10 replies to this topic

[Optimus]

Admiral Badger presented a good story on the military situation in North China ( Suiyuan-Peiping Corridor ) during the year 1948 ( military situation in the far east united states congress 1951 ). Admiral Badger pointed out that the failure to get the American 16 million military aid on prompt time and the incomplete useless condition of the equipments for General Fu Zuoyi's operations was the straw that broke the camel's back. General Fu and his troops were demoralized and simply gave up resisting the Communist after that.

Major General Barr during the same committee hearing, had a different recollection of the North China situation and the 16 million aid in contrast to Admiral Badger. General Barr had the famous line, “no battle was lost by the Nationalist because of the lack of adequate ammunition or equipment” ( China White Paper 1948 ). General Barr disagreed with Admiral Badger about the straw that broke the camel's back. Barr believed that the Nationalist were doomed in North China, with or without military aid.

anyone can clarify the facts in the two American commanders’ testimonies from the Chinese Nationalist perspective. there are many discrepancies between their statements.

was General Fu Zuoyi leaning toward surrendering Beiping and troops to the Communist long before Battle of Pingjin?

testimony of Admiral Badger pg 2727
testimony of General Barr pg 2947
military situation in the far east united states congress 1951
http://www.hathitrust.org/

[redstick426]

Admiral Badger presented a good story on the military situation in North China ( Suiyuan-Peiping Corridor ) during the year 1948 ( military situation in the far east united states congress 1951 ). Admiral Badger pointed out that the failure to get the American 16 million military aid on prompt time and the incomplete useless condition of the equipments for General Fu Zuoyi's operations was the straw that broke the camel's back. General Fu and his troops were demoralized and simply gave up resisting the Communist after that.

Major General Barr during the same committee hearing, had a different recollection of the North China situation and the 16 million aid in contrast to Admiral Badger. General Barr had the famous line, “no battle was lost by the Nationalist because of the lack of adequate ammunition or equipment” ( China White Paper 1948 ). General Barr disagreed with Admiral Badger about the straw that broke the camel's back. Barr believed that the Nationalist were doomed in North China, with or without military aid.

anyone can clarify the facts in the two American commanders’ testimonies from the Chinese Nationalist perspective. there are many discrepancies between their statements.

was General Fu Zuoyi leaning toward surrendering Beiping and troops to the Communist long before Battle of Pingjin?

testimony of Admiral Badger pg 2727
testimony of General Barr pg 2947
military situation in the far east united states congress 1951
http://www.hathitrust.org/

Maybe forum member like Ahxiang who is more familiar with the event can shed more light on this. But I sort of agree with Barr's comment that I doubt even Fu Zuoyi can withstand CCP's invasion even with full-blown support from US. It is just a matter of time for CCP to capture Peking. Here is my take:

1.The loss of Siping in Manchuria enriched power base for CCP - the rich military/industrial factory left behind by Japanese and abundant military aids provided by Soviet in addition to millions of former Chinese collaborator soldiers and 30,000-40,000 elite Japanese Kwantung army defected to CCP, became the basis of Lin Biao's Forth Field army which eventually conquered the entire Mainland China.

2.The espionage set up by CCP within KMT inner circle was astounding. Many high ranking KMT officials were in reality underground Communist reported to Zhou EnLai. Military strategy from KMT reached straight to Mao's camp way before Chiang Kai Shek. With their continuous intelligence, there was no hope for KMT to defeat CCP even with all the military supply. Fu ZuoYi's own daughter(underground CCP member) was famous for persuading his father into surrendering into CCP.

3.The propaganda set up by CCP. There were many anti-US protests after 1945 to call for US military pull out from China to end the Civil War. It turned out most of them were staged by CCP. One of the famous protest was Shen Chong raping Incident. It was revealed by CCP itself that Shen Chong was underground CCP member who followed the order from the CCP to fabricate that she was raped by US servicemen and the news eventually swept the entire nation to call for US withdrawal which it did at the end. The relationship between US and KMT government became more or less strained and aftermath embargo against KMT because of it. Also, many people especially among the youth and intellectuals became enchanted with CCP because of left-leaning movement at that time in the world and Mao 's "promise" to establish "democracy" in China.

4. Many KMT soldiers grew tired of fighting after 8 years with the Japanese, let alone fighting the CCP. Many KMT officers and foot soldiers came from the south and were positioned to the North to fight the CCP. Fighting far away from home was the last thing they wanted to see after all those years. It is no wonder why the defection rate was very high among KMT soldiers.

