The history nobody knew on the Stilwell Road

In 1942, the Japanese overran Burma and cut off the road, forcing the Allies to set up the Hump Route, a very dangerous, temporary aerial route over the Himalayas.

At the same time, the Allies started building the Ledo Road and linked it with the part of Burma Road in northern Burma which the Allies regained in 1945. As a token of appreciation, the Chinese government named the Burma and Ledo roads, a total of 1,736 km, Stilwell Road after general Stilwell who was commander of all American forces in the China-Burma-India Theater of World War II.

"Ledo appeared exactly the same as when the Allied troops were here 60 years ago," says Ge. Cattle still strolled on roads, peddlers slept in primitive roadside shacks, and electric poles made from oil tubes and rail tracks still stood.

At Ramgarh, a small town 350 km northwest of Calcutta, Ge and his companion reached the cemetery of the China Expedition Army in the World War II. There were a total of 573 tombs.

In 1942, when the China Expedition Army first came to Burma at the request of the British colonial government, 50,000 died in battle or in retreat. In the battles to recover northern Burma between 1943-45, 15,000-20,000 more Chinese soldiers lost their lives, and 20,000 died in the battle to retake western Yunnan. Nearly 100,000 Chinese had given their lives in that part of the anti-Japanese war.

"Local Chinese expatriates told us we were the first Chinese mainland people to visit there in 60 years," Ge says. When they returned to Kunming, they showed the pictures of Ramgarh to three former China Expedition Army soldiers, now in their 80s. They confirmed that some of the buildings had been their barracks.

In Nov 1984, Ge, an ambitious graduate from Yunnan Normal University, visited a mausoleum in Tengchong county by sheer chance. He was surprised to see the devastated tombstones of more than 8,000 Chinese and American soldiers who died helping to recover Tengchong from the Japanese. The cemetery was destroyed by Red Guards during the "cultural revolution" (1966-76).

As a history major, Ge felt shocked that none of the books he had read mentioned this episode at all. "Tens of thousands of Chinese soldiers lost their lives fighting Japanese, and nobody knew!" He says. "As a rebellious youth, I was determined to probe into that."

Ge visited each stop on the Burma Road and interviewed more than 100 witnesses and survivors of World War II. His work has led him to meet quite a few American friends, including John Easterbrook, Joseph Stilwell's grandson, plus "Tex" Hill and Peter Wright, both Flying Tiger pilots. His acquaintances even include Japanese soldiers who fought in the war in Yunnan.

In Nov 1991, Ge organized a meeting between Chinese and Japanese veteran soldiers in Kunming. As an old Chinese man related his stories of the war, an old Japanese man couldn't help supporting him with hands, and hugging him.

"Although it was an extremely difficult and complicated moment for both of them, I saw the old Chinese soldier shed tears on the shoulder of his Japanese counterpart," Ge says.

Partly with Ge's help, the stories of brave Chinese Kuomintang soldiers fighting in World War II are widely reported. Today, old Chinese expatriates, American and Japanese veterans, as well as journalists, have revisited the former sites of Stilwell Road. "Each section of the road, each mountain peak, wood or stream, could tell a shocking and weepy story," says Ge.

"Most people who lived or fought here have passed away. But the intrepidity of our fathers' generation at the Road is an epitome of the indomitable spirit of the Chinese in difficult times. That spirit will live forever."