Modern China's Ethnic Frontiers: A Journey to the West

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Modern China’s Ethnic Frontiers

The purpose of this book is to examine the strategies and practices of the Han Chinese Nationalists vis-à-vis post-Qing dynasty China’s ethnic minorities, as well as to explore the role they played in the formation of contemporary China’s Central Asian frontier territoriality and border security. The Chinese Revolution of 1911, initiated by Sun Yat-sen, liberated the Han Chinese from the rule of the Manchus and ended the Qing dynastic order that had existed for centuries. With the collapse of the Qing dynasty, the Mongols and the Tibetans, who had been dominated by the Manchus, took advantage of the revolution and declared their independence. Under the leadership of Yuan Shikai, the new Chinese Republican government in Peking in turn proclaimed the similar “five-nationality Republic” proposed by the Revolutionaries as a model with which to sustain the deteriorating Qing territorial order. The shifting politics of the multi-ethnic state during the regime transition and the role those politics played in defining the identity of the modern Chinese state were issues that would haunt the new Chinese Republic from its inception to its downfall. Modern China’s Ethnic Frontiers will be of interest to students and scholars of Chinese history, Asian history, and modern history. Hsiao-ting Lin is a Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, US.


Routledge studies in the modern history of Asia

1 The Police in Occupation Japan Control, corruption and resistance to reform Christopher Aldous

8 Religion and Nationalism in India The case of the Punjab Harnik Deol

2 Chinese Workers A new history Jackie Sheehan

9 Japanese Industrialisation Historical and cultural perspectives Ian Inkster

3 The Aftermath of Partition in South Asia Tai Yong Tan and Gyanesh Kudaisya

10 War and Nationalism in China 1925–1945 Hans J. van de Ven

4 The Australia–Japan Political Alignment 1952 to the present Alan Rix 5 Japan and Singapore in the World Economy Japan’s economic advance into Singapore, 1870–1965 Shimizu Hiroshi and Hirakawa Hitoshi 6 The Triads as Business Yiu Kong Chu 7 Contemporary Taiwanese Cultural Nationalism A-chin Hsiau

11 Hong Kong in Transition One country, two systems Edited by Robert Ash, Peter Ferdinand, Brian Hook and Robin Porter 12 Japan’s Postwar Economic Recovery and Anglo-Japanese Relations, 1948–1962 Noriko Yokoi 13 Japanese Army Stragglers and Memories of the War in Japan, 1950–1975 Beatrice Trefalt 14 Ending the Vietnam War The Vietnamese communists’ perspective Ang Cheng Guan


15 The Development of the Japanese Nursing Profession Adopting and adapting Western influences Aya Takahashi

24 The Internment of Western Civilians under the Japanese, 1941–1945 A patchwork of internment Bernice Archer

16 Women’s Suffrage in Asia Gender nationalism and democracy Louise Edwards and Mina Roces

25 The British Empire and Tibet 1900–1922 Wendy Palace

17 The Anglo-Japanese Alliance, 1902–1922 Phillips Payson O’Brien 18 The United States and Cambodia, 1870–1969 From curiosity to confrontation Kenton Clymer 19 Capitalist Restructuring and the Pacific Rim Ravi Arvind Palat 20 The United States and Cambodia, 1969–2000 A troubled relationship Kenton Clymer 21 British Business in Post-Colonial Malaysia, 1957–70 “Neo-colonialism” or “disengagement?” Nicholas J. White 22 The Rise and Decline of Thai Absolutism Kullada Kesboonchoo Mead 23 Russian Views of Japan, 1792–1913 An anthology of travel writing David N. Wells

26 Nationalism in Southeast Asia If the people are with us Nicholas Tarling 27 Women, Work and the Japanese Economic Miracle The case of the cotton textile industry, 1945–1975 Helen Macnaughtan 28 A Colonial Economy in Crisis Burma’s rice cultivators and the world depression of the 1930s Ian Brown 29 A Vietnamese Royal Exile in Japan Prince Cuong De (1882–1951) Tran My-Van 30 Corruption and Good Governance in Asia Nicholas Tarling 31 US–China Cold War Collaboration, 1971–1989 S. Mahmud Ali 32 Rural Economic Development in Japan From the nineteenth century to the Pacific War Penelope Francks 33 Colonial Armies in Southeast Asia Edited by Karl Hack and Tobias Rettig


34 Intra Asian Trade and the World Market A.J.H. Latham and Heita Kawakatsu 35 Japanese–German Relations, 1895–1945 War, diplomacy and public opinion Edited by Christian W. Spang and Rolf-Harald Wippich 36 Britain’s Imperial Cornerstone in China The Chinese maritime customs service, 1854–1949 Donna Brunero 37 Colonial Cambodia’s “Bad Frenchmen” The rise of French rule and the life of Thomas Caraman, 1840–1887 Gregor Muller 38 Japanese–American Civilian Prisoner Exchanges and Detention Camps, 1941–45 Bruce Elleman 39 Regionalism in Southeast Asia Nicholas Tarling 40 Changing Visions of East Asia, 1943–93 Transformations and continuities R.B. Smith edited by Chad J. Mitcham 41 Christian Heretics in Late Imperial China Christian inculturation and state control, 1720–1850 Lars P. Laamann 42 Beijing – A Concise History Stephen G. Haw

43 The Impact of the Russo- Japanese War Edited by Rotem Kowner 44 Business–Government Relations in Prewar Japan Peter von Staden 45 India’s Princely States People, princes and colonialism Edited by Waltraud Ernst and Biswamoy Pati 46 Rethinking Gandhi and Nonviolent Relationality Global perspectives Edited by Debjani Ganguly and John Docker 47 The Quest for Gentility in China Negotiations beyond gender and class Edited by Daria Berg and Chloë Starr 48 Forgotten Captives in Japanese Occupied Asia Edited by Kevin Blackburn and Karl Hack 49 Japanese Diplomacy in the 1950s From isolation to integration Edited by Iokibe Makoto, Caroline Rose, Tomaru Junko and John Weste 50 The Limits of British Colonial Control in South Asia Spaces of disorder in the Indian Ocean region Edited by Ashwini Tambe and Harald Fischer-Tiné


51 On the Borders of State Power Frontiers in the greater Mekong sub-region Edited by Martin Gainsborough

60 Southeast Asia and the Great Powers Nicholas Tarling

52 Pre-Communist Indochina R.B. Smith edited by Beryl Williams

61 The Cold War and National Assertion in Southeast Asia Britain, the United States and Burma, 1948–1962 Matthew Foley

53 Communist Indochina R.B. Smith edited by Beryl Williams 54 Port Cities in Asia and Europe Edited by Arndt Graf and Chua Beng Huat 55 Moscow and the Emergence of Communist Power in China, 1925–30 The Nanchang Rising and the birth of the Red Army Bruce A. Elleman 56 Colonialism, Violence and Muslims in Southeast Asia The Maria Hertogh controversy and its aftermath Syed Muhd Khairudin Aljunied 57 Japanese and Hong Kong Film Industries Understanding the origins of East Asian film networks Kinnia Shuk-ting 58 Provincial Life and the Military in Imperial Japan The phantom samurai Stewart Lone 59 Southeast Asia and the Vietnam War Ang Cheng Guan

62 The International History of East Asia, 1900–1968 Trade, ideology and the quest for order Edited by Antony Best 63 Journalism and Politics in Indonesia A critical biography of Mochtar Lubis (1922–2004) as editor and author David T. Hill 64 Atrocity and American Military Justice in Southeast Asia Trial by army Louise Barnett 65 The Japanese Occupation of Borneo, 1941–1945 Ooi Keat Gin 66 National Pasts in Europe and East Asia P.W. Preston 67 Modern China’s Ethnic Frontiers A journey to the west Hsiao-ting Lin



Modern China’s Ethnic Frontiers

A journey to the west

Hsiao-ting Lin


First published 2011 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 270 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2010. To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk. © 2011 Hsiao-ting Lin The right of Hsiao-ting Lin to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patent Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Lin, Hsiao-ting. Modern China’s ethnic frontiers: a journey to the west / Hsiao-ting Lin. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Minorities–China, Northwest–History–20th century. 2. Minorities– Government policy–China, Northwest–History–20th century. 3. China, Northwest–Ethnic relations–History. 4. China–History–Republic, 1912–1949. 5. China–Boundaries–Asia, Central. I. Title. DS730.L5475 2010 305.80095196–dc22 2010007403 ISBN 0-203-84497-1 Master e-book ISBN

ISBN13: 978-0-415-58264-3 (hbk) ISBN13: 978-0-203-84497-7 (ebk)


Contents

List of illustrations Preface Acknowledgments List of acronyms and abbreviations Prologue

