Anti-Fengtian War
Encyclopedia
Republic of China (1912–1949)
In 1911, after over two thousand years of imperial rule, a republic was established in China and the monarchy overthrown by a group of revolutionaries. The Qing Dynasty, having just experienced a century of instability, suffered from both internal rebellion and foreign imperialism...
's northern Beiyang government
Beiyang Government
The Beiyang government or warlord government collectively refers to a series of military regimes that ruled from Beijing from 1912 to 1928 at Zhongnanhai. It was internationally recognized as the legitimate Government of the Republic of China. The name comes from the Beiyang Army which dominated...
prior to the Northern Expedition. It lasted from November 1925 to April 1926 and was waged by the Guominjun
Guominjun
The Guominjun , a.k.a Nationalist Army, KMC, or Northwest Army , refers to the military faction founded by Feng Yuxiang, Hu Jingyi and Sun Yue during China's Warlord Era. It was formed when Feng betrayed the Zhili clique during the Second Zhili-Fengtian War with the Fengtian clique in 1924...
against the Fengtian clique
Fengtian clique
The Fengtian Clique was one of several mutually hostile cliques or factions that split from the Beiyang Clique in the Republic of China's warlord era. It was named for Fengtian Province and led by Zhang Zuolin...
and their Zhili clique allies. The war ended with the defeat of the Guominjun and the end of the provisional executive government. The war is also known as either Guominjun-Fengtian War (Guo Feng Zhan Zheng, 国奉战争), or the Third Zhili-Fengtian War (Di San Ci Zhi Feng Zhan Zheng, 第三次直奉战争).
Cause
The end result of the Second Zhili-Fengtian WarSecond Zhili-Fengtian War
The Second Zhili–Fengtian War of 1924 was a conflict between the Japanese-backed Fengtian clique based in Manchuria, and the more liberal Zhili clique controlling Beijing and backed by Anglo-American business interests...
had led to the creation of a provisional executive government in Beijing in November 1924, where an informal triumvirate
Triumvirate
A triumvirate is a political regime dominated by three powerful individuals, each a triumvir . The arrangement can be formal or informal, and though the three are usually equal on paper, in reality this is rarely the case...
formed by Fengtian's Zhang Zuolin
Zhang Zuolin
Zhang Zuolin was the warlord of Manchuria from 1916 to 1928 . He successfully invaded China proper in October 1924 in the Second Zhili-Fengtian War. He gained control of Peking, including China's internationally recognized government, in April 1926...
, the Guominjun's Feng Yuxiang
Feng Yuxiang
Feng Yuxiang was a warlord and leader in Republican China. He was also known as the Christian General for his zeal to convert his troops and the Betrayal General for his penchant to break with the establishment. In 1911, he was an officer in the ranks of Yuan Shikai's Beiyang Army but joined...
, and the Anhui clique
Anhui clique
The Anhui clique was one of several mutually hostile cliques or factions that split from the Beiyang Clique in the Republic of China's Warlord era. It was named after Anhui province because several of its generals including its founder, Duan Qirui, was born in Anhui...
's Duan Qirui
Duan Qirui
Duan Qirui was a Chinese warlord and politician, commander in the Beiyang Army, and the Provisional Chief Executive of Republic of China from November 24, 1924 to April 20, 1926. He was arguably the most powerful man in China from 1916 to 1920.- Early life :Born in Hefei as Duan Qirui , his...
had ruled. Duan's position as head of state
Head of State
A head of state is the individual that serves as the chief public representative of a monarchy, republic, federation, commonwealth or other kind of state. His or her role generally includes legitimizing the state and exercising the political powers, functions, and duties granted to the head of...
was merely as a figurehead, however, as his clique had been almost destroyed. His small army of bodyguards operated solely within the capital he now figuratively ruled.