[Optimus]

Maybe forum member like Ahxiang who is more familiar with the event can shed more light on this. But I sort of agree with Barr's comment that I doubt even Fu Zuoyi can withstand CCP's invasion even with full-blown support from US. It is just a matter of time for CCP to capture Peking. Here is my take:

regarding the 16 million military aid, it will be used to equip General Fu Zuoyi remaining unequipped divisions. Fu Zuoyi would then be able to set up an offensive to the northeast stabilizing the Chinhuangtao-Hulutal corridor and for the eventual relief of Mukden ( 300K Nationalist best troops besieged there ) Admiral Badger considered the chances of success to be better than 50-50. North China might have been saved.

General Barr believed that Fu Zuoyi was preparing for the surrender of Peiping for quite some time. Generalissimo Chiang allowed Fu Zuoyi to make the decision and he chose to remain and fight in Peiping to the very end. Fu Zuoyi had the option of his troops retreating south before Peiping became a besieged city. did Generalisso Chiang believe that Fu was loyal to the Nationalist government till the very last when he had no choice but to surrender Peiping?

both the American commanders cited Fu Zuoyi had 11 divisons and 110K troops in 1948. the figures seem inaccurate. maybe they only meant the Peiping garrison. wikipedia said it is 500K. do you know Fu Zuoyi and his generals troops strength in 1948? Fu surrendered 250K troops at Peiping?

Edited by Optimus, 08 August 2012 - 12:48 AM.

[redstick426]

regarding the 16 million military aid, it will be used to equip General Fu Zuoyi remaining unequipped divisions. Fu Zuoyi would then be able to set up an offensive to the northeast stabilizing the Chinhuangtao-Hulutal corridor and for the eventual relief of Mukden ( 300K Nationalist best troops besieged there ) Admiral Badger considered the chances of success to be better than 50-50. North China might have been saved.

General Barr believed that Fu Zuoyi was preparing for the surrender of Peiping for quite some time. Generalissimo Chiang allowed Fu Zuoyi to make the decision and he chose to remain and fight in Peiping to the very end. Fu Zuoyi had the option of his troops retreating south before Peiping became a besieged city. did Generalisso Chiang believe that Fu was loyal to the Nationalist government till the very last when he had no choice but to surrender Peiping?

both the American commanders cited Fu Zuoyi had 11 divisons and 110K troops in 1948. the figures seem inaccurate. maybe they only meant the Peiping garrison. wikipedia said it is 500K. do you know Fu Zuoyi and his generals troops strength in 1948? Fu surrendered 250K troops at Peiping?

I can't really answer all your question but I think Chiang had full faith in Fu Zuoyi, even Fu did not see much action in Japanese war period (Only thing he was known for was crushing the pro-Japanese Mongolian troop in Inner Mongolia) nor was he Whampoa academy affiliated, but he was given full administration/military power by Chiang in dealing with the Northern China "anti-bandit" warfare.

I read that there was speculation that in 60's Fu Zuoyi somehow was guilty of his surrender to CCP or he was horrified to see what Mao has done to China.On Chiang's diary, Chiang mentioned that Fu secretly sent messenger to Taiwan via Hong Kong to try to reestablish his relationship with Chiang...

Edited by redstick426, 08 August 2012 - 06:45 PM.

[Optimus]

I can't really answer all your question but I think Chiang had full faith in Fu Zuoyi, even Fu did not see much action in Japanese war period (Only thing he was known for was crushing the pro-Japanese Mongolian troop in Inner Mongolia) nor was he Whampoa academy affiliated, but he was given full administration/military power by Chiang in dealing with the Northern China "anti-bandit" warfare.

I read that there was speculation that in 60's Fu Zuoyi somehow was guilty of his surrender to CCP or he was horrified to see what Mao has done to China.On Chiang's diary, Chiang mentioned that Fu secretly sent messenger to Taiwan via Hong Kong to try to reestablish his relationship with Chiang...

after the fall of Mukden ( Nov 1948 ), General Fu Zuoyi as the North China Zone Commander had to fight a winning battle to raise the army rapidly collapsing morale. Fu Zouyi devised a battle plan which his generals and Fu all agreed that it stood a good chance of victory. ( by then Fu’s troops had received 60% of the 16 million American military aid. italics mine )

the next day the plan was proceeding, Fu Zuoyi as usual listened to the Communist radio broadcast. the announcer talked about his battle plan, the generals involved in the plan meeting, the generals’ units, the troops’ strength and the battle plan in details. Fu was shocked beyond belief and realized that he was betrayed by one of his trusted aide. Fu changed the battle plan and redeployed his troops to avoid annihilation by the Communist. Fu Zuoyi at that time realized that he can no longer defeat the Communist.

