Culture Shock! China - A Survival Guide to Customs and Etiquette, 2nd Edition

Overview and History 21

named Chiang Kai-shek, who returned to China and assumed
the leadership of the Whampoa Military Academy.
Unfortunately, Sun Yat-sen died of cancer in 1925, before
he could see his dream of a united China realised. The
leadership of the KMT passed on to the younger Chiang
Kai-shek, who embarked on a ‘Northern Expedition’ from
Guangzhou to Shanghai in July 1926, to root out opposition
and recapture territory. By April of the following year, Chiang
and his troops had reached the lower Yangtze and were
preparing to move on Shanghai. Despite the inclusion of
communists among KMT party ranks, Chiang’s move on
Shanghai included a massacre of communists that marked a
firm break with much of the rest of the KMT. The Communist
Party members thus fled to the countryside in droves to
escape further crackdowns by KMT troops, which pressed
on to Beijing in a similar frame of mind, reaching their
destination in 1928 and formally unifying the country.

The Lead up to the Long March

With recognition of the Nationalist (KMT) government by international

powers and the funding that came with it, a path was paved for

the swift development of a prosperous, independent China, ruled

by Chinese. But the all-too-familiar issues of corruption, internal

discord and interference by foreign powers (this time the Japanese)

kept Chiang Kai-shek’s attention splintered and distracted from the

immediate need to improve the lives of the people.

While Chiang carried out a determined effort to eliminate these

issues, the communists, under the leadership of Mao Zedong, focused

on winning over the hearts and minds of those in the countryside

with the agrarian reforms that Chiang was neglecting.

Yet the KMT would not give up their hunt for the communists,

leading to a massive siege in Jiangxi in 1934, that prompted The

Long March. The communists’ escape from behind the KMT lines set

them on their trek from Jiangxi to Shaanxi Province, a colossal effort

that began with more than 100,000 men and women, but ended one

year and 6,000 miles later with less than 10,000 people. It was at

their new base in Yan’an that Mao consolidated his position as the

sole leader of the revolution.

While the KMT and Communist Party were fighting
and hiding, the Japanese were busy invading Manchuria,
creating the puppet state of Manchukuo in 1932. Eventually,