The Earth Transformed: An Untold History

by Peter Frankopan

With the fault lines of the Cold War already taking shape, a series of decisions were now made in Washington that had momentous significance. Unlike western Europe, which benefited from a massive injection of funds to help it rebuild, little or nothing was set aside to support China. Moreover, George Marshall, the architect of the regeneration of post-war Europe, was sent to China by President Truman with instructions not to back the government of Chiang Kai-shek, but to broker an agreement with Mao and the communists, persuaded by Stalin’s apparent lack of interest in China, and by the soothing promises that ‘Chinese democracy’ under Mao would follow ‘the American path’. Mao and his followers had little to lose and much to gain by making such commitments – especially when Washington imposed an arms embargo, which tied the hands of Chiang while those of his rivals were being untied and empowered with a massive injection of rifles, machine guns, aircraft and artillery from Moscow.