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Revelling in Chiang’s defeats, Mao launched a Rectification Campaign, a Stalinesque terror of what he called ‘pain and friction’ managed by Kang Sheng, a sadistic myrmidon who always wore a black tunic and boots and rode a black horse. Kang had escorted Mao’s two sons to be educated in Moscow, where in 1937 he had helped Stalin’s hatchet man Yezhov liquidate Chinese Trotskyites. Now attaching himself to Mao, with whom he enjoyed talking about sex and terror, sharing erotica and devising tortures, he tortured and shot thousands while staging the ‘struggle and confession’ sessions that would characterize Maoist terror.

Mao played mahjong, read history books and frolicked with a harem of Shanghai actresses until a dazzling film star, Jiang Qing, twenty-seven-year-old daughter of a concubine and an alcoholic innkeeper, arrived in Yen’an. In Shanghai she had been arrested for Leftism but had flirted if not slept with her KMT interrogators. Mao’s comrades criticized his ‘imperial concubines’, but, addressing a meeting, he spotted her in the front row and lent her his coat. Later she arrived at his residence to return the coat and stayed the night. Mao abandoned his respected wife, who had endured the Long March, and insisted on marrying Jiang Qing, backed by Kang Sheng, whose alliance with her lasted until the 1970s. Mao’s son Anying now arrived back from Russia, with a pistol given by Stalin, joining his four-year-old sister Li Min in their troglodytic ménage. In 1940, Jiang Qing gave birth to a daughter, Li Na, but family was always at the mercy of power. Mao declined to rescue his brother Zemin, who was excuted by the KMT; Jiang meanwhile denounced Li Na’s nanny for poisoning their milk, shrieking, ‘Poison! Confess!’ Mao recognized that Jiang Qing was ‘as deadly poisonous as a scorpion’: one day she would almost rule China.

After Rangoon fell, the Japanese threatened India where Nehru, charming, quicksilver, elegant, had emerged as the leader of Congress, respectfully following his ‘Bapu’ Gandhi. In 1928, Nehru had declared, ‘India must sever the British connection and attain Purna Swaraj – total independence.’^* Nehru was in jail when his wife Kamala died of TB. He had devoted himself to politics – admitting, ‘I almost overlooked her’ – though she had been jailed for her campaigning. It was their daughter, Indira, often alone while her father was in jail, who became his political confidante.^*

Nehru and Gandhi, frustrated by years of British obfuscation, disagreed on the war: Gandhi, a pacific pragmatist, wanted neutrality; Nehru, an internationalist socialist, supported Britain against fascism. But the British refusal to promise post-war independence reunited them again. ‘Some say Jawaharlal and I were estranged,’ said Gandhi. ‘It will require much more than difference of opinion to estrange us … Jawaharlal will be my successor.’ But many Muslims as well as Hindus volunteered to fight for Britain, increasing the size of the Indian army tenfold to 2.5 million, and the British recognized Jinnah as representative of Indian Muslims: ‘After I was treated on the same basis as Mr Gandhi, I was wonderstruck.’ In Lahore, Jinnah declared, ‘Muslims are a nation according to any definition of a nation and must have … their states.’ Gandhi was agonized by this dilemma.

Now Chiang Kai-shek, keen to help Britain but also to show Asian solidarity, flew to Delhi to meet Nehru and Gandhi, whom he urged to join the war. They both cordially ignored him.

In August 1942, they launched a Quit India campaign, which, far beyond civil disobedience, destroyed hundreds of police and railway stations, sabotaging railways and telegraphs. The British responded by deploying troops and mass arrests but the campaign failed. Indians continued to volunteer for Britain.

During Chiang’s visit, two famines were killing many in the two greatest Asian countries, both exacerbated by governmental incompetence and wartime priorities. Three million Indians died in a famine in Bengal.^* Six hundred miles to the east, in Henan, noted Chiang, ‘People are starving, dogs and animals are eating corpses.’ He added, ‘Our social reality is scarred. We’re exhausted after six years of the war.’ Two million Chinese died.

In May 1942, Razor Tojo was planning an extravagantly Japanese Pacific – as fantastical as Hitler’s visions – dominating China, giving eastern India to a new Burmese kingdom, ruling Australia, Hawaii, Alaska, even Canada. But Admiral Yamamoto resisted this ‘victory fever’, writing to his favourite geisha, ‘The first stage has been a kind of children’s hour and it will soon be over; now comes the adult’s hour.’

THE FUTURE OF MANKIND: ROOSEVELT, STALIN AND JACK KENNEDY