Chiang Wei-kuo

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Chiang Wei-kuo in the Wehrmacht uniform of a flag junker with rifle cord

Chiang Wei-kuo ( Chinese  蔣緯國  /  蒋纬国 , Pinyin Jiang Weiguo ; * October 6, 1916 ; † September 22, 1997 ), in a different order and spelling Wego Chiang , was an adopted son of National-Chinese President Chiang Kai-shek and adoptive brother of later president Chiang Ching-kuo . He was a general in the Army of the Republic of China (Taiwan) and an important figure in the Kuomintang . His biological father was Dai Jitao .

Life

Birth and study

Chiang Wei-kuo was born in Tokyo on October 6, 1916, when Chiang Kai-shek and the Army of the Republic of China were exiled to Japan by the Beiyang government . It has long been speculated that he was the illegitimate child of Dai Jitao and a Japanese woman named Shigematsu Kaneko.

Chiang Wei-kuo has previously denied such allegations, insisting that he was a biological son of Chiang Kai-shek. It was only in the last few years of his life (1988) that he admitted that he had been adopted. In 1910 he moved to the old family residence in Fenghua and studied economics at Soochow University .

Military training in Germany and the USA

Chiang Wei-kuo (left) in mountain troop uniform with a German officer (probably 1939)

Chiang Wei-kuo received his military training in Germany in the 1930s. He graduated from the War Academy in Munich and was then trained as a mountain hunter in the 98 Mountain Infantry Regiment of the 1st Mountain Division . Here he also completed the specialized Alpine war training and was awarded the Edelweiss badge.

Wei-kuo was promoted to flag junior and acquired the rifle line . During the annexation of Austria he was a tank commander and almost took part in the attack on Poland as an observer . On the way to the Polish border he traveled through Berlin to present his report to the Chinese embassy . There he received a new assignment that he should travel to the United States to expand his military training and skills.

Chiang Wei-kuo visited the United States as a guest of the US Army . Chiang Wei-kuo first enrolled at the United States Army Air Corps Academy at Maxwell-Gunter Air Force Base in Alabama . When the American high command learned that he already had experience as a tank commander, he was transferred to the tank troops at Fort Knox . He stopped there u. a. Lectures on the efficiency of the German army and military tactics.

Second Sino-Japanese War

Chiang Wei-kuo returned to Asia in late 1940 and became an officer in the National Revolutionary Army during the Second Sino-Japanese War . He set up an armored battalion with some officers. He also spent some time in India studying the tanks of the British Army. At 32, Chiang Wei-kuo was promoted to colonel and commanded a tank battalion . He was later promoted to major general in Taiwan . After defeating the Japanese in 1945, he participated in the Chinese civil war on the side of Chiang Kai-shek.

Chinese civil war

During the Chinese Civil War , Chiang Wei-kuo worked out some tactics that he had learned while studying in the German Wehrmacht and the US Army. He was responsible for the formation and training of an M4 Sherman tank battalion during the Huaihai campaign against Mao Zedong's troops and achieved a number of victories with it.

Taiwan

Chiang Wei-kuo in a general uniform of the Taiwanese army

In the course of the conquest of mainland China by the People's Liberation Army under Mao Zedong , the national conservative government of the Republic of China under its President Chiang Kai-shek withdrew to Taiwan. When that conflict ended in defeat for Chiang Kai-shek in 1949, Chiang Wei-kuo was among the soldiers who followed him to Taiwan.

After the end of the civil war, he held various high positions in the Republic of China (Taiwan) .

In 1969 he founded a military academy devoted to teaching war strategy . In 1975, Chiang Wei-kuo was promoted to general and was named president of his established military academy. In 1980, Chiang served as the logistics commander. In 1986 he retired from active military service and became Secretary General of the National Security Council.

Use in politics

In 1993, Chiang Wei-kuo was appointed advisor to the President of the Republic of China. After Chiang Ching-kuo's death , Chiang was a political competitor to local Taiwanese Lee Teng-hui . Wei-Kuo opposed the Taiwan localization movement aimed at by President Lee and the associated detachment from mainland China.

On September 22, 1997, Chiang Wei-kuo died of kidney failure at the age of 80 . He wanted to be buried in Suzhou, Jiangsu, on the mainland, but was instead interred in the Wuchih Mountain Military Cemetery in Xizhi .

German-Taiwanese military cooperation

Chiang Wei-kuo also worked hard to expand the Taiwanese army and train its officers abroad.

In order to reduce the military dependence on Washington, Chiang Kai-shek wanted to recruit military advisers from other countries. In this way, Chiang Wei-kuo was able to build on his contacts with former officers of the Wehrmacht and the German Bundeswehr. In addition, Chiang Kai-shek had a German advisory group before World War II. These were the two military advisers Bodo von Stein and Erich Stölzner, who had not obeyed the return order issued from Berlin in 1938, had stayed in China and had been evacuated to Taiwan in 1949 with the defeated Koumintang troops and remained in Chinese service.

