Lend Lease to China, Russia, and Britain should be well known. It’s not a secret that FDR was shipping gold and supplies to Russia.

This all stopped when Japan surrendered.

Chiang didn’t see it ( the termination, the atomic bomb, coming )

For his domestic purposes, he proceeded to continue to spend large — but without the economic base to support his spending.

So, he used the old, old, old, Chinese technique. He hyper-printed his currency. ( China not only invented paper, she invented paper money and hype-inflation, too. )

Chiang was CUT OFF because he was so corrupt and thus so offended EVERY Western military officer — to include George Marshall — as Secretary of State that they all bitterly complained that the boy was no serious leader of men.

Needless to say, Chiang was above taking ANY Western military advice.

Instead, he pre-peated the wails of Thieu.

“Give me, give me…”

America DID give Chiang ENTIRE weapons factories — most notably those that manufactured the Thompson machine gun.

( Deemed obsolete by the War Department, but highly regarded by all Asians. Both the Russians and the Americans were jumping straight towards today’s assault guns, having recognized the significance of the German weapon. )

It was just such weapons that faked out US troops when Mao launched Southern Chinese armies against MacArthur’s UN expeditionary forces. All concerned assumed that the racking of the bullets in the Chinese Thompsons came from friendly troops — and so dismissed the acoustic signature of ChiComs enveloping all forward positions. The key troopers making this fateful mistake had all served in WWII and recognized the distinctive sound from the first.

Of course, Mao intended to DESTROY the Southern Chinese armies against MacArthur. They were his internal enemies — the last defenders of Chiang.

This logic entirely eluded all Western officers — and is never brought up in the official histories of the military campaign. Yes, they never had a clue, hence such films as:

“Pork Chop Hill” (Gregory Peck )

YEARS after the Korean War such a film could be crafted — oblivious to the end as to why suicidal assaults were occurring all the way through.

As you probably guessed, Mao NEVER used his own boys — his Northern armies.

They stood way behind the front and forced the Southern armies into their own destruction, with America providing the ammo.

It reminds me of Robbes Pierre’s Committee of Public Safety. His rivals in the revolution, got so afraid of him, that they purged him first, thinking Pierre was going to purge them.

Generally having rivals in a revolution is a bad thing. Stalin vs Trotsky. That’s because your support is filtered through these different “heirs” of the Revolution, and it would be better to consolidate the support. Just like heirs fight and kill each other to pursue a throne. Revolutions did not produce anything better than mankind has known in government and power.

External enemies are fine, so let’s look at Mao vs Chiang Kai Shek in China. Mao liked the Japanese occupation, he used it as an excuse to bleed the nationalists dry, by making the Nationalists fight the Japanese occupation, while Mao hid out and conserved his forces. All the while declaring that he was beating the Japanese back. Then when Kai Shek won the war and pushed the Japanese out, then Mao attacks the nationalists in a civil war. So the Japanese, being “external enemies” isn’t a threat to your public support or your ethnic support. Those are your people, they aren’t going to become disloyal suddenly.

However, if the nationalists won fame, glory, and reputation, and gained enough of Mao’s allies to defeat Mao on the battlefield, then there’s a Real Problem.

I hope your son stays safe.

The people of Turkey are among the most Westernized in the Middle East, and have been ever since Ataturk. It was not accomplished without great difficulty, and unfortunately the forces going against that are winning right now, as they did in Iran (another greatly Westernized country) back in 1979.

Actually, it is precisely the opposite.

Erdogan, not unlike the Ayatollah Khomeini, are using their “interpretation” of their religion to herd, cajole, and appeal to people – and eliminate or isolate the rest who cannot be.

For tyrants and would be tyrants, it is just another way to divide and conquer. Religion is their tool.

Is it any different from only a few hundred years ago when our “western” rulers used religion as one of their tools – “Divine Right of Kings”. Rather darn close to “Sharia Law”, IMHO.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divine_right_of_kings

When I first read about dictators murdering their own supporters I was shocked. It seems so counterintuitive that a dictator becomes stronger by murdering his supporters but it obviously works since so many powerful dictators have done just that.
* * *
Early on in a revolution, all the factions have about even amounts of power and “legitimacy” – so the person who is most determined to become dictator has to eliminate potential rivals as soon as it becomes feasible for him to progress without their help.
That’s my reading, anyway.

When I first read about dictators murdering their own supporters I was shocked. It seems so counterintuitive that a dictator becomes stronger by murdering his supporters but it obviously works since so many powerful dictators have done just that. So far one has mentioned the biggest murder of all, Mao, who murdered thousands of his fellow communists when he was resting up from torturing and killing innocent commoners.

Nick:

Egypt? El-Sisi?

Jordan?

&&&

Their economies have been destroyed — and so they are now living off of eleemosynary impulses.

Tourism into to MENA has collapsed:

Turkey
Egypt
Syria
Jordan

Even

Greece,
Yugoslavia — that whole zone

have been torn up.

The Greek situation gets glossed over — not admitted as being the foundation for her Euro currency distress.

Greece has DEADBEATS all over the countryside.

Italy is doing its best to round them up and put them in — de facto isolation// bachelor’s prisons.

You can witness the kvetching on YouTube, BTW.