Part I
The United States and China Become Allies

Chapter I
Aid to China Involves the U.S. Army

The geographic circumstance that placed China across the Pacific Ocean from the United States, the history and culture that gave it some 400,000,000 industrious, clever, prolific people of an ancient civilization, and the disorders that vexed the Chinese land as its people sought to adapt themselves to the industrial ways and materialist culture of the West long combined to make China an object of peculiar interest and concern to the people and Government of the United States. Itself the outstanding example of revolt against European colonialism, the United States of America was sympathetic to the efforts of the Chinese to work out their destiny in their own way and supported them as the situation permitted.

The United States could not believe that the possession of modern industrial techniques by European states and the one Oriental nation successfully imitating them, Japan, conferred the right to dispose of the freedom and patrimony of Asia and considered that the long-range interests of the United States were best served by the support of Asiatic nationalism. As the twentieth century progressed, Asiatic nationalism began to rise ever closer to the flood stage. Large-scale fighting threatened Asia as Japan, the latecomer to industrialism, started to repeat, at China's expense, the imperialist behavior of her Western tutors. Japan's actions seemed contrary to the course and spirit of international political developments of the 1920's; they threatened to upset the status quo in the Pacific in a manner dangerous to American security, and so the United States, fearing the ultimate menace, moved ever closer to open support of China, which was immediately menaced.

The history of Japanese efforts to establish a special position for the Japanese Empire in China is far too long to detail here. China's markets and resources and the absence for many years of a strong central government seemed to the Japanese to offer natural and obvious opportunities, while the undisciplined troops of Chinese war lords on occasion subjected Japanese citizens to treatment of the sort to which, fifty years before, Japan's western mentors had habitually responded by the dispatch of gunboats. So there were

incidents, diplomatic notes, and diplomatic crises. Lending hope for the future, the period 1922-1930 after World War I brought forth liberal cabinets in Japan which signed treaties pledging their nation to allow China the chance to work out her destiny in her own way. Then came the Great Depression of the thirties. Japan's overseas markets contracted and unrest grew. The most powerful voices of protest in Japan came from factions allied to, or even part of, the Japanese Army. These sought a remedy for Japan's troubles at home in seizing the raw materials and monopolizing the markets of China and her northern possession, Manchuria.

The Japanese Army's continental adventure began 18 September 1931 when a carefully staged incident near Mukden, Manchuria, offered the pretext under which the Japanese Army, while the Japanese Foreign Office offered polite regrets and promises that soon proved empty, soon overran all Manchuria. The United States was then under Republican administration. President Herbert C. Hoover was a man of peace, profoundly adverse to the United States' taking any course in the Pacific, in restraint of Japan, that might mean war. The rest of the Great Powers, for diverse reasons, were equally reluctant to undertake vigorous action.

Faced with a situation in which military and economic sanctions, by European powers or the United States or both, were out of the question, Mr. Hoover's Secretary of State, Henry L. Stimson, suggested that the United States adopt a policy of not recognizing the legality of any changes in Asia that the Japanese might effect by force. To Mr. Stimson, announcement of the policy on 7 January 1932 was a reassertion of cherished American convictions and a notice to the Chinese that the United States would not condone violations of China's sovereignty and territorial integrity.¹ The note had no discernible effect on the Japanese, but it placed on record for all to see that American and Japanese interests, as defined by the two governments, were clashing and identified Stimson as a firm opponent of Japanese aggression in the Far East.

Having separated Manchuria from China the Japanese found themselves faced by a Chinese boycott. One of the few means of retaliation open to China, the boycott was a severe blow to Japan's trade in one of her principal markets. Chinese indignation was steadily rising and there were attacks on Japanese residents in China. The Japanese had occupied Manchuria on less provocation. On 28 January 1932 they landed an expeditionary force in Shanghai. Heavy fighting followed in which for the first time the Chinese gave a good account of themselves against the Japanese. World opinion, governmental and public,

quickly hardened, and in May 1932 the Japanese withdrew their forces from Shanghai. An uneasy peace followed in Asia.

In the years that followed there were great changes in China and the United States. In the United States, the Democratic administration of Franklin Delano Roosevelt took office in March 1933. In China, the Chinese gave the appearance of rapidly and steadily coalescing into a unified state. Their finances improved, their manufactures increased, and peace and stability gradually spread through the land as the Nationalist Government of the Republic of China, controlled by the Kuomintang Party under Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, brought one after another of the war lords to heel and attracted more and more Chinese to its banner. By 1937 there was but one major dissident element, the Chinese Communists. Possessed of their own small army, they were compressed into the far northwest of China. Generalissimo Chiang was bitterly opposed to them and by one expedition after another had steadily whittled away their territory.

The Japanese did not watch the unification and progress of China with complacence. In the four and a half years from 1932 to summer 1937 there were incidents on China's Manchurian and Mongolian frontiers; Japanese troop movements and maneuvers involved the Japanese garrisons, which treaty rights permitted in north China; Japanese naval landing parties went ashore at Hankow, Pakhoi, Tsingtao, and a suburb of Shanghai; and within Japan the forces favoring aggressive policies in Asia grew steadily in strength. The behavior of the Japanese toward China greatly irritated Chinese opinion, which was growing ever more nationalistic, and there was increasing popular pressure on the Chinese Government to resist Japan.

Japanese imperialists and Chinese Communists posed a grave problem for the Generalissimo. The resources of China's new government did not permit him to deal with both simultaneously. The solution that he preferred, and that he sought to follow, was to crush the Communists while opposing Japan by diplomacy alone. This did not meet with general approval. Chinese opinion generally was outraged by the Japanese, and since the articulate elements in China were either sincerely nationalist or thought it politic to profess such sentiments, it may well be that many Chinese overrated their resources and underestimated their enemy's. Be that as it may, in December 1936 a group of Chinese led by Marshal Chang Hsueh-liang kidnapped the Generalissimo. To their captive, they insisted that he lead both Nationalists and Communists into a United Front, which would stand firm against the Japanese. The Generalissimo won his freedom by agreeing, and honored his bargain. The next Japanese move meant large-scale hostilities.

On 8 July 1937 Japanese troops attacked a Chinese garrison near Peiping, in north China. At first a local incident, it spread as the Japanese manifested an aggressive, intransigent attitude, while the Chinese, having already lost

Manchuria and seen their control of north China whittled away, showed no disposition to yield further. Military operations on the grand scale were soon under way with the national forces supporting the provincial troops who were first involved. The Nationalist Government of the Republic of China had tried to create a modern army, for only thus could it continue to dominate China's factions and provinces and hope to resist further Japanese encroachments on Chinese territory.

For military advice and martial gear the Kuomintang had turned to Germany, Italy, and Russia, not to the United States, whose Army in the thirties was unimpressive. By 1937 the skilled and highly regarded German Military Mission (1928-38) had brought about thirty divisions, loyal to Chiang Kai-shek, to a standard of efficiency never before known in China.² These troops fought in the defense of the lower Yangtze valley, but by 1939 the Japanese possessed the lines of communications, the seaports, and the key cities of China, including the capital, Nanking.

As the Chinese fell back into the interior, the Chinese and sympathetic observers released accounts to the Western world claiming that the Chinese had lost only because they lacked modern arms. Neither the German Mission, which had trained and advised the best Chinese divisions, nor Col. Joseph W. Stilwell, the American Military Attaché (1935-39), agreed with the press releases. According to their reports, the Chinese committed basic military errors: neglect of fundamental principles of strategy and tactics; improper use of supporting weapons; indifference to military intelligence; inability to adopt sound command and staff procedures; failure to establish a communications net; and failure to keep vehicles and weapons in operating condition.

After the capture of Canton and Hankow in October 1938, the Japanese paused to consolidate their positions. The Chinese seized the opportunity to raise a series of obstacles ahead of the river lines and mountain barriers of west and south China. Roads were trenched, railways dismantled, bridges removed, ferry sites destroyed, and mountain passes barricaded to give the Chinese a buffer from fifty to one hundred miles wide. Walled towns attracted remnants of the national divisions and housed makeshift arsenals. Chungking became the seat of the Generalissimo's wartime government. A stalemate settled over the vast front, broken by sporadic Japanese forays to disperse Chinese troop concentrations and, in 1939, by two abortive Chinese offensives which could not gain enough momentum. Both sides engaged in diplomatic maneuvering, with each other and with possible allies. Nationalist China sought closer ties with Britain, France, the Soviet Union, and the United States. Japan drew closer

to heavily armed and increasingly aggressive Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, the Axis Powers. Opportunities for Japanese aggrandizement in Asia at the expense of European colonial powers developed steadily as war clouds in Europe gathered. In China, the Japanese reorganized their twenty-three divisions and twenty independent mixed brigades on a garrison basis in order to free mobile troops for service elsewhere. In March 1940 the Japanese installed Wang Ching-wei's puppet regime in Nanking, but his defection from the Nationalist cause had no decisive result.³

China Seeks U.S. Aid

War in Europe after September 1939 made it unlikely that European powers friendly to China could spare arms and technical assistance, so the Chinese Government approached the United States, whose sympathy for it was openly manifested by government and people alike, though not on a scale to commit the United States to intervention in the Sino-Japanese conflict. In two loans the American Export-Import Bank lent the Chinese-owned Universal Trading Corporation $45,000,000, its use restricted to purchase of civilian supplies.⁴

Following the occupation of Poland by German and Russian armies in September 1939 there was a period of undeclared truce in Europe, called at the time the "phony war." War was real enough at sea, but on land, save in Finland where the Russians struck to extend their borders, there was quiet. Then on 9 April 1940, without warning, the Germans attacked Norway and Denmark. The long training and preparation of the Germans carried all before them, and the campaign in Norway was obviously in its final stages when on 10 May 1940 the Germans struck again, this time against Holland, Belgium, and France, the first two of them declared neutrals. Being then at the peak of their power, the German Army and Air Force overran France and the Low Countries in six weeks. The British Expeditionary Force, plus a considerable number of Frenchmen, was successfully withdrawn through Dunkerque harbor, but this deliverance, though hopeful for the future, could not obscure the fact that Adolf Hitler's Germany was master of Europe from the Pyrenees to North Cape, from the Atlantic to the Polish marshes, on the far side of which Russia stood in strange, uneasy partnership. Italy joined Germany in the closing days of the fight, and there seemed every prospect that Japan might soon do the same and seize the chance of taking French, British, and Dutch

possessions in Asia. Britain stood alone, and the United States had to make decisions of the utmost gravity.

In June 1940 Mr. T. V. Soong⁵ visited the United States to ask for arms and more credits. Two factors weighed heavily in favor of a loan to China for arms. U.S. sympathy lay with China's cause and American planners, in appraising the possibility and probable course of a conflict with Japan, recognized the advantages for the United States in having China's manpower and geographic position as an aid. However, the United States was most anxious not to provoke Japan to ally herself with Germany since that alliance would further jeopardize England's already desperate position. Moreover, since Germany had just overrun western Europe to the English Channel, the United States itself seemed in danger, and the American munitions stock was not great enough to provide for China after American needs were met and after the United States supported Great Britain, whose plight seemed most directly to affect the United States. Furthermore, it was not feasible to diminish the U.S. stockpile in order to send supplies to China since matériel previously sent was not reaching the fronts because lines of communications were inadequate for forwarding it.⁶

Two blows fell hard on Chinese morale with the advent of autumn. The first was the entrance of the Japanese into northern Indochina on 23 September, by agreement with the Government of Unoccupied France. Then, four days later, Japan, Germany, and Italy signed a pact whose wording suggested they would join in offensive action against the British Commonwealth and the United States. To encourage the dejected Chinese, the United States gave a third credit of $25,000,000 to China. But the loan did not answer China's pleas for arms, and in October the Chinese renewed their requests. They were spurred on by the fact that the Japanese occupation of northern Indochina closed the Yunnan-Indochina Railway, leaving the Burma Road, which extended from Chungking to the terminus of the Burma Railways, Lashio, Burma, as China's sole supply link with the outside world. The Burma Road, though maladministration and corruption had reduced its inherently low capacity, now had great symbolic value as China's last tie with freedom. That summer the sorely tried British had closed the Lashio terminal for three

months to placate the Japanese. Although the Burma Road was reopened on 10 October 1940, the Chinese and British saw the events of September bringing the Japanese ever closer to it, and there was little Britain could do to keep the Japanese out of Burma.⁷

On 18 October 1940 the Generalissimo described his problems and made his proposals to the U.S. Ambassador, Mr. Nelson T. Johnson. The Generalissimo admitted that the Japanese blockade had weakened China's economy and hurt public morale. The Chinese Communists were taking advantage of the situation, and by his own admission the Generalissimo feared them more than he feared the Japanese. (It must be recalled that this was the era of the Russo-German nonaggression pact of 1939, and that the Russian and German Foreign Ministers were soon to meet and debate the parceling out of the Middle East.) The Generalissimo was anxious lest the Japanese seize Singapore or cut the Burma Road. Before either of these disasters, China must have economic aid plus numbers of U.S. aircraft manned by American volunteers. Unless this aid came soon, China might collapse. If it came in time, the internal situation would be restored and the Japanese forestalled. The aircraft would also permit the Generalissimo to effect a "fundamental solution" of the Pacific problem by destroying the Japanese Navy in its bases.⁸ Proposed a month before British carrier aircraft attacked the Italian Navy at Taranto, the Generalissimo's plan might indeed have been the fundamental solution, but in the irony of history it was the Japanese who attempted the method at Pearl Harbor.⁹

Mr. Johnson considered this a time for decision and urged the State Department to effective action to uphold the U.S. position in the Far East. The Department's reply on 23 October was guarded in tone.¹⁰ It reassured the Generalissimo by observing that both Singapore and the Burma Road appeared safe for the present, and went on to describe Chinese and American interests as parallel, even though the traditional U.S. policy was one of shunning alliances. It concluded with the statement that the U.S. Government would continue to study the matter to see what could be done within the framework of existing law. Every reader of the press knew that the United States had found it legally possible to ship large quantities of arms to the British, and

therefore, although the Generalissimo did not say so specifically, he impressed Ambassador Johnson as being pleased with the American reply. He asked the American envoy to convey his deep gratitude to President Franklin D. Roosevelt.¹¹ After the American note of 23 October, the Chinese closed their ears to offers of mediation from Japan's ally, Germany.¹²

The fear of the Chinese Communists that the Generalissimo communicated to Ambassador Johnson may have reflected awareness of a widening breach between the Nationalists and Communists, which became evident a few months later in January 1941. No outsider could hope to untangle the rights and wrongs of the incident that marked the end of the United Front, but in January 1941 the Nationalists and the Communist New 4th Army clashed. When the battle ended, the New 4th Army headquarters staff were dead or captive, together with their troops. Thereafter, many Nationalist divisions were deployed against the Communists, who, for their part, were quite willing to join in fratricidal war. This meant that the Generalissimo had another factor to consider in the shifting political balances within China.

