Madame Chiang Kai-shek died October 23 at the astonishing age of 105, having far outlived her fame.(The Week)(Brief Article)(Obituary)

* Madame Chiang Kai-shek died October 23 at the astonishing age of 105, having far outlived her fame. Older Americans remembered her as an attractive and eloquent spokeswoman for her nation, which her husband was struggling valiantly to defend against fascist invaders and Communist insurrectionists. The Japanese were of course defeated at last, but Mao Tsetung's Communists won the subsequent civil war, and the Chiangs were forced to flee to Taiwan. Given the horrors of Mao's rule on the mainland, and the eventual democratization and economic success of Taiwan, a casual observer might be puzzled by the unflattering tone of Madame Chiang's obituaries, and by the bad press the Chiangs have received from anti-Communist historians. A close study of the period dispels most doubts. While Chiang Kai-shek's analysis of his country's peril--the Japanese were, he said, merely a disease of the ...