1 Early years and early strategies

x xii xv xvii xxi 1

2 Frontier politics in metropolitan China

17

3 In search of a new territorial base

34

4 War and new frontier designs

54

5 War and opportunities

73

6 Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality

93

Epilogue Glossary of names and terms Notes Bibliography Index

113 124 129 169 186


Illustrations

Figures 2.1 The closing ceremony of the Mongolian Affairs Conference, June 1930 2.2 The Panchen Lama receiving his devout followers in Qinghai, c.1937 2.3 Inner Mongols prostrated in front of the Panchen Lama’s field headquarters at Bailingmiao, c.1933 2.4 The first batch of ethnic minority students from Xinjiang to study in Nanking, c.1934 3.1 Luo Wen’gan met with the newly reformed Xinjiang provincial leaders in Urumqi, September 1933 3.2 The welcome ceremony held at Ili by Zhang Peiyuan for Luo Wen’gan, September 1933 3.3 Huang Shaohong meeting with Inner Mongol nobles at Bailingmiao as an effort to prevent the Mongols from tilting toward Japan, November 1933 3.4 T.V. Soong in Xi’an, where he was greeted by Shaanxi Governor Yang Hucheng and a group of local citizens, April 1934 3.5 T.V. Soong visited a mosque in Xining, Qinghai, May 1934 3.6 Bailingmiao, c.1933, the base of the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Movement in the 1930s 4.1 Prince Demchugdongrob (De Wang) reviewing his military band at Kalgan, where the Japanese-sponsored “Mongolian Federated Autonomous Government” was headquartered, c.1938 4.2 Sheng Shicai, the Soviet Consul-General in Urumqi Garegin Apresov, and Nationalist Minister of Education Chen Lifu in Urumqi, October 1937 4.3 The Labrang Tibetans in Chongqing, where they were treated with great pomp and courtesy, February 1940 4.4 Anti-Japanese Muslim guerrillas in Northwest China, c.1939

22 30 30 32 42 42 44 46 47 48

55 57 62 66


Illustrations xi 5.1 The KMT party headquarters holding its political activities in Urumqi, c.1942 5.2 A street view of Wuwei, an important oasis in Gansu Corridor, before Chiang Kai-shek’s inspection, August 1942 5.3 Chiang Kai-shek met with Ma Bufang and Ma Buqing at his temporary residence in Xining, August 1942 5.4 Chiang Kai-shek, Ma Hongkui and Ma Hongbin in Ningxia, August 1942 5.5 British Consulate General at Kashgar

74 77 78 79 89

Maps Map 1 Nationalist China in the 1930s Map 2 China’s western frontiers

xix xx


Preface

Modern China’s Ethnic Frontiers: A Journey to the West is meant to be a companion to my earlier book, Tibet and Nationalist China’s Frontier: Intrigues and Ethnopolitics, 1928–49. In my first book, I examined China’s policy toward Tibet during the Nationalist era (1928–49). I argued that modern China’s Tibetan frontier was neither the subject of concerted aggression by a centralized and indoctrinated Chinese Nationalist government, nor of an ideologically driven nationalist ethnopolitics. Instead, modern China’s sovereignty claim over Tibet was much more the result of rhetorical grandstanding by the Nationalists than a definite plan to exert direct control over the region. My first book also delineates how, during the divisive and chaotic Nationalist period, Chinese ethnic territoriality continued to change from a traditional empire to a modern nation-state, often in unexpected and inadvertent ways. This book further undertakes an important enquiry into the making of modern China’s frontier territoriality and the nature of Nationalist ethnic frontiers from a fresh and broader perspective. It was stimulated, to a large extent, by a reviewer of Tibet and Nationalist China’s Frontier who remarked that I should further stretch the focus from Tibet to modern China’s other Inner Asian ethnic borderlands that were inherited from the Qing imperial house and the Peking-based Republican government by the originally localized, power-restrained Chinese Nationalist regime. In conclusion, this review article strongly suggested I re- examine the nature of the Nationalist frontier and ethnic politics as well as its impact on the formation of post-1949 contemporary China’s border security and ethnic territoriality. To a considerable degree, this new research is also stimulated by a series of political unrests in China’s ethnic frontiers in recent years. One still remembers the ethnic minorities’ anti-government riots in Lhasa and Khotan before the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, the abortive attempt by the Muslim Uighurs to crash a domestic airplane flying between Urumqi and Beijing around the same time, and the Uighur–Han ethnic confrontations in Urumqi and other oasis cities in Xinjiang in 2009. These incidents strongly indicate that governing China’s far-flung ethnic borderlands has been, and will continue to be, a haunting challenge to the leaders of the People’s Republic of China. Modern China’s Ethnic Frontiers is therefore both an extension to my previous book and a response to a timely and


Preface xiii important research topic which has been, and continues to be, one of present-day China’s most pressing issues. There has been an explosion of history-writing in the recent decade. Volumes exploring modern Chinese ethnic frontiers and minority histories of varying geographical scope and subject matters are to be found on the shelves of bookshops everywhere, together with histories of every other time and place. With little doubt, the issues relating to China’s complicated ethnicity and ethnopolitics, from the Qing imperial period to the early People’s Republic, have become a trendy focus in recent scholarships. Among recent literature, some are intended for an academic audience, some cover only limited periods of time and space, some focus on particular non-Han ethnic characters, and still some are based entirely on Western or secondary Chinese sources. In this book my purpose has been to try to provide for both specialists and general readers, a concise, overall picture of modern China’s frontier and ethnic politics from the late Qing of the 1900s to the People’s Republic in the early 1950s, during which period the Han- Chinese Nationalists were the main players of post-imperial China’s politics. My aim has been to counter the over-simplified and stereotyped notion that, when it comes to ethnic territorial disposition, the Nationalists and their regime, indoctrinated under the leadership of Sun Yat-sen and Chiang Kai-shek, were revolutionary and ideologically oriented, and had perennially resorted to nationalism to restore post-Qing China’s sovereignty over frontier territories and ethnic peoples. I would say that it is not the intention of this book to focus on a specific incident or event as a case study to demonstrate how the Nationalists dealt with China’s ethnic-frontier issues according to the aforementioned assumption. Rather, I try to illuminate what best characterizes modern China’s ethnic frontiers and politics. By providing a broad and clear view of how modern China’s ethnic frontiers and orders has slowly evolved, this research elucidates the main factors leading to the Nationalist presence in the defunct Qing Empire’s territorial reaches in western frontiers, where the post-1949 Chinese Communists substantiated their authority within a relatively short span of time. To a large extent, this process of Nationalist power stretch into non-Han ethnic peripheries was closely related to how the modern Chinese state was defined or re-defined, and how post-imperial Chinese ethnic frontier politics was exploited by the Nationalists as a way to fulfill their goals of state-building and regime consolidation. This book is perhaps one of the very first English-language studies to provide a comprehensive survey of the development and evolution of Chinese Nationalist frontier and ethnopolitical practice. I hope it will fill an important lacuna in the historical scholarship on modern China which has tended to focus on the frontier ethnopolitics of the Qing Empire and the Chinese Communists while missing the important bridging role played by the Chinese Nationalists and their regime. This research has benefited substantially from the release of new modern Chinese source materials in recent years. With the availability of Nationalist Chinese official documents, private papers and diaries of top Nationalist leaders


xiv Preface like Chiang Kai-shek and T.V. Soong, a reassessment of modern China’s history has not only become a possibility, but also a necessity. Having access to these new materials not only helps us obtain a more balanced perception toward the Nationalists and the Chinese politics of their time, but also allows us to realize how these leaders conceptualized a China which they endeavored to administer. Without a doubt, one important, thorny, and yet unavoidable agenda confronting these Nationalist leaders was post-imperial China’s ethnic frontier and minority issues, and China’s transformation from a multi-ethnic empire to a nation-state that had brought about these issues. In short, this book scrutinizes practices and policy-choices of Nationalist China’s frontier territorial agenda. Readers may discover that I have sought to de-construct and de-ideologize the Nationalists’ strategies to substantiate their authority in peripheral China, and tried to demonstrate that the making of modern China’s central authority in the Inner Asian frontiers was closely related to the external and domestic factors that had threatened the security and survival of the originally localized Nationalist regime. Seeing this historical phenomenon as a display of “opportunistic nationalism” or “pragmatic nationalism” on China’s ethnic frontiers, I argue that this power-furtherance process in China’s traditional peripheries was more the result of political reluctance, incidentals, and inevitability on the part of the Nationalists than the deliberately orchestrated ethnopolitics predominated by their revolutionary ideologies. The rationale behind this process, as I will show in this book, was mainly regime survival and security. The exploration of this topic, I hope, will offer a sweeping reappraisal of modern Chinese nationalism in the context of the central regime’s opportunistic and pragmatic practices to cope with complex and delicate ethnic territorial issues. It is also my wish that readers will find this work exciting, discovering that what emerges from it is a new understanding of the Nationalists’ flexibility and strategic policy toward China’s far-flung ethnic frontiers. Concerning the Romanization of this work, most of the Chinese personal and place names are given in pinyin. Because of their familiarity to readers, however, some historical Wade-Giles names, such as Sun Yat-sen, Chiang Kai-shek, Nanking, and Peking, are retained.


