milton miles

the more i think about him the more i think it's sad. for all of his intelligence work, none of which went into how much sweat he put into his work. there is no recognition anywhere to be found anywhere, except his own book and books written by soldiers working under him.

but the more i contemplate about it, the more important i value his work. i can't really dig into his story about the weather intelligence and the pacific warfare in WWII. but i could just imagine how important his intelligent report really was for the fourteenth Air Troops. only with the service he provided, could Clair Chennault's air force be as effective as they were on the south china sea. and for fourteenth air troop to be effective at bombing enemy supply line, the intelligence in the front would be crucial as well. all this intelligence was milton miles' contribution. and yet, nobody mentioned about it anymore. For the USA people, there was only corruption, imcompetence, and revoltion. It's incredibly sad that there was man, who successeed in working with Chinese with an attitude that ALL Chinese should remember, celebrate, and cherish. And yet, none of them will be remembered.

I read three USA military memoirs in China during WWII. One was Clair Chennault, one i only finished half way was Joseph Stilwell, the last one was Milton Miles. What was so striking from reading Milton Miles memoir was the attitude he had towards Chinese.

Claire Chennault did not know Chinese before 1927. He brought what the Chinese most needed at the time. Chinese government treated him well, and he used his knowledge and ability to fight with Chinese. His attitude towards Chinese was that this was a people that i could help. they respected my work and knowledge. i will in term fight with them with all i got. so he fought hard with the chinese.
Joseph Stilwell on the other hand, was quite familiar with Chinese custom, language, and politics. many people who knew china like Joseph Stilwell was weary of the Chinese politics. The best among them kept a cold and calculated mind. The worst of them looked hard to see where he could profit. Joseph Stilwell was among the best of them, who were unsatisfied with current government. They laughed at the the government's every effort, they pitied that Chinese people was led by this pooly trained people. Joseph Stilwell was one of those with the thoughts.

Milton Miles, an USA navy served in China just like Joseph Stilwell was vastly different in attitude towards Chinese. Milton Miles could speak a few dialect, he traveled through mainland China with his family well into Burma once. He was assigned by Admiral King, then USA Pacific Navy Commander, to China to prepare for USA Navy landing in 3-4 years. He then end up working with Dai Li(戴笠). They signed a treaty to form an organization called Sino American Cooperative Organization. Trying to work with Chinese, Milton Miles decided that he wanted his staffs and soldiers to have no previous knowledge of China at all. His reason for this was if you want to work with Chinese, you have to have no prejudice against them. He thought many foreigners including USA people, who knew China too well, will ruined the cooperative mood he tried to built between Chinese field soldiers and guerrilla. USA OSS, CIA's daddy, thought it was an absurd comment. Many Old chinese hands, who knew chinese affair qutie well, was ridiculed by the comment as well. Milton's attitude towards working with Chinese was that he was a foreigner, who had the same goal as Chinese people. He viewed Chinese as in a turmoil time in desperate need for help. He wanted to fight Japanese, but he also very much in need of chinese cooperation for him to gather weather report for the pacific Navy operation. He strifed very hard to find a way to truly find a way to work with Chinese. In the end, He was the only two USA people succeeded doing just that.

He tried hard to describe why other people failed in getting cooperation out of Chinese in his memoir, a different kind of war. The genuine respect for chinese was shown between lines and words. He trained Chinese guerrilla with fresh USA soldiers, who knew little about China. Those young USA soldiers dined the same thing Chinese soldiers dined. They lived with Chinese on the battlefield, when most of foreigners were not allowed to go to the frontline. Milton Miles worked with Dai Li, who did not easily trust anyone. But Dai Li trusted Milton Miles and his men. That's a shocking news to many other foriegners.