Zhang was the strongest of the three leaders and controlled the wealthy northeastern provinces. Feng's smaller army controlled the poorer northwest. As such, the power sharing arrangement between the two was destined to fail: Zhang was a monarchist backed by Japan, whereas Feng dabbled with radical politics, Christianity and revolutionary idealism all with Soviet support. Duan, lacking a power base of his own, played the two against each other in order to retain some control.
Throughout the summer of 1925 both Zhang and Feng began soliciting help from their former Zhili enemy, Wu Peifu
Wu Peifu
Wu Peifu or Wu P'ei-fu , was a major figure in the struggles between the warlords who dominated Republican China from 1916 to 1927.- Early career :...
. Seething at Feng's earlier betrayal during the Beijing coup
Beijing coup
The Beijing coup refers to the October 1924 coup d'etat by Feng Yuxiang against Chinese President Cao Kun, leader of the Zhili warlord faction. Feng called it the Capital Revolution . The coup occurred at a crucial moment in the Second Zhili–Fengtian War and allowed the pro-Japanese Fengtian...
, Wu sealed an alliance with Zhang in November. This alliance would last until the defeat of both cliques under the Northern Expedition in 1928.
Course
In October 1925, Guo SonglingGuo Songling
Guo Songling was a Manchurian general who led a three month rebellion against his commanding warlord - Zhang Zuolin....
, a division commander of the Fengtian clique, defected to Feng's Guominjun clique. From November 22 he began to lay siege to Mukden, the capital city of his former Fengtian master. Chiang Kai-shek
Chiang Kai-shek
Chiang Kai-shek was a political and military leader of 20th century China. He is known as Jiǎng Jièshí or Jiǎng Zhōngzhèng in Mandarin....
sought to convince Sun Chuanfang
Sun Chuanfang
Sun Chuanfang aka the "Nanking Warlord" or leader of the "League of Five Provinces" was a Zhili clique warlord and protege of the "Jade Marshal" Wu Peifu .- Biography :Sun Chuanfang was born in Lichen, Shandong...
to also defect, though to the Kuomintang
Kuomintang
The Kuomintang of China , sometimes romanized as Guomindang via the Pinyin transcription system or GMD for short, and translated as the Chinese Nationalist Party is a founding and ruling political party of the Republic of China . Its guiding ideology is the Three Principles of the People, espoused...
. Sun, who was affiliated with Wu Peifu's Zhili clique, was a popular target to woo; having recently fought against Zhang's armies, he was openly unhappy about his enforced alliance with the Fengtian clique. Sun, however, refused and executed Chiang's emissaries. Chiang retaliated in turn by executing Sun's envoys.
A power struggle was also taking place among the key figures in the KMT. Wang Jingwei
Wang Jingwei
Wang Jingwei , alternate name Wang Zhaoming, was a Chinese politician. He was initially known as a member of the left wing of the Kuomintang , but later became increasingly anti-Communist after his efforts to collaborate with the CCP ended in political failure...
, Chiang Kai-shek's rival for absolute control over the Nationalist Party, proposed sending Chiang to Feng's Guominjun as an adviser. Chiang saw this as an attempt to detach him from his Whampoa power base and declined.
On December 24, in a stunning reversal of fortune, Guo's siege of Mukden was lifted and he was killed. The Guominjun began hemorrhaging soldiers, both from fighting and desertion, as it tried to hold off the combined armies of Wu Peifu, Zhang Zuolin, Li Jinglin
Li Jinglin
Li Jinglin Li Jinglin (also known as Li Fangchen) Li Jinglin (also known as Li Fangchen) ((李景林, 1885 - 1931) was a deputy inspector-general and later army general for the Fengtian clique during the Chinese warlord era. He hailed from Zaoqiang County, Hebei province, China. After his military...
and Zhang Zongchang
Zhang Zongchang
Zhang Zongchang , nicknamed the "Dogmeat General" and "72-Cannon Chang" , was a Chinese warlord in Shandong in the early 20th century...