Acknowledgments

My greatest debt of gratitude is first reserved for my colleagues at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. Director John Raisian has endeavored to make Hoover a highly stimulating place for academic pursuit and excellence. This research could not have been done without his wise and capable leadership. I owe a great deal of appreciation to Richard Sousa, senior associate director and director of the Hoover Library and Archives, who renders tremendous support and encouragement both to my research and curatorial work. Deputy Director David Brady always has a caring heart to my research work, providing me with fresh insights into issues both within and outside the China study field. Ramon Myers and Tai-chun Kuo, my mentors, colleagues, and friends, who first brought me to Hoover and opened a new door for my academic pursuit on the other end of the Atlantic. My deep thanks also go to Bradley Bauer, Linda Bernard, Larry Diamond, Claudia Hubbard, Stephen Langlois, Carol Leadenham, Lea Limgenco, Mandy MacCalla, Jorge Machado, Lisa Miller, Lisa H. Nguyen, William Ratliff, Anatol Shmelev, Maciej Siekierski, Nicholas Siekierski, Shirley Soong, Celeste Szeto, Issayas Tesfamariam, Paul Thomas, Deborah Ventura, E. Ann Wood, and Jialin Zhang, for their intellectual partnership, company, and friendship. The manuscript has been read, in whole or in part, by the following scholars. I want to express my deepest appreciation for their insightful comments, criticism and suggestions: Chi Hsi-sheng, Federica Ferlanti, Kobayashi Ryosuke, James Leibold, Laura J. Newby, So Wai Chor, Paul H. Tai, and Peter Chen-main Wang. Of the many others whose myriad assistance is discernible in my book, I would like to mention the following by name: Brad Burge, Cindy Chan, Ming K. Chan, Chang Chi-hsiung, Chang Jui-te, Chang Li, Chen Yung-fa, Chu Hung- yuan, Amy B. Desai, Duan Ruicong, Emily Hill, Ho Szu-yin, Max Ko-wu Huang, Huang Tzu-chin, Huang Wende, Edward Ingram, Kawashima Shin, Li Yu-chuan, Lin Hsin-yi, Liu Wei-kai, Lu Fang-shang, Luo Min, Ma Zhendu, Abbas Milani, Rana Mitter, Thomas Mullaney, Shih Chih-yu, Michael Sullivan, Tang Chi-hua, Yangdhon, Yoshida Toyoko, Yudru Tsomu, Hans J. Van de Ven, Wang Hsien-chun, Wang Wen-lung, Wu Che, Wu Jingping, Wu Sufeng, Yang Tianshi, Yiu Yi-wen, and Eric Chen-hua Yu. Special thanks also go to Francois and Charlotte de Blois of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland,


xvi Acknowledgments for their encouragement and assistance during my research. Any errors and flaws, of course, are entirely my own. Several of these chapters have been read in some preliminary form at conferences and workshops, and I am grateful to the following hosts for the opportunity for discussion and debate: Chinese Institute, Oxford University; Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica (Taiwan); Institute of Modern History, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (Beijing); and the History Departments at National Chengchi University, Tunghai University, and Fu Jen Catholic University in Taiwan. Portions of Chapter 6 and the Epilogue first appeared in a different form as “From Rimland to Heartland: Nationalist China’s Geopolitics and Ethnopolitics in Central Asia, 1937–1952” in International History Review, vol. 30, no. 1 (March 2008), pp. 52–75. I acknowledge the journal’s permission to use these materials in my book with great gratitude. I want to express my deep appreciation to the staff at the Routledge, especially my acquisition editors Stephanie Rogers and Leanne Hinves, who went out of their way to help me prepare the manuscript for publication in an extraordinarily efficient fashion. My gratitude also goes to the two anonymous readers for their useful comments and suggestions. I am grateful to the Chiang Ching-Kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange (United States), who generously awarded me a junior research grant to facilitate the completion of this book. I am also thankful to Michael Feng, Shao Minghuang, the Kuomintang Party Archives (Taiwan), and the Shanxi People’s Press (China) for granting me permission to reproduce some photographs in this book. Finally, my greatest debt is to my family. To my parents Lin Wen-huei and Kuo Pei-hua, who, in addition to fostering me with their love and affection, guided me toward a life as an academic. To my wife Hai-lei; without her understanding, companionship and love, this project could have never been accomplished. To Ian and Ethan for their hugs, smiles and kisses; my life has been fondly enriched because of them.


Acronyms and abbreviations

AAH AKMT AMFA-1 AMFA-2 ANG ASNDC CB CKSD FO FRUS GW/BW

GW/DZ

GW/ZJ

KMT MTAC OIOC

Guoshiguan Dang’an (Archives of the Academia Historica) Guomindang Dangshihui Dang’an (Archives of the Kuomintang Historical Committee) Waijiaobu Dang’an (Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; deposited in the Academia Historica, Taipei) Waijiaobu Dang’an (Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; deposited in the Institute of Modern History Archives, Academia Sinica, Taipei) Guomin Zhengfu Dang’an (Archives of the Nationalist government) Guofang Zuigao Weiyuanhui Dang’an (Archives of the Supreme National Defense Council) Jiang Zhongzheng Zongtong Dang’an: Choubi (President Chiang Kai-shek Collections: Plans and Directives) Chiang Kai-shek Diaries (Hoover Institution Archives, Stanford University, California) Foreign Office (United Kingdom) Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers Jiang Zhongzheng Zongtong Dang’an: Geming Wenxian/Kanluan Shiqi/Zhengzhi-Bianwu (President Chiang Kai-shek Collections: Revolutionary documents/Rebellion suppressing/Politics: Frontier Affairs) Jiang Zhongzheng Zongtong Dang’an: Geming Wenxian/Kangzhan Fanlue: Dihou Zuozhan (President Chiang Kai-shek Collections: Revolutionary documents/General plans for the War of Resistance: Operations behind the Enemy Lines) Jiang Zhongzheng Zongtong Dang’an: Geming Wenxian/Kangzhan Fanlue: Zhengjun (President Chiang Kai-shek Collections: Revolutionary documents/General plans for the War of Resistance: Consolidation of the Army) Kuomintang (Nationalist Party) Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission (the Nationalist government) Oriental and India Office Collections (United Kingdom)


xviii Acronyms and abbreviations PRC People’s Republic of China SNDC Supreme National Defense Council (the Nationalist government) TD/JMBZ Jiang Zhongzheng Zongtong Dang’an: Tejiao Dang’an/Junshi/ Jin-Ma ji Bianqu Zuozhan (Specially submitted archives/Military/ Operations in Kinmen, Matsu, and Border Regions) TD/MB Jiang Zhongzheng Zongtong Dang’an: Tejiao Dang’an/Zhengzhi/ Menggu Bianqing (President Chiang Kai-shek Collections: Specially submitted archives/Politics/Mongolian Border Situation) TD/YB Jiang Zhongzheng Zongtong Dang’an: Tejiao Dang’an/Zhengzhi/ Yiban Bianzheng (President Chiang Kai-shek Collections: Specially submitted archives/Politics/General Frontier Politics) TD/XW Jiang Zhongzheng Zongtong Dang’an: Tejiao Dang’an/Zhengzhi/ Xizang Wenti (President Chiang Kai-shek Collections: Specially submitted archives/Politics/Tibetan Issues) TD/XinW Jiang Zhongzheng Zongtong Dang’an: Tejiao Dang’an/Zhengzhi/ Xinjiang Wenti (President Chiang Kai-shek Collections: Specially submitted archives/Politics/Xinjiang Issues) TW Jiang Zhongzheng Zongtong Dang’an: Tejiao Wendian/Lingxiu Shigong/Jiji Zhibian (President Chiang Kai-shek Collections: Specially submitted dispatches/Leader’s Deeds/Frontier Endeavors) USDS Records of the Department of State relating to Internal Affairs of China (microfilm series) USFR United States National Archives, State Department Archives USMIR United States Military Intelligence Report, China, 1911–1941 (microfilm) Waijiaobu Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Nationalist government) WO War Office records (United Kingdom) YXSP Yan Xishan Dang’an (Yan Xishan papers) YXZG Yuan Yilai Xizang Difang yu Zhongyang Zhengfu Guanxi Dang’an Shiliao Huibian (collection of historical materials from the archives on the relationship between the Tibetan area and the central government since the Yuan) ZJSYZ Zongtong Jianggong Sixiang Yanlun Zongji (General collections of President Chiang Kai-shek’s thoughts and speeches) ZMDZH Zhonghua Minguoshi Dang’an Ziliao Huibian (compendium of historical materials on the Republic of China) ZZSC Zhonghua Minguo Zhongyao Shiliao Chubian─Dui Ri Kangzhan Shiqi (First selection of historical materials on the Republic of China – the period of the war against Japan)

HEILONGJIANG Ulan Bator (Urga)

lli


Bartak Bogdo Urumqi

Yarkand

Ape Pass

Harbin JILIN

OUTER MONGOLIA (MONGOLIAN PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC)

XINJIANG

Peking HEBEI

Hunza

SHANXI Xining QINGHAI TIBET Lhasa

XIKANG

Lanzhou SHAANXI Xi’an

200 miles

0

200 kilometers

Kunming Longling YUNNAN

SHANDONG

Wuhan

GUIZHOU

Dairen

Tianjin

ZHEJIANG

Nanchang Changsha JIANGXI HUNAN FUJIAN

GUANGXI

GUANGDONG Canton Hong Kong South China Sea

Map 1 Nationalist China in the 1930s.

Yellow Sea

JIANGSU Luoyang Nanking HENAN ANHUI Shanghai

SICHUAN Chengdu Chongqing

0

REHE Mukden Chengde LIAONING

CHAHAR

SUIYUAN

NINGXIA

GANSU

Vladivostok

East China Sea

Taipei

0

200 miles

0

200 kilometers

Ulan Bator (Urga)

OUTER MONGOLIA (MONGOLIAN PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC)

Urumqi 18

2

8 19

17

15

9

SUIYUAN

NINGXIA

GANSU

Tianjin

HEBEI

7

Lake Kokonor

QINGHAI

6 Xining 5

SHANXI

JIAN

SHAANXI

HENAN

Xi’an

TIBET

10 11

XIKANG

Lhasa

12

SHANDONG

Lanzhou 1

HUBEI

SICHUAN Chengdu

3 4

Tianshui Turfan Hami Kashgar

5 6 7 8

Labrang Yinchuan Alashaa Ejine

Map 2 China’s western frontiers.