In November 1940 the Generalissimo sent a mission under Maj. Gen. Mao Pang-tzo, Director of the Operations Division, Chinese Air Force, to the United States. With him was an American citizen, Capt. Claire L. Chennault (USA-Ret.), who had been an articulate and forceful advocate of fighter aviation vis-à-vis the bomber and a daring and skillful pilot. After his retirement from the U.S. Army Air Corps in 1937 for physical disability, Chennault had gone to China, where he had won the confidence and affection of the Chinese. As one of their technical advisers he had become a colonel in their Air Force. Studying Japanese equipment, tactics, and military potential, Chennault had devised a plan to defeat Japan with a small air force, operating under a tactical system designed by him to exploit the relative strengths and weaknesses of American and Japanese aircraft and pilots.¹³

Since 1937 the Chinese had been discussing with two other Americans the possibility of using their influence and business organizations in placing American air power in China. Mr. William D. Pawley and Lt. Comdr. Bruce Leighton (USNR-Ret.) were asked by Soong and Mao to co-operate in giving air support to the Chinese.¹⁴

The Mao mission presented its request on 25 November 1940 to the President's Liaison Committee, the civilian agency co-ordinating foreign arms purchases in the United States. The Chinese wanted 500 combat planes

delivered to China in 1941. They also wanted crews to fly them since, despite the efforts of successive European and American air missions, the Chinese had been unable to train a body of pilots. One hundred and fifty basic trainers and ten transports would complete a small but balanced air force. Twenty percent spare parts were requested, plus matériel to build 14 major airfields and 122 landing strips, and ammunition and ordnance requirements for one year's operation.¹⁵

Concurrently with Mao's aircraft proposal came a Chinese bid for $30,000,000 worth of ground force matériel. This first bid was on a scale appropriate to the equipping of thirty Chinese divisions. Extension of a $100,000,000 credit on 1 December 1940 became the first step toward initiating military aid for China. Of the total sum, 25 percent could be used to purchase arms. Obviously this amount was insufficient to finance either Mao's aircraft program or the Chinese bid for ground force matériel. Nor was the U.S. Army able to find facilities to manufacture the caliber of weapons which the Chinese requested. The Chinese were also told that the U.S. Army had no authority to sell ordnance from its own stocks to China.¹⁶

With $25,000,000 available, Mao's aircraft requests fared better. On 4 December Dr. Stanley K. Hornbeck of the State Department hinted that military aid to China would start with aircraft and that no objection would be raised to the American volunteer scheme. On 19 December 1940 Mr. Roosevelt approved military aid for China and asked the State, War, Navy, and Treasury Departments to find ways of implementing a program.¹⁷

Fearing Japan's intentions since the Japanese sank the USS Panay in December 1937, the Navy Department closely studied the Mao proposals. Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox, assisted by his aide, Capt. Morton L. Deyo (USN), discussed both the strategic implications and the Chinese ability to use and maintain 500 modern aircraft with Mr. Pawley and Commander Leighton. Both had had years of experience in selling transport and combat aircraft to the Chinese Government. Having served on the U.S. Navy's Yangtze River patrol, Commander Leighton had acquired a deep appreciation

of the strategic importance of China-based air power to deter further Japanese aggression, but he was quick to point out its limitations in the hands of the Chinese. He insisted that American technicians would have to assist in all phases of the 500-plane air force scheme, otherwise there would be failures and waste. Though proceeding with caution, Mr. Knox soon became a leading advocate of aircraft and volunteers for the Chinese Air Force.¹⁸

Unfortunately, the Mao program conflicted with American and British requirements, whose high priorities were to keep this matériel from China until June 1942.¹⁹ The thought behind aid to China was to keep the Japanese fully occupied there beginning in the last six months of 1941, not twelve months later, and the time lag suggested this could not be done. The size of the program was quite acceptable, for the policy then was to accept foreign orders which would lead to enlargement of the U.S. munitions plant.²⁰ The initial step in resolving priority conflicts was the agreement of the British purchasing mission to let the Chinese have 100 P-40B's allocated to Britain, if the Chinese in turn would yield their priority rights to 100 later model fighters.²¹ The British assumed responsibility for completing the armament of the P-40's. In their haste to get fighters, the Chinese agreed and accepted the first thirty-six P-40's without essential combat gear.

While the various bureaus worked on these proposals, which Chennault had prepared with expert care, Mr. Soong and his Chinese colleagues laid before the President a scheme to bomb Japan from Chinese bases with B-17's manned by American volunteers. This proposal won considerable attention, unlike the Generalissimo's proposal to sink the Japanese fleet. Gen. George C. Marshall, Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army, said it had the approval of the Secretary of State, Cordell Hull, and his colleague, Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau. Appearing at the War Department with that august support, the plan underwent a more searching examination, during which it appeared that the Chinese had already expended a group of Martin bombers without result by operating them without fighter cover or antiaircraft support, just as they proposed to operate the B-17's. Trained American crews were as scarce as B-17's. Permitting them to volunteer would greatly handicap the Army Air Corps' expansion program. Moreover, because it was most difficult to ship spare parts to airfields within bombing range of Japan, maintenance problems

for the B-17's would be insoluble. Although the War Department did not grant the request for B-17's and volunteer crews, the discussions showed that at this early date the Department entertained the idea of containing Japan by putting air power into China.²²

Origins of Lend-Lease Aid for China

After the purchase of 100 P-40's, the Chinese were in need of more credits to complete the Mao air program and to contract for matériel for the Chinese Army. Early in January 1941 the War Department told the Chinese to await developments on both of their projects since the American aid program was about to undergo a profound change.²³ Because of the pending exhaustion of British dollar resources, President Roosevelt in December proposed the device of removing the "dollar sign" by lending or leasing arms to Great Britain or any other nation whose defense was thought vital to American security.²⁴ Lend-lease was a tremendous weapon in the bloodless struggle then under way between the United States on the one hand and Germany and Italy on the other, because it put the prodigious resources and industry of the United States behind Great Britain and China.²⁵

The Lend-Lease bill went before Congress on 6 January 1941. In comparison with Great Britain, China played a very minor role in the planning of lend-lease legislation. One reason was that, apart from the Mao program, Washington had little specific, itemized information as to what China's overall needs were, for Soong's staff had offered only vague generalities.²⁶ The British, on the other hand, had presented concrete programs on which the estimate of the first lend-lease appropriation was based. A second reason lay in the fact that, though the War Department wanted Japan to be contained in China, the British Commonwealth with its vast holdings in the Orient was considered to have a predominant interest in maintaining China as a belligerent.²⁷ The Commonwealth would have received U.S. approval of any reasonable program of transfers to China.

At this point the Generalissimo asked that Dr. Lauchlin Currie, one of the President's administrative assistants, be sent to China to examine the military and economic situation. Dr. Currie subsequently visited China from 28 January to 11 March 1941. Without, it would seem, having actually explored the scope

and degree of completion of the various projects presented to him by the Chinese, Currie returned to tell the President that in anticipation of increased U.S. support the Generalissimo was rushing completion of airfields for B-17's, making plans to centralize administrative control of the Burma Road, and assembling troops at strategic points to receive American weapons. Currie also presented Chinese requests for technicians, advisers, and further credits for currency stabilization.²⁸

The President signed the Lend-Lease Act on 11 March 1941. On 31 March Soong presented China's requirements to Maj. Gen. James H. Burns, Executive Officer of the Division of Defense Aid Reports, the forerunner of the Office of Lend-Lease Administration.²⁹ This and subsequent Chinese requests were considered in the light of the availability of matériel and of the already formulated policy of making the major American effort in the Atlantic or European area.³⁰

Soong's first request for supplies and services fell under seven heads, but close analysis revealed it centered about three related projects. These were:

1. An enlargement of the Mao-Chennault proposals, calling for a modern air force of 1,000 aircraft, with American training and technical help.

2. Arms which, if issued on the basis of organization finally presented by the Chinese in March 1942,³¹ would equip thirty divisions.

3. An efficient line of communications between China and friendly powers, with:

   1. A narrow-gauge railway from Yunnan to the Burma Railways.

   2. A highway from Sadiya, India, across north Burma to China.

   3. Trucks, repair shops, and resurfacing for the Burma Road.

   4. Transport aircraft to supplement the road and railways.

Scattered through the request were indications of the strategy behind them, which suggested a Chinese hope that the air force would protect China's airfields and cities and their approaches. With these secure, the lines of communications to them could operate efficiently. Expanded lines of supply would then support the newly equipped divisions, some of whose requirements would be supplied from China's arsenals. Soong believed that a revitalized Chinese Army could not only hold key defensive points, thereby forcing Japan to keep troops in China, but could ultimately assume the offensive. He estimated that with adequate lend-lease aid these strategic aims might be achieved in two years' time.³²

On his return from Chungking, Dr. Currie had received from Mr. Harry L. Hopkins, the President's confidential adviser, the task of expediting Chinese lend-lease aid.³³ Currie found Soong's program faring badly in the initial confusion of setting up lend-lease machinery.³⁴ Powerful impetus toward expediting aid to China came from the signature on 13 April of the Russo-Japanese neutrality pact, which stunned the Chinese. The Chinese had found the USSR willing to sell them small quantities of arms, and now this source had dried up. So the Generalissimo again appealed for help, while Washington was eager to find means to offset the pact's effect on world public opinion.³⁵

Dr. Currie rushed Mr. Soong's program to the War Department,³⁶ where it received searching analysis. The consensus at the Department was that the Chinese were not prepared to take full advantage of the Lend-Lease Act because they did not know what they needed. Requirements for ordnance and aircraft were in specific quantities and understandably identified, but engineering and medical requirements were in "general statements . . . to be followed by detailed information as soon as available."³⁷ For the Yunnan-Burma Railway they asked 30,000 tons of rails but omitted specifications. In asking for trucks, Soong gave elaborately worked out tables, all on the basis of 4-ton trucks, which were not available in quantity in the United States and which would have torn the unimproved Chinese roads to pieces. The spare parts problem for these vehicles was met by the simple request for some, with no estimate based on operating experience as to what quantity might be needed. To be sure, the program promised "future details" on these matters, but this was March 1941 and Soong had been asking aid ever since the previous June. Every day of delay in giving the specifications meant a day of delay in procurement, while the general air of vagueness and unreality about these requirements made an unfavorable impression on the War Department.

On 22 April the War Department gave Currie a preliminary report on Soong's program and a list of matériel which if available could be supplied to China without interfering to any appreciable extent with U.S. Army and British programs.³⁸ (Table 1) Scarcity of trucks and road-building machinery forced

Currie to cut the list, and the President earmarked $45,100,000 to initiate China's lend-lease program.³⁹ (See Table 1.) Since funds were available, Soong's

Table 1
Initial Programming of Lend-Lease Funds for China: April 1941

Type	Soong Program		Initial Approval
	Quantity	Estimated Cost	Quantity	Estimated Cost
Total	. . . . . . . .	$76,100,000	. . . . . . . .	$45,100,000
War Department Procurement	. . . . . . . .	56,600,000	. . . . . . . .	28,600,000
Trucks, Commercial	7,300	21,000,000	2,000	6,000,000
Trucks, Military	6,500	19,000,000	2,000	6,000,000
Railroad Equipment	. . . . . . . .	15,000,000	. . . . . . . .	15,000,000
Communications Equipment	. . . . . . . .	1,000,000	. . . . . . . .	1,000,000
Tractors	150	300,000	150	300,000
Passenger Cars	300	300,000	300	300,000
Treasury Department Procurement	. . . . . . . .	19,500,000	. . . . . . . .	16,5O0,000
Arsenal Materials	. . . . . . . .	10,000,000	. . . . . . . .	10,000,000
Cotton Blankets	3,000,000	4,500,000	3,000,000	4,500,000
Road Machinery	. . . . . . . .	3,000,000	. . . . . . . .	. . . . . . . .
Gasoline (gallons)	5,000,000	1,000,000	5,000,000	1,000,000
Grey Sheeting (yards)	10,000,000	700,000	10,000,000	700,000
Lubricating Oil (tons)	2,500	250,000	2,500	250,000
Diesel Oil (tons)	5,000	50,000	5,000	50,000

Source: Memo, Stimson for Currie, 22 Apr 41, sub: Aid Program to ChinaóLend-Lease Act. AG 400.329) (4-14-41) Sec 1A.

initial requisition on 1 May (as against a requirement) for 300 2½-ton trucks was speedily approved by Mr. Roosevelt on 6 May.⁴⁰ Within a fortnight this first lend-lease equipment left New York bound for Rangoon, Burma. Meanwhile, the War Department completed its estimate of availability, dollar costs, and shipping data for the whole Soong program. This study laid the basis of all Chinese lend-lease programing before Pearl Harbor. Singling out ordnance items, Currie secured War Department and presidential approval for funds to start the ground force project. (Table 2) Currie learned that the War Department's approval of funds for the production of any item on a Chinese program did not make its delivery to China a sacred commitment. The War Department

emphasized that emergencies might force shifting priorities when the weapons were ready for distribution.⁴¹

By late spring 1941 an additional $100,000,000 of lend-lease funds was divided between Soong's communications and air force projects.⁴² (See Tables 1 and 2 for first grants.) Since he had been given little hope that ordnance and communications items would be available for China in any quantity before mid-1942, Currie concentrated his efforts on a more promising air program.

Table 2
Essential Ordnance Requirements Requested as Lend-Lease for China

Item	Requirements		Availability
	Quantity	Estimated Cost
Total	. . . . . . . .	$49,341,000
Pack Howitzer, 75-mm	600	9,200,000	Mid-1942.
Ammunition, 75-mm. (rounds)	1,200,000	19,128,000	Mid-1942.
Gun, 75-mm. motorized	144	3,007,000	On receipt of 105-mm. replacements.
Shell, 75-mm. (rounds)	144,000	1,866,000	On receipt of 105-mm. replacements.
Tank, Light, with machine guns	360	15,000,000	Immediate order.
Truck, ¼-ton (jeep)	1,000	1,140,000	Immediate order.

Source: Ltr, Stimson to Currie, 16 May 41. WD 400.3295 (5-14-41) MC, China Lend-Lease, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299.

Putting Air Power in China: The AVG and Currie's Lend-Lease Program

Two air programs were clearly emerging from the original Chinese 500-plane proposal by the early spring of 1941. The availability of 100 Curtiss P-40B's in January and February 1941 afforded an opportunity that Chennault and Soong had exploited, with powerful and essential aid from the services. Soong's aim was to rush the organization of a fighter group for earliest possible service in China. Currie, on the other hand, was eager to secure lend-lease funds to fill a larger long-range air program, which, if successful, would have created a potent Chinese Air Force. While both programs developed concurrently, the P-40 project outdistanced its lend-lease counterpart in the period before Pearl Harbor.

On 15 February 1941, General Marshall told the Acting Secretary of State, Mr. Sumner Welles, that a man had been found who was willing to take a

chance on recruiting pilots for the P-40B's in spite of existing neutrality legislation.⁴³ This was the same Mr. Pawley who had been conferring with Secretary Knox since December 1940 on a volunteer scheme. Two months later Pawley signed a nonprofit contract with Soong to equip, supply, and operate the American Volunteer Group (AVG), as it was to be known. Under the contract, Colonel Chennault bore the unmartial title of supervisor. To insure co-ordination between the different branches of the organization setting up the AVG, the contract required Chennault to maintain close liaison with Pawley's organization in the Far East and in New York.⁴⁴

Although the AVG was not supported by lend-lease funds, the War and Navy Departments, giving effect to the President's policy, were soon involved. Both services extended facilities to Pawley's recruiting agents and released pilots and crews for service in China's Air Force.⁴⁵ Pawley's agents toured Air Corps and Navy training fields everywhere save in Hawaii and the Philippines, offering big salaries and hinting of bonuses for victories confirmed. Administrative and technical staffs were complete on 9 August, but pilot recruiting was not complete for another month. There were 101 pilot volunteers, 63 from the Navy and 38 from the Army, each with a one-year contract dating from the time the volunteer reached the Far East.⁴⁶ Overseas movement began on 9 June with the first pilots sailing later on a Dutch vessel escorted through the Japanese mandate islands by American warships. Though contrary to the neutrality laws, the escort was considered by Admiral Harold R. Stark, Chief of Naval Operations, to be essential to U.S. support of China.⁴⁷

Having signed a contract with Soong on 15 April 1941 to secure volunteers for the 100 P-40's (which had already been put on board ship for Rangoon), Mr. Pawley sent his brother Edward to Chungking to check the preparations the Chinese had promised to make to receive the American Volunteer Group in China. Edward Pawley reported that the Chinese had not begun their preparations to receive the volunteers. Consequently, Pawley told his brother to ask the British military authorities in Burma for training facilities. At Lashio, Mr. Edward Pawley was so fortunate as to encounter Air Chief Marshal

Sir Robert Brooke-Popham, the British commander-in-chief in the Far East, who numbered the defense of Burma among his many responsibilities. Sir Robert was most helpful, and obtained permission of the British War Office to offer facilities at Toungoo and Magwe to the American Volunteer Group.⁴⁸

When the first contingent of volunteers arrived on 28 July, they were promptly sent to a recently completed Royal Air Force (RAF) airdrome in the midst of a pestilent jungle six miles from Toungoo. This airfield was turned over to the AVG by London for full combat training with the proviso that the Burmese airfields would not be used as a base to attack the Japanese, for Britain was anxious to avoid war with Japan. Administrative difficulties with the British and Burmese civil authorities resulted from the arrangement. Having been forbidden to use American armed guards or to employ the Burmese as guards, the AVG felt its security jeopardized and was finally able to obtain Gurkha guards. The AVG could make no additions or changes in airfield construction without the official permission of the RAF. The position of the American volunteers training in Burma was anomalous, for the AVG was part of the Chinese Air Force, and, until war between the United States and Japan broke out, they had no official connection with the United States Army Air Forces.

