| Chiang Wei-kuo (蔣緯國) | |
|---|---|
Chiang Wei-kuo as an officer candidate in the Wehrmacht. The shoulder boards indicate the rank of Fahnenjunker. |
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| Born | October 6, 1916 Tokyo, Japan |
| Died | September 22, 1997 (aged 80) Taipei, Republic of China |
| Place of burial | Wuzhi Mountain Military Cemetery |
| Allegiance | Republic of China Nazi Germany |
| Years of service | (Wehrmacht) 1936-1939 (ROC) 1936, 1939-1997 |
| Rank | (Wehrmacht) Lieutenant (ROC) General |
| Unit | (ROC) First Armored Regiment |
| Commands held | (ROC) Commander-in-Chief of Armored Forces |
| Battles/wars | (Wehrmacht) Anschluss (ROC) Second Sino-Japanese War, Chinese Civil War |
| Awards | (Wehrmacht) Gebirgsjäger Edelweiss sleeve insignia (ROC) Order of Blue Sky and White Sun |
Chiang Wei-kuo (simplified Chinese: 蒋纬国; traditional Chinese: 蔣緯國; pinyin: Jiǎng Wěiguó, or Wego Chiang; October 6, 1916 – September 22, 1997) was an adopted son of President Chiang Kai-shek, adoptive brother of President Chiang Ching-kuo, and an important figure in the Kuomintang (KMT). His courtesy names were Jianhao (建鎬) and Niantang (念堂).
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As one of two sons of Chiang Kai-shek, Chiang Wei-kuo's name has a particular meaning as intended by his father. "Wei" literally means "parallel (of latitude)" while "kuo" means "nation"; in his brother's name, "Ching" literally means "longitude". The names are inspired by the references in Chinese classics such as the Guoyu, in which "to draw the longitudes and latitudes of the world" is used as a metaphor for a person with great abilities, especially in managing a country.
Born in Tokyo when Chiang Kai-shek and the KMT were exiled to Japan by the Beiyang Government, Chiang Wei-kuo has long been speculated to be an offspring of Tai Chi-tao and a Japanese woman, Shigematsu Kaneko (重松金子).[1][2] Chiang Wei-kuo previously discredited any such claims and insisted he was a legitimate son of Chiang Kai-shek until his later years (1988), when he admitted that he was adopted.[3]
According to popular gossip, Tai believed knowledge of his Japanese tryst would destroy his marriage and his career, so he entrusted Wei-kuo to Chiang Kai-shek, after the Japanese Yamada Juntaro (山田純太郎) brought the infant to Shanghai.[1] Yao Yecheng (姚冶誠), Chiang's wife at the time, raised Wei-kuo as her own. The boy called Tai his "Dear Uncle" (親伯).
Chiang moved to the Chiang ancestral home in Xikou Town of Fenghua in 1910. Wei-kuo later studied Economics at Soochow University.
With his sibling Chiang Ching-kuo being held as a virtual political hostage in the Soviet Union by Joseph Stalin having prior been a student studying in Moscow, Chiang sent Wei-kuo to Germany for a military education at the Munich Military Academy (Kriegshochschule). Here, he would learn the most up to date German military tactical doctrines, organization, and use of weaponry on the modern battlefield such as the German-inspired theory of the Maschinengewehr (Medium machine gun, at this time, the MG-34) led squad, incorporation of Air and Armored branches into infantry attack, etc. After completing this training, Wei-kuo completed specialized Alpine warfare training, thus earning him the coveted Gebirgsjäger (The elite Wehrmacht Mountain Troop) Edelweiss sleeve insignia. This was not an easy accomplishment, as part of the training selection included carrying 30 kilos of ruck sack through the Bavarian Alps. Wei-kuo was promoted to Unteroffizier (also known as Fahnenjunker, or Officer Candidate) and was evidently a fine marksman, as his pictures depict him wearing the Schützenschnur lanyard.
Wei-kuo commanded a Panzer unit during the 1938 Austrian Anschluss as a sergeant officer-candidate,[4] leading a tank into that country; subsequently, he was promoted to Lieutenant of a Panzer unit awaiting to be sent into Poland. Before he was given the mobilization order, he was recalled to China.
Upon being recalled from Germany, Chiang Wei-kuo formally took part in the National Revolutionary Army. There, Wei-kuo became a Major at 28, a Lieutenant Colonel at 29, a Colonel at 32, and later, a Major General. Chiang Wei-kuo was stationed at a garrison in Xi'an in 1941.