9 10 11 12

Yumen Nagchuka Chamdo Dartsedo

N

Wuhan

Z

Chongqing

Nanchang

JIANGXI

g

2

ANHUI

Yangtze R

GUIZHOU 1

L

Peking

Yell ow R

16

Chengde 14

XINJIANG

Yarkand

REHE

CHAHAR

3

Mekon


lli

4

HEILON

13

13 14 15 16

Kiakhta Bailingmiao Khotan Tashkurghan

HUNAN 17 18 19

FUJI

Keriya Aksu Dunghuang


Prologue

On February 29, 1952, Chiang Kai-shek received a top-secret proposal. A few weeks before, Taipei had received a confidential report from Nationalist spies in Communist-controlled China reporting that they had established contacts with a number of influential ethnic minority leaders along China’s Central Asian border regions. According to the report, these ethnic minority leaders shared Chiang’s animosity towards the Chinese Communists and wished to reestablish the amic able relationship they had shared with the Nationalists before 1949. The leaders were prepared to join forces with the Taiwan-based Nationalist regime and launch a guerilla war against the Communists on the mainland. Those who were willing to cooperate included Huang Zhengqing, the former leader of the Labrang Tibetans in southern Gansu; Ma Yuanxiang, a Tungan Muslim general with blood ties to the renowned Ma Muslim family in Chinese Central Asia; Palgonchrinle, a Golok native-chieftain (tusi) from the Sichuan–Qinghai border; and Su Yonghe, a Khampa native-chieftain from Nagchuka on the Qinghai– Tibetan border. According to Nationalist intelligence reports, these leaders altogether commanded about 80,000 irregulars. Once well armed and equipped, Taipei estimated that the new force would establish a base of military operations in China’s western borderlands, thus facilitating what Taipei expected would be a protracted war against the Communists. Chiang’s military advisors were convinced that these new military resources, although scattered and still ill-trained, would be of considerable value to their effort to recapture the Chinese mainland, and therefore convinced Chiang to accept the minority leaders’ support.1 This acceptance was by no means an isolated event, as the exiled Nationalists continued to accept and even to seek out the aid of ethnic minority groups. By mid-1952, two and a half years after their retreat to the island of Taiwan, Chiang Kai-shek and his Nationalist remnants were still optimistic about the possibility of a renewed military effort that would carry them back to the Chinese mainland. With the outbreak of the Korean War in June 1950, the Nationalists took advantage of the rapidly changing international scenario in East Asia to urge the Truman administration to render more military and diplomatic support so as to transform Taiwan into a solid anti-Communist base. After the US Seventh Fleet arrived in the Taiwan Strait in the summer of 1950, thus securing their position on the island, the Nationalists actively and energetically tried to revitalize their


xxii Prologue former connections with non-Han ethnic minority leaders in China’s Central Asian borderlands, whose forces continued to be a major target of the Chinese Communists.2 By 1952, with coastal China now under total Communist control, the far-flung ethnic borderlands in the west and its large minority population became central to the island-based Nationalists’ plan to solicit local support and establish military bases against the entrenched Communists. It was within this strategic and political framework that in May 1952 Chiang’s secret agents contacted Ma Liang, who commanded 2,000 guerrillas on the Gansu–Qinghai border. Ma, a distant relative of Ma Bufang, the former Nationalist governor of Qinghai, willingly accepted his appointment as commander-inchief of the 103rd Route of the Nationalist Army. He sent his confidants to Nagchuka, where they awaited airdrops from the CIA-operated Western Enterprises, Inc. containing munitions, wireless radio equipment, and 150 taels of gold bars. This secret operation was conducted as part of Taipei’s broader goals, which also included the recruitment of several reputed Tibetan Buddhist prelates who had fled to Taiwan following the Communist takeover in 1949. The new allies, including the Janggiya Hutuktu and the Kanjurwa Hutuktu, were asked to generate propaganda intended to encourage their erstwhile ethnic minority followers in Inner Mongolia, Qinghai and Xikang to rise against the Communists.3 In the first months of 1952, the Nationalists’ underground activities in China’s western frontiers had become so effective that at one point the majority of intelligence information came from officials as high in the Communist hierarchy as Marshal Yang Yong, then the Communist chairman of Guizhou Province and commander of the Air Force in the Communist Southwest Military Region. Jeremy Brown’s new research has demonstrated that, in the early 1950s, Communist control over Guizhou remained extremely tenuous.4 In April 1952, as illuminated by recently declassified Chinese archival materials, Yang was approached by Nationalist secret agents and allegedly expressed his willingness to defect to Chiang Kai-shek. Yang surreptitiously accepted Taipei’s titular appointment as commander-in-chief of the fictitious Southwestern Anti- Communist National Salvation Army. Yang also promised to act in coordination with Taipei once Nationalist forces had established a position in southwest China. In return for his cooperation, Yang requested that Chiang grant him the same venerable position as that of Communist veteran Marshal Liu Bocheng if the Nationalists returned to power in China.5 Brown’s research also indicates that, at this juncture, a force of 8,000 Nationalist guerrillas remained intact in the Sichuan–Yunnan–Guizhou border region, where they continued to receive instructions from Taipei.6

The Nationalists and modern China’s ethnopolitics In the early 1950s, despite the Nationalists’ expulsion from the mainland as a result of the civil war, Nationalist influence in China’s remote Central Asian frontiers persisted. By reviving its former ties with ethnic minority communities in China’s western borderlands, the exiled Nationalist regime in Taiwan endeav-


Prologue xxiii ored to transform its sporadic and disparate political and military resources in the borderlands into a coherent force for pushing back the Communists. Despite the ultimate failure of the Nationalists to return to the mainland, their efforts to harness the social and military capital of China’s ethnic minorities nevertheless give rise to deeper questions about modern China’s frontier ethnopolitics and border security, an important research field that has attracted considerable scholarly attention in recent years.7 Looking back upon the rise and fall of the Chinese Nationalists over the first half of the twentieth century, it is clear that to unify the vast and diverse Chinese territory was going to be a difficult journey for the Nationalists. Growing from a power-constrained localized regime in the mid- 1910s to a consolidated government in the mid-1940s, the Nationalists managed to push their authority deep into the Central Asian territories. Here, the military, political, and ideological legacies left by the Nationalists when they fled the Communist juggernaut ultimately put them in a position to establish valuable bases of operation despite their exile. Among the questions begged by this short history are: How did the Nationalists make their presence in Central Asia in a relatively short period of time? What were the strategies and circumstances that enabled the Nationalists to establish lasting military, political, and ideological legacies in Central Asia? In recent years, newly available Chinese historical source materials, especially the previously classified official documents and the personal diaries of Chiang Kai- shek, as well as the Kuomintang party archives, provide a solid base for answering these uneasy questions and constructing, or “reconstructing,” a sober picture of Nationalist Chinese frontier ethnopolitics. Without first carefully interpreting various ethnic and frontier events using these recently declassified Chinese historical materials, any attempt to theorize or generalize Nationalist China’s ethnic and frontier politics can only be deemed too superficial and immature. Thanks to new archival materials, now we learn that whether they were based in Canton (as in the 1920s), Nanking (from 1928–37 and again from 1946–9), Chongqing (from 1938–45), or in Taipei (after 1950), the Nationalists perennially treated the security of their regime as their top priority. It has now become clear that Nationalist China’s centrality of focus on regime security was fundamentally linked to their outwardly uncompromising stance with respect to ethnic frontier and territorial issues. The following chapters are intended to illustrate that when the Nationalists were threatened, both from within and from without, China’s expansive and diverse ethnic frontiers provided them with geographical as well as political room to maneuver. In other words, Nationalist China’s ethnopolitics and the extension of Nationalist authority into modern China’s inner frontiers were not motivated merely by blind ideology; rather, they were linked to specific pragmatic concerns tied to considerations of regime consolidation and security. This book examines the strategies and practices of the Chinese Nationalists vis-à-vis post-Qing China’s ethnic minorities, as well as to explore the role they played in the formation of contemporary China’s ethnic frontier territoriality and border security. The Chinese Revolution of 1911, initiated by Sun Yat-sen,