At Toungoo the volunteers for three squadrons of P-40's were trained in Chennault's system of tactics, which was based on years of study and observation of the Japanese Air Force. Chennault's men used a two-ship element, always flying and fighting in pairs, diving in, making a quick pass, and then breaking away, thus exploiting the superior diving speed of the P-40 and refusing the turning combat for which the frail, maneuverable, Japanese aircraft were designed. Gunnery was stressed, that the brief contact might be lethal. As a unit, the AVG was trained to break up the Japanese formations, confront their pilots with unexpected situations, and exploit the resulting confusion.⁴⁹

The training in these tactics took a heavy toll of the planes, which were badly in need of proper and complete equipment. In the haste to obtain fighters, the P-40's had been accepted without necessary equipment and spare parts, on the understanding that the British would release guns and ammunition from their lend-lease stocks. This division of responsibility produced much debate in the days ahead, with the principal Chinese purchasing and supply agency, China Defense Supplies, Inc., arguing that if the British could not equip the aircraft the War Department had to.⁵⁰ The latter was not eager

to be charged with support of a fighter group so far from U.S. bases, and was further embarrassed by the current grave shortage of .30- and .50-caliber ammunition. Though the War Department approved the concept of keeping the Japanese contained in China, when faced with the concrete problem of creating and supporting the AVG some of its senior members had misgivings. Fully admitting that the details of logistical support made "the whole thing so confusing" and convinced that the sober facts of inadequate ordnance and signal equipment had not been brought to Mr. Roosevelt's attention, Secretary of War Stimson refused to entertain any claim that the Department was not responsible for the AVG. "Unfortunately, it is," was his comment. Ultimately, Currie had to take the matter to the President with the pertinent remark that if the fighters were sent to China without ammunition, there would be an international scandal and the rest of the lend-lease program might as well be forgotten. The President ordered the release of ammunition, and 1,500,000 rounds came from Army stocks. Spare parts were just as hard to find, for the factory no longer made many of them for the outmoded P-40B. The larger question of the War Department's relation to the AVG was not settled before war commenced.⁵¹

Though involved in the effort to rush creation of a fighter group Dr. Currie was also at work on his larger program. After considering U.S. aircraft production figures and bearing in mind that China received but $53,000,000 for aircraft out of the first lend-lease allocations, Currie outlined his program on 28 May 1941.⁵² To supplement the AVG's 100 fighters, he arranged with the British to release 144 Vultee P-48's. At the Republic aviation plant he found 125 P-43's. In addition he located 66 Lockheed and Douglas bombers under British contract for which the RAF lacked pilots. These he proposed to obtain by transfer from the British. Placing his program before Secretary Knox, Currie argued: "If this program were adopted China would possess, in early 1942, a respectable air force, judged by Far Eastern standards, which should be sufficient to (a) protect strategic points, (b) permit local army offensive action, (c) permit the bombing of Japanese air bases and supply dumps in China and Indo-China, and the bombing of coastal and river transport, and (d)

permit occasional incendiary bombing of Japan."⁵³ Currie set 31 October 1941 as the date for the completion of the program, and claimed that such a force would be "a powerful means to check a Japanese attack on Singapore and the South Seas."⁵⁴ Studying these proposals, the highest joint service echelon, the Joint Board, raised no objections to their strategic concepts.⁵⁵

The Indochina Crisis and Aid to China

During the winter of 1940-1941 the greatest military events took place on the shores of the Mediterranean. The German armies placed ever more men opposite the Russian frontier, but in the Mediterranean only their air arm was active. There the Germans had to support Fascist Italy, which in fall 1940 proved incapable of overrunning Greece and in December 1940 lost its military reputation at the hands of Gen. Sir Archibald P. Wavell, the British commander in the Middle East. This German air support was not enough, while the German southern flank opposite Russia needed strengthening. Germans in various guises moved into the Balkans in ever greater numbers. The Yugoslav people in March 1941 revolted against an attempt to bring them into the German camp as a satellite. It was the first spontaneous popular defiance of Germany's "new order" in Europe.

The Germans could not let the challenge pass. By a great feat of rapid planning and logistical improvisation they so quickly altered their dispositions in the Balkans that on 6 April 1941 they could attack Yugoslavia and Greece. The events of spring 1940 were repeated as the perfectly equipped, splendidly trained German veterans overran the Yugoslavs who tried to defend their borders, while the inability of the Greeks to withdraw their best troops from Albania made futile Wavell's attempts to support the Greeks with a small air contingent and a task force of some 60,000 men, of whom about 33,000 came from Australia and New Zealand. The evacuation under the blows of the Germans, whose air superiority could not be disputed in the campaign's later phases, was a painful experience.

After Greece surrendered on 24 April 1941, the Germans organized an airborne attack on the island of Crete. The Germans began their operation on 20 May and after a week's hard fighting had another victory, for Crete was

theirs. But the triumph, though technically of great interest, was as costly to the Germans as to the Allies for the German airborne units which took part were thoroughly shaken up and the Germans never tried to duplicate Crete. Much of the burden of Crete's defense was borne by Dominion troops; their losses in Crete and Greece had effect on the policies of their governments.

Then the German divisions moved back north and east, leaving garrisons in the Balkans. In May and June they rejoined the principal German forces, which for months past had been quietly gathering along the Russian frontier. The Russians were alarmed; the Germans, enigmatic. The Russians attempted various forms of appeasement, but the Germans were bent on their project and crossed the Soviet frontier on 22 June 1941. Like Napoleon, Hitler had turned his back on the Channel and was marching to Moscow. It appeared certain that the German armies would be occupied for some weeks to come. A few even hoped the Russians might last out the winter.

About 4 July 1941 British and American intelligence agencies became aware that the Japanese were on the verge of a major move. The United States had broken the Japanese diplomatic code, and so the President and Cabinet in early July had the full revelation of how Japan would react to the situation created by the German attack on Russia on 22 June 1941. They learned that Japan would not attack Russia, but would try to end the undeclared war in China and prepare for a southward advance, toward the oil and rubber of British Malaya and the Netherlands Indies. As a first step, Japan would occupy southern French Indochina and Thailand, even at the risk of war with Great Britain and the United States.⁵⁶ This was alarming news, for the British might not survive the loss of their Far Eastern possessions. Furthermore, the motorized American economy, now pledged to support Britain's cause, depended on Malayan rubber.

The Japanese steps were soberly and earnestly debated by the President, his Cabinet, and at the highest service levels during July's summer heat. An oil embargo, striking at the weakest spot in the Japanese economy, was proposed, but Admiral Stark and General Marshall opposed it, warning that it might mean war, for such an embargo would offer Japan the somber choice of surrender or striking for the oil of the Indies.⁵⁷ Diplomatic warnings over the next few days failed to stop the Japanese, and the United States was confronted

with Japanese occupation of southern French Indochina on 21 July 1941.⁵⁸ Following as it did on the seizure of northern Indochina in September 1940 and Hainan in February 1939, the Japanese advance southward was an ominous step.

The American reaction was strong and culminated in a decisive step that set a time limit within which the Pacific problem would inevitably be brought to the crisis stage and which would greatly affect any long-range program of aid to China. On 23 July the President approved a Joint Board paper which recommended that the United States equip, man, and maintain the 500-plane Chinese Air Force proposed by Currie. The paper suggested that this force embark on a vigorous program to be climaxed by the bombing of Japan in November 1941. Joint Board Paper 355 also defined the strategy behind aid to China: "The continuation of active military operations by the Chinese is highly desirable as a deterrent to the extension of Japanese military and naval operations to the South."⁵⁹

The general concept of giving China lend-lease aid, as distinguished from any specific program that might be submitted, was approved because at this time in Washington there was a myth and a hope about China. An ardent, articulate, and adroit Sinophile faction claimed that the Chinese were courageously and competently resisting the Japanese and needed only arms to drive them into the sea. The services were too well informed to share that belief, but they hoped that if the Chinese were rearmed, reorganized, and trained they might cause the Japanese such concern as to bar any adventures in the South Seas. So the myth and the hope converged, and lend-lease aid to China found increased support in high places.⁶⁰

A presidential proclamation calling the armed forces of the Philippine Commonwealth into the service of the United States was issued, and Lt. Gen. Douglas MacArthur became head of a new army command in the Far East. Plans were set in motion to reinforce the Philippines. General Marshall and Admiral Stark believed it was understood that economic sanctions would not go beyond the licensing of Japanese trade, to control all exports to Japan. On 26 July an order was issued from the summer White House at Hyde Park freezing Japanese assets. Press and public hailed it as an "oil embargo," and when no licenses for the purchase of oil were ever issued to the Japanese under the executive order, it became in effect the decisive step of embargo, setting

about a twelve-month limit within which the Japanese would have to reach an understanding with the United States or attack the Netherlands Indies.⁶¹

The Joint Board recommendations approved by the President on 23 July were that (a) 269 fighters and 66 bombers be furnished for "effective action against Japanese military and naval forces operating in China and in neighboring countries and waters"; (b) the United States provide means to train Chinese to fly and maintain these aircraft; (c) the United States send a military mission to China to advise the Chinese on the proper use of the large amount of arms being furnished by the United States. Aircraft allocations were left subject to U.S. and British requirements; most of them would have to be transferred from British allocations. Thus, the Joint Board accepted Currie's aircraft program.⁶²

Immediately after the President's approval of these recommendations, Soong and Pawley initiated plans for a second American Volunteer Group, based on American concepts of a light bombardment unit, with American pilots for the thirty-three Lockheed Hudson bombers and Chinese pilots for the thirty-three Douglas.⁶³ Hiring began on 1 November, but Pawley had difficulty in finding trained bombardiers. On 21 November forty-nine ground personnel for the second AVG left for China. The outbreak of the war stranded them in Australia.⁶⁴

In November and December 1941 there was a distinct possibility that the AVG might become an Anglo-American organization. Following a warning from the British Ambassador to China on 31 October 1941 that the situation

in China was very grave, Air Chief Marshal Brooke-Popham's headquarters began preparations to place a volunteer fighter squadron and, if possible, some bombers in China to operate with the American Volunteer Group. William D. Pawley strongly urged the British project and co-operated in the logistical preparations.⁶⁵

The aircraft procurement recommended by the board went more slowly. When the complicated details of transferring aircraft from British to Chinese allocations had been completed and Currie had been rescued from the embarrassment caused by his having promised aircraft to China before the British consented to release them, it appeared that deliveries could not start until November 1941 and would not be complete until April 1942.⁶⁶ So went another hope of containing the Japanese in 1941.

The Thirty Division Program

Mr. T. V. Soong's requirements of 31 March for artillery and arsenal materials clearly implied a plan to rearm thirty divisions. He gave priority to thirty battalions of 75-mm. pack howitzers, with 2,000 rounds per piece, and thirty battalions of 37-mm. antitank guns, with 1,500 rounds each. The War Department understood this artillery was organic to the Chinese division, but Mr. Soong did not elaborate the point. Lower priority went to thirty battalions of 105-mm. and eight battalions of 155-mm. howitzers, with ammunition. For the Chinese infantry, Soong asked 15,000 7.92-mm. machine guns with 500,000,000 rounds of ammunition. China had perhaps 200 obsolete tanks, and Soong wanted 360 light tanks and 400 scout cars to replace them.⁶⁷

As the War Department studied Soong's proposals, it found there was little that it could spare from existing stocks or current production. However, if the President was to allocate $184,000,000 from lend-lease funds, future production might meet China's ordnance needs by mid-1942. In mid-May 1941 the Secretary of War agreed with Dr. Currie that the Chinese might begin their rearmament with $50,000,000 of lend-lease funds and that $23,000,000 worth could be from U.S. Army stockpiles or current production. From the latter sources the War Department hoped to find before mid-1942: 144 75-mm. guns, 235 75-mm. howitzers, 265 scout cars less armament, 360 light tanks

with machine guns, and 1,000 ¼-ton trucks (jeeps). Ammunition would be included. Additional lend-lease funds were set aside for an arsenal program and signal, engineering, and medical items.⁶⁸

In May 1941 the Chinese purchasing and supply authority in the United States, China Defense Supplies, began to present its detailed requisitions against the approved thirty division program.⁶⁹ Although China Defense Supplies' officials could call on War Department personnel to assist them in preparing these requisitions, complaints soon arose that these Chinese agents not only had no idea of what was actually needed for war in China but were ignorant of the inherent limitations and qualities of the weapons desired. One example was the story of the Chinese requisition for 50,000 .30-caliber rifles, M1917-A (Enfield), with bayonets, scabbards, and accessories. The War Department had some on hand in mid-1941, though 1,000,000 had already gone to Britain. The weapon compared very well with the standard Japanese piece, and the Chinese and their sympathizers represented their need for arms as desperate. The War Department considered making these rifles available to the Chinese even before their request was received, though there was no .30-caliber ammunition immediately available. On 17 June Soong bid for 50,000 Enfield rifles, but when a sample was delivered to his ordnance expert the latter said "it would jeopardize his reputation" to send the Enfields to China and demanded 50,000 Garand semiautomatics. Supply of the Garand was quite inadequate for the U.S. Army at this time, and none were available. There was the further problem of finding enough ammunition for this weapon, with its high rate of fire. Later the War Department learned in confidence that the Chinese were negotiating with a small New York manufacturer to convert the Enfields into semiautomatics, a difficult and most unsatisfactory operation. Still later, China Defense Supplies urged that the 50,000 rifles be sent to China, there to be converted to 7.92-mm., a task which would have absorbed the energies of the Chinese arsenals for months on end. In February 1942, after some had been shipped to Great Britain and others issued to the state militias, the War Department still had 20,000.⁷⁰ These Enfields went to India and ultimately were used by the Chinese to retake north Burma.

In their requisitions for tanks, the Chinese again revealed ignorance of what was possible for operations in China. Soong asked for the standard U.S. light tank, a 13-ton model. Since it was pointed out repeatedly that this tank could not cross the majority of bridges in China and Burma, Chinese insistence on the 13-ton type until as late as November 1941 typified something that appeared over and over again--Chinese demands for the biggest and newest equipment regardless of availability or practicality. The story of the Marmon-

Herrington 7-ton tanks was very like that of the Enfields. The tank was in production, it was available in quantity, and it could be used on the primitive Chinese road net. The Chinese objected to its armament of one .50- and two .30-caliber machine guns and demanded it carry three .30-caliber machine guns, a flame thrower, and a 37-mm. antitank gun, an impossible problem in design and production on a 7-ton chassis. When the Chinese had been persuaded to accept the standard armament, it then developed there was a shortage of .50- caliber machine guns, so Marmon-Herrington was told to use three .30-caliber pieces. When the tanks began coming off the assembly line in December 1941, it was found the turrets would not permit replacing the .30's with .50's when the latter became available. The Chinese at once charged bad faith and refused to take delivery. Excited tempers were cooled when arrangements were made at London to supply the Chinese with 1,200 Bren gun carriers from British and Canadian production in place of the tanks, which the United States accepted and used for guarding airfields.⁷¹ Such action by China Defense Supplies resulted in increased and irresistible pressure within the War and Treasury Departments to secure a greater measure of control over the whole process of rearming the Chinese Army.⁷²

Creation of the American Military Mission to China (AMMISCA)

China's military problems were not new to the War Department. Military attachés and the recent air mission to China (17 May-6 June 1941) of Brig. Gen. Henry B. Clagett, commanding the Philippine Department Air Force, reported on those problems.⁷³ Other officers, including General Marshall, had served in China with the tiny garrisons that the United States maintained there as a symbol of its support of Chinese nationalism against the several European and Asiatic imperialisms. Twenty-eight officers had been in China (1923-37) as language students. There was, therefore, a group of men in the War Department well able to interpret press dispatches from China and to appraise Chinese requests for aid.

