Was wondering if anyone knows who - originally - called Chiang Kai-shek ‘Cash My Check’? (or who was credited with having coined it?) Stilwell? Truman? Janis Joplin? Any idea? Any sources? Any spare change?
Thank you,
Edward
I thought Stilwell called him ‘Peanut’.
‘Cash my Check’ sounds like something termed from Capitol Hill…, or perhaps The Department of State.
state.gov/secretary/former/40821.htm
my chiang biography mentions it appearing about late 1943, there’s an attribution to barbara tuchman’s book, pg 413, perhaps more there.
Stilwell did call him “Peanut,” although he later began to call him “the rattlensnake.”
What bio do you have? I’ve got Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek - And the China He Lost by Jonathan Fenby.
My guess is that ‘Cash My Check’ was something that just sort of sprang up anonymously and was latched onto after it became clear that the US had spent billions on a client state that had little intention of seeing that funds were spent “properly.” I thought that it was Truman who said it, but although he did call the Chiang clique “grafters and crooks,” I can’t find any ‘Cash My Check’ label coming from him directly.
Thanks for the feedback.
Ed
Stilwell referred to CKS as both Peanut and Cash My Check. It’s detailed in Stilwell’s biography by Barbara Tuchman (as mentioned by Tempo Gain).
[quote=“Ed Lakewood”]
What bio do you have? I’ve got Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek - And the China He Lost by Jonathan Fenby.
Ed[/quote]
me too, it’s mentioned on very bottom of page 412. a mention is made of the regime’s “nasty habit of financial blackmail” that led to the name.
BTW – How is the Fenby book? I checked several bookstores in my area but can’t seem to find it. I may eventually go with Amazon, but I wanted to have a better look before I bought it.
Hope I’m not jacking the thread too badly
very good. balanced, yet unsparing. his years in taiwan are only covered by a page or two though. i got my copy at the tienmu caves.
Chiang wasn’t the only one to get an insulting nickname. I remember seeing a document by Patrick J. Hurley, who served as the U.S. ambassador to China in 1944-45, in which Zhou Enlai was referred to as “Joe in Lie.” But that nickname doesn’t seem to have caught on.
Thanks Tempo,
How you described the book is - I would say - exactly right. I think it’s an excellent biograghy. You get to see, along with a great deal else, Chiang the person; he’s not portrayed as a monster or some carbboard cutout dictator, but as an extremely flawed character with a grand design that simply failed.
Here’s another question:
I remember reading in the Soong Dynasty (although, it’s been a while) that Chiang or Chiang’s men used to sell weapons to the Japanese; that the KMT would set up a sort of market, sell eqipment and what have you, and then retreat. In the Fenby book, I don’t think it mentions that. It talks about profiteering (along with dozens of examples of corruption) and how the KMT was reluctant to use or even deploy equipment at times, but there’s no mention of - for example - saying to the Japanese, 'OK, we just got these three new tanks. You wanna buy ‘em?’
It wouldn’t seem to make sense to do that. Certainly, they would have wanted the goods to battle the communists. I realize the lines of communication to the enemy were never down and that Chiang tried unsuccessfully to broker deals with Tokyo, but selling materiel - that doesn’t seem right.
Anyone know anything about that?
Ed
I need to get the Tuchman biography of Stilwell. I’m ambling thru her ‘Stilwell and the American Experience in China 1911-45’ and it is an excellent book.
The ‘Generalissimo Chiang Kai-Shek - And the China He Lost’ by Jonathan Fenby also sounds like another great resource.
I never quite understood why my Father held Chiang in such low esteem until I began actually reading up on him. IMO, nothing more than a freebooter and an opportunist extraordinaire.
[quote=“TainanCowboy”]I need to get the Tuchman biography of Stilwell. I’m ambling thru her ‘Stilwell and the American Experience in China 1911-45’ and it is an excellent book.
[/quote]
one and the same no? a great book as was everything else of hers i read. she is really partial to stilwell though.
one and the same no? a great book as was everything else of hers I read. she is really partial to stillwell though.[/quote]TG -
Is it?
The posts on this thread led me to think this is a different book.
Is this not the case? Is there a different Tuchman biography of Stillwell? I’m really not clear on this now.
As to her being ‘partial’ to Stillwell…I don’t understand the comment. She is writing about him and clearly shows his strength of character and faults on an equal basis. He comes across as a hard-corp old school Soldier who cusses, is frequently rude to those who rank above him, has no time for slackers and basically p*sses off those who don’t agree with him. I like the sound of him…
She is writing in a time before the sickening censor of political correctness inserted its anal probe into the literary scene - perhaps Stillwell would get a different write by one of todays academic scribes…maybe.
He was quite a ‘one-off’ even in his day and age.
Only the one Stillwell book by Tuchman. Another good book by her is The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam.
HG
HGC -
“Only the one Stillwell book by Tuchman.”
Thanks for clearing that up. Much appreciated.
[quote=“TainanCowboy”]
As to her being ‘partial’ to Stillwell…I don’t understand the comment. She is writing about him and clearly shows his strength of character and faults on an equal basis. He comes across as a hard-corp old school Soldier who cusses, is frequently rude to those who rank above him, has no time for slackers and basically p*sses off those who don’t agree with him. I like the sound of him…
She is writing in a time before the sickening censor of political correctness inserted its anal probe into the literary scene - perhaps Stillwell would get a different write by one of todays academic scribes…maybe.
He was quite a ‘one-off’ even in his day and age.[/quote]
I like the sound of him too, and he no doubt was in an impossible position, but he turned out to be a horrible diplomat, and was pretty clearly the wrong guy for the job. as i remember this doesn’t come across so clearly in the book.
TG -
Thanks.
“Horrible diplomat”…:roflmao:…yes…he was a ‘horrible diplomat.’
I get the impression he would be satisfied with that observation…
I’m sure he would have been lol. but the job called for more of a diplomat. He wanted to be in combat first and foremost. It was obviously driving him nuts not to be with ww2 going on around him. It’s a great tragedy that he wound up in that job and not where his talents and nature would have normally dictated he would be.
I think sometimes undiplomatic diplomats are the best kind (Yitzhak Rabin as Ambassador to the US etc). Rabin, despite being Labor, had no patience for idiots and often offended many Democratic party big wigs.
The ROC officials hated Stillwell during WW2 because he could understand their language and call them out on their bullshit. I think his straightforward and blunt personality was exactly what was needed during the war.
Perhaps, if they has listend to his advice more and restructured the army as he requested, took more of an aggressive posture when it came to fighting, and dealt with corruption and inaction head on, they may have won the civil war.
Practically anyone could have played hardball with them, even if it were with a translator’s help. Really anyone in that position would have understood the basic dynamic, that Chiang was dependent on our support, and wouldn’t have allowed themselves to be pushed around. It didn’t take much to put a finger on the underlying problems of the regime either. Actually the reason Stilwell got the job was solely because he was of high enough rank, knew the country and the language. besides that, he wasn’t suited to it. He managed to alienate Chiang spectacularly, and in the end, he failed pretty miserably to accomplish anything. Perhaps no one could have done better but that’s really about the best you can say.