. In January, Feng resigned as a warlord and moved to the Soviet Union to study. Japan supported Zhang's forces, directly providing air and naval support. During an artillery attack on Guominjun forces, civilians were killed, leading to protests in Beiping and the March 18 Massacre
March 18 Massacre
The March 18 Massacre was a massacre that took place on March 18, 1926 amid an anti-warlord and anti-imperialist demonstration in Beijing, Republic of China...
. Though Duan expressed his remorse at the brutal suppression of the protests, the Guominjun removed him from office the next month.
In April, and in order to appease the Zhili clique, the Guominjun released the deposed ex-president Cao Kun
Cao Kun
|-...
, who had been put under arrest by Feng in 1923. Wu did not respond. The Young Marshal, Zhang Xueliang
Zhang Xueliang
Zhang Xueliang or Chang Hsüeh-liang , occasionally called Peter Hsueh Liang Chang in English, nicknamed the Young Marshal , was the effective ruler of Manchuria and much of North China after the assassination of his father, Zhang Zuolin, by the Japanese on 4 June 1928...
, had his army occupy the capital with Wu's troops arriving a little later. They sacked the capital causing much chaos and leading to the collapse of much of the Beiyang government's bureaucracy. It would not fully recover until its occupation by the Nationalists in 1928.
Guominjun troops tried to flee through Shanxi
Shanxi
' is a province in Northern China. Its one-character abbreviation is "晋" , after the state of Jin that existed here during the Spring and Autumn Period....
, but the Shanxi clique
Shanxi clique
The Shanxi clique was one of several military factions that split off from the Beiyang Army during China's warlord era.Though a close associate of Duan Qirui, Shanxi's military governor, Yan Xishan, did not join Duan's Anhui clique. He kept his province neutral from the various civil wars the...
led by Yan Xishan
Yan Xishan
Yan Xishan, was a Chinese warlord who served in the government of the Republic of China. Yan effectively controlled the province of Shanxi from the 1911 Xinhai Revolution to the 1949 Communist victory in the Chinese Civil War...
maintained a very strict neutrality policy and attacked any soldiers that encroached their borders. Yan, an ex-Tongmenghui
Tongmenghui
The Tongmenghui, also known as the Chinese United League, United League, Chinese Revolutionary Alliance, Chinese Alliance and United Allegiance Society, was a secret society and underground resistance movement formed when merging many Chinese revolutionary groups together by Sun Yat-sen, Song...
member, was sympathetic with the Guominjun but did not want his province drawn into civil war. He would go on side with Feng during the Northern Expedition and Central Plains War
Central Plains War
Central Plains War was a civil war within the factionalised Kuomintang that broke out in 1930. It was fought between the forces of Chiang Kai-shek and the coalition of three military commanders who had previously allied with Chiang: Yan Xishan, Feng Yuxiang, and Li Zongren...
.
Aftermath
Though jointly occupying Beiping, Zhang and Wu could not agree who should lead the new government. Wu wanted to restore Cao to the presidency, whereas Zhang hinted at restoring the last Manchu Emperor, Pu-yi. In the end, they resorted to a string of short-lived and powerless interim cabinets, but with the Zhili clique decimated, Zhang personally took charge of the government as a dictatorDictator
A dictator is a ruler who assumes sole and absolute power but without hereditary ascension such as an absolute monarch. When other states call the head of state of a particular state a dictator, that state is called a dictatorship...
. Militarily, the war had also caused the Zhili clique to shift their armies northward, leaving their southern flank and industrial base thinly defended against the underestimated armies of the KMT. This would prove crucial when, in July 1926, the KMT launched their Northern Expedition. The remainder of the Guominjun which held out northwest of Beiping would fold into the National Revolutionary Army
National Revolutionary Army
The National Revolutionary Army , pre-1928 sometimes shortened to 革命軍 or Revolutionary Army and between 1928-1947 as 國軍 or National Army was the Military Arm of the Kuomintang from 1925 until 1947, as well as the national army of the Republic of China during the KMT's period of party rule...
when the KMT advanced.