The difficulties that arose in processing Chinese requests for lend-lease arms suggested to several officers that the War Department take some positive

action to improve the handling of lend-lease by China. The current military attaché in Chungking, Lt. Col. William Mayer, recommended on 15 June 1941 that his successor be a general officer charged with advising and assisting the Generalissimo. He observed that both Joseph W. Stilwell and John Magruder had attained general officer's rank, had been attachés in China, and so either would be qualified.⁷⁴ On 16 June G-4, War Department General Staff, suggested a lend-lease mission of Army personnel.⁷⁵

Memoranda began to pass back and forth, from which these arguments for the dispatch of a mission emerged: (1) preliminary plans and moves for aid to China had not been meshed with the over-all lend-lease program, with strategic estimates, or with national policy; (2) Soong's strategic goals would be more easily reached if American personnel, acting with China's leaders, could advise and assist the Chinese; (3) since China Defense Supplies had no competent military advice, it had asked for far more equipment (and brought pressure to bear to get it) than the Chinese could use or even transport to China; (4) China's history provided many instances of the waste of foreign loans and gifts; (5) the work of the German Military Mission, which had greatly assisted the Generalissimo's rise to power, could be excelled by American officers profiting by the Germans' experiences; (6) the American Volunteer Group and its logistical problems were not receiving proper attention; (7) if war came, a basis for Sino-American military co-operation would have been laid.⁷⁶

Further support for the mission came from the foreign scene. Knowledge that if war came the British Military Attaché to China, Maj. Gen. L. E. Dennys, would emerge as chief of a military mission sponsoring guerrilla and RAF activities suggested an American mission.⁷⁷ The fear that the Soviet Union might be defeated also expedited the formation of an American mission to China as a reassuring diplomatic gesture, for the Chinese feared Russian collapse would release Japanese troops in Manchuria for adventures elsewhere.⁷⁸ On 3 July 1941 General Marshall approved the American Military Mission to China (its short title, AMMISCA, will be used hereafter).⁷⁹ Eight days later the Acting Chief of Staff, G-2, Brig. Gen. Sherman Miles, wrote a personal

letter to Brig. Gen. John Magruder, commanding Fort Devens, Mass., to inform him he was being considered to head a lend-lease mission to China, which in the event of war would be "the liaison for strategic planning and cooperation with our ally, China."⁸⁰ Magruder reported to Washington soon after and began his studies of the China problem.⁸¹

As was noted previously, the Joint Board paper approved by the President on 23 July called for a military mission to China, which thus put the final seal on the project, and the bureaucratic struggle to write the directive, fix the jurisdiction, and prescribe the composition of AMMISCA began. There were long discussions with the State Department, which wanted the mission to be controlled by the new American Ambassador to China, Mr. Clarence E. Gauss.⁸² The War Department carried its point with the contention that AMMISCA was "operational" in the highest sense, so that Magruder was merely attached to the Embassy to assure what was called "the coordinating jurisdiction of the Ambassador."⁸³

AMMISCA Receives Its Orders

The Chinese were told of AMMISCA's coming on 20 August 1941,⁸⁴ four days before the British Prime Minister, Mr. Winston S. Churchill, revealed that conversations were under way between the American and Japanese Governments on the gravest issues of Pacific diplomacy. The question of Magruder's directive became an immediate issue. For a while it was felt that Magruder should be authorized to conduct staff talks with the Chinese on co-operation between the two Allied Powers should war arise in the Pacific between America and Japan.⁸⁵ If adopted, this provision would have helped fill one of the gaps in prewar planning, but it was never authorized. When the issue came to a head in November, the War Department told Magruder to express no opinions of his own on the employment of U.S. Forces in China, nor to discuss any Chinese proposals, but simply to transmit the latter to Washington.⁸⁶

The orders given General Magruder faithfully reflected the growing War Department convictions about China. He was told to:

1. Advise and assist the Chinese Government in all phases of procurement, transport, and maintenance of materials, equipment, and munitions requisite to the prosecution of its military effort.

2. Advise and assist the Chinese Government in the training of Chinese personnel in the use and maintenance of materials, equipment, and munitions supplied as defense aid material by the United States.

3. When requested, assist personnel of other Departments of the [United States] Government in carrying out their respective duties in furtherance of the objectives of the Lend-Lease Act pertaining to China.

4. Assist the Chinese Government in obtaining prompt and co-ordinated administrative action by the United States authorities necessary to insure the orderly flow of materials and munitions from lend-lease agencies to the Chinese military forces.

5. Explore the vital port, road, and railroad facilities with a view to the establishment and maintenance of an adequate line of communications.⁸⁷

Magruder was further instructed to negotiate only with the Generalissimo, and to refrain from dealings with the war lords and cliques.

Diplomatically, the dispatch of AMMISCA may be classed with other measures taken at this time as warnings or deterrents to Japan, such as the oil embargo, stern notes, and the reinforcement of the Philippines. Though AMMISCA was primarily intended to see to it that lend-lease aid was effectively applied, the Joint Board was well aware that it had great, possibly dramatic, potentialities since the ultimate objective of all this was "Chinese military self-sufficiency."⁸⁸ Magruder told Marshall that "implementation in China of this policy in counterbalancing Japanese military capacity, if successfully carried out, can be measured militarily in terms of army corps."⁸⁹

During the first two weeks of September, AMMISCA took hold among the swarming bureaus of Washington. It had two functional subgroups, one to operate in China and on the line of communications up from Rangoon, and the other in Washington to deal with China Defense Supplies, the Treasury, the rest of the War Department, and other government agencies. Magruder also received approval of his plan to form groups of specialists who would go to China from time to time "in connection with vital road and railroad problems, training in new equipment as it is made available, motor and armament maintenance problems, etc."⁹⁰

Before he left for Chungking, Magruder was quickly initiated into the problems of his new role. The composition of his staff was affected by the Generalissimo's desire, expressed through Soong, that certain technicians be included.⁹¹ This was an opportunity to acquire valuable experience for the War Department, which therefore sent several reserve officers to cope with technical problems peculiar to the Orient. Magruder also found that the Chinese expected him to have great weight in War Department discussions of lend-lease arms.⁹² When Mr. Soong complained to Col. William J. Donovan, Co-ordinator of Information, that the United States was not keeping its promises to China, the matter was promptly referred to Magruder. In suggesting an answer, Magruder told Marshall that "since the will of Chiang Kai-shek almost alone fixes the will of the Chinese people, the morale of this leader should be supported in every practicable way."⁹³ He asked Marshall to approve shipment of matériel for two battalions of field artillery, to accelerate the delivery of 144 P-43 fighters, to arrange for immediate procurement of the thirty-three Lockheed Hudsons, and to ship ordnance and ammunition for the American Volunteer Group at once. This time Marshall's reaction was immediate and favorable, for the War Department released its first shipment of ammunition to the Chinese as August 1941 ended. The release of yet more aid was an imminent prospect and China's lend-lease funds were scheduled for a sharp increase in the planning for a second lend-lease appropriation bill (later passed in October 1941).⁹⁴

On 13 September 1941 the first group of AMMISCA personnel flew to Chungking via Manila and Hong Kong. Before their arrival, the Japanese forces in China opened a drive on Changsha. This offensive brought new appeals for aid from the Generalissimo, for any Japanese activity forced him to expend some of his carefully husbanded stocks.⁹⁵ Japanese extremists, on their side, could persuade themselves further that Washington was merely trying to gain time before attacking them, because Magruder stopped at Manila on 3ñ4 October to confer with senior American and visiting British officers from Singapore.⁹⁶ Moreover, Japanese agents at Rangoon could count every ton of aid going over the docks.

General Magruder's arrival in Chungking coincided with the ceremonies commemorating Double Ten Day (10 October), the thirtieth anniversary of

the Chinese Republic, and enthusiasm for AMMISCA's arrival was unconcealed. Though the Generalissimo was absent from Chungking when AMMISCA arrived, and for a fortnight more, Magruder lost no time in going to work. Officers were assigned to five major projects: communications, aviation, military supply, arsenals, and military training.⁹⁷ Their work deployed some of them along the line of communications from Rangoon north, sent some to observe the front at I-chang and on the Yunnan-Indochina border, and retained the rest around Chungking. Magruder told his officers these duties would involve work in widely separated areas, often out of touch with Chungking, so that they would have to show initiative and good judgment. Under no circumstances were AMMISCA officers to exceed their authority by negotiating or making commitments to British and Chinese officials or American agencies until such matters had been approved through diplomatic channels.⁹⁸ They were reminded that they could hardly hope to change characteristics which the centuries had implanted in the Chinese, that AMMISCA's "effectiveness will depend not on our efforts to change or reform the Chinese, but upon our ability to put our advice and aid in such forms as to make it practical."⁹⁹

The Chinese Army, Fall 1941¹⁰⁰

The state and nature of the Chinese Army in the fall of 1941 were no surprise to Magruder and many of his staff who had served in China before. From personal observations Magruder's staff were able to bring their recollections up to date and to send back to the War Department a series of reports on the Chinese Army. From military attaché reports of the twenties and thirties, from the reports of AMMISCA officers, and from the reports of observers who saw the Chinese Army at first hand, the War Department received the impression of a heterogeneous force that had considerable potentialities but that was not yet an effective, well-trained, well-disciplined army.

During the 1930's, newborn Chinese nationalism and recurrent waves of anti-Japanese sentiment brought a number of war lords to the Generalissimo's Nationalist banners. There was a brief United Front period when the Chinese Communists recognized the Generalissimo's leadership in resisting the Japanese. The result was a coalition army but not a unified national force as Westerners conceived an army to be. Its German-trained divisions, and those of the more progressive and capable war lords, would be classed as mediocre by Western standards. These divisions numbered perhaps forty in all, but were understrength, lacked heavy equipment, and were widely dispersed. The balance of the Chinese "divisions" were in reality large bands of lightly armed and poorly trained men, whose allegiance enabled their commanders to dominate the peasantry. These troops were not in contact with the Japanese, and could not have been maintained in battle against them. The greatest asset of the Chinese Army was the hardihood and valor of the peasant soldier, fighting in defense of the familiar things of his province. Its greatest liability was the failure of its war lord commanders to see their soldiers as anything more than counters in the unending game of Chinese politics.

In terms of formal structure, the Generalissimo, presiding over the National Military Council, commanded this coalition army. He maintained this command by seeing to it that, so far as Chinese domestic politics permitted, only men loyal to himself held positions of consequence. Loyalty to the Generalissimo rather than success in battle was the secret of a brilliant military career in China. The Chinese Army was deployed over twelve war areas and received orders through the Generalissimo's Chief of Staff, General Ho Ying-chin, working with the National Military Council. What effective fighting China had done since 1939 had been done within one particular war area at a time. In most cases, war area boundaries conformed to the ancient provincial boundaries. Often the war area commander doubled as provincial governor and exercised both military and political control. In the rear of each war area were a few of the Generalissimo's loyal divisions to guarantee the fidelity of the war area commander.

This decentralized regional defense system was primarily intended to keep the Japanese from ending the war with one blow. It also tended to keep dissident or traitorous elements (puppets) from taking advantage of a military crisis to seize control of an unoccupied area. The system had two major drawbacks. The wide dispersion of the better troops left the Generalissimo no mass of maneuver. And, the creation of twelve war area commanders with military and political power resulted in the creation of as many semi-independent satraps. Under these circumstances, the Generalissimo's greatest contribution to China's war of resistance lay not in his military skill, but rather in his political talents in keeping the war area commanders loyal to China.

Each war area commander recruited, trained, and partially equipped his own men. If a Japanese foray threatened more than one war area, the National

Military Council tried to co-ordinate the efforts of the menaced war areas. Consequently, a species of coalition warfare, involving all the attendant difficulties that the United Nations met in their attempts to wage it on the global scale, was to be met within China. Japanese expeditions often moved along war area boundaries, strongly suggesting that they were taking advantage of Chinese politics to cause their opponents the maximum of political embarrassment.

On paper, the Chinese division included all the arms and services it needed to make it a self-sufficient combat team. Division strength was nominally 9,529, but divisions averaged from six to seven thousand, some of them, of course, far understrength. Aside from lacking competent and trained commanders and staff officers and having only the rudiments of a supply system, the Chinese division had no artillery and was understrength in heavy weapons and rifles. The 800-odd pieces of Chinese artillery, a heterogeneous assortment from the arsenals of Europe and Japan, were hoarded by the war area commanders and the Generalissimo, to be doled out a piece at a time on great occasions. Their employment was extremely inefficient. For artillery support the division relied on its trench mortars, of which it had eighteen to thirty. On paper the division had 324 light and heavy machine guns (7.92-mm.) but the average was 200, of which 36 were heavy. China had perhaps 1,000,000 rifles. Its arsenals could make field artillery, mortars, machine guns, and rifles plus ammunition, but the general shortage of nonferrous metals and explosives kept output to a trickle.¹⁰¹ Added to the general concept of the division as the personal property of its commander and to the inherent thrift of the Chinese, this shortage of matériel for 300-odd divisions made the Chinese extremely reluctant to use or expend any item of equipment.

That the division was its commander's property affected all Chinese tactics and strategy. The division was a military and political asset, not to be expended, for no replacements of men or matériel would be forthcoming. American observers believed that the divisional commander who lost one third of his men lost one third of his power and income. Consequently, though there were shining and valiant exceptions, most Chinese commanders would not dream of leading their troops as would their Japanese opponents, who, with their men, thought dying for the Emperor the goal of a soldier's life. Moreover, Americans who worked closely with Chinese divisions discovered that in those units, which they had no reason to consider atypical, the soldier's pay was among the perquisites of the commander. It was therefore to the commander's interest to keep his unit somewhat understrength.

The location of divisions in the Chinese order of battle does not suggest that China had traded space for time. The Chinese divisions had not retired into western China there to mass and wait the arrival of arms from the West.

Instead, the greater part had fallen back from the big cities and railway lines into the countryside, while the Japanese flowed round and past them. Nor had the Generalissimo concentrated any of his better troops in areas where they might hope to receive U.S. arms. Had there been a plan to receive such help and then prepare for a great effort to drive the Japanese into the sea, the chosen troops would have been designated and a portion of them would be in training centers eagerly waiting the arms and instructors. On the contrary, years passed before the Chinese finally settled on the divisions they wanted to re-equip, while the American experience with training centers for Chinese troops in China paralleled that of the man who led his horse to water, but could not make it drink.

The nomenclature of units in the Chinese Army resembled the Japanese system rather than the American. The Chinese used the now familiar triangular (three-regiment) division, but had no army corps. Instead, they had armies, each consisting of three divisions plus army troops. Three Chinese "armies" in turn made a "group army," which was analogous to the American army. Thus the Chinese built their Army up by dividing each successive higher echelon by three--three regiments to a division, three divisions to an army, and three armies to a group army. Most Chinese war areas had three group armies.

China had about 3,819,000 men under arms. Of these, 2,919,000 were formed into 246 divisions classed by the Chinese as "front-line" troops, plus 44 "brigades" (a term loosely applied to men organized on military lines). In rear areas were another 70 divisions plus 3 brigades, or 900,000 more. Except for the Generalissimo's personal troops, estimated at about 30 divisions, the loyalties of China's troops lay with their war area commanders.¹⁰²

The whole tangled structure of Chinese politics, culture, and society was reflected in the question of what troops would obey whom under what set of circumstances. Loyalty being a conditional virtue in most men, only an observer gifted with clairvoyance could state with accuracy that such and such a division would obey the orders of Chungking under all circumstances. Thus, the Chinese Ministry of War would not attempt to order certain Yunnanese and Szechwanese divisions¹⁰³ to leave their native provinces. On another occasion, a very senior general officer of the Chinese Government bitterly protested giving lend-lease to the troops of a certain war area commander, of unchallenged loyalty to Chinese nationalism and the Allied cause, at a time when those troops were hotly engaged with the Japanese.¹⁰⁴ The war area commander was then out of favor in Chungking, and only a very few insiders would have known why.

Staff and command procedures were peculiar to the Chinese Army. Orders given through a staff officer meant nothing. Orders had to come from the commander personally, and, if written, bear his seal or chop. Transport was not something to be carefully provided for in advance but was commandeered, often at gun point, or else was an object of barter and diplomatic negotiation between the commanders. Diversion of transport to haul loot and commanders' personal property was one of the more noticeable abuses.

The maintenance of this huge mass was a fearful drain on the Chinese economy. The number of Chinese divisions was more than three times as many divisions as the United States had in the field in 1945. A veritable flood of lend-lease equipment, in hundreds of thousands of tons every year, would have been needed to arm 316 divisions and 47 brigades, after they had been taught how to use and maintain it. A small amount, spread over all these units with a nice eye to face and patronage, would have been spread so thin as to have no effect on the situation. Thus, 1,080 75-mm. howitzers would give a modest artillery complement, not far below Japanese standards, to thirty divisions. Spread evenly over 316 divisions it would amount to about three new pieces for each division, which would leave each unit only nominally less ineffective than before.¹⁰⁵

From 19 October to 10 November 1941, two of AMMISCA's officers inspected the I and V War Areas, which swung north and east of Chungking in a broad arc across the natural avenues of a Japanese approach to Chungking. These officers reported:

V. CONCLUSIONS:

1. The training in the artillery is very poor. A certain amount of technique is taught in the schools regarding indirect fire, but in actual practice the greater use is in direct fire, with axial methods for indirect fire being used where an obstacle provides protection for the guns.

2. The officer personnel in batteries is poor. How poor is difficult to visualize without seeing. In the battery specially selected for our inspection at Laolokow [Lao-ho-kou] the battery commander was not of a very high order or intelligence. He was barefooted except for sandals. It would probably be very difficult to teach modern artillery methods to men of this type.