xxiv Prologue liberated the Han Chinese from the rule of the Manchus and ended the Qing imperial order that had existed for centuries. With the collapse of Qing rule, the Mongols and the Tibetans, who had been dominated by the Manchus, took advantage of the revolution and declared their independence. Under the leadership of Yuan Shikai, the new Chinese Republican government in Peking in turn proclaimed the similar “five-nationality Republic” proposed by the Revolutionaries as a model with which to sustain the deteriorating Qing territorial order. The shifting politics of the multi-ethnic state during the regime transition and the role those politics played in defining the identity of the modern Chinese state were issues that would haunt the new Chinese Republic from its inception to its downfall. The process of establishing modern China’s frontier territoriality has deep roots going back to the Qing dynasty’s empire-building in the latter half of the nineteenth century as well as to the conquest-dominated eighteenth century, when the Manchus first established control over Central Asia.8 It was believed that the Manchu emperor embodied the universal value of the “mandate of heaven” and that it was his role to distribute its benefit to those below him. The Qing dynasty ruled neighboring territories through the tribute system, which can be described as a two-leveled “Sinicized empire” consisting of the directly- ruled China proper and the nominally ruled tributary states. The Manchu court directly succeeded the Sino-centric Ming Empire (1368–1644) in China proper, but like the Mongol Yuan (1279–1368) succeeded in achieving hegemony over Inner Asia, where they placed the Mongols, the Muslims (including the Uighurs and Kazakhs), and the Tibetans under the new category of vassals (fanbu). The defunct Ming dynasty’s six boards had been designed to exercise its direct rule over China proper and nominal rule over the tributary states, while the Court of Colonial Affairs (Lifanyuan) was established to regulate the vassals indirectly.9 As a result, the Manchus ruled the majority Han Chinese people in the relatively Sinicized China proper while controlling the Mongolian, Muslim and Tibetan vassals separately through the multi-leveled imperial leverages and mechanisms.10 Thus, the Qing dynasty was in reality a dual dynasty comprised of the Sinic empire and the steppe empire – much like their Mongol predecessors. During Qing rule, national boundaries did not exist in expansive Central Asia, and the line between domestic and foreign issues was often blurred.11 However, in the modern era, this geopolitical ambiguity was gradually replaced by a “horizontal” world order constituted by plural and equal sovereign states. National boundaries were drawn throughout Asia, a change which put geographical limits on the extent of Chinese influence while at the same time reducing the global concept of China as a nebulous and powerful political force to one of a defined political entity at the same level as that of its neighbors. Understanding the significance of the changes, in the mid-1880s the Qing court created the new province of Xinjiang in Central Asia both to prevent Western and Tsarist incursion and to reinforce its administration in the area. Under what they called the “New Policy” (xinzheng), the Manchus also opened up the Manchurian, Mongolian


Prologue xxv and Kham–Tibetan borderlands to Han migration, leading to the gradual Sinicization of the regions. In the last days of Qing rule, as the ailing court in Peking struggled to reorganize itself into a nation-state and to preserve its far-flung territories from the pressure of the Western horizontal state system, the essentially dual Manchu Empire was already falling into the hands of Han Chinese. Partly as a result of this new ethnic power balance, the Mongolian and Tibetan independence movements began even before the Qing imperial household officially abdicated in February 1912. The Chinese revolutionary movement was largely derived from the rise of a new consciousness of race (zhongzu) among the Han people as opposed to growing out of dissatisfaction with existing state apparatus or social organizations.12 When Sun Yat-sen established the Revive China Society (Xingzhonghui) in 1894, one of his main purposes was to exclude the Manchus and to return China to the Han Chinese. Although Sun later denied that his goal was racial retaliation, nationalistic resentment, hostility, and revenge by the Han Chinese against the Manchus figured prominently in Sun’s revolutionary propaganda. There was no shortage of arguments by Sun’s early revolutionary adherents that the dying Qing’s New Policy was in fact only an attempt to prolong and reinforce the Manchu rule, thus justifying the right of the Han people to establish their own republic. As a corollary, the early Revolutionaries strongly advocated that the Han Chinese “race” or “nationality,” an imaginary identity based on nonexistent biological continuity, should be free from the imperial governance of the Manchu “race.” By establishing a new Han Chinese-based nation-state, the Qing world order would be toppled and the new Chinese nation-state would be able to participate in the Western state system.13 An interesting question awaiting further scholarly scrutiny remains: How could a Han-centered nationalism, initially defined in negative terms in opposition to the Manchu “race,” justify retaining the former imperial territories in non-Han areas yet include the non-Han occupants of these territories within a Han-dominated state? James Millward argues that the Han Chinese, lacking the legitimacy enjoyed by the Qing, sought to “justify maintenance of the former Qing borders on the basis of Western principles of nationalism, as they understood and adopted them.”14 This is indeed an insightful observation. In retrospect, however, it remains open to scrutiny whether the early Han Chinese Revolutionaries-turned-Nationalists ever seriously took into consideration the relationship between their new republic and the neighboring non-Han nationalities. Their lack of consensus, if not their ignorance, of a policy vis-à-vis various ethnic minorities clearly suggested that the early Revolutionaries were primarily concerned about the Han–Manchu relations while paying little attention to the other ethnicities which had comprised the Qing imperial order. As this book will demonstrate, it was this lack of a broad ethnopolitical ideology and border policy that led the Nationalist regime to assume a far more pragmatic and survivalist stance toward China’s ethnic and frontier issues throughout its governance. This is not to say, however, that the Nationalists did not harbor a grand, idealized picture of post-Qing China’s frontier territorial landscape. As can be


xxvi Prologue detected from various official statements throughout the Nationalist era, the imperial territorial legacy left by the Qing, along with idealistic and revolutionary views about a great China image, continued to be felt in the Nationalist policy planning. The lack of political and military power, nonetheless, had largely prevented the trouble-ridden Nationalist regime from implementing an effective great frontier policy. As a result, as I will argue, Nationalist China’s frontier ethnopolitics was like a pendulum that swung between idealism and pragmatism: during the time of political and military hardship, realism, survivalist, and opportunism might best characterize the Nationalist government’s dealing with its frontier ethnic politics. When China’s international status was elevated as a result of its bitter war with Japan during World War II, the restoration of China’s past territorial glory inevitably loomed large in the minds of the Nationalists. Judging from a historical perspective, the “pendulum swing” proposed here also took place between whether the threats to the Nationalist regime were foreign, particularly from the Japanese (1932–45), or were domestic, particularly from rival warlords (1911–28), allied warlords (1929–31), and the Chinese Communists (1946–9). As the following chapters will illuminate, the major time periods and the concurrent main threats posed to the Nationalist regime have led to different responses from Nationalist leaders regarding handling ethnic minorities, managing relations with authorities in border regions, or dealing with frontier territorial issues through various means, channels and strategies. These interrelated foreign and domestic threats, and how the Nationalists responded to them, demonstrate modern China’s frontier characters in the interim period between 1911 and 1949, and beyond. Nationalist identity and authority began in geographically isolated regions far from the traditional center of Chinese power and early on, the Nationalists seemed to be driven by political and racial ideology; as a result it is both ironic and significant that the amorphous and yet pragmatic nature of modern Chinese ethnopolitics allowed the budding Nationalists to embrace an expedient and opportunistic approach to extend their authority into the formerly Qing inner frontier territories. In a broader historical context, the extension of Nationalist power into China’s western frontiers represented a “reassertion” or “return” of Chinese control to Central Asia. More significantly, the westward expansion of the Nationalists also transformed post-Qing China from a primarily maritime economy rooted in East Asia to a continental one based on overland trade routes through Central Asia. The expansion, I shall add, was more than a continuity of Qing expansion into Central Asia, for the Nationalists brought with them all of the political apparatus of a twentieth-century party system to the region, a change whose political legacy would endure through the 1950s. Nevertheless, it should be noted that the consolidation of Nationalist power in China’s western peripheries and the resultant “return” of modern Chinese central authority to the Central Asian borderland were not intended goals of Nationalist policymakers. Instead, China’s internal turmoil in the 1920s and the early 1930s, its war with Japan in


Prologue xxvii the 1930s and the 1940s, and the Nationalist-Communist confrontation of the 1930s and again, from the mid-1940s, were individually and collectively the most important factors driving the Nationalist thrust into China’s far west. One unexpected result of this westward movement was China’s diplomatic outreach to the Middle East as a springboard from which the Nationalists believed they might strengthen their diplomatic ties with the international world.

The frontier theory, border security, and strategy Owen Lattimore’s study of traditional China’s relationship with the nomads of Inner Asia suggests that modern China’s territorial expansion was the continuation of a much longer period of state-building on the part of the Nationalists. According to Lattimore, such expansion suggested the existence of “a line of optimum conquest” beyond which further expansion became counterproductive.15 However, a careful study of the history of modern China’s frontier-policy may suggest a different scenario from Lattimore’s. An analysis of the Nationalists’ power extension westward into Central Asia reveals that it was primarily driven by threats to their regime security, both domestic and foreign. The defunct Qing dynasty’s imperial territorial legacies provided a convenient and yet disputable framework for the initially weak and localized Nationalists to extend the scope of their ethnopolitical strategy and further extend their power in the frontier zones.16 Time and again policy on the border has been internally constrained, or even driven back, and this fact has had real costs. Rather than being the results of the sorts of deep ecological and socio-economic forces that writers such as Lattimore have proposed as explanations, it appears many Chinese decisions about border policy have been determined by internal political rivalries and consolidations, taking place both on the concrete level of factional struggle, and on the more abstract plane of politically-useful philosophical redefinition of such concepts as loyalty, patriotism, and the nation.17 The substantiation of Nationalist power, as I argue in this book, was largely based on the practicalities of regime survival. To a considerable extent, John P. LeDonne’s theory of Russia’s imperial expansion between 1700 and 1917 provides this research with a solid analytical framework. According to LeDonne, as the Russians advanced into the frontier zones, they sought to control the relatively rare locations in an otherwise indistinguishable landscape suited to the creation of power bases. Upon these, they built an administrative, political, and military infrastructure designed to consolidate their gains while they continued their advance into the great plain that kept inviting them. In their advance, the Russians applied an inclusive policy that reflected their confidence in their own strength and the certainty of their success. They not only made alliances with the most powerful men in the frontier zones, whose allegiance shifted along with the shift in the local balance of power, but also made them members of the ruling elite. In return, their collaborators propelled their advance.18 A close examination of the Nationalists’ movement westward into Central Asia bears some striking resemblances to the Russian advance into their Central


