导人从11月22日至26日在梅纳大厦饭店开了四天的会。 会后发表的联合公报对蒋介石个人来说是一大胜利，联合公报记录了三个盟国决定剥夺日本“从中国人那里窃取的诸如满洲、台湾、澎湖列岛”等所有领土，并将这些地方全部归还给中华民国。而且，罗斯福保证支持1944年春对缅甸日军的海陆空联合进攻，以打破对中国的包围，并为国民党的九十个师提供武器装备和训练。他还表示在战后将继续支持中国反对“外国入侵”。中美将联合占领大连海军综合基地。这些保证显然是为了防止苏联争夺东北，同时，总统也让蒋介石作出了解决共产党问题的承诺。 得意洋洋的蒋介石带着从未有过的声望回到了中国。 他不知道罗斯福总统还要在德黑兰（11月27日至12月2日）与邱吉尔和斯大林会晤，在这个会议上，罗斯福向斯大林作出了与给蒋介石的承诺完全相矛盾的保证。 的确，美国人没有履行罗斯福在开罗向委员长作出的许诺。1944年罗斯福取消了对缅甸的联合进攻，也没有落实对国民党九十个师的武装和训练。而他的继任者杜鲁门没有在战后支持中华民国对付俄国人，尽管他的确作了一次努力，但已为时过晚。然而，有一件事罗斯福坚持住了，即决心让蒋介石兑现他的承诺，解决他与共产党人的分歧。