3. The entire military system, being built on personal loyalty, prevents it being possible to train artillery officers and send them to units indiscriminately as we do in the States.

4. There is very little activity along the front. Either side could probably push in a salient at any point they thought it profitable to do so. No contact between Chinese and Japanese troops at the front was observed.

5. The interest of the Chinese towards any aggressive action appears to be quite negligible, regardless of their statements that all they need is airplanes, tanks, and artillery in order to drive the aggressor from their shores.

6. The small amount of artillery available in the past has resulted in artillery not being present in most divisions, but being held centrally under army or higher control.

7. The maintenance of motor transport is very faulty and makes the use of mechanized units a matter of doubtful advisability.¹⁰⁶

The Generalissimo Warns of Peril

Shortly after General Magruder and his staff arrived at Chungking the Chinese through AMMISCA warned of an imminent Japanese attack on Kunming and asked for more arms in accents of urgency that caused grave concern on the highest levels in Washington. The President, the State Department, and the Joint Board were all involved in deciding how the United States should act, while in Chungking Magruder was drawn into those discussions of strategy and policy which his directive had sought to prevent. The Generalissimo's warnings seem in retrospect to have originated before Magruder reached Chungking.

In the fall of 1941 the Chinese made two requests for an emergency issue of arms. Neither was related to the initial Soong requests of March 1941. In the first, the Generalissimo asked Soong to arrange a complete revision of existing lend-lease delivery schedules, saying that he needed 1,000 antiaircraft guns by 31 October, and a number of pack howitzers by the end of the year. The Generalissimo explained he wanted these weapons for the central China front. Moreover, he was greatly disappointed that the 13-ton tanks "originally promised us" could not be shipped in the near future. With the supply line so congested, it was manifestly impossible to have these weapons in China by 31 October, but the request was promptly forwarded to the War Department, which had to explain that the munitions stockpile would permit only 61 howitzers and 285 .50-caliber machine guns to go by the end of 1941.¹⁰⁷

The War Department's reply distressed Currie, who wrote Hopkins on 6 October: "Aside from 500 Bren guns with ammunition which I got from Canada, we haven't shipped one gun yet to China on Lend-Lease."¹⁰⁸ The Generalissimo's plea brought results. The outcome was that almost a year after the Chinese first asked for arms, China Defense Supplies shipped the first weapons for the Chinese Army on the SS Tulsa on 22 October. The cargo was a most valuable one, with 48 75-mm. howitzers, 11,000 Thompson submachine guns, 500 more Bren guns, 100 .50-caliber machine guns, ample ammunition, and 35 scout cars.¹⁰⁹ Sent at a time when American forces in the Philippines

were soon to enter battle with obsolete 2.95-inch howitzers, vintage of '98, the shipment was a real sacrifice.

The Generalissimo's first request may have been a testing of the American position, for he promptly followed it by sounding the alarm in the strongest manner. The Generalissimo and Madame Chiang Kai-shek welcomed Magruder and AMMISCA to Chungking at a conference on 27 October 1941. Magruder presented his five-point program for the Generalissimo's consideration.¹¹⁰ The Chinese leader was satisfied with Magruder's approach to the issues but singled out aviation for the top priority, for he was expecting early arrival of the promised lend-lease aircraft. The Generalissimo proposed that AMMISCA assume control of and develop the AVG, even at the cost of separating it from the Chinese Air Force. Before Magruder could comment on these points the Generalissimo introduced grave issues of high policy into the conference.

The Chinese Government feared that Japanese troops from Indochina were about to attack Yunnan Province and seize Kunming. This action would close the Burma Road and destroy China's last link with the outside world. Actually, the seeming threat was but part of a Japanese cover plan to draw attention from projected operations elsewhere.¹¹¹ To meet this disturbing prospect the Generalissimo asked that air support be detached from the RAF at Singapore, and that Anglo-American diplomatic pressure be placed on the Japanese.¹¹² Magruder concurred in the Generalissimo's views and sent them on to Washington,¹¹³ where they resulted in grave concern during October-November 1941. The Generalissimo and Magruder met again on 31 October, and the Chinese leader again stressed his fear of a Japanese drive on Kunming.¹¹⁴ Magruder sent these warnings as well to Washington. His radios asked for guidance, saying that, as far as the U.S. effort in China was concerned, the heart of the matter was the Generalissimo's intention of using the AVG, without regard to its state of training and equipment, against the Japanese if they should attack Yunnan.¹¹⁵ Thus, despite the precautions of those who drew up Magruder's directive, the Chinese had immediately involved him in a discussion of major points of U.S. Pacific policy.

The Chinese reasons for doing so seem clear. Immediately after the disclosure on 24 August 1941 that Japanese-American diplomatic conversations of the greatest importance to the peace of the Pacific were under way, the Generalissimo had taken diplomatic action to defend China's interests. He told

the President that China's failure to win an ally had given the Chinese a feeling of isolation. The Generalissimo suggested that Mr. Roosevelt take the initiative in arranging either of two alternatives: (1) the Soviet Union and Great Britain propose an alliance to China; (2) the United States, Great Britain, and the Netherlands Indies include China in their discussions.¹¹⁶ This latter was a clear reference to the staff talks that the latter three powers had conducted intermittently since January 1941. The President did not accept either of the alternatives, but sought to reassure the Generalissimo by announcing AMMISCA's creation.¹¹⁷ The Generalissimo was not told that Magruder was forbidden to engage in staff talks; very likely he assumed that was one major reason why Magruder was in Chungking. The Generalissimo could also remember the success of his recent plea for arms.

The Generalissimo's conversations with Magruder were followed shortly by a note that came from T. V. Soong, giving China's requirements in munitions if Yunnan was to be held.¹¹⁸ Mr. Roosevelt gave the Generalissimo's note to Secretary of State Hull, and Soong's note went to Hopkins. Conferences followed between the State, War, and Navy Departments, and in the Joint Board. The radios from AMMISCA and the Chinese notes received the most earnest and searching examination.

The War Plans Division of the War Department, at Marshall's request, examined the problem posed by the Chinese and concluded that aid for Kunming could come only from the Royal Air Force at Singapore or the American air garrison of Manila.¹¹⁹ The latter would weaken Manila and risk war with Japan; "no involvement should be risked which would lessen the main effort against Germany."¹²⁰ G-2, War Department General Staff, strongly doubted the likelihood of a Japanese attack on Kunming. The Joint Board met on 3 November and reaffirmed the desire and the necessity of avoiding Pacific commitments so as to concentrate on the Atlantic. A note embodying the views of the military went to the State Department, which shortly after thanked the services for their "lucid" analysis, saying that AMMISCA had caused the State Department more worry than was necessary.¹²¹

Roosevelt had asked the Chief of Naval Operations and Chief of Staff for their views on the AMMISCA and Chinese messages. Their reply defined the highest service views on aid to China on the eve of Pearl Harbor. On 4 November Stark and Marshall told the President that they did not think the United States would be justified in undertaking an offensive war against Japan to keep her from cutting the Burma Road and taking Kunming. "The only existing plans for war against Japan in the Far East are to conduct a defensive war, in co-operation with the British and Dutch . . . ."¹²² By mid-December 1941, there would be added U.S. strength in the Philippines, but even so, until February or March 1942, intervention against Japan, save in defense of the Philippines or Malaya, would be futile. Military counteraction against Japan should follow only if Japan attacked the United States, the Netherlands Indies, or British Commonwealth, or moved into west or south Thailand, or Timor. The Atlantic First policy should be adhered to. With respect to the AMMISCA and Chinese notes, they recommended that no U.S. armed forces be sent to China; that reinforcement and equipment of the AVG be expedited; that aid to China be accelerated; and that no ultimatum be sent to Japan.¹²³ The State Department thoroughly approved of these views.¹²⁴

Meanwhile, Churchill had received a similar appeal from the Generalissimo and, fearing that the Japanese might "drift" into war, suggested on 5 November that another strong warning be sent from Britain and the United States. Churchill observed that the policy of gaining time had worked so far, "but our joint embargo is steadily forcing the Japanese to decisions for peace or war."¹²⁵

Soong appealed directly to Roosevelt on 8 November, asking that the U.S. Navy release one-third of its dive bombers to China, to be delivered to the Philippines by aircraft carrier and ferried from there to China. On arrival there they would be manned by Chennault's pilots.¹²⁶ Soong's proposal was another indication that the Chinese found it very difficult to understand the organizing, training, and equipping of military units. On the eve of Pearl Harbor they were proposing to deprive the U.S. Navy's carrier air groups of their most effective weapon and themselves of what proved the best fighter group in Asia, to produce an extemporized and untrained dive-bomber unit which would then be sent into battle without fighter cover. With this scheme went a restatement of Chinese ordnance requirements without whose satisfaction, Soong

stated, the Chinese could not hope to resist a Japanese attack on Kunming.

The President and Hopkins sent Soong's note to the War Department. Marshall and Stimson personally reviewed the ordnance situation and found the cupboard almost bare. In effect, Soong was told that he would have to be content with what was already earmarked for China, plus some 2.95-inch howitzers and 3-inch antiaircraft guns that would be rushed from the Philippines when their replacements arrived. The Generalissimo was reminded through Soong that twenty-four nations in all were clamoring for lend-lease aid, and that the United States, in addition, had its own forces to equip. The best the United States could do in response to Soong's appeal was to speed the flow of lend-lease aid and facilitate the building-up of the American Volunteer Group. Soong was further informed that the United States was reinforcing the Philippines, whose garrison, with the Pacific Fleet, would be a significant factor in the situation.¹²⁷

In mid-November, General Marshall prepared a reply to Magruder's queries of 28 and 31 October. An exchange of memoranda in July 1941 with the State Department on a lend-lease training program for Chinese airmen influenced Marshall's answer that the Chinese would have to decide when the AVG was to be used. At that time General Marshall, who had experience of Chinese methods and temperament, proposed to Currie that as a quid pro quo the United States receive certain guarantees from the Chinese regarding the command and staff functions of the Americans with the AVG, and that Magruder have the responsibility of fixing the date the AVG entered combat.¹²⁸ Such a proposal was an attempt by Marshall to use lend-lease as a bargaining device toward gaining greater efficiency and a degree of self-help from the Chinese. The State Department and Currie had demurred, the latter writing, "In view of the dependence by China upon us for continued aid, it is not anticipated that any difficulty of non-co-operation will be experienced."¹²⁹

AMMISCA's Appraisal of the Thirty Division Program

Among the orders Magruder took with him to Chungking was one to report as soon as possible on the Chinese capabilities for offensive action in

1941.¹³⁰ From surveys of China's twenty arsenals, from observer reports of the central China and Indochina border fronts, and from studies of Chinese service schools, Magruder concluded that, if the Chinese were given arms and were willing to use them effectively, a considerable number of divisions could execute diversions or even substantial local offensives.¹³¹ Subsequent events showed that the War Department concurred.

But on what basis were these arms to be distributed? Soong's programs of March 1941 had implied thirty divisions, but final confirmation did not come until 17 November when Maj. Gen. Yu Ta-wei, head of the Chinese ordnance departments, told Lt. Col. Arcadi Gluckman of AMMISCA that for some time the National Military Council had planned to create thirty kung chen tui (or assault-on-fortified-position) divisions. Ten thousand strong, the new units were to be organized into ten armies and located in strategic defensive positions. At the same time, General Yu stated that twelve divisions had been designated and the remainder were under consideration. General Yu told Gluckman that Chinese arsenals could furnish rifles for the thirty divisions plus many of their infantry weapons, but that powder and metals for ammunition were nonexistent in China. He claimed that most of the 800-odd pieces of field artillery were being distributed among the twelve divisions, but that spare parts and ammunition for them, especially for those brought from the Soviet Union, were almost exhausted. This plan was still tentative, for the Generalissimo had not yet approved it.¹³²

Realizing that Soong had already submitted most of General Yu's needs for procurement, Magruder radioed Stimson that little more could be done on matériel until the Thirty Division Program had the Generalissimo's unqualified approval. For future guidance of the War Department Magruder recommended that ground force matériel be released to the Chinese on the following priorities: (a) arsenal metals, explosives, and machinery; (b) finished small arms ammunition; (c) infantry weapons; (d) organic division artillery; (e) corps artillery. Furthermore, he urged the War Department to remove the Chinese supply agencies in Washington from the lend-lease field.¹³³

AMMISCA learned too that the Generalissimo contemplated establishing two training centers, one near Kunming, the other near Kweiyang where cadres of the thirty divisions might learn to use lend-lease arms. During October and November 1941, however, the National Military Council hesitated to locate the centers or name their commanders. Despite this procrastination, Magruder

asked AMMISCA's Washington office to dispatch "task force specialists" to aid the Chinese in setting up tank, infantry, and artillery schools.¹³⁴ These requirements were being studied when war came.

Before Pearl Harbor, AMMISCA personnel expressed two differing views on China. Familiar with China, Magruder was neither surprised nor depressed by the contrast between Chinese propaganda in the United States and Chinese action in China. By estimating what might still be done by tactfully applying American technique, Magruder reported to the Secretary of War and the Chief of Staff in tones of mild optimism regarding the creation of an effective Chinese Army. Magruder considered he was not there to describe or expose China to his superiors, many of whom had served in China, but rather to aid China in helping itself.

Nevertheless, many of Magruder's assistants were surprised and disillusioned by what they saw in China. As these officers traveled about China, visited Chinese headquarters, chatted with Chinese officers, and inspected Chinese establishments they saw for themselves the manner in which the Chinese were resisting Japan. Inevitably, they appraised the Chinese war effort as would professional soldiers, and their letters began to flow back to friends in the War Department and to families at home couched in terms of angry disillusion.¹³⁵ Typical of many such was a report to General Magruder by Lt. Col. George W. Sliney, summing up the impressions of his inspection trips in October and November:

The following general impressions were gained through conversations with Chinese officers and by observations of conditions of front-line activity and of training, during my visits to the 1st, 5th, and 8th War Areas, to the Training Center at Cha Tso, and to the Field Artillery School at Tuyin. Such matters are not subject to proof, but should receive consideration in deciding any Allied plan of action.

1. Several Chinese officers have stated to me that they believed China might be able to win this war without further fighting. They expected international diplomatic pressure to force Japan out of China. I feel that this attitude combined with many months of inactive defense has created a non-aggressive attitude in the soldiers that will take time to overcome.

2. The general idea in the United States that China has fought Japan to a standstill, and has had many glorious victories, is a delusion. Japan has generally been able to push forward any place she wanted to. She has stopped mostly because of the fact that a certain number of troops can safely hold only a certain number of miles of front without allowing dangerous holes to exist in it. The will to fight an aggressive action does not yet exist in the Chinese Army. If the Government of the United States is counting on such intent it should be cautioned against being too sure of any large-scale offensive action at present. This attitude is being changed by diplomatic persuasion from without, but it will require well-directed

propaganda from within to give the proper mental attitude to the soldiers who are to do the fighting.

3. Many small things all pointing in the same direction have caused me to have a feeling, stronger than a suspicion, that the desire of the Chinese for more modern matériel was not, before December 8th, for the purpose of pressing the war against Japan, but was to make the Central Government safe against insurrection after diplomatic pressure by other nations had forced Japan out of China.

4. The method of employment of artillery by the Chinese is very inefficient due to the poor standard of education of the officer personnel. In releasing American artillery to the Chinese this fact should be considered, as well as the relative likelihood of its actually being employed by the United States or by China.

It is recommended that the above ideas be considered by the American Military Mission in making plans, and be presented to the War Department for consideration in connection with other available opinion in planning any War Department action in this hemisphere.¹³⁶

AMMISCA, Lend-Lease, and the Line of Communications

Following his initial conferences with the Generalissimo, Magruder flew between Chungking, Kunming, Lashio, Rangoon, and Singapore, acting as trouble shooter for his five projects.¹³⁷ His chief concern, however, was the line of communications to Kunming, since all AMMISCA's projects depended on a flow of matériel from the port of Rangoon, up the Burma railway and highway to Lashio, and then over the road to China. This problem of the line of communications was to vex all Magruder's successors as it vexed him; in many ways it was the principal problem of the American effort in China, Burma, and India.

