Chiang Wei-kuo (6 October 191 6-), the younger son of Chiang Kai-shek, military officer who held important posts in Taiwan.

Born at Shanghai, Chiang Wei-kuo was raised as the second son of Chiang Kai-shek. Little is known of his childhood or early education. Between 1934 and 1936 he studied physics at Tung-wu University at Soochow and also became a reserve officer in the Kiangsu provincial training corps. In September 1937 Chiang went to Europe and enrolled at the Kriegshochschule in Munich, where he was known as Wego W. K. Chiang. He studied the German language and German military science. After receiving an honorary commission as a second lieutenant, Chiang was assigned for training purposes to the 98th (Jager) Regiment, and he participated with that unit in the German invasion of Austria in March 1938. After the Second World War broke out in September 1939, Chiang left Germany for the United States, where he spent about a year as a cadet at the Air Corps School at Maxwell Field, Alabama, and at the United States Army's Armored Center at Fort Knox, Kentucky. On 31 March 1940 he addressed a rally in New York's Chinatown. He condemned the actions of Wang Ching-wei (q.v.) as the leader of the Japanese-sponsored government at Nanking. Chiang returned to China in November 1940. After receiving political indoctrination, he was assigned in 1941 to the 1st Infantry Division of the First Army as a second lieutenant. Under the command of Hu Tsung-nan (q.v.), a favorite of Chiang Kai-shek, the First Army, with headquarters at Sian, stood guard against the Japanese forces deployed along the Yellow River bend near Tungkuan and against the Chinese Communist forces (which nominally were allied with the Nationalists) to the north. Because he spoke English, Chiang was selected to escort Wendell Willkie and his party on a tour of the Shensi front in 1942. Chiang became a Christian in June 1943, with the Methodist bishop of west China officiating at his baptism. In August, he went to India for advanced training at the tank center which the United States Army had established. A few months later, he returned to China and rejoined his unit at Tungkuan. He remained with the 1st Infantry Division until 1945 and advanced to the rank of major. In 1945 Chiang was promoted to lieutenant colonel and was assigned to command a battalion of the 616th Infantry Regiment. During the civil war with the Communists, he served chiefly with armored units, notably the 1st Tank Regiment, in which he was executive officer and then deputy commander. The entire armored force of the Nationalists participated in the massive Hwai-Hai battle that began on the eastern segment of the Lunghai rail line in early November 1948, and Chiang Wei-kuo, by then a colonel, served as its deputy commander. In that critical battle, the Nationalists lost almost all of their equipment. Chiang Wei-kuo and other senior Nationalist officers escaped from Hsuchow and avoided capture by the Communists. After the Nationalist removal to Taiwan, Chiang Wei-kuo served from 1950 to 1953 as commanding general of the Armored Force m Command. In 1953 he went to the United States to attend the Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. After his return to Taiwan in July 1955, he became deputy director of the G-3 (operations) division of the ministry of national defense, in which his brother, Chiang Ching-kuo (q.v.), held high office. In March 1958 Chiang Weikuo became director of the G-5 (planning) division and deputy chairman of the joint operations planning group in the ministry of national defense. Later that year he resumed command of the Armored Force Command, with the rank of major general. In 1959 he attended the United States Army Air Defense School at Fort Bliss. After his return to Taiwan, Chiang was promoted to the rank of lieutenant general and was named commandant of the Command and General Staff College of the Chinese Army. Despite his military background, Chiang Weikuo was not regarded as a figure of major political influence in Taiwan. After returning from the United States, he became an active member of the Taipei Rotary Club, which was composed primarily of Americans and Englishspeaking Chinese. During the Sino-Japanese war, Chiang Weikuo married Shih Ching-i, the daughter of a prosperous businessman from the Northeast; she died in childbirth in Taiwan. Chiang later married Ellen Chiu, an attractive woman of Chinese-German parentage.