Americans rightly regard General Joseph W. Stilwell as a hero. Few know that he was a total failure with respect to his primary mission which was to be the Commander of American Forces in the China Burma India theater (CBI) and Chief of Staff to Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek! That story has not been told.
Stilwell became an iconic hero in the annals of World War II. His famous "walk out from Burma," his salty language, and his later retaking of Burma in 1944 generated a good deal of interest at a time when the American public was starving for heroes. The official history of World War II, the 79 volumes of the "Green Book" series devoted three volumes to the CBI where Stilwell served in World War II and praise him highly for his efforts in Burma and China. Popular historian Barbara Tuchman in her best seller Stillwell and the American Experience in China writes glowingly of his exploits, and in turn disparagingly of his successor, General Albert C. Wedemeyer. She found Wedemeyer's use of an exclamation mark in his own 1958 memoir, Wedemeyer Reports! to be pompous and, in a foot stamping put down said: "Not given, as he climbed, to reticence about his virtues, he subsequently vindicated his career in a book
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