Like the Chinese Army, the port of Rangoon and the Burma Road had been fully described in reports from U.S. representatives in Burma and Yunnan. By fall 1941 local American representatives believed that the Burma Road was the worst logistical bottleneck in aid to China. There were physical limitations because it was not an all-weather highway and so suffered during the monsoon rains. Communications along its length were woefully inadequate. There were sanitary limitations because it passed through a malarial belt. Since the road's 715 miles were the last route over which goods could move to a starving Chinese economy, the Burma Road was the center of interest to speculators and traders, and a battleground for politics--national and local, Burmese, Chinese, and British.¹³⁸

Attempting to control the road's traffic, the Generalissimo had piled agency on agency, over which his cousin, General Yu Fei-peng, presided.¹³⁹ Summarizing this situation, a military attaché report of August 1941 remarked:

The foreigner who surveys the Road is inclined to jump to the conclusion that a competent man, backed by the Generalissimo, can administer it efficiently without much difficulty. He forgets that the Generalissimo is not the absolute dictator of China, and that even if he himself were to devote all of his time to the efficient administration of the Road, he might not be able to overcome the myriad difficulties which would face him in the way of vested interests, political intrigues, distrust, jealousy, and even enmity of important subordinates, and above all, the general inability of the Chinese efficiently to administer anything through centralized control.¹⁴⁰

Surveying the problem, lend-lease officials in Washington learned that British traffic figures for Lashio were greater than Chinese border figures at Wanting, which in turn were 50 percent more than at Kunming. The unmistakable inference was that goods brought over what was then termed by the press "China's life line" were simply vanishing into the countryside for private profit. Customs figures indicated that, in May 1941, 25 percent of the tonnage arriving at Kunming was yarn and piece goods, 27 percent military goods and metals, and 39 percent was spare parts and gasoline exclusive of what the trucks carried for their own use. The last was a most important item, for trucks had to carry their own fuel. As a result, one estimate was that to lay down 5,000 tons at Chungking, 14,000 had to leave Lashio. When it is recalled that Chungking in turn was many hundreds of miles from the Chinese lines, which meant a further immense effort to move supplies eastward, it can be seen that the road was hardly China's life-line. But it offered the hope that under competent and honest management it might be made to carry 30,000 tons a month of ordnance, nonferrous metals, explosives, and gasoline, as against a trickle of oil and cloth for the bazaars, and a few arms for the war lords' praetorian guards.¹⁴¹

In August of 1941 Mr. David G. Arnstein and two associates prepared a report for the Generalissimo (copies sent to Mr. Roosevelt and Mr. Hopkins) which summarized the impressions made on them by an inspection of the Burma Road and the Chinese agencies operating on it. Arnstein reported that no less than sixteen Chinese agencies operated on the Burma Road. All were heavily overstaffed with inexperienced executives, their relatives, hangers-on, and so forth. No central authority regulated traffic or controlled drivers. Trucks were overloaded, recklessly driven, and given no systematic maintenance. Vehicles moved in convoys of fifteen to twenty-five, which would all halt when one truck was stopped for repairs or to have its papers checked. Lucrative private trucking crowded the road as speculators in Rangoon bought trucks, loaded them with bazaar goods, and after two or three trips sold them in Kunming at a great profit. The profits of private trade and employment made government drivers quit unless they too could smuggle goods and passengers into

China. Arnstein's report, which the Generalissimo carried about with him for some days, and by which he was most impressed, recommended sweeping changes, including the significant one that arms have priority over consumer goods and that a foreigner be appointed to run the road with full powers.¹⁴² Putting the final seal on his work by declining such a post, Arnstein then left China.

The port of Rangoon itself was no bottleneck, but administrative difficulties in Rangoon wasted time.¹⁴³ Customs regulations were sources of infinite difficulty, for the transit of lend-lease supplies and of goods bought by the Chinese with pre-lend-lease credits involved importing and re-exporting. The semi-autonomous Government of Burma had a 1-percent transit tax on all items bound for China which of course included lend-lease aid. Arnstein's report, and later communications from AMMISCA, directed such attention to this tax on the American effort to support China and divert the Japanese from Malaya and the Netherlands Indies that the British Foreign Office finally announced Great Britain would assume the tax burden by giving the Burmese an equivalent subsidy.

The formalities of compliance with customs and the transit tax were time wasting. For example, each vehicle assembled had in effect to be checked into Burma at Rangoon and checked out again at the border. Chinese and Burmese Government agencies were suspicious of each other and filled the ears of AMMISCA personnel with tales of what they suffered at the hands of their opposite numbers. All this tended to slow the movement of goods through Burma.

The major physical bottleneck in the Burma line of communications was the Gokteik gorge between Mandalay and Lashio. There the Burma Railways climb 3,000 feet in twenty-seven miles, about half the distance at a grade of 1 foot in every 25. Trains had to be broken into sections and hauled by hill-climbing locomotives. Because of this, and because the Burma Railways also had to serve the needs of the Burmese economy, Burmese rail officials could promise the Chinese but 550 tons a day to be laid down at Lashio in November. Deliveries in that month suggested the performance would not match the promise. There was also a road from Mandalay to Lashio; it, too, had a very limited capacity, thanks to one particularly bad stretch.

The result of this maladministration and limited capacity was a massive congestion of the line of communications to China. Lend-lease material was pouring into Burma via Rangoon far faster than it moved up the Burma Road

from Lashio. At Lashio it was added to a stockpile of arms and raw materials purchased by the Chinese with credits granted earlier. In July 1941, of the 79,000 tons of Chinese goods stored in Rangoon, only 22,000 tons were truckable. At that month's rate of moving goods, eight months would have been needed to clear the stockpile, yet more was coming in constantly. At the end of the rail line, Lashio, 30,000 tons were stored, a four month's backlog.

Soong's March 1941 lend-lease program had faced the line of communications problem.¹⁴⁴ The program included trucks, road-building matériel, spare parts, and maintenance facilities for the Burma Road, and matériel for the projected narrow-gauge Yunnan-Burma Railway. This latter would have made a dramatic improvement in the situation could it have been completed. Currie had laid the scheme before the President, and the Chinese Government had presented it to British authority, which had been interested in such a railway since 1938. Both the British and the President approved the idea, and the Chinese began their section in April 1941. Lend-lease funds introduced an American interest, and the War Department sent Maj. John E. Ausland, a former official of the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad, to Burma. The Government of Burma assigned Sir John Rowland as Director of Construction and the Chinese provided the services of Brig. Gen. Tseng Yang-fu, Vice-Commissioner of Communications. Though their responsibilities cut across international lines, the triumvirate co-operated in a wholehearted fashion.

By September 1941 the Office of the Chief of Engineers had 90 percent of the required equipment and supplies for the Yunnan-Burma Railway on order. The War Department bought an abandoned 125-mile stretch of narrow-gauge line from the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad and began dismantling it for shipment to Burma. Shipments of supplies for the line increased as autumn wore on. But greater familiarity with the terrain and with the project began to reveal discouraging obstacles. The War Department found that procurement of diesel locomotives and rolling stock would delay the project until late in 1942. Meanwhile, Major Ausland's report suggested that bridging the Salween River and completing certain tunnels in Yunnan would also delay the railway until the winter of 1942-43. In addition to these problems, Ausland reported that the British feared the monsoon rains would make the Yunnan-Burma Railway a six-year effort. There was also a problem of health, for the 200,000 conscripted Yunnanese laborers were working in areas where a deadly form of malaria was endemic. To alleviate this, Currie and Hopkins sent a Public Health commission to aid in mosquito control.¹⁴⁵ When war came, shipments of railway matériel for Burma ceased; shipments en route were diverted to India, where they found use in other transportation projects in support of China.

Surveying this often depressing scene, AMMISCA urged the War Department to send matériel and experts to increase Burma Road capacity. The Department did its best to comply. General Motors was given a contract to assemble trucks in Rangoon. Forty-five technicians left on 10 November to help with supply and maintenance problems. Within the United States, warehouse facilities were expanded to speed movement of lend-lease to shipside. In November 14,561 tons left Newport News, Virginia, and more was piling up to await shipping space. But these measures were at best palliatives, and AMMISCA warned that tighter controls over lend-lease purchases would have to be established and maintained until all Chinese stockpiles in Burma had been cut to more manageable proportions. In October 1941 more goods moved from Lashio to China than arrived from Rangoon. This was not, however, all lend-lease aid, most of which was held in Rangoon by the congested lines of communication.¹⁴⁶

Recommendations to Washington on the logistics problem were made on 12 November and had conclusive effects when the Chinese lend-lease program was appraised after Pearl Harbor. AMMISCA suggested that there be no more purchasing or shipping of goods for China until the Burma stockpile was inventoried to see what was actually at hand. When purchasing was resumed, AMMISCA suggested it should not be done by Chinese agencies in Washington, which were ignorant of the real supply situation in China, but by the War Department in accord with AMMISCA recommendations. Other suggestions were that ship sailings from Newport News be staggered to avoid choking Rangoon with undeliverable goods; that title to lend-lease be kept in U.S. hands until it was actually delivered to the Chinese in China, so that it should not be the object of squabbles and corruption among outside parties; and that, as a matter of policy, goods procurable locally should not be sent on lend-lease, so as to end, among several other objectionable practices, that of sending lead to one of the world's greatest sources of nonferrous metals.¹⁴⁷

Summary

As November passed into December, and the Japanese task force drew closer to Pearl Harbor, the status of the American effort to aid China was:

1. A clearly defined concept of the reasons for giving arms to China had been framed by the military and approved by the President.

2. The War Department had weighed its resources against world-wide demands on them, and had programmed a series of shipments to China on which to base procurement. (Table 3 includes 1941 shipments.)

3. In framing this program the War Department had implicitly accepted the Chinese proposals to (a) create a modern Chinese Air Force, (b) institute

and maintain an efficient line of communications into China, and (c) arm thirty divisions.

4. A military mission had been sent to China to aid the Chinese in asking for and using American matériel and services.

There was, however, one gap in this program. There was no planning to meet the effect of war in the Pacific by a combined Sino-American effort. Such staff talks had been held between British and Americans, but there had been none between Chinese and Americans. Partly as a result of this, Magruder had no directive as to what his mission would be were war to result from the current Japanese-American crisis in the Pacific.

Table 3
Lend-Lease Supplies Shipped to China: May 1941-April 1942^a
[In Long Tons]

Type	Total	1941								1942
		May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr
Total	110,864	7,532	4,917	5,452	8,099	9,146	9,803	14,561	7,145	9,920	6,487	20,343	7,439
Arsenal	24,703	3,125	5	3,112	82	250	1,807	4,661	1,804	2,388	256	7,121	92
Aviation	2,533	0	0	0	0	0	246	144	6	264	58	1,123	692
Airplanes	1,657	0	0	0	0	0	53	130	0	200	44	687	543
Airplane Parts	876	0	0	0	0	0	193	14	6	64	14	436	149
Medical	1,138	0	0	0	22	0	6	120	0	50	28	228	684
Motor Transport	33,536	1,998	1,512	0	5,346	6,643	4,153	5,701	1,468	2,477	1,871	2,158	209
Vehicles	29,081	1,930	1,287	0	4,440	6,473	3,826	4,906	1,252	1,754	1,367	1,671	175
Spare Parts	4,455	68	225	0	906	170	327	795	216	723	504	487	34
Ordnance	11,398	0	0	0	91	30	784	18	364	1,044	496	3,571	5,000
Weapons	286	0	0	0	0	0	114	14	9	297	23	635	194
Ammunition	8,725	0	0	0	91	30	625	3	347	461	469	2,129	4,570
Miscellaneous	1,387	0	0	0	0	0	45	1	8	286	4	807	236
Petroleum	14,927	2,404	1,970	728	15	1,500	0	1,931	9	195	837	4,929	409
Aviation	3,562	1,155	0	0	0	1,500	0	1,931	9	0	5	553	409
Motor Transport	9,365	1,249	1,970	728	15	0	0	0	0	195	832	4,376	0
Road Building	19,365	0	1,410	1,605	2,496	665	2,125	1,351	2,543	2,801	2,938	1,078	353
Materials	12,593	0	1,410	1,605	1,461	615	919	996	1,967	1,547	1,550	523	0
Machinery	1,398	0	0	0	40	0	570	21	53	199	0	191	324
Tools and Equipment	5,374	0	0	0	995	50	636	334	523	1,055	1,388	364	29
Signal	651	0	0	0	0	0	105	21	106	281	3	135	0
Textiles	2,613	25	20	7	47	58	577	614	845	420	0	0	0

^a Loss of Burma prevented delivery of some of this tonnage.

Source: Memo, 1st Lt William S. Brewster for Lt Col Lucien C. Strong, 20 May 42. AG(AMMISCA) 319.1.

Footnotes

1. Henry L. Stimson and McGeorge Bundy, On Active Service in Peace and War (New York, 1947), Ch. IX.

2. (1) MA Rpts: Maj John Magruder, 20 Dec 26-15 Mar 30; Col Nelson E. Margetts, 16 Mar 30-2 Mar 32; Lt Col Walter S. Drysdale, 3 Mar 32-7 Jul 35; Col Joseph W. Stilwell, 8 Jul 35-30 Apr 39; Maj William Mayer, 13 Jun 39-18 Aug 42. National Archives. (2) Selected papers of the German Military Mission. Folder 2009-255, National Archives.

3. (1) Rpts and selected papers cited n. 2. (2) MA Rpts, Stilwell. Folders 2657-H-439, 2279-1-4, National Archives. (3) Japanese Studies in World War II (hereafter, Japanese Study --), 76, China Expeditionary Army Operations in China and Manchuria, 1937-45, and 70. Gen Ref Br, OCMH. (See Bibliographical Note.)

4. Background on Chinese loans as well as a summary of Sino-American agencies involved in the transactions in Memo, BR 7, Far Eastern Sec, Co-ordinator of Information, sub: American Aid to China. (Hereafter, American Aid to China.) AG (AMMISCA) 400.3295, Job-11, HRS DRB AGO.

5. Mr. Soong, brother-in-law of the Generalissimo, received his bachelor's degree from Harvard in 1915. Following graduate work at Columbia, he returned to China. Showing great aptitude for finance, Soong became Minister of Finance in the Sun Yat-sen regime in Canton in 1925. From 1930 to 1933 he was governor of the Central Bank of China. Soong then became chairman of the Board of Directors of the National Bank of China. Shortly after the beginning of war in the Pacific on 23 December 1941, he became Minister of Foreign Affairs.

6. (1) Capt Tracy B. Kittredge, USNR, draft MS, United States-British Naval Co-operation, 1940-1945, III, D, 87; III, D, 302-03; IV, D, 247, n. 1; IV, A, 297. JCS Hist Sec. (2) Studies of China's geographic position and manpower as early as January 1940 appended to JB Paper 355 (Ser 691), 9 Jul 41. AG (AMMISCA) 336.2. (3) WPD Study 4389, Cases 1-28, Sec 1, A47-30, contains staff papers on which the Joint Board Paper is based. (4) Robert E. Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins: An Intimate History (New York, 1949), p. 150.

7. (1) For an analysis of the pact by the U.S. Ambassador to Japan, see the State Department's Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, Japan: 1931-1941 (Washington, 1943), Vol. II, pp. 169-70. (2) The Chinese requests are in Rads, Chungking 524, 526, Johnson to STATE, 17, 18 Oct 40. Dept State 793.93/16241, 793.94/16245. (3) Prime Minister Churchill's explanation to Mr. Roosevelt of the British decision to close the Burma Road in Winston S. Churchill, Their Finest Hour (Boston, 1949), pp. 497-98.

8. Rads Chungking 528, 529, Johnson to STATE, 20 Oct 40. Dept State 793.94/16249, 793.94/16251.

9. On 12 November 1940 British torpedo-carrying planes sank the battleship Cavour and grounded two other Italian warships at Taranto.

10. (1) Rad 529 cited n. 8. (2) Rad STATE 181, Washington to Johnson, 23 Oct 40. Dept State 793.94/16245.

11. Rad Chungking 551, Johnson to STATE, 31 Oct 40. Dept State 793.94/16277.

12. Rad Chungking 581, Johnson to STATE, 22 Nov 40; Rad Chungking 587, Johnson to STATE, 27 Nov 40. Dept State 793.94/16345. Ambassador Johnson summarized his October and November conversations with the Generalissimo in the latter message.

13. Maj. Gen. Claire L. Chennault, USA-Ret., Way of a Fighter: The Memoirs of Claire Lee Chennault (New York, 1949), pp. 59, 90-104.

14. Ltr, W. D. Pawley, Pres, Intercontinent Corp., to Romanus, 6 Jul 50. HIS 330.14 CBI 1950. (See Bibliographical Note.)

