Editing Claire Lee Chennault (section)

==Postwar==
[[File:Chennaut and wife.JPG|thumb|200px|Chennault and second wife [[Chen Xiangmei]]]]

Chennault, unlike Stilwell, had a high opinion of [[Chiang Kai-shek]] and advocated international support for Asian [[anti-communist]] movements. Returning to China, he purchased several surplus military aircraft and created the [[Civil Air Transport]] (later known as [[Air America (airline)|Air America]]).<ref name="Smith 1995">Smith 1995</ref> The aircraft facilitated aid to [[Nationalist Government (China)|Nationalist China]] during the struggle against the [[Chinese Communists]] in the late 1940s and were later used in supply missions to French forces in [[Indochina]]<ref name="Smith 1995"/> and the [[Kuomintang]] occupation of northern Burma throughout the mid- and late 1950s, providing support for the [[Thai police]] force. The same force supplied the [[US intelligence community]] and others during the [[Vietnam War]].<ref name=Robbins2005>{{cite book |last1=Robbins|first1=Christopher|title=Air America; from World War II to Vietnam |date=2005 |publisher=Asia Books |isbn=978-974-8303-51-2|place=Bangkok|edition=4th}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |first=Capt. Ed |last=Adams |url=http://www.air-america.org/Articles/Fall_of_Saigon.shtml#adams |title=The Beginning of the End |department=The Fall of Saigon |publisher=Air America Association |date=March 26, 2005 |access-date=April 29, 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110720084338/http://www.air-america.org/Articles/Fall_of_Saigon.shtml#adams |archive-date=July 20, 2011 |df=mdy-all }}</ref><ref name="blum-cia-drugs">{{cite web |url=http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Blum/CIADrugs_WBlum.html |title=The CIA and Drugs: Just Say 'Why Not?' |last=Blum |first=William |work=Third World Traveller |access-date=May 26, 2013}}</ref>

In 1951, now retired, [[Major General]] Chennault testified and provided written statements to the Senate Joint Committee on [[United States Senate Committee on Armed Services|Armed Forces]] and [[United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations|Foreign Relations]], which was investigating the causes of the 1949 fall of China to the communists. Together with Army General [[Albert C. Wedemeyer]], Navy [[Vice Admiral]] [[Oscar C. Badger II]], and others, Chennault claimed that the [[Truman administration]]'s arms embargo had been a key factor in the loss of [[morale]] to the Nationalist armies.<ref>Chennault, Claire Lee (Major-General, retired). ''Testimony to the Senate Joint Committee on the Armed Forces and Foreign Relations'', letter dated June 20, 1951, and supplemental statement, Appendix 00, p. 3342.</ref>

Chennault advocated changes in how [[foreign aid]] was distributed and encouraged the [[US Congress]] to focus on individualized aid assistance with specific goals, with close monitoring by US advisers. Those viewpoints may have reflected his experiences during the [[Chinese Civil War]] in which officials of the Kuomintang as well as semi-independent army officers has diverted aid intended for the Nationalist armies. Shortly before his death, Chennault was asked to testify before the [[House Un-American Activities Committee]] of the Congress. When a committee member asked him who won the [[Korean War]], his response was blunt: "The Communists."<ref>{{cite web | url=https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc1.31822024209397&seq=15 | title=International communism (Communist encroachment in the Far East) / Consultation with Maj. Gen. Claire Lee Chennault, United States Army }}</ref>

On July 24, 1953, Chennault met with a number of former U.S. military officers, including [[Pedro del Valle]] and [[Bonner Fellers]], to form the Defenders of the American Constitution (DAC). The DAC believed in a "one-worldist conspiracy" led by New York Jewish financiers who controlled international communism, and described their goal as the defense of "the US constitution against enemies and encroachments, both foreign and domestic."<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal |last=Macklin |first=Graham |date=2012 |title=Transatlantic Connections and Conspiracies: A.K. Chesterton and The New Unhappy Lords |journal=Journal of Contemporary History |language=en-US |volume=47 |issue=2 |pages=278–281 |doi=10.1177/0022009411431723 |issn=0022-0094 |s2cid=153984405}}</ref><ref name="Defenders">{{cite web |last=Coogan |first=K. |title=The Defenders of the American Constitution and the League of Empire Loyalists: The First Postwar Anglo-American Revolts Against the 'One World Order' |url=http://www.iisg.nl/research/coogan.doc |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060823103720/http://www.iisg.nl/research/coogan.doc |archive-date=August 23, 2006 |access-date=2007-10-17}}</ref>