Craig Watson
speaker
4,699 appearances
13 recordings
1 series
first heard May 2026
last heard 17 Aug
Craig Watson’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 13 in all, peaking in Jun 2026 with 5.
Appearances
The fundamental strategic doctrine guiding American policy was Europe first, which meant that the European theater and to defeat Nazi Germany received priority over the Pacific.
Additionally, China's geography made it extraordinarily difficult to supply.
China could only be reached through supply lines of extraordinary length and complexity, either through the port of Rangoon in Burma, and then overland via the treacherous Yunnan Burma Road.
Or through the port of Hong Kong, which of course fell almost immediately to the Japanese.
The first Sino American loan agreement had specified that the United States would deliver commodities worth forty five million to China in nineteen forty one.
However, shipping shortages meant that only about twenty six million worth of commodities actually left the United States.
These commodities were shipped to the transit port of Rangoon, where a massive traffic jam developed as supplies accumulated faster than they could be distributed onwards to China.
Along the Yunnan Burma Road, the much contested lifeline as it became known.
Well, conditions were quite chaotic.
The road had always been a source of trouble.
It was very long, extraordinarily difficult to keep in repair.
Fantastically dangerous to travel, and too narrow to permit much volume of traffic in any one time.
Due to mismanagement and pilfering, the commodities that were shipped out of Burma suffered heavy losses in transit, and only about a third of them actually arrived in Chongqing.
Yet the United States had already established one valuable asset in China that could be deployed relatively quickly.
An air force.
Just before Pearl Harbor, a group of American aviators have been formally organized in Chongqing, and they're working as volunteers for China under the command of Colonel Claire Chenault, an American aviation officer who served as instructor for the Chinese Air Force Cadet School.
Some of these men have been flying in China since the Kuomintang first began purchasing American aircraft.
I've been come to demonstrate the aircraft and remaining to pilot and teach.
Others had hurried to China after being released from their volunteer service in Spain, where they had gained some very good combat experience during the Spanish Civil War.
It was quite a familiar joke that pilots from both sides of the Spanish conflict were likely to meet up and work side by side in China.
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