later in Dec 1948, Fu Zuoyi decided to get Rev Raymond J. De Jaegher to meet Admiral Badger to discuss the dire military situation and get some military equipment for his troops in urgent needs. Fu told DeJaegher that he simply cannot personally go or sent one of his generals to meet Badger. there was a Communist mole among his 20 generals. what if he handed over his command to the mole or he sent the mole to meet Badger? the consequences will be dreadful. Raymond J. De Jaegher without hesitation agreed to be Fu’s representative to meet up with Admiral Badger. the Reverend felt very sorry for his longtime friend who was in a state of despondent wretchedness. Jaegher met up with Badger to discuss the current situation but it was too late, the Communist troops had started to besiege the areas around Beiping-Tianjin.
( Raymond J. De Jaegher. Book: The enemy within. )

i found it interesting to read about Admiral Badger, General Barr and Rev Raymond J. De Jaegher giving high praise of General Fu Zuoyi as a military leader and character-wise. They were sympathetic of Fu Zuoyi and believed that he was forced by circumstances to surrender to the Communist. imo Fu Zouyi was a man who had committed about the most reprehensible act that a military man could be guilty of. General Barr said that Chairman Chiang Kai Shek let Fu Zuoyi made the decision on what he wanted to do. Fu chose to remain in Peking and supposedly fought to the very last but he didn’t. Fu’s troops had the option to leave Peking and retreat south of Yangtze before the Communist besiege but they didn’t. General Fu Zuoyi betrayed Chairman Chiang and the Kuomintang Government. he surrendered Beiping and 200-300K troops by choice, not forced by circumstances.

[ahxiang]

after the fall of Mukden ( Nov 1948 ), General Fu Zuoyi as the North China Zone Commander had to fight a winning battle to raise the army rapidly collapsing morale. Fu Zouyi devised a battle plan which his generals and Fu all agreed that it stood a good chance of victory. ( by then Fu’s troops had received 60% of the 16 million American military aid. italics mine )

the next day the plan was proceeding, Fu Zuoyi as usual listened to the Communist radio broadcast. the announcer talked about his battle plan, the generals involved in the plan meeting, the generals’ units, the troops’ strength and the battle plan in details. Fu was shocked beyond belief and realized that he was betrayed by one of his trusted aide. Fu changed the battle plan and redeployed his troops to avoid annihilation by the Communist. Fu Zuoyi at that time realized that he can no longer defeat the Communist.

later in Dec 1948, Fu Zuoyi decided to get Rev Raymond J. De Jaegher to meet Admiral Badger to discuss the dire military situation and get some military equipment for his troops in urgent needs. Fu told DeJaegher that he simply cannot personally go or sent one of his generals to meet Badger. there was a Communist mole among his 20 generals. what if he handed over his command to the mole or he sent the mole to meet Badger? the consequences will be dreadful. Raymond J. De Jaegher without hesitation agreed to be Fu’s representative to meet up with Admiral Badger. the Reverend felt very sorry for his longtime friend who was in a state of despondent wretchedness. Jaegher met up with Badger to discuss the current situation but it was too late, the Communist troops had started to besiege the areas around Beiping-Tianjin.
( Raymond J. De Jaegher. Book: The enemy within. )

i found it interesting to read about Admiral Badger, General Barr and Rev Raymond J. De Jaegher giving high praise of General Fu Zuoyi as a military leader and character-wise. They were sympathetic of Fu Zuoyi and believed that he was forced by circumstances to surrender to the Communist. imo Fu Zouyi was a man who had committed about the most reprehensible act that a military man could be guilty of. General Barr said that Chairman Chiang Kai Shek let Fu Zuoyi made the decision on what he wanted to do. Fu chose to remain in Peking and supposedly fought to the very last but he didn’t. Fu’s troops had the option to leave Peking and retreat south of Yangtze before the Communist besiege but they didn’t. General Fu Zuoyi betrayed Chairman Chiang and the Kuomintang Government. he surrendered Beiping and 200-300K troops by choice, not forced by circumstances.

