AuthorPeter Man Archives
March 2022
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To understand the truth, one has to dig a little beyond the surface. Rare treasures are buried deep.
Most of us have heard about the Opium Wars, the Taiping Rebellion, the First Sino-Japanese War, and the Boxer Rebellion; these disasters for China occurred during the last half century of the Manchurian Qing dynasty. We have to clarify that the Manchu tribe that ruled China for 268 years under the Qing dynasty was a foreign tribe originally from south Siberia. The Qing’s weakness in its waning years caused many Chinese scholars and military thinkers to consider reformation or revolution to deal with the Western onslaught. The progressive Emperor Guangxu wanted to adopt constitutional monarchy, but the plan was thwarted by the Empress Dowager Cixi. The only other choice left for the Chinese was rebellion and revolution, replacing the Qing dynasty with a Chinese republic. One of the first revolutionaries who took up that stance was Dr. Sun Yat-sen. Dr. Sun was educated in America and adapted the American system with Chinese characteristics for China. A local uprising in 1911 at the city of Wuchang (a part of modern Wuhan) accidentally succeeded and caused widespread rebellion, culminating in the fall of the Qing dynasty in 1912. Dr. Sun however did not have an army, and the republic was quickly hijacked by the military. Thus started the era of the warlords. Dr. Sun had hoped that his republic would be supported by the West, but it was in vain. Western powers in China had enjoyed the privileges and benefits of semi-colonialism, and it was easier for them to continue the partying with the warlords in power. The Chinese warlords were constantly fighting among themselves and triangulating between competing Western powers and Imperial Japan for support. The foreign powers obviously felt that a fragmented China was easier to control and exploit. Without Western support, the revolution led by Dr. Sun failed. During the First World War, the Beijing warlord was considered the legitimate government of China by foreign powers. The Chinese government entered the war on the side of the Allies, and sent 150,000 laborers to the European front-lines. Some of them engaged in dangerous work such as digging trenches. Approximately 10,000 Chinese workers would die for the common cause. Chinese academics were hopeful that after winning the war, China could rid itself of semi-colonialism under Wilson’s Fourteen Points. But at the Paris Peace Conference in early 1919, China did not have a voice, and the previous German colony in Shandong was ceded by the victorious Western powers to Japan. China was the only ally who did not sign the Treaty of Versailles. China was completely on its own. It could not depend on a single ally to stand up and speak righteously about this travesty. This is where it all began. Chinese academics and students were furious. They started a national protest known as the May Fourth Movement. Many of them realized that they could not depend on the good will of the West to gain true independence. Dr. Sun meanwhile gave up on waiting for American support and, with the uncertain backing of a fickle warlord, set up his own government in the province of Guangzhou (old name Canton) in the south. When the Russian Bolsheviks fought a civil war to bring communism to Russia, some Chinese academics became attracted to this new form of political concept which brought about a successful revolution of the common people. Thirteen academics got together in Shanghai and formed the Chinese Communist Party (in the absence of its two founders). Dr. Sun Yat-sen realized that to unify China and to rid itself of semi-colonialism, he needed an army. Dr. Sun received the help of the Soviet Union and he co-operated with the Chinese Communist Party. Many senior members of the CCP were also members and senior executives of Dr. Sun’s Kumintang (Nationalist Party). The two political parties under the leadership of Dr. Sun and with the help of the Soviet Union established the Whampoa Military Academy. The school would churn out most of the military leaders who would defeat the warlords, fight the Japanese, and fight among each other in the Chinese Civil War. Dr. Sun died prematurely. The KMT, the government of the Republic of China, and the Nationalist army came under the control of one person, Chiang Kai-shek. Chiang Kai-shek with the support of the Western powers purged the communists and persecuted them in a period of so-called White Terror. Thus started the Chinese Civil War. Eventually, the Chinese Communist Party won the Civil War. America backed the wrong side, and it would not be the last time. There were a lot of China hands who knew the situation in China but the powers that be in Washington would have none of it. When the soul of America gave rise to Joseph McCarthy, rapprochement between the two countries was hopeless. China went its own way, as if the Americans had never come … until Nixon. According to this story, the original cause of the break between China and the US goes back to Wilson, who sold out his own principles to placate Japanese demands, causing the May Fourth Movement, which was led by one of the Founders of the Chinese Communist Party. The rest, as people say, is history.
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