General Joseph Stilwell

Biography

Joseph Warren Stilwell was born on March 19, 1883, in Palatka, Florida, and grew up in New York. His name in the history of the Second Sino-Japanese War is inseparable from one of history's most spectacular command failures of interpersonal chemistry — an officer of genuine brilliance who was comprehensively wrong about everything important while being factually right about almost everything he observed. Stilwell spoke fluent Mandarin, having served in China during the 1920s and 1930s, and was considered the US Army's foremost China expert when he was appointed in 1942 to serve as Chiang Kai-shek's Chief of Staff and commander of US forces in the China-Burma-India (CBI) theater. His mandate was essentially impossible: to persuade Chiang Kai-shek to commit his best forces to offensive operations in Burma, thereby reopening the Burma Road supply line to China, while simultaneously training and equipping Chinese divisions to fight effectively. Stilwell's contempt for Chiang — whom he privately called 'Peanut' in his diaries — was genuine and mutually destructive. He believed Chiang was a corrupt coward who was hoarding American Lend-Lease supplies and US-trained divisions for the post-war civil war rather than fighting Japan. He was largely right in this assessment. But Stilwell's remedy — demanding personal command of all Chinese forces, browbeating Chiang in front of subordinates, and constantly threatening to cut off supplies — was diplomatically catastrophic and ultimately unworkable. The relationship deteriorated through a succession of crises: the Burma retreat of 1942, the airlift over the Hump, the Salween River offensive, and finally the Ichigo disaster of 1944. When Ichigo overran four US airbases and devastated Chinese armies, President Roosevelt sent Chiang an ultimatum demanding Stilwell be given full command of all Chinese forces. Chiang refused and demanded Stilwell's recall instead. Roosevelt, recognizing that deposing Chiang in wartime was not a viable option, recalled Stilwell in October 1944. Stilwell returned to the United States — publicly in disgrace but privately convinced history would vindicate him. It largely did: his assessment of Nationalist corruption and Communist military effectiveness proved prescient. He died of cancer on October 12, 1946.

Key Battles