xxviii Prologue Asian frontiers. The Japanese invasion of China between 1937 and 1945 offered the Nationalists an unforeseen opportunity for state-building and frontier consolidation: to extend Han Chinese dominance westwards in Central Asia. Even if the process represents the reassertion of control, China did not re-create the state of affairs under the Qing. The Nationalists, in their bid to reassert the sovereignty of a formerly weak, now besieged, central government, brought a twentieth-century nationalist political party-state to Central Asia. The Nationalists’ advance westward did not exemplify the imposition of paramount power by an imperial regime such as the Qing. Rather, the Nationalists under Chiang Kai- shek sought to assert authority over the local rulers along China’s western frontier in an attempt to defend their regime from further Japanese encroachment. This westward expansion gradually shifted the balance of power between the Nationalists and local ethnic minority groups. Their style in reasserting their sovereignty nonetheless resembled an empire-builder’s dealings with its collaborators. The Nationalists’ movement westward into Central Asia during the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–45) was the result of both external and domestic pressures. As will be discussed in Chapter 5, one unexpected result of the movement was China’s diplomatic outreach to the Middle East, which the Nationalists hoped to turn into a springboard into the wider world. This development, with historical hindsight, might be interpreted as an alternative route for Nationalist China to world power. To apply LeDonne’s theory again: China may have been seeking to advance from the coastal rimlands to the Central Asian heartland to the west, in the face of Japan’s temporarily successful bid to deprive China of access to its own coastal rimlands in the east. It remains unclear whether the Nationalists ever expected their control of China’s western border territories to help them face down the Communists during the civil war of 1945–9. Nevertheless, in the final stages of the war, Central Asia did provide them with a potential territorial base from which to resist.

Reconsidering Nationalist ethnopolitics In the past several decades, the field of modern Chinese ethnopolitics and frontier territoriality has more often been based on presumption than on reliable primary sources. The revolutionary ideology of the Chinese Nationalists espoused by Sun Yat-sen, Chiang Kai-shek, and their revolutionary associates, has long been central to scholarly discourse, causing many historians to argue that since the turn of the twentieth century the Chinese Nationalists had proactively and imperialistically attempted to bring China’s traditional ethnic territories and peoples under Nationalist control. Furthermore, surviving Nationalist propaganda has convinced many scholars that the Nationalists actively attempted to assimilate non-Han ethnic groups. This perspective has led historians of the Chinese Republican period as well as of the contemporary era to assume that the main goal of the Nationalist regime was to restore to Chinese control the frontier territories that had been lost through the ineptitude of the Qing dynasty.


Prologue xxix Parallel to this oversimplified and stereotyped view of the Nationalist frontier and ethnic minority policy is the perspective that the Chinese Nationalists’ intransigence with regards to dissident minorities’ pleas for autonomy represented an unwillingness to follow through on their early promises of equality and self-determination. Frederick C. Teiwes’s work is representative of such a generalization. Teiwes depicts a Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang, KMT) that, influenced by Western concepts of nationalism, took a much more assimilationist approach in that it refused to grant autonomy to minority groups; however, the political weakness of the regime forced it to make compromises which resulted in policies that alienated ethnic minorities without assimilating them.19 On the other hand, in response to these accusations of assimilationism, Nationalist sympathizers argue that the Nationalists failed because they were too preoccupied with struggles against rapacious warlords and foreign meddlers, and particularly with the protracted war with Japan.20 While debates of this kind are always divisive and inconclusive, in-depth investigations into the reality of Chinese Nationalist frontier policy remain scarce to date. Ultimately, discussions over the role of the Nationalists in shaping contemporary China’s ethnic territoriality continue to represent a serious gap in scholarly research. In one revisionist work, William Kirby reminds us that one of the surprising facts of the Chinese Republican era (1911–49) is that the vast territory of the former Qing Empire was not only redefined as “Chinese” under the Nationalists, but was also defended to such a degree that the borders of modern People’s Republic of China (PRC) today are essentially identical to those of the Qing Empire. According to Kirby, this territorial maintenance was perhaps the greatest accomplishment of Republican diplomacy. Kirby also believes that the overall success of Republican and Nationalist Chinese diplomacy vis-à-vis the most distant regions of the Manchu realm may help to explain why the contemporary PRC is so resolutely determined to “recover” for China the territory of Taiwan, despite the readily apparent fact that Beijing has never for a single day governed the island.21 Kirby’s point of view is shared by Joseph W. Esherick, who observes that the early Chinese Republic’s international relations largely defined and decided how the Qing Empire became China.22 The self-awareness and sophistication of Republican China’s diplomacy may in part explain how the central regimes of China in the decades before the Communist victory were able to protect China’s outlying territories from dismemberment. Yet, any diplomatic maneuverings that may have taken place could not have been the sole factor leading to such astonishing preservation. Neither would Republican Chinese diplomacy alone be sufficient to explain how modern China’s ethnic territoriality came to where it is today. When it comes to the making of contemporary China’s frontier territoriality and border security, many critical questions remain unanswered. For example, leaving aside the inflated discourse of revolutionary propaganda, how did the Chinese Nationalists cope with the problematic yet unavoidable frontier territorial issues on a practical level? What did the Nationalist leaders of the early Chinese Republic really understand about the ethnic minority issues facing post-Qing China, at the


xxx Prologue moment when even the survival of their revolutionary campaigns was in doubt? Under what circumstances did the early Nationalists form their revolutionary ideologies? In 1928, the Nationalists under Chiang Kai-shek used the Northern Expedition to seize power and were henceforth in a better position to implement their own ethnopolitical strategy. How did the highly localized central government in Nanking formulate a feasible strategy to extend their theretofore fictitious authority into the vast border regions while simultaneously confronting unrelenting challenges both from within and from abroad? Did Nationalist frontier policy planning emanate intact from their ideology, or did it instead emerge piece by piece from external factors that forced the Nationalists to constantly reevaluate and renegotiate their ethnopolitics? Finally, this book seeks to provide some preliminary answers to the question: What sort of impact did Nationalist ethnic frontier policies ultimately have on the Communist takeover of China’s ethnic borderlands in the late 1940s and the early 1950s, and on the PRC’s border defense and territoriality in the years that followed? Answers to these questions cannot be found without first scrutinizing the attitudes, strategies, and practices of the early Han Revolutionaries (and later Nationalists) relating to China’s ethnopolitics before their coming to power in 1928. These issues will be discussed in Chapter 1.



Early perceptions toward ethnopolitics Even today, when referring to the making of Republican China, a deep-rooted perception remains that the revolutionary campaign under Sun Yat-sen in the late Qing period was the central factor leading to the final collapse of Manchu rule. The political reality, however, was that Sun never really solidified his status as the top leader of Republican China. As a result, the Revolutionaries under Sun were largely unable to confront the ethnopolitical and territorial issues of post- Qing China. In January 1912, Sun Yat-sen was elected “provisional president” of the Chinese Republic. Yet within less than three months, his presidency was transferred to the northern-based Yuan Shikai, whose military power allowed him to stand out as the most capable figure to depose the ailing Qing imperial house, to command the more powerful Beiyang Army, and to generate foreign support.1 As Yuan became the new political leader of Republican China, it was his Peking-based government – not Sun Yat-sen and his fellow Revolutionaries – that was burdened with the challenging task of integrating the formerly Manchu outlying dependencies into the new Chinese nation-state. The Revolutionaries’ relative lack of political power in the early Chinese Republic by no means suggests that they were uninterested in the young Republic’s precarious frontier scenario. Before the Revolution of 1911, the primary aim of Sun Yat-sen and his followers had been to topple the Manchus. As a result, the political slogan adopted by the Revive China Society and the subsequent Alliance Society (Tongmenghui) – “drive out the Tartar slaves and revive China” – inevitably loomed large in their thinking. During the inchoate stage of Chinese revolution in the last decades of the Qing dynasty, however, the Revolutionaries had been struggling in vain to develop a consonant discourse about the Han peoples’ relations with other ethnic minority groups within the Qing Empire. As Pamela Crossley has argued, in the latter years of the Qing Empire, awareness of the evolving self-identities of non-Han Chinese in the domain of what was supposed to be “China” presented a conceptual crisis to the early nationalist Revolutionaries, regardless of their own varieties of ideological commitment.2 A key figure in the revolutionary activities, Wang Jingwei argued that a new China emancipated from Manchu rule would be a China entirely dominated by