15. (1) Specifically, the Chinese asked for 250 Brewster 4F-4's or Grumman 36A's, 100 Curtiss-Wright P-40's, which were considered a match for the new Japanese Zero fighter, 50 Douglas B-23's, and 100 Lockheed Hudsons. The Mao-Chennault specifications in Ltr, Soong to Maj Gen James H. Burns, Executive Off, Office, Div of Def Aid Rpts, 31 Mar 41. Exhibit A, Sec II, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299, Folder, China-Requirements Presented by the Chinese Representatives. (Hereafter, Soong Requirements.) (2) Ltr, Philip Young, Office of Production Management, to Harry Hopkins, 21 Apr 41, sub: Rpt on China Requests for Lauchlin Currie. China Pre-Pearl Harbor Folder, Hopkins Papers, Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, New York.

16. Ltr, Archie Lockhead, Pres, Universal Trading Corp., to Philip Young, Chairman, President's Ln Com, 8 Jan 41; Memo, Lt Col Edward E. MacMorland, Secy, Army-Navy Munitions Bd, for ACofS, G-4, WDGS, 17 Jan, sub: Chinese Ordnance Reqmts; Memo, Maj Gen James H. Burns, U.S. Army member, President's Ln Com, for Young, 28 Jan 41. China Folder, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299.

17. Kittredge, draft MS, Evolution of Global Strategy in World War II, Ch. 11, p. 119. JCS Hist Sec.

18. (1) Memo, Leighton for CNO, 17 Jan 41. Incl B, JB Paper cited n. 6(2). (2) Ltr, Leighton to Deyo, 20 Jan 41. Leighton Folder 1-9, W. D. Pawley Papers, Intercontinent Corp., 30 Rockefeller Plaza, New York, N. Y.

19. Memo, Col Charles Hines, Chairman, Clearance Com, Army-Navy Munitions Bd, for President's Ln Com, 6 Dec 40, sub: Chinese Aircraft and Antiaircraft Reqmts. China Folder, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299.

20. Memo, Hines for President's Ln Com, 3 Feb 41, sub: Chinese Aircraft and Program. China Folder, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299.

21. Memo, Burns for Lt Col Andrew J. McFarland, 23 Dec 40, sub: Conf re Allocation of P-40 Aircraft, AG 400.3295 (4-14-41) Sec 1A, Tab C.

22. Min, Conf in OCofS, 0830, 23 Dec 40. Vol I, Conferences, A47-68.

23. (1) Memos cited n. 16. (2) Memo, Col Hines for Ray A. Graham, President's Ln Com, 3 Feb 41. China Folder, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299.

24. Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, p. 225.

25. For details on the background of the Lend-Lease Act see Richard M. Leighton and Robert Coakley, Logistics of Global Warfare: 1941-43, a forthcoming volume in this series.

26. J. Franklin Ray, Jr., Notes on History of Lend-Lease Aid to China, prepared for Hist Sec, Hq, U.S. Forces, India-Burma Theater, 1945. Gen Ref Br, OCMH.

27. JB Paper cited n. 6(2).

28. (1) American Aid to China, pp. 17-18. (2) A part of Currie's findings is set forth in Resume of the Economic and Political Situation in China and Suggestions for Action, 14 Apr 41. Dept State 893.50/245.

29. Soong Requirements.

30. Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, pp. 272-73.

31. See pp. 25, 42-43, n. 24 on p. 159, and p. 235, below.

32. Soong Requirements.

33. Memo, Hopkins for Burns, 4 Apr 41. Folder, China Personnel, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299.

34. Ltr, Young to Hopkins, 21 Apr 41, sub: Rpt on China Requests for Laughlin Currie, with comments and atchd tables. China Pre-Pearl Harbor Folder, Hopkins Papers.

35. (1) Memo, Sumner Welles for Hopkins, 21 Apr 41; Cables, Roosevelt to Chiang Kai-shek, 26, 28 Apr, 2 May 41. Record Room, Dept State. (2) Summaries on Russian Aid to Nationalist China in Ltr, Louis Johnson, Actg SW, to Secy State, 15 Jun 38, sub: Rpt on Equipment Coming into China. Item 563, Secy War, A46-215. (3) U.S. Embassy Rpt 14, Clarence E. Gauss to Hull, 6 Jun 41. AG (AMMISCA) 334.8. (4) MA Rpt 13 (China), IG 5610, 16 Sep 41, sub: Mun, Imports and Exports from Russia to China. MID Library.

36. Ltr, Currie to Stimson, 14 Apr 41. AG 400.3295 (4-14-41) Sec 1A.

37. (1) Soong Requirements. (2) Rpt 1, signed MacMorland, Def Aid Div, 30 Apr 41, sub: Rpt of Accomplishments, Functionings, etc., of Def Aid Div, OUSW. ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299.

38. Memo, Stimson for Currie, 22 Apr 41, sub: Aid Program to ChinañLend-Lease Act. AG 400.3295 (4-14-41) Sec 1A.

39. Memo, Currie for Roosevelt, 23 Apr 41, sub: Prelim Aid Program for China--Lend-Lease Act. AG 400.3295 (4-14-41) Sec 1A. Mr. Roosevelt placed his familiar "O.K.-F. D. R." on this memorandum.

40. (1) Folder, China Requisition, AG (AMMISCA) 400.312. (2) Ltr, Currie to Hopkins, 25 Apr 41. China Pre-Pearl Harbor Folder, Hopkins Papers. (3) AG 400.3295 (4-14-41) Sec 1A contains Mr. Roosevelt's original signature to the statement that China was vital to the defense of the United States and was eligible for lend-lease aid. (4) AG (AMMISCA) 523.02 and 611 contain sailing data and cargo content for the first twelve lend-lease shipments to Rangoon.

41. Ltr, Robert Patterson, Actg SW, to Currie, 3 May 41. AG 400.3295 (4-14-41) Sec 1A. The War Department's review of Soong's entire program is dated 30 April 1941 and is appended to Patterson's letter. The War Department estimated that Soong's requirements, at a cost of $1,067,000,000, would take eighteen months to fill.

42. Memo, Patterson for Marshall, 19 Jul 41, sub: Relative Co-ordination of Chinese Def Aid. AG 400.3295 (4-14-41) Sec 1A, Tab H.

43. Min, Standing Ln Com, 15 Feb 41. A48-139.

44. (1) Interv with Pawley, 24 May 51. (2) Ltr, with atchd Central Aircraft Mfg Co. contract, Soong to Pawley and Leighton, 15 Apr 41. Contract Folder, Pawley Papers.

45. Numerous folders in the Pawley Papers show the official relationship between the services and Mr. Pawley's organization. Through unofficial correspondence with many friends in the services, former Army and Navy officers on the staff of Pawley's company adopted current Air Corps Tables of Organization and Equipment for the organization of the AVG. The extent of this contribution is revealed in the Leighton and Aldworth Folders, Pawley Papers.

46. (1) Letters of introduction to Pawley's agents at Navy and Army installations are in the W. D. Pawley Folder, Pawley Papers. (2) Rad, Chennault to Soong, 8 Feb 42. CDS Folder 2-10, Pawley Papers. This message verifies that on 2 April 1941 Chennault received approval from Soong to pay a 500-dollar bonus to AVG pilots. (3) Ltr, Capt Richard Aldworth (USA-Ret.) to Capt F. E. Beatty (USN), Aide to Secy Knox, 24 May 41. Navy Dept Folder, Pawley Papers. (4) Progress reports on personnel for the AVG are in the Pawley Papers. (5) Contract cited n. 44(2).

47. Interv with Admiral Stark, 26 Apr 49, Washington, D.C.

48. (1) Pawley Interv cited n. 44(1). (2) Air Marshal Sir Robert Brooke-Popham, "Operations in the Far East, from 17th October 1940 to 27th December 1941," Supplement to The London Gazette, January 22, 1948, par. 26.

49. (1) Chennault, Way of a Fighter, pp. 107, 117-19. (2) Robert B. Hotz, With General Chennault (New York, 1943), pp. 112, 115-17, 125.

50. Ltr, David M. Corcoran, Pres, CDS, to Burns, 10 May 41. Folder, China Lend-Lease Corresp, Apr-Oct 41, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299.

51. (1) Quotations from Min, Conf in OSW, 0915, 10 Jun 41. OSW Conf, A45-466. (2) Ltr, Marhall to Currie, 16 Jun 41. AG 400.3295 (4-14-41) Sec 1A. (3) Memo, Currie for Hopkins, 3 Jul 41; Memo, Hopkins for Burns, 12 Jul 41. China Pre-Pearl Harbor Folder, Hopkins Papers. (4) Memo, Maj Gen Leonard T. Gerow, Actg CofS, WPD, for Maj Gen R. C. Moore, DCofS, 1 Aug 41, with accompanying Ltrs from JSM in Washington; Ltr, Young to Stimson, 8 Aug 41. AG 400.3295 (4-14-41) Sec 1A.

52. (1) Memo, Robert A. Lovett, ASW for Air, for Stimson, 14 Jun 41, sub: Status of Chinese Requests for Air. Stimson Papers in temporary custody of Dr. Rudolph A. Winnacker, Office, Secy Def. (2) Memo, Maj Patrick W. Timberlake, recorder, Jt Aircraft Com, for Burns, 19 Apr 41, and Burns' reply to Timberlake, 23 Apr 41. Folder, China Lend-Lease Corresp, Apr-Oct 41, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299. (3) WPD 4389, Cases 1-28, Sec 1, A47-30. (See Bibliographical Note.) (4) Because Currie's program involved diversion of lend-lease aircraft, the Joint Aircraft Committee had to seek policy guidance from the Joint Board. Joint Board Paper 355 (Ser 691) contains Currie's Short-Term Aircraft Program for China.

53. Ltr, Currie to Knox, 28 May 41. Incl, JB Paper 355 (Ser 691). In addition to the proposal on combat aircraft, Currie incorporated a plan to place ten DC-3 transport planes in service with the China National Aviation Corporation for hauls between Lashio and Kunming. In July the Joint Board found that no transports were available, but in the fall lend-lease funds to buy ten DC-3's, with a promise that all would be in service by March 1942, were given to the Chinese. Currie's program also covered the training of 500 Chinese airmen on lend-lease funds. Training of the Chinese began on 1 October 1941 with a group of fifty pilots followed each week by a class of fifty new candidates.

54. Incl to JB Paper 355 (Ser 691).

55. Stark and Marshall approved JB Paper 355 (Ser 691) on 12 July 1941, followed by Knox on the 15th and by Acting Secretary of War Patterson on the 18th.

56. (1) Rad 255, Canton to Tokyo, PURPLE Code, 14 Jul 41, Hearings of the Congressional Joint Committee Investigating the Attack on Pearl Harbor (Washington, 1946), Pt. 12, Exhibit 1, p. 2. (2) Memo, Notes on Cabinet Mtg, 18 Jul 41, Stimson Papers. (3) Ltr, Stark to Admiral Thomas C. Hart, 24 Jul 41, Hearings of the Congressional Joint Committee . . ., Pt. 16, Exhibit 106, p. 2173. (4) Memoirs of Prince Konoye, Hearings of the Congressional Joint Committee . . ., Pt. 20, Exhibit 173.

57. (1) Memo, Capt Kittredge to authors, 4 Apr 50. HIS 330.14 CBI 1950. (2) Japanese attempts to create a synthetic oil industry were an admitted failure by mid-1941. U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey [USSBS], Over-all Economic Effects Div, Effects of Strategic Bombing on Japan's War Economy (Washington, 1946), p. 9. (3) Jerome B. Cohen, Japan's Economy in War and Reconstruction (Minneapolis, Minn., 1949), p. 137.

58. U.S. Department of State, Peace and War: U.S. Foreign Policy, 1931-1941 (Washington, 1942), pp. 696, 699.

59. The President initialed a covering letter to JB Paper 355 (Ser 691) on 23 July 1941. This letter, dated 18 July, is from Patterson and Knox to the President and was returned to the Joint Board in the form of a memorandum by Lt. Col. William P. Scobey, Secretary of the Joint Board, for General Marshall on 23 July 1941. These covering papers head the Army's copy of JB Paper 355 (Ser 691) in G-3 Registered Documents Section.

60. (1) Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, p. 405. (2) Memo, Brig Gen Sherman Miles, Actg ACofS, G-2, WDGS, for CofS, 26 Mar 41, sub: Chinese Power of Resistance. MID 381.2, China (3-26-41). (3) Memo, Patterson for Marshall, 19 Jul 41, sub: Relative Co-ordination of Chinese Def Aid. AG 400.3295 (4-14-41) Sec 1A. Tabs A-H.

61. (1) In the margin of a draft manuscript of this chapter, Admiral Stark wrote: ". . . statement about oil is correct--but I understood at the time--it was not an oil embargo though it ultimately did develop into it." HIS 330.14 CBI 1950. (2) In commenting on a draft manuscript for this portion of the text, Admiral Stark and Captain Kittredge, Joint Chiefs of Staff Historical Section, outlined the following Joint Board recommendations of 25 July 1941 which the Chief of Staff and the Chief of Naval Operations thought had been approved by the President:

"1 A Presidential proclamation calling the Philippine forces in U.S. service, with the appointment of Gen. MacArthur as Commanding General of a new army command, 'U.S. Army Forces in the Far East' (USAFFE) with proposals for immediate strengthening of U.S. forces in the Philippines.
"2 Approval of the program for aid to China, including the CAF [Chinese Air Force] project, the AVG program, the supply of further ordnance material for the 30 division program, and the sending of a U.S. military mission.
"3 Approval of proposals for release of munitions for Russia, including items from the Army and Navy and future production previously allocated to the U.S. and British forces.
"4 Maintenance of the closing of the Panama Canal to Japanese ships, with provision for co-operation with British and Allied forces in the Southwest Pacific for reduction of shipments to Japan.
"5 No general embargo on Japan, but introduction of a licensing system for exports, assuring U.S. control of all shipments to Japan."

(3) For data on Japan's oil situation, see sources cited in note 57(2) and (3).

62. JB Paper cited n. 6(2).

63. Initial plans for a Chinese-American composite unit were laid in the Soong-Pawley-Aldworth-Chennault correspondence of fall 1941. Captain Aldworth drafted Tables of Organization and Equipment to meet the needs of the 66 bomber and 269 fighter allocations. Chennault approved these tables for the second AVG on 29 September 1941. Ltr, Aldworth to Soong, 17 Aug 41; Ltr, signed "Ken", to Aldworth, 24 Aug 41; Ltr, Soong to Chennault, 15 Aug 41; Rad, Chennault to Soong, 29 Sep 41. Soong-Pawley Folder, Pawley Papers.

64. 2d AVG Folder, Pawley Papers.

65. (1) Brooke-Popham Despatch, Supplement to The London Gazette, par. 26. (2) Pawley Interv cited n. 44(1).

66. (1) Ltr, Currie to Soong, 23 Jul 41. Item 13, AG (AMMISCA) 336.2. (2) Min, JB Mtg, 4 Sep 41. G-3 Registered Documents Section. (3) Ltr, Currie to Hopkins, 20 Aug 41. China Pre-Pearl Harbor Folder, Hopkins Papers. (4) Ltr, Soong to Col William J. Donovan, 16 Aug 41. Folder, China-Howitzers, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299. (5) Memo, Currie for Roosevelt, 26 Aug 41; Cable 4166, Ambassador John Winant to Hopkins, 9 Sep 41. China Pre-Pearl Harbor Folder, Hopkins Papers. (6) Memo, Maj Gen Henry H. Arnold for Marshall, 9 Sep 41. ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299. (7) Schedules for the release of the P-43's and P-66's in Rad, Col H. W. T. Eglin, Chief, AMMISCA Washington Detail, to Magruder, 15 Oct 41. Item 25, AG (AMMISCA) 336.2.

67. Soong Requirements.

68. Memo, Patterson for Marshall, 19 Jul 41, sub: Relative Co-ordination of Chinese Def Aid. AG 400.3295 (4-14-41) Sec 1A, Tabs A-H.

69. Ibid.

70. (1) AG (AMMISCA) 474. (2) Folder, China Rifles, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299.

71. (1) Folder, China Tanks, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299. (2) Folder, Marmon-Herrington Co., Inc., AG 095, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299. (3) AG (AMMISCA) 400.312. (4) AG (AMMISCA) 470.8. (5) Ltr, Col Haydon L. Boatner to Chief, HD SSUSA, 14 Nov 47. HIS 330.14 CBI 1947. (6) Memo for Record by Boatner, 7 Oct 41. Folder, China Lend-Lease Corresp, Apr-Oct 41. ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299.

