Thread by @DemesDavid

Now that the backstory of Chiang Wan-an (#蔣萬安) has come under scrutiny once again, I thought I'd make a thread detailing some of the questions that have been raised with regard to his Chiang family pedigree. Buckle up!

Chiang Wan-an was born Chang Wan-an in 1978. His father Chang Hsiao-yen (章孝嚴) claimed to be the son of late ROC president Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國) and successfully changed his surname to Chiang in 2005. How did he manage to do so?

After a sex scandal in 1999, then Secretary-­General to the President Chang Hsiao-yen was forced to resign after a mere month on the job. He had first heard the rumor that his grandfather was Chiang Kai-shek in the 1960s. This information would be key to his political comeback.

In 2002, Chang went to China to collect evidence regarding his birth. His two cousins penned a statement, saying Chang was not the son of their father Chang Hau-juo (章浩若). Until then, Chang's personal ID had shown Hau-juo and his wife Chi Chen (紀琛) to be his legal parents.

Yet, the fact that Chang was the son of Chang Ya-juo (章亞若) had been public knowledge since at least 1990, when Clara Chou published the book "Chiang Ching-kuo and Chang Ya-juo" based on interviews with members of the Chiang clan that had remained in China after the war.

Later, Chang went to the US to find his legal mother Chi Chen. Under the supervision of two consular officers of the Taiwanese representative office, Chang took a few of her hairs for a DNA sample. Unsurprisingly, the result showed that Chang and Chi were not related by blood.

Chang and his twin brother Hsiao-tzu (孝慈) were the sons of her late husband Hau-juo's sister Chang Ya-juo. However, the true identity of their father has been shrouded in mystery. Apparently, Ya-juo had intimate relations with many men at the time, including Chiang Ching-kuo.

Ya-juo died of a mysterious illness in August 1942, just a few months after the children were born leading many to believe that she had been poisoned. This twins were brought up by their maternal grandmother Chou Chin-hua (周錦華) who later took them to Taiwan.

A key piece of evidence supporting Chang's claim was a statement made by Gen. Wang Sheng (王昇), who testified to the fact that Chiang Ching-kuo had made regular payments to the twins' grandmother to support them. However, in his diary, CCK denied that the children were his.👇

Chiang Ching-kuo wrote he supported the children out of loyalty to their father, his late friend Wang Chi-chun (王繼春). Yet, some historians believe he might have lied in his diary out of fear his father would find out about his extramarital affair with Ya-juo.

The DNA evidence combined with General Wang's statement and a new Chinese birth certificate showing Ya-juo as his mother was enough for clerks at the Daan Household Registration Office in Taipei to change his parents' entry to Chang Ya-juo and Chiang Ching-kuo in 2002.

Chang waited until the death of CCK's widow Faina Chiang Fang-liang (蔣方良) to officially change his surname to Chiang. He said he didn't want to hurt the old lady's feelings out of respect for his late father. Others might come to a different conclusion as to why he waited. 👀

In fact, the Chiang family never accepted Chang/Chiang Hsiao-yen as part of the family. Both Soong Mei-ling (宋美齡) and Chiang Fang-liang refused to meet with him. Furthermore, his brother Chang Hsiao-tzu, who died in 1996, also never claimed to be the son of Chiang Ching-kuo.

More recently, Prof. Chiang Yuan-tsan (蔣元贊), who claims to be a distant relative of Chiang Kai-shek, has challenged Chiang Wan-an to take a DNA test and see whether the two are related or not.

Chiang Wan-an's surname wouldn't matter as much if he and the KMT were not trying to capitalize on his alleged heritage. At his campaign rallies, other candidates often invoke Chiang Ching-kuo to score political points. The KMT Taipei chapter even put out these flags:

In fact, another contender for the paternity of the Chang twins is Kuo Li-po (郭禮伯). In his father's biography, Kuo's son wrote that Ya-juo had told Kuo of the pregnancy early on and claimed the children were his. Allegedly, both hatched a plan to pass the kids off as Chiang's.

CYJ: I'm pregnant.
KLP: Who's the father?
CYJ: Of course it's yours. Who else's could it be?
KLP: Wait for 1-2 months and then tell CCK. When the child is born in March, tell him it was preterm. It's better the child is surnamed Chiang than Kuo.

Interestingly, CIA analysts seemed to have believed Chang Hsiao-yen to be Chiang Ching-kuo's son. In a 1985 document titled "The Political Succession on Taiwan" they not only listed his father as "Current President", but also presented his surname as "Chiang" rather than "Chang".