2 Early years and early strategies the Han Chinese. As for the other ethnic frontier peoples, Wang optimistically believed that, once the Manchus were toppled and submitted to the Han Chinese, they would ultimately be assimilated into Han culture.3 Yet not all of Wang Jingwei’s fellow revolutionaries agreed with him. Liu Kuiyi, for instance, proposed on the eve of the Qing dynasty’s collapse that the Tongmenghui should expand its membership by recruiting new members from the Manchu, Mongol, Hui Muslim and Tibetan nationalities. Although Liu and many of his associates undoubtedly believed that China proper should belong to the Han Chinese, they nevertheless sensed that Han China proper would not be stable until the surrounding ethnic borderlands were secure. As a result, Liu advocated that the Han Revolutionaries should endeavor to woo the minority nationalities to their side without delay, and should treat them as important potential allies in overthrowing the Qing imperial rule.4 Pragmatic concerns soon came to the fore shortly after the 1911 Revolution, when suddenly the Qing imperial house was no longer the principal enemy; a fresh idea swiftly emerged among the Revolutionaries which imagined post- imperial China as “the Republic of Five Nationalities” (wuzu gonghe). The “five nationalities” were to include the five major ethnicities of the former empire: the Han Chinese, Manchus, Mongols, Tibetans and Hui Muslims. The premise of the five-nationality doctrine was the conviction that non-Han peoples on the ethnic frontiers would want equal treatment under Chinese jurisdiction, as opposed to political independence from Chinese control altogether.5 Moreover, behind the political ideology of this “five-nationality republic” was the implication that the Revolutionaries wished to re-create the ethnic political order of the frontier – this time with the Han people at the center – once they took over the political machine of the whole Chinese nation. In August 1912, when the Alliance Society was reorganized as the KMT, and when the Revolutionaries were turning into the Nationalists, such a concept was further substantiated as an appeal for “the strict implementation of racial assimilation.”6 It therefore came as no surprise that, in the strong revolutionary milieu of 1910s China, the KMT Nationalists were outwardly uncompromising and determined in their public expressions that Yuan Shikai’s republican regime should take a pro-active stance toward solving post-Qing China’s problematic frontier territoriality. The crisis in Outer Mongolia (Mongolia north of the Gobi), was one of the earliest thorny problems confronting the nascent Peking authorities, and had attracted much attention among the Nationalists.7 In December 1911, the Mongols at Urga used the chaos of the Chinese Revolution as an opportunity to declare independence, with the reputed Yellow Hat sect prelate, the eighth Jebtsundamba Hutuktu, as their head of state (Bogd Khan). No longer believing that they should be loyal to a new Han Chinese republican regime, the Mongols ousted the Qing-appointed military governor from Urga, and most Han settlers who had flooded into Outer Mongolia in the last decade of Qing were driven out or killed during the period of 1911–12.8 On November 3, 1912, a Russo-Mongol Agreement was signed between Urga and Tsarist Russia, in which the Russians recognized the political autonomy of Outer Mongolia and promised to aid Urga


Early years and early strategies 3 in the building and training of its own army. In return, the Mongols agreed to grant economic and trade privileges to the Russians. The signing of this agreement also indicated that henceforth the new Republican China’s position in the vast formerly Qing dependency was nearing a point at which it might be entirely excluded.9 The general response of the Nationalists to the situation in Outer Mongolia was sharp and severe. Chiang Kai-shek, then a 26-year-old middle-ranking officer serving in the Shanghai Revolutionary Army, wrote in December 1912 that there was already a “deep consensus” among the majority of Chinese people that the use of military means was necessary if Republican China wished to consolidate its precarious position on the northern frontier. Strongly favoring a proactive stance toward the independent-minded Outer Mongols, Chiang urged Peking to dispatch troops to Urga without hesitation in order to restore Chinese authority there. He also suggested that Yuan Shikai should be prepared to face up to the reality that, behind the scenes, China’s true enemies were the Russians, who were backing the Mongols against the Chinese. The young Chiang Kai-shek cast serious doubt on whether Republican China was then capable of fighting a victorious war against Tsarist Russia. As a military man, however, Chiang still proposed a very detailed military scheme for the review of the policy planners in Peking, in which he argued that once the situation quieted down in Outer Mongolia, some 200,000 troops should be deployed on such northern frontiers as Urga, northern Xinjiang and the Mongolia-Manchuria border in preparation for a possible war with Russia.10 Dai Chuanxian (also known as Dai Jitao), one of Chiang Kai-shek’s closest revolutionary associates and an active revolutionary theorist who would be among Chiang’s most trusted frontier advisors after 1928, was taking an equally proactive view about the infant Republic’s thorny frontier issues. Writing in November 1912 in the popular journal Minchuan Bao (People’s Rights) he edited, Dai exclaimed that the KMT was then the only political party in China courageous enough to propose military solutions for the crisis in Outer Mongolia. Dai accused both Yuan’s central government and other political parties of adopting an evasive attitude toward problems on China’s northern frontiers, and he strongly appealed to Han Chinese commoners to be prepared for a war with the “treacherous and obstinate” Mongols. Toward the end of 1912, Dai was so enthusiastic about using drastic means to secure the Mongolian region that he went as far as to urge his fellow countrymen to fulfill their “citizen duties” by saving daily expenses for the Peking government’s military expenditure.11 The early Revolutionaries-cum-Nationalists like Chiang Kai-shek and Dai Chuanxian were equally concerned about the situation in China’s ethnic borderlands in the southwest. Beginning around 1905, the Qing court implemented a series of reform programs in the southwest in order to strengthen the Qing government’s declining influence in the region. Attempts made by the Qing court included insisting that all inhabitants of the Kham district in Eastern Tibet were subject to the Peking-appointed magistrates; that all taxes were to be paid to the central government; that traditional taxes paid to Lhasa were to be abolished;


4 Early years and early strategies and that all ethnic Tibetans were to be subject to Chinese law. These reform programs, coupled with a Qing military advance from Sichuan into Tibet proper, greatly infuriated the thirteenth Dalai Lama, leading to his 1910 flight to India where he was warmly received by the British. The Qing court responded to the Dalai Lama’s flight by deposing him.12 With the outbreak of the Chinese Revolution, the garrison troops stationed in Lhasa quickly mutinied, and Qing officials were in no position to continue their proactive policies. Taking advantage of the chaotic situation in China proper, Lhasa demanded the withdrawal of all Chinese soldiers and Qing-appointed officials from Tibet. After assuming the presidency, Yuan Shikai hastily restored the rank and title of the exiled Dalai Lama, blaming the now defunct Qing court for the wrongdoings that had provoked his flight. Yet, the Dalai Lama was no longer prepared to trust any Chinese promises or to accept new Han-dominated Republican Chinese authority over his realm. By the fall of 1912, most of the Chinese troops were removed from Tibet proper via British India, and in early 1913 the Dalai Lama triumphantly returned to a Lhasa free of Chinese troops and officials for the first time since the eighteenth century.13 Under strong diplomatic pressure from the British, who insisted that the settlement of outstanding issues between China and Tibet should be a precondition to their official recognition of the new Republic, Yuan was left with very few alternatives but to be conciliatory toward the Tibetans. When the Simla Talks took place in the fall of 1913, the Tibetan delegates were even allowed to be present on an equal footing with their Chinese and British counterparts.14 In the face of the unpromising frontier scenario in southwest China, the power-limited, out-of-office Nationalists seemed unanimously annoyed at the misconducts of Yuan’s central regime. To demonstrate that the KMT was much more capable than Peking when it came to dealing with frontier issues, Sun Yat- sen and Huang Xing enthusiastically advocated setting up various frontier development initiatives to encourage Han people to migrate to ethnic borderlands where they could develop natural resources in China’s remote frontiers. Sun, then excited about a nationwide railroad construction project, argued it was extremely unwise for a poor country like China to neglect the development of its far-flung frontiers. His points thus implied that China’s ethnic borderlands, including Outer Mongolia and Tibet, were the new Republic’s intra-state colonies that were indispensable for competing with the imperialist powers.15 Chiang Kai-shek believed that Tibet had historically been an inseparable part of Chinese territory, and the Tibetan refusal to allow Chinese troops to remain in Lhasa was obviously an intolerable gesture antagonistic to the establishment of a progressive, five-nationality Chinese Republic. Writing in the summer of 1912, when the regrouped Chinese forces in Kham under a capable Sichuan general named Yin Changheng were able to retake several local strongholds, Chiang advocated that the only way open for Peking vis-à-vis Tibet’s territorial integrity was to encourage General Yin to continue his military advance into Lhasa so as to set up a basis for future negotiations with the British.16 His close comrade Dai Chuanxian also argued that the recovery of Tibet would not only help the Peking


Early years and early strategies 5 authorities to incorporate this piece of territory into China’s effective jurisdiction, but would also enhance Republican China’s vulnerable border defense in the southwest, thus guarding against possible British encroachment from India. Like Chiang, Dai also encouraged Yuan Shikai to authorize Yin Changheng to act for the central government, allowing Yin to install new garrison stations in areas bordering Yunnan, Sichuan and Tibet after his military operations were completed.17 Conceivably still not in a position to offend the British, and presumably unwilling to allocate more financial and military resources to the remote, uncontrollable local authorities in southwest China, Yuan Shikai repeatedly instructed Yin Changheng and his troops to halt on the Kham–Tibetan border and to avoid any conflict with the Tibetans. This decision was made despite the fact that Yin’s force was then on the winning side, and that provincial authorities in Yunnan and Sichuan, like the roaring Nationalists, were in favor of using military means to solve the Tibetan issue for good.18