During the Chinese Civil War, Chiang Wei-kuo employed tactics he had learned whilst studying in the German Wehrmacht. He was in charge of a M4 Sherman tank battalion during the Huaihai Campaign against Mao Zedong's troops, scoring some early victories.[5] Meanwhile, in 1949 he moved his tank regiment to Taiwan after the nationalist defeat in Chinese Civil War.
Chiang Wei-kuo continued to hold senior positions in the Republic of China Armed Forces following the ROC retreat to Taiwan. Following the Hukou Incident in 1964, Chiang Wei-kuo was punished as he was connected to Chao Chih-hwa, a subordinate of Wei-kuo who attempted a Coup d'état, and never held any real authority in the military again.[6][7][8]
From 1964 onwards, Chiang Wei-kuo made preparations in establishing a school dedicated in teaching warfare strategy; such a school was established in 1969. In 1975, Chiang Wei-kuo was further promoted to the position of general, and served as president of the Armed Forces University. In 1980, Chiang served as joint logistics commander in chief; then in 1986, he retired from the army, and became National Security Council Secretary-General.
In 1993, Chiang Wei-kuo was employed as the advisor of the president of the Republic of China.
After Chiang Ching-kuo's death, Chiang was a political rival of native Taiwanese Lee Teng-hui, and he strongly opposed Lee's Taiwan localization movement. Chiang ran as vice-president with Taiwan Governor Lin Yang-kang in the 1990 ROC indirect presidential election. Lee ran as the KMT presidential candidate and defeated the Lin-Chiang ticket.[9][10][11][12]
In 1991, Chiang's housemaid, Li Hung-mei (李洪美, or 李嫂) was found dead in Chiang's estate in the Taipei City. The following police investigation discovered a stockpile of sixty guns on Chiang's estate. Chiang himself admitted the possibility of a link between the guns and his maid's death, which was later ruled a suicide by the police.[13] The incident permanently tarnished Chiang Wei-kuo's name, at a time when the Chiang family was increasingly unpopular on Taiwan and even within the Nationalist Party. A new generation of Nationalists no longer had the will or desire to cover the decades of corruption and scandal that the Chiang family had surrounded itself ever since Chiang Kai-shek rose to power in the 1930s.
In 1944, he married Shih Chin-i (石靜宜), the daughter of Shih Feng-hsiang (石鳳翔), a textile tycoon from North West China. Shih died in 1953 during child birth. Wei-kuo later established the Jinsin Elementary School (靜心小學) in Taipei to commemorate his late wife.
In 1957, Chiang re-married, to Chiu Ju-hsüeh (丘如雪), also known as Chiu Ai-lun (邱愛倫), a daughter of Chinese and German parents. Chiu gave birth to Chiang's only son, Chiang Hsiao-kang, (蔣孝剛) in 1962. Chiang Hsiao-kang is the youngest of the Hsiao generation of the Chiang family.
Chiang Wei-kuo was also quite active in civilian society, where he was the founder of the Chinese Institute of Strategy and Sino-German Cultural and Economic Association, as well as the Chairman of the Republic of China Football Association. He was the first chairman of Jingxin Primary School (靜心小學), and served as the president of the United States Students Association of China.
In the early 1990s, Chiang Wei-kuo established an 11-person unofficial Spirit Relocation Committee (奉安移靈小組) to petition the Communist government to allow his father and brother to be interred in mainland China (neither had been interred after their deaths in Taiwan, but rather placed in converted mausoleums awaiting a future burial on the mainland).[13] His request was largely ignored by both the Nationalist and Communist governments, and he was persuaded to abandon the petition by his stepmother and his father's widow, Soong May-ling in November 1996.
In 1994, a hospital was supposed to be named after him (蔣緯國醫療中心) in Sanchih, Taipei County (now New Taipei City), after an unnamed politician donated to Ruentex Financial Group (潤泰企業集團), whose founder was from Sanchih. Politicians questioned the motivation.[13]
In 1996, the Chiang home on military land was finally demolished by the order of the Taipei municipal government under Chen Shui-bian. The estate had been constructed in 1971. After Chiang moved elsewhere in 1981, he deeded it to his son. The justification was that son was not in military service and thus was not entitled to live there.[14]
Chiang Wei-kuo died at the age of 80 from kidney failure. He had been experiencing falling blood pressure complicated by diabetes after a 10-month stay at Veteran's General Hospital, Taipei. He wished to be buried in Suzhou in mainland China, but was instead buried at Wuchih Mountain Military Cemetery.
His positions in the Republic of China government included: