XI.

Tensions: Chinese Civil War

(1945-1949)
1
I. Early Friction
• May 22nd, 1925, Chiang Kai-shek was appointed to command the Nationalist
Army.
• July 9th, 1926, Chiang Kai-shek launched the Northern Expedition to defeat the
Warlords of central and northern China to unite China under KMT control.
• April 12th, 1927, KMT arrested and executed several thousands CCP leaders and
left-wing KMT members in an event known as “Shanghai Massacre”. Mao and
other CCP members fled to Hunan Province where they mounted “Autumn Harvest
Uprising” with peasants and miners.
• April 28th, 1928, KMT captured Beijing and finished the Northern Expedition.
II. Acceleration
• May 15th, 1930, KMT launched a series of encirclement campaigns known as “Central
Plain War” to isolate and attack the Jiangxi Soviet base. Five different campaigns were
highly successful for over four year. The main campaign lasted from December 1930 to July
1931, and resulted in the destruction of CCP target base areas, and thousand of
communist members died.
• September 8th, 1931, Japanese started invasion of China and occupied Manchuria.
• September 25th, 1933, KMT launched another campaign that involved the systematic
encirclement of the Jiangxi Soviet region, with fortified blockhouses. This time, the aim of
KMT troops was to surround the Communist areas and cut off their supplies and food
resources. However, in October, CCP took the advantage of the gaps and escaped.
• October 16th, 1934, the Long March began. With imminent defeat, CCP army based in the
Jiangxi Soviet fled to the Yanan Soviet in northern China. The retreating force consisted of
more than 85,000 soldiers.
• October 20th, 1935, the Long March ended. It marked the emergence of Mao as the
undisputed leader of the CCP. And learning of the Communists’ heroism in the Long March,
thousands of young Chinese traveled to Yanan to enlist in Mao’s red army. Yanan was the
largest base and heaquater for the CCP between 1936 and 1948.
• 25,000 li; 24 months; 14 provinces; 86859; 30 years old.
III. Turning point
 • December 1936, Xi’an Incident – This was
a major turning point during the Chinese
Civil War where Chiang was kidnapped
and forced to agree to truce with CCP in
order to form a second united front against
Japan. Later when Anti-Japanese war was
officially started, KMT were engaged in full
scale warfare while CCP was involve in
guerilla warfare against the Japanese
army.
• January 6th, 1941, repeated disagreements and
skirmishes between KMT and CCP in freed Chinese
areas led to a total breakdown of the Second United
Front, in particular New Fourth Army incident. This was
when KMT forces breached the truce by attacking and
destroying the headquarter of CCP New Fourth Army,
with thousands of Communist casualties. This incident
portrayed the KMT in a negative light while the CCP was
seen as heroes. However, the CCP lost possession of the
land south of Yangtze River.
IV. Final collapse
• August 28th, 1945, Chongqing negociation. Mao was accompanied by American
ambassador Patrick Hurley to arrive in Chongqing to discuss the reuniting and
rebuilding of the country. On October 10th, 1945, the two parties announced that
they had reached an agreement in principle to work for a united and democratic
China, but serious fighting between government and Communist troops later
erupted. In January of 1946, negociation was resumed with the help of the
States, while an intensifided fighting occurred all over the place and the civil war
was inevitable.
Liaoshen Campaign, 1948.9-
12

Pingjin Campaign, 1948.11-

1949.1

Huaihai Campaign, 1948.11-

1949.1
Liberation of Nanjing, April 1949

七律 · 人民解放军占领南京
毛泽东
钟山风雨起苍黄，百万雄师过大江。
虎踞龙盘今胜昔，天翻地覆慨而慷。
宜将剩勇追穷寇，不可沽名学霸王。
天若有情天亦老，人间正道是沧桑。
Impact
• While statistics vary, it has been
suggested that up to 2.5 million people
died during the 1945-1949 phase of
the Civil War. Several historians
suggest the death toll for the entire
Chinese Civil War period (1927-49)
exceeded six million.
• Life during the Civil War was severely
impacted by economic problems
including hyperinflation, mass
unemployment, inadequate
reconstruction of industry and large
numbers of refugees. “in 1940, 100
yuan bought a pig, in 1943 a chicken,
in 1945 a fish, in 1946 an egg, and in
1947 one third of a box of matches”. -
Michael Lynch
 “There is a sense in which the Chinese Civil War
has not ended; no formal peace treaty or
agreement has ever been made. The two
Chinese states that emerged from the civil war,
the PRC and Taiwan, have followed very different
paths… but each side continues to claim that it
alone is the legitimate government of all China.
At the start of the second decade of the 21st
century, the issues over which the civil war had
been fought have still to be resolved.”

Michael Lynch
 HOMEWORK

https://www.britannica.com/event/Chinese-Civil-War/

18