David Barrett had a chapter on Suiyuan. From what this pro-communist dupe, we could tell that Fu Zuoyi's army was able to defend the Suiyuan-Peking Railway throughout the war. Every communist army attempt at breaking the railway tracks were beaten back. Raymond J. De Jaegher had of course covered extensively on the 70-80 trucks that moved over from Burma through the Yellow River Bend to deliver supplies to Huang Wei's army at Kalgan, where they figured out that the parking lot, a school playground, had innumerable communist dead buried. The 70-80 trucks were later used as a mechanized force to send into Manchuria to give relief to government troops at one time. Though, we could not give Fu Zuoyi exclusive credit. General Shi Jue and his 13th Corps - the ace of Tang Enbo's army throughout the resistance war, after splitting from the 52nd Corps after the Battle of Heishan, went west to Jehol and defended against the Outer Mongolia cavalry from 1946 to the late 1948.

I found that someone was talking about Fu Zuoyi


http://books.google....=gbs_navlinks_s
Open Secrets of American Foreign Policy (Google eBoek)
Gordon Tullock
0 Recensies
World Scientific, 30 jun. 2007

What you would find out is that Fu was trying to go around the American arms embargo to buy weapons from Sweden. But Leighton frustrated this attempt.

As to Fu Zuoyi's performance in the resistance war, I would say it was mainly to segregate the communists from Outer Mongolia. The communists in Yenan was able to buy over some general at the northeastern Yellow River bend to have free flow on two sides of the Yellow River, mainly for trafficking of opium and trade, but they was unable to go beyond Fu Zuoyi's station area to have contact with communists in Outer Mongolia. Limited flow of weapons during WWII could have occurred through the traffic nexus at the northwestern point, near Dingyuanyingzi, i.e., the Ningxia-Mongolia border. Why was Fu Zuoyi not actively fighting the Japanese? It could have something to do with the secret Russo-Japanese Treaty to halve China, with spheres of influence predefined by the Japanese and the Soviets to make the area of Shenxi a Chinese communist sphere that was to be free of harassment and bombing.

[Optimus]

David Barrett had a chapter on Suiyuan. From what this pro-communist dupe, we could tell that Fu Zuoyi's army was able to defend the Suiyuan-Peking Railway throughout the war. Every communist army attempt at breaking the railway tracks were beaten back. Raymond J. De Jaegher had of course covered extensively on the 70-80 trucks that moved over from Burma through the Yellow River Bend to deliver supplies to Huang Wei's army at Kalgan, where they figured out that the parking lot, a school playground, had innumerable communist dead buried. The 70-80 trucks were later used as a mechanized force to send into Manchuria to give relief to government troops at one time. Though, we could not give Fu Zuoyi exclusive credit. General Shi Jue and his 13th Corps - the ace of Tang Enbo's army throughout the resistance war, after splitting from the 52nd Corps after the Battle of Heishan, went west to Jehol and defended against the Outer Mongolia cavalry from 1946 to the late 1948.

in your opinion, General Fu Zuoyi was a traitor to the Nationalist cause or forced by desperate circumstances to surrender to the Communist?

[ahxiang]

in your opinion, General Fu Zuoyi was a traitor to the Nationalist cause or forced by desperate circumstances to surrender to the Communist?

Fu Zuoyi was recorded to have regretted a lot the second day he agreed to being pacified by the communists. This scheme would have backfired should the communist agents around Fu Zuoyi had submitted the communist declaration, in which Mao had used the ancient style rebuke-style sentences to accuse Fu Zuoyi of crimes. Fu was not given the article from Mao.

One thing about Fu was that there was an important communist mole called Zhou beifeng who stayed with Fu since the resistance war time period. This guy called Zhou was an Europe-returnee on the same par as Yang Xiufeng et al.

[Optimus]

ahxiang.

in ( military situation in the far east united states congress 1951 ). General Hurley revealed that the Japanese and Chinese Communist knew about Yalta secret agreement. Hurley actually learnt about it from the Chinese Communist thus he returned to Washington in March 1945 to verify this matter with the department of state and President Roosevelt. i thought this was a most surprising revelation but the Senators didn't make Hurley elaborate more on it.

[ahxiang]

ahxiang.

in ( military situation in the far east united states congress 1951 ). General Hurley revealed that the Japanese and Chinese Communist knew about Yalta secret agreement. Hurley actually learnt about it from the Chinese Communist thus he returned to Washington in March 1945 to verify this matter with the department of state and President Roosevelt. i thought this was a most surprising revelation but the Senators didn't make Hurley elaborate more on it.

