新档案、新视野： 蒋介石-史迪威争执（zt)

Vinegar Joe vs. Generalissimo, 1942—1944:
New Evidence to Understand the Stilwell-Chiang Kai-shek Dispute
新档案、新视野： 蒋介石-史迪威争执
Chia-yun (Bauer) Wann
(万佳昀)
Barbara Tuchman’s Stilwell and the American Experience in China, 1911-1945 has been
influential since its first publication in 1971. Using primary sources, particularly Stilwell papers
and diaries as well as the U.S. government archives, she presented a creative and persuasive
argument about U.S.-China relations in the 20th century.
Tuchman addresses two main themes. The first theme is General Joseph Stilwell’s
experience in China during World War II. His bitter mission in China and his sour relationship
with Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek and the Nationalist leaders provided fuel for a political
controversy after Chiang and his government were defeated by Chinese Communists in 1949—
who lost China? The second theme is an in-depth exploration into the political history of the
United States foreign policy toward China.
A journalist and a historian, Tuchman skillfully uses the issue of Stilwell’s Chinese
experience to address a larger issue, the American Experience in China. In this book, Stilwell is
portrayed sympathetically in spite of his weakness and mistakes. Read by many, this book
deepens the conventional understanding that the Nationalist leadership’s corruption, ineptness,
and refusal to reform was responsible for the Nationalist China’s military defeat in 1949.
Tuchman smartly intertwines the history of U.S.-China relations in the 20th Century with the
life of General Stilwell who played a leading role in the U.S.’s relationship with China. A gifted
China-hand in American Army, General Stilwell arrived in China in March 1942 as Chief-of
Staff to Generalissimo Chiang who was Commander-in-Chief of the China theatre. Also, Stilwell
represented Washington to oversee the Lend-Lease materials in China. Chiang at first welcomed
him warmly, but the Chiang-Stilwell relationship soon went sour. They disagreed with each other
on many issues, from the tactics and strategy of Burma war to the policy toward Chinese
Communists. Their dispute went so serious that Chiang had to request President Roosevelt to
recall Stilwell and replace him with General Albert Wedemeyer in September 1944.
Stilwell saw his recall as the biggest humiliation in his life. One year after World War II
ended, Stilwell died in October 1946. Chiang Kai-shek and his administration, Washington’s
chosen ally, were defeated by the Chinese Communists and withdrew to the island of Taiwan in
1949. It is one of the most critical failures of American foreign policy toward China in the 20th
As Tuchman describes in the book, Stilwell was a brilliant and proud man. He was hardworking,
nice to his combat soldiers both Chinese and American, sympathetic toward Chinese
people, and willing to sacrifice himself in the pursuit of an elusive and probably impossible goal,
full U.S.-China combat operations. However, he was not a people person and he lacked the ability
to deal with his Chinese partners tactfully and he was impatient toward the Nationalist
leaders. Thus, the unhappy partnership and conflicting ideas and beliefs of American and
Century.