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Without committing U.S. combat troops and without supporting a coalition government, the [[Truman Doctrine]] saved Greece from Communism. Greece received weapons and financial support and, most importantly, operational advisers at the battalion level, who ensured that American aid was used effectively. Marshall himself testified that similar aid might have worked in China, but General David Barr's military mission to China was specifically instructed not to supply this kind of assistance. <ref>Military Situation in the Far East, Hearings before the Committee on Armed Services and the Committee on Foreign Relations, U.S. Senate, 82nd Congress (Washington, 1951), p. 558.</ref> General [[Albert C. Wedemeyer]] recommended this approach in his report on his 1947 fact-finding mission, but Marshall personally suppressed the report. <ref>Tang Tsou, ''America's Failure in China, 1941-1945'', Chicago 1964, pg. 457.</ref> Chiang believed that the Truman Doctrine to [[Containment|contain]] the spread of International Communism directed from Moscow would be extended to China, and ordered an offensive as soon as word of the new policy reached him. <ref>Richard C. Thornton, ''China: A Political History, 1917-1980'', (1982), pg. 208.</ref> Truman however, made no effort to save China from Communism.
Without committing U.S. combat troops and without supporting a coalition government, the [[Truman Doctrine]] saved Greece from Communism. Greece received weapons and financial support and, most importantly, operational advisers at the battalion level, who ensured that American aid was used effectively. Marshall himself testified that similar aid might have worked in China, but General David Barr's military mission to China was specifically instructed not to supply this kind of assistance. <ref>Military Situation in the Far East, Hearings before the Committee on Armed Services and the Committee on Foreign Relations, U.S. Senate, 82nd Congress (Washington, 1951), p. 558.</ref> General [[Albert C. Wedemeyer]] recommended this approach in his report on his 1947 fact-finding mission, but Marshall personally suppressed the report. <ref>Tang Tsou, ''America's Failure in China, 1941-1945'', Chicago 1964, pg. 457.</ref> Chiang believed that the Truman Doctrine to [[Containment|contain]] the spread of International Communism directed from Moscow would be extended to China, and ordered an offensive as soon as word of the new policy reached him. <ref>Richard C. Thornton, ''China: A Political History, 1917-1980'', (1982), pg. 208.</ref> Truman however, made no effort to save China from Communism.
George C. Marshall had dictated a four-month ceasefire in Manchuria in June 1946. In this period, the Russians shipped in Japanese, Soviet, and Nazi arms and trained the Reds in using these. The forces were sternly disciplined. In the winter of 1946-47, red general Lin Biao ruthlessly attacked the Nationalist troops in Manchuria in a freezing winter.
Meanwhile, Hu Tsung-nan was sent to take communist areas outside Manchuria. Secretly a communist spy, he handed over huge numbers of well-trained troops and their GI arms to the communists in the Yenan region. Wei Li-huang, commander in Manchuria and also a red spy, surrendered Chiang's best, largest, and best equipped troops. North China fell because of a mentally ill general, and somehow the reds crossed the Yangtze and took southern China, Sichuan, and a few islands.
Chiang was forced from the Chinese mainland to the island of [[Taiwan]] in 1949, where he resumed his position as president, albeit of a massively reduced territory.
Chiang was forced from the Chinese mainland to the island of [[Taiwan]] in 1949, where he resumed his position as president, albeit of a massively reduced territory.