After the authorized representative of BND President Reinhard Gehlen , Wolfgang Langkau, visited Taipei in 1961 , Chiang Wei-kuo planned, in cooperation with the BND, to form an advisory group of highly decorated and experienced former German officers. Major General a. D. Oskar Munzel became chief advisor. Munzel had served in the Reichswehr , in the Wehrmacht and in the German Armed Forces and was involved in building up the German armored forces as an employee of Heinz Guderian.He was also responsible for training the armored forces as commander of the armored forces school in Munster . Between 1964 and 1972, a total of 25 high-ranking officers from Taiwan were trained in the command academy of the German Armed Forces .

Personal

In 1944 Wei-kuo married Shih Chin-i (石靜宜), the daughter of Shih Feng-hsiang (石鳳翔), a textile tycoon from northwest China. Shih died in 1953 during complications of childbirth. Wei-kuo later founded Chingshin Elementary School (靜心 小學) in Taipei to commemorate his late wife.

In 1957 he married Chiu Ru-hsüeh (丘 如雪), also known as Chiu Ai-lun (邱愛倫), a daughter of Chinese and German parents. The only son, Chiang Hsiao-Kang, (蔣孝剛) was born in 1962. Chiang Hsiao-Kang is the youngest of the Hsiao generation of the Chiang family.

Chiang Wei-kuo was the founder of the Chinese Institute for Strategy and Sino-German Cultural and Business Association, as well as the chairman of the Football Association of the Republic of China. He was the first chairman of Chingshin Primary School (靜心 小學) and served as president of the United States Students Association.

Chiang Wei-kuo was a member of the Masonic League .

Works

  • Grand Strategy Summary 《大 戰略 概 說》
  • A Summary of National Strategy 《國家 戰略 概 說》
  • The strategic value of Taiwan in the world 《臺灣 在世 局 中 的 戰略 價值》 (1977)
  • The Middle Way and Life 《中道 與 人生》 (1979)
  • Soft military offensive 《柔性 攻勢》
  • The basic principles of the military system 《軍 制 基本 原理》 (1974)
  • The Z that creates this age 《創造 這個 時代 的 Z》

Literature and Sources

  • Wang Shichun (汪士淳), (1996). Traveling alone for a thousand mountains: The Life of Chiang Wei-kuo (千山 獨行 蔣緯國 的 人生 之 旅), Tianxia Publishing, Taiwan. ISBN 957-621-338-X
  • Zhou Shao (周 劭). The trifles of Chiang Wei-kuo's youth (青年 蔣緯國 瑣事), within the volume "Huanghun Xiaopin" (黃昏 小品), Shanghai Guji Publishing House (上海 古籍 出版社), Shanghai, 1995. ISBN 7-5325-1235-5
  • KWAN Kwok Huen (關 國 煊). Biography of Chiang Wei-kuo (蔣緯國 小 傳). Biography Literature (傳記 文學), 78 , 4.
  • William C. Kirby: Germany and Republican China. Stanford University Press, Stanford CA 1984, ISBN 0-8047-1209-3 .
  • Frederick F. Liu: A Military History of Modern China. 1924-1949. Princeton University Press, Princeton NJ 1956.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ 2009 年 08 月 02 日, 人民網, 蔣介石 、 宋美齡 的 感情 危機 與 蔣緯國 的 身世 之 謎 , 新華網 (港澳臺)
  2. ↑ Sep 23, 1997, Last son of Chiang Kai-shek dies , China Informed
  3. ↑ Laura Tyson Li (2007). Madame Chiang Kai-Shek: China's Eternal First Lady (reprint, illustrated ed.). Grove Press. p. 148. ISBN 0-8021-4322-9 . Retrieved May 21, 2011.
  4. ↑ Jay Taylor: The Generalissimo: Chiang Kai-shek and the Struggle for Modern China  ; published by the University of Chicago; Press No. 63; (January 2010)
  5. ↑ Dr. Gary J. Bjorge, (2004). Moving the Enemy: Operational Art in the Chinese PLA's Huai Hai Campaign ( Memento of the original from March 26, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . Leavenworth Paper, No.22. Combat Studies Institute Press, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / cgsc.leavenworth.army.mil
  6. ↑ Chern Chen: German military advisers in Taiwan The German-National-Chinese Relations in the Cold War published in the quarterly books for contemporary history of the Institute for Contemporary History ; Issue 3 (Volume 51; 2003)
  7. ↑ Famous Freemasons ; on the LaPorte York Rite homepage www.laporteyorkrite.com/( accessed February 27, 2017)
  8. ↑ Hannah Pakula: The Last Empress: Madame Chiang Kai-Shek and the Birth of Modern China ; published by W&N Verlag., ISBN 978-0-7538-2802-1 (November 11, 2010)
  9. ↑ Famous Freemasons ; on the homepage of Szechwan Lodge No. 4 (accessed on May 16, 2020)

See also

Web links

Commons : Chiang Wei-kuo  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files


personal data
SURNAME Chiang Wei-kuo
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Taiwanese son of National-Chinese President Chiang Kai-shek and adoptive brother of later President Chiang Ching-kuo
DATE OF BIRTH October 6, 1916
DATE OF DEATH September 22, 1997