I had corrected at http://www.chinahist...ers-after-1949/ that it was Doak Barnett who wrote on the defense of the Suiyuan-Peiping Railway.

A few years back, I read extensively on the Dixie Mission. My finding was that Hurley was initially naive about former ambassador Gauss and his pro-communist cohorts, i.e., the so-called "political advisers" installed by Stilwell. At one time, Hurley and Wedemeyer were not talking for a day or longer. It was during the immediate showdown between Chiang and Stilwell that Hurley realized something was wrong with the "political" stance of Amercans in Chungking and Burma. But Hurley was not knowing that they were Soviet spies. It would be during the trip to Yenan that Hurley figured out that the Dixie folks and the American embassy staff were actively colluding with Mao and the communists, including an offer to relay a credit request with Americans from the communists to use to buy weapons from puppets as well as to arrange a visit of Mao to the United States. Vladimirov, in Yenan, was treating Mao as someone opportune, attempting to get benefits from both the Soviet side and American side. Vladimirov, of course, did not know that a full house of Soviet agents had already controlled the United States government. Mao, I guess, knew some workings about the US government. Because Mao had to know that their communist cells, i.e., the 1925 Qinghua University agents, had infiltrated into the US twenty years ago, and worked with Lattimore, the Institute of Pacific relations, the Soviet agents in the US treasury depatrtment etc, to sabotage the Republic of China. Why so? Because Ji Chaoding, one of the 1925 class, had shuttled between the U.S. and China numerous times, conversing with Zhou Enlai in Chungking, and managing to fetch a younger brother, Ji Chaozhu, to go to US for studies. So to say, the Chinese communists knew well that they controlled the United States' China policies through those agents. As far as Yalta concerned, I doubt Hurley was aware of it. Hurley went into rage mainly because of anger over the embassy staff -as he thought his embassy staff was thwarting his efforts to broker a KMT-CCP coalition government. Hurley fired the embassy gang. When he returned to US, he found those pro-communist saboteurs were rehired by the State Department to become Hurley's superiors. Hurley, in an outrage, resigned in late 1945. (I would have hoped Hurley to stay on; otherwise, Marshall would not so easily come to China.)

I replied to your question on the conspiracy regarding the Marco Polo Bridge Incident at http://www.chinahist...ers-after-1949/ After so many years, I did not bother to refine the piece. I was just overwhelmed by the stuff on hand, and could not get to the 1945-1950 civil wars time period - though it would be possibly the most fascinating part of my writing on the Republican China. I updated the pdf file at http://republicanchi...dgeIncident.pdf -Note I spent years transliterating the craaps relating to the names of the Japanese, Russian and Korean. I believe only a real serious writing with a full set of correctly-spelled names could convince people what the real history is.

[Optimus]

So to say, the Chinese communists knew well that they controlled the United States' China policies through those agents. As far as Yalta concerned, I doubt Hurley was aware of it. Hurley went into rage mainly because of anger over the embassy staff -as he thought his embassy staff was thwarting his efforts to broker a KMT-CCP coalition government. Hurley fired the embassy gang. When he returned to US, he found those pro-communist saboteurs were rehired by the State Department to become Hurley's superiors. Hurley, in an outrage, resigned in late 1945. (I would have hoped Hurley to stay on; otherwise, Marshall would not so easily come to China.)

I replied to your question on the conspiracy regarding the Marco Polo Bridge Incident at http://www.chinahist...ers-after-1949/ After so many years, I did not bother to refine the piece. I was just overwhelmed by the stuff on hand, and could not get to the 1945-1950 civil wars time period - though it would be possibly the most fascinating part of my writing on the Republican China. I updated the pdf file at http://republicanchi...dgeIncident.pdf -Note I spent years transliterating the craaps relating to the names of the Japanese, Russian and Korean. I believe only a real serious writing with a full set of correctly-spelled names could convince people what the real history is.

Hurley said that Stilwell was already pro-Chinese Communist in the 1930s. Stilwell's beliefs greatly shaped his good friend Marshall's mindset whom believed that Chiang and the Kuomintang were responsible for all the ills of China.

will read your updated pdf soon. your past works on the Chinese Communist-Russian sabotage and espionage operations are quite beyond my understanding. I need to read up more on that part of Chinese history. Imai Takeo's memoir is a good read.