Nationalism versus pragmatism The latter-day image of the KMT as heir to modern China’s nationalist movement, as well as the revolutionary forerunner of post-Qing China’s territorial integrity, is so powerful that people tend inadvertently to forget the fact that skepticism about the early Chinese Revolutionaries’ genuine perceptions toward China’s frontier territoriality had already emerged as early as the birth of the Republic. Kang Youwei, a well-known advocate of constitutional monarchy who was at odds with Sun Yat-sen, wrote in the summer of 1912 that while it was indeed correct to take the Outer Mongolian crisis seriously, the KMT Nationalists could by no means be exempted from responsibility for causing such a grave situation. Kang candidly pointed out that the Russians were venturesome enough to advance into China’s northern borderland simply because they were convinced that, in the last days of the Qing dynasty, the Revolutionaries still lacked a clear idea as to whether or not the far-flung ethnic minority territories should be included on the map of the new Republic. On the contrary, Kang argued that the Revolutionaries had a dual purpose with regard to post-Qing China’s ethnic frontier territoriality. One the one hand, the Revolutionaries would be pleased to succeed the entirety of former Qing dependencies if the situation allowed. On the other hand, however, Sun Yat-sen and his followers would be ready to relinquish the outlying territories if the foreign powers were willing to render support to their revolutionary cause within China proper. Therefore, as Kang saw it, when the revolution first broke out in Hubei Province, it was not surprising that the Wuhan military government chose the 18-star flag as China’s new national flag. To many people both within and outside China, it was a clear indicator that the Revolutionaries’ top priority was to preserve the 18 provinces of China proper, while less concerned with whether the outlying territories of Mongolia, Xinjiang, Tibet and Manchuria would be preserved.19 As a matter of fact, after the revolution broke out in Hubei, the Revolutionaries’ relations with other non-Han peoples remained ambiguous. A decree issued


6 Early years and early strategies by the newly founded Wuhan military government of the Chinese Republic on the very day of the revolution defined the revolutionary cause as the independence of Han people from the Manchu rule. Another telegram dispatched to the Qing court in Peking two days later on October 12 only required that the Manchus “give up the throne, become a vassal, claim subjection, and pay tribute” in their “old homeland of Manchuria.” The message manifestly demanded the Manchus’ surrender to the Han Chinese and their withdrawal from China proper. But it never made it clear the new government’s relations with the Mongols, the Muslims, or the Tibetans.20 Viewed from a fresh historical angle, however, the indecisive and opaque character of the Revolutionaries’ ethnic minority policy to a large degree allowed them to selectively implement policies that would best serve their political interests. About one month after the Wuhan uprising, the Revolutionaries decided on a peaceful transfer of power through negotiations with Yuan Shikai, then the most powerful Han Chinese figure serving in the Qing court. And it was at this juncture that, for the first time, the position of the non-Han peoples was being seriously contemplated among the Revolutionaries. On November 6, 1911, in the midst of the peace negotiations between the southern Revolutionaries and the northern Constitutionalists, Wang Jingwei and Yang Du, respectively representing the two camps, organized a Society for United Salvation of National Affairs (Guoshi Gongjihui) in Peking. In its proclamation it advocated that both camps should endeavor to promote the people’s rights and that the “five main nationalities should be under the rule of one united government so as to prevent China’s territorial dismemberment.”21 During the ongoing peace conference between the south and the north, it was further agreed that the vested interests of the Manchus, the Mongols, the Muslims, and the Tibetans should be preserved in order to maintain the Qing’s existing frontier territoriality and to avoid new Republican China being “carved up” by the imperialist powers.22 As a result, the discourse for the Han revolution and the Han independence from the Manchu rule was interwoven with the establishment of a Han-centered yet multi-ethnic Republic based on a meta-national ideal. It is noteworthy that, during the peace negotiations, the conditions settled upon by the south and the north to preserve the titles of the Manchu child Emperor Puyi and his imperial family, and their private property, were actually first broached by the Revolutionaries – not by Yuan’s group – with a view to prompting the north to accept a smooth and immediate power transition from the imperial house to the Revolutionaries. Despite dissenting views from within the revolutionary camp, these decisions, though outwardly favorable to the overthrown Manchus, were made in fear of losing the territory inhabited by the other non-Han peoples and putting China in danger of being carved up. 23 Later on, in the spring of 1912, when the Revolutionaries in Nanking saw little hope of being at the helm and were obliged to surrender power to Yuan Shikai’s central regime in Peking, they shifted and decided to adopt a tough and uncompromising attitude toward China’s problematic ethnic frontier issues in order to obtain more mass support. As has been discussed above, when the Mongolian and Tibetan


Early years and early strategies 7 independence movements in the early Republican days aroused much anxiety among the Han Chinese, Nationalist elites such as Sun Yat-sen, Huang Xing, and Song Jiaoren unanimously advocated “racial assimilation” and encouraged “migration and cultivation enterprises” to be carried out on China’s frontiers. To weaken Yuan Shikai’s political legitimacy after his attempt to restore the monarchy, Sun and Huang did not hesitate to chastise Yuan by attributing Mongolian and Tibetan separatisms to Peking’s ignorance of the two peoples as well as to its inability to counter imperialist activities in China’s frontier regions.24

The opaque Nationalist ethnopolitics Recently released source materials pertaining to Sun Yat-sen shed even more light on the pragmatic and opportunistic tendencies of Nationalist territorial ethnopolitics. Since the mid-1910s, Sun had repeatedly urged foreign powers to support his revolutionary campaign, rather than to help maintain China’s traditional territorial integrity. In June 1917, the Republican parliament in Peking was dissolved as a result of conflict between President Li Yuanhong and Premier Duan Qirui. Sun, seizing the chance, set up a new government in Canton, the legitimacy of which was bolstered by his election in early September as “Grand Marshal” by nearly 100 loyalists from the former Peking parliament.25 Seeking early support for the move, Sun appealed to Japan by expressing his willingness to trade control over Manchuria for Japanese financial and military assistance.26 In conversations with the famous Japanese entrepreneur Matsunaga Anzaemon in November 1918, Sun further promised that he would consent to the Japanese “occupation” (ryo yu) of Manchuria and eastern Mongolia, if Tokyo was willing to support the southerners and back him as leader of China.27 As long as Sun Yat-sen and his cohorts were separated from the state political apparatus, they were given no real opportunity to take care of China’s problematic ethnopolitical landscape. Yet paradoxically, this separation granted them a greater degree of political flexibility and expediency, thus allowing them to use China’s unsettled frontier issues as a bargaining chip with which to achieve their other ends. Despite the Nationalists’ constant disparagement of the Peking regime, it was ironically that very Peking-based government which contributed to the precarious maintenance of post-Qing China’s territorial integrity over the ethnic borderlands. This seemingly paradoxical dynamic was evident at the tripartite conference on Tibet, which was held at Simla, India, in 1913–14. During the course of the negotiations, the British proposed to set up an “Inner” and “Outer” Tibet as a first step toward demarcating the vast ethnographic Tibetan area. Inner Tibet would encompass western Sichuan, eastern Kham (Xikang) and a great part of Kokonor (Qinghai), thus allowing the Chinese to secure their historical position. Outer Tibet would include western Kham and Tibet proper, where political autonomy would be recognized and safeguarded by a Chinese promise not to seize it.28 Under strong pressure, the Republican Chinese delegates at Simla tentatively consented to the new arrangement by initiating the draft agreement. The new


8 Early years and early strategies agreement, however, was subsequently repudiated by Yuan Shikai. The Chinese delegates were also soon instructed to leave Simla, thus eliminating any possibility that China and Britain would reach a settlement over the Tibetan issue. Yuan’s decision to repudiate the agreement was made despite significant pressure from the British, whose financial and political support was vital to his new and still-vulnerable regime.29 According to Melvyn Goldstein, Peking had initially planned to accept the Simla agreement, but it was unwilling to agree to the border delimitation, which would have meant giving up control of strategic ethnic Tibetan strongholds such as Chamdo in Kham.30 Another explanation may be that, by 1914, Peking lacked the capability to withstand the tremendous public and parliamentary opposition, or the opposition of the people of Sichuan who claimed the whole Kham region as part of Sichuan Province.31 Whatever the reason for the Yuan government’s abrupt withdrawal from the Simla Talks and its subsequent repudiation of the draft agreement, Peking policymakers would henceforth condemn any territorial or administrative agreement about southwest China between the British and the Tibetans as an illegitimate “unilateral action” falling short of credibility. Consequently, Tibet’s political status would continue to be a pending issue opened to Chinese interpretation. Peking was able to justify the new Republic’s authority over Tibet, however unrealistic and fictitious it actually was, for as long as that claim served to bolster its claim to legitimate power. The Peking government’s asserted control over Tibet thus became a troublesome legacy that would continue to haunt the subsequent Chinese Nationalist regime in the decades to come.32 On China’s northern frontier, the situation was somewhat different. Peking refused to recognize the Russo-Mongol Agreement of November 1912, claiming that Outer Mongolia was only a part of China and thus had no right to sign treaties with a foreign nation. Instead, China proposed direct negotiations between Peking and Russia provided that the latter cancelled its agreement with the Mongols. The Russians knew very well that Mongolia’s independence meant nothing unless recognized by the Chinese, and therefore accepted China’s proposal.33 The Sino-Russian negotiations ended one year later, in November 1913, with Russian recognition of Republican China’s suzerainty over an autonomous Mongolