Informed by Marshall, Stilwell summed up the decision as based on “total misapprehension of the character, intentions, authority and ability of Chiang Kai-shek.” Privately he thought Madame had “put it over FDR like a tent.” Chiang’s Government was “a one-man joke. The KMT is his tool. Madame is his front. The silly U.S. propaganda is his lever. We are his suckers.”