72. Memo, Burns for Hopkins, 14 May 41, with Incl, Ltr, J. P. Sanger, Asst Dir of Purchases, to C. E. Mack, Dir of Procurement, Treasury Dept, 8 May 41. China Pre-Pearl Harbor Folder, Hopkins Papers.

73. During Currie's mission to Chungking, the Generalissimo had requested that a high-ranking air officer come to China. Mr. Roosevelt approved the request. Seeing that Soong's program of air power in China was obviously going to claim a large share of American resources, Marshall sent Clagett to China. Clagett's report of the Chinese Air Force and its installations in Rpt, Clagett to Marshall, 12 Jun 41, sub: Air Mission to China. AG (AMMISCA) 336.2.

74. Rad, Mayer to AG WAR, 15 Jun 41. AMMISCA Rad File, Job-11.

75. Memo, Brig Gen Eugene Reybold, Actg ACofS, G-4, WDGS, for CofS, 16 Jun 41. Folder, Mission to China, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299. Maj. Haydon L. Boatner prepared this paper for Reybold's signature.

76. (1) Memorandum cited note 68 contains various staff studies for initiating AMMISCA for the Office, Under Secretary of War, to consider. (2) Memo with Incls, MacMorland, Def Aid Div, OUSW, for WPD, 20 Jun 41, sub: Organization of Mil Mission to China. WPD 4389-7, Sec 1. (3) The Assistant Secretary of War, John J. McCloy, supported AMMISCA since he had been disturbed over the lack of planning for the AVG. Memo, McCloy for Miles, 21 Jul 41. G-4, 32192/1, A43-3.

77. American reports on the scope and mission of the British Military Mission to China in Rad, MA Chungking to AG WAR, 25 Jun 41; Rad, MA Chungking to WPD, 6 Jul 41; Rad, STATE 82, Gauss to Hull, 24 Jul 41. AG (AMMISCA) 334.8 and WPD 4389-11, Sec 1.

78. Memo, Welles for Hopkins, 7 Jul 41. WPD 4389-7, Sec 1.

79. WPD 4389-17.

80. Memo, Miles for Magruder, 11 Jul 41. AMMISCA Folder 1, Gen Ref Br, OCMH. (See Bibliographical Note.)

81. Magruder's planning papers in AMMISCA Folder 1.

82. As a Foreign Service officer at Shanghai, Gauss had had long experience in dealing with the Chinese. As it worked out, Gauss had no control over AMMISCA, which, since the latter appeared to control lend-lease aid, created a situation not lost on the observant Chinese. Gauss was Ambassador to China until November 1944.

83. The exchange of planning papers is in AMMISCA Folder 1.

84. (1) Ltr, Roosevelt to Soong, 20 Aug 41. Folder, Mission to China, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299. (2) Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, p. 404.

85. WPD 4389-17.

86. Rad, AMMISCA 40, AGWAR to Chungking, 15 Nov 41. WPD 4389-30.

87. (1) Memo, Patterson for Magruder, 27 Aug 41, sub: Instructions for Mil Mission to China. AMMISCA Folder 1. (2) Points 4 and 5 in JB Paper 354 (Ser 716), 19 Sep 41.

88. JB Paper 354 (Ser 716).

89. Memo, Magruder for Marshall, 11 Aug 41, sub: Mil Mission to China. AMMISCA Folder 1.

90. (1) Ibid. Approval came in Memo cited n. 87(1). (2) Three valuable diaries record AMMISCA activities. The official diary, recorded and numbered by weeks, not only contains a daily summary, but has appended to it the most important papers and staff studies which were sent by pouch to Washington. AMMISCA Weekly Rpts in AG (AMMISCA) 319.1. The weekly diary of the Washington Detail of AMMISCA is in the same file. The other two diaries are unofficial. One is the work of Col. Edward E. MacMorland, Chief of Staff, AMMISCA, and it provides background information on conferences and policy radios reported to Washington. Another diary was kept by Col. Harry S. Aldrich, who recorded day-by-day events in Burma before Pearl Harbor. Aldrich's diary later records the activities of the Joint Allied Military Council located in Chungking. Notes from the MacMorland and Aldrich Diaries are in Gen Ref Br, OCMH. (See Bibliographical Note.)

91. (1) Memo, Eglin for Co-ordinator of Information, 12 Nov 41. AG (AMMISCA) 334.8. (2) Ltr, Soong to Donovan, 16 Aug 41. Folder, China--Howitzers, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299.

92. AG (AMMISCA) 210.

93. (1) Ltr cited n. 91(2). (2) Quotation in Memo, Magruder for Marshall, 18 Aug 41, sub: Release of Equipment for China. AMMISCA Folder 1.

94. G-4/32192, A43-3.

95. Ltr, Soong to Hopkins, 24 Sep 41. China Pre-Pearl Harbor Folder, Hopkins Papers.

96. (1) On 19 September 1941 Magruder was instructed to stop in Manila to confer with MacArthur who had been charged "for all strategic planning involving U.S. Army Forces in the Far East." Both officers were told to maintain correspondence and liaison on this subject. Ltr, Marshall to MacArthur, 19 Sep 41, sub: Mil Mission to China. WPD 4389-19. (2) MacMorland Diary, 3 Oct 42.

97. (1) MacMorland Diary. (2) Memo, Magruder for AMMISCA Personnel, 25 Oct 41. AMMISCA Folder 5.

98. Memo, Magruder for Stf Off, 7 Nov 41. AMMISCA Folder 5.

99. Memo, Magruder for all AMMISCA Offs, 18 Sep 41. AG (AMMISCA) 210.

100. (1) Unless indicated otherwise, this section is based on the following sources: (a) AMMISCA rpts and files in Job-11; (b) AMMISCA radio files incorporated with Hq, U.S. Forces, China Theater, records at KCRC; (c) AMMISCA Folder 1; (d) MA Rpts cited n. 2(1); (e) WPD 4389-15, 102; (f) GHQ, Far East Comd, Mil Hist Div, Imperial General Headquarters Army Orders, Vol. I, Army Directives, Vol. I. Gen Ref Br, OCMH. (2) Additional background material on the Chinese Army is given in the following secondary works: (a) Graham Peck, Two Kinds of Time (Boston, 1950); (b) The China Year Book, H. G. W. Woodhead, ed. (Shanghai and London, 1941); (c) Evans F. Carlson's The Chinese Army: Its Organization and Military Efficiency (New York, 1940) treats of the Chinese Army before the Japanese blockade; (d) Theodore H. White and Annalee Jacoby in their Thunder Out of China (New York, 1946) present their view of the Chinese Army; (e) Gerald K. Winfield's China: The Land and the People (New York, 1948) has a chapter, "War and the People of China," which discusses Chinese popular attitudes toward their Army; (f) David Morris' China Changed My Mind (Boston, 1949) is a candid opinion of a wartime observer.

101. Description of a Chinese division in AG (AMMISCA) 371.

102. (1) Orders of Battle as assembled from Chinese and American sources in AG (AMMISCA) 336.2, 371. (2) MA Rpts, MID 2009-198, 2271-I-36, 2657-H-439, 2271-L-19, 2347-I-44, 2271-I-33, 2279-I-14, 2009-255. National Archives.

103. See Ch. IX, below.

104. MS, History of ZEBRA Force, pp. 6-7. Gen Ref Br, OCMH.

105. Maj. Gen. Yu Ta-wei's ordnance inventory distributed on current U.S. Army Tables of Organization and Equipment forms the basis of this computation. General Yu's inventory of Nov 41 in Memo, Lt Col Arcadi Gluckman, AMMISCA Supply Specialist, for Magruder, 17 Nov 41, sub: Ordnance Equipment for Thirty Assault Divisions, AG (AMMISCA) 319.1. The latter survey is in Stilwell Numbered File (hereafter SNF --) 52. Stilwell Documents, Hoover Library. (See Bibliographical Note.)

106. Rpt, Lt Cols George W. Sliney and Edwin M. Sutherland. Item 87, AMMISCA Folder 4.

107. Ltr, Soong to Currie, 24 Sep 41; Ltr, Currie to Patterson, 29 Sep 41; Ltr, Patterson to Currie, 1 Oct 41; Ltr, Currie to Hopkins, 6 Oct 41. China Pre-Pearl Harbor Folder, Hopkins Papers.

108. Ltr, Currie to Hopkins, 6 Oct 41. China Pre-Pearl Harbor Folder, Hopkins Papers.

109. History of the China-Burma-India Theater, 21 May 1942-25 October 1944 (hereafter, History of CBI), Sec. III, App. III, Item 1. OPD 314.7 CTO, A47-30. (See Bibliographical Note.)

110. See p. 32, above.

111. Imperial General Headquarters Army Directive 969, 20 Sep 41, GHQ, Far East Comd, Mil Hist Div, Imperial General Headquarters Army Directives, Vol. II. Gen Ref Br, OCMH.

112. Memo, Conf with Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, 27 Oct 41. AMMISCA Folder 3.

113. Rad AMMISCA 28, Magruder to Marshall and Stimson, 28 Oct 41. Bk A (1941), Folder 8, Executive Office Files, OPD. (Hereafter, OPD Exec --.) (See Bibliographical Note.)

114. Memo, Conf with Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, 31 Oct 41. AMMISCA Folder 3.

115. Rad AMMISCA 32, Magruder to Marshall and Stimson, 31 Oct 41. Bk A (1941), OPD Exec 8.

116. Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, p. 404.

117. Though Mr. Roosevelt informed Soong of AMMISCA's creation on 20 August 1941, the President did not issue a press release on AMMISCA until 26 August 1941. See n. 84.

118. Memo, Soong for Roosevelt, 31 Oct 41. Folder, China 2, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299.

119. Memo, Gerow for Marshall, 1 Nov 41, sub: Far Eastern Situation. Bk A (1941), OPD Exec 8.

120. Memo, Gerow for Marshall, 1 Nov 41, sub: Immediate Aid to China. Bk A (1941), OPD Exec 8. Table A of this memorandum contains the G-2 estimate.

121. (1) Memo for Record, Col C. W. Bundy, Chief, Plans Gp, WPD, 1 Nov 41, sub: Immediate Aid to China. Bk A (1941), OPD Exec 8. (2) Memo for Record, Bundy, 2 Nov 41, sub: Notes on Conf with Mr. Currie at State Dept, 1245, 1 Nov 41. Bk A (1941), OPD Exec 8. (3) Admiral Royal E. Ingersoll reminded the Joint Board of the decision to make a major effort in the Atlantic and pointed out that a major effort in the western Pacific, or a shift of the major effort to that ocean to rescue China would force a tremendous shift of merchant ship tonnage. Statement of Ingersoll before the JB, 3 Nov 41. Bk A (1941), OPD Exec 8. (4) Dr. Hornbeck called General Marshall on the evening of 4 November 1941. Memo, Marshall for Gerow, 5 Nov 41. Bk A (1941), OPD Exec 8.

122. (1) Memo, Marshall and Stark for Roosevelt, 4 Nov 41, sub: Far Eastern Situation. Bk A (1941), OPD Exec 8. (2) Report of Congressional Joint Committee on Pearl Harbor Attack (Washington, 1946), p. 342.

123. Memo cited n. 122(1).

124. Currie and Hull concurred in the views of the War Department. Memo cited n. 121(2).

125. (1) Report of Congressional Joint Committee . . ., p. 340. (2) Rad, Churchill to the Generalissimo, undated. Bk A (1941), OPD Exec 8.

126. Ltr, Soong to President, 8 Nov 41, sub: China and Impending Attack on Burma Road. China Pre-Pearl Harbor Folder, Hopkins Papers. The President sent Soong's letter to Hopkins with a typed note dated 12 November 1941: "What can we do about this?"

127. (1) These curt summaries should not be taken as indicating any brusqueness in the letters themselves, which were sympathetic and friendly. The items desired by the Chinese were those desperately needed by all. (2) Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, pp. 408-09. (3) Ltr, Soong to Stimson, 6 Nov 41; Ltr, Stimson to Soong, 12 Nov 41, sub: Def of Yunnan and Burma Road. AG 400.3295 (4-14-41) Sec 1A. (4) Report of Congressional Joint Committee . . ., p. 343.

128. (1) Ltr, Marshall to Currie, 5 Jul 41, sub: Aviation Aid to China. Item 10, AG (AMMISCA) 336.2. (2) Ltr, Marshall to Currie, 15 Jul 41. AG 400.3295 (4-14-41) Sec 1A. (3) Min, Conf in OSW, 0915, 21 Jul 41. OSW Conf, A45-466. (4) Ltr, Currie to Soong, 23 Jul 41. Item 13, AG (AMMISCA) 336.2. (5) Ltr, Currie to Marshall, 6 Aug 41; Ltr, Marshall to Currie, 30 Aug 41. AG 336.2 (7-30-42). (6) WPD 4389-15. (7) Rad AMMISCA 82, Marshall to Magruder, 15 Nov 41. AG 400.3295 (4-14-41) Sec 1A.

129. Ltr, 6 Aug 41, cited n. 128(5).

130. (1) JB Paper 354 (Ser 716), 19 Sep 41. (2) JB Paper 325 (Ser 729), 25 Sep 41.

131. (1) Weekly AMMISCA Diary (Nov 41). AG (AMMISCA) 319.1. (2) AMMISCA Folder 5.

132. Memo, Gluckman for Magruder, 17 Nov 41, sub: Ord Equipment for Thirty Assault Divs. AG (AMMISCA) 319.1. Magruder's first indorsement was dated 7 March 1942. The long delay reflects the fact that Chinese Government agencies in Chungking did not until then come to a very tentative agreement on the Thirty Division Program's various aspects, such as the choice of the divisions to be re-equipped.

133. Rad AMMISCA 12, Magruder to AG WAR, 20 Nov 41; Rad AMMISCA 45, Magruder to AG WAR, 11 Nov 41. AMMISCA Radio File, Job-11.

134. (1) Rad AMMISCA 60, Magruder to AGWAR, 20 Nov 41. Job-11. (2) Memo, Eglin for G-1, WDGS, 22 Nov 41, sub: Task Off for U.S. Mil Mission to China. AG (AMMISCA) 319.1. (3) Rad AMMISCA 76, Magruder to AGWAR, 3 Dec 41. Job-11.

135. Not only do the reports and letters in AG (AMMISCA) 319.1, AMMISCA Folder 1, and WPD 4389-102 present these two differing views, but interviews with Magruder and former officers in AMMISCA support these statements. Correspondence with former AMMISCA officers in HIS 330.14 CBI 1950.

136. Memo, Sliney for Magruder, 10 Dec 41. AMMISCA Folder 4.

137. Weekly AMMISCA Diary (Nov 41). AG (AMMISCA) 319.1.

138. (1) Ltr, Lt Col David D. Barrett, Asst MA Chungking, to G-2, WDGS, 6 Apr 41, sub: Burma Road. AG (AMMISCA) 611. (2) Rpt, Austin C. Brady, American Consul, Rangoon, Burma, to Secy State, 14 June 41, sub: Gen Transportation Conditions Affecting Shipt of Supplies through Burma into China. Item 2, Port of Rangoon Folder, CT 42, Dr 4, KCRC.

139. American Aid to China.

140. MA Rpt (China) IG 4610, 23 Aug 41, sub: Present Status of Burma Road. AG (AMMISCA) 611.

141. (1) Ltr, Currie to MacMorland, 7 Jul 41; Memo, Miles for MacMorland, 8 Jul 41, sub: China Aid Program; Memo (unused), MacMorland for Miles, 10 Jul 41. Folder, China Lend-Lease Corresp (Apr-Oct 41), ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299. (2) American Aid to China.

142. Rpt, Arnstein, Harold C. Davis, and Marco F. Hellman, to the Generalissimo, 9 Aug 41, sub: Present Trucking Opns as Conducted on Burma Road and Recommendations for Their Improvement. AG (AMMISCA) 231.5. Arnstein completed his survey as an employee of the Chinese Government.

143. Sources consulted for this section: (1) American Aid to China. (2) Rpt cited n. 138(2). (3) Rpt, Maj John E. Russell, AMMISCA Specialist, to Magruder, 12 Nov 41, sub: Lend-Lease Supply and Transportation in Burma. Port of Rangoon Folder, CT 42, Dr 4, KCRC.

144. Folder, China Railways and Railway Requirements, ASF (DAD) ID, A46-299. This folder and AG (AMMISCA) 453 and 611 outline the scope and size of the Yunnan-Burma Railway project.

145. American Aid to China.

146. AG (AMMISCA) 319.1.

147. Rpt cited n. 143(3).