Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
  1. Home
  2. Search

Refine search

Refine search

Access:
Content type:
Publication date:
Apply   From and To filters
Subject: Show more
Journals Show more
Publishers: Show more
Societies Show more
Series: Show more
Collections: Show more

Actions for selected content:

Select all | Deselect all
  • View selected items
  • Export citations
  • Download PDF (zip)
  • Save to Kindle
  • Save to Dropbox
  • Save to Google Drive

Save Search

You can save your searches here and later view and run them again in "My saved searches".

Please provide a title, maximum of 40 characters.
Cancel
×

1 results

  • 4 - Stilwell, Chiang Kai-shek, and World War II

  • Peter Lorge, Vanderbilt University, Tennessee
  • Book:
    Sun Tzu in the West
    Published online:
    03 November 2022
    Print publication:
    17 November 2022, pp 87-106

  • Summary

    Joseph Stilwell’s career and campaigns in China present a counterexample to Samuel Griffith and unconventional war. Sunzi was essentialized into the Chinese way of fighting and used to encapsulate the problems facing Stilwell and excuse his inability to do more. One of the central messages of Barbara Tuchman’s account of Stilwell in China was that he accomplished what he did despite ferocious resistance from Chiang Kai-shek and the GMD. He was heroic because he achieved anything at all, defeating the Japanese Army at Myitkyina and building an impossible road through Burma. Yet Stilwell’s mission, like the American engagement with China more generally, was a failure. America could not overcome the reality of China under Chiang Kai-shek. China was “lost” to the Communists, who were also Chinese. Mao Zedong won by using Sunzi, but Chiang Kai-shek lost by using Sunzi. Chiang did not produce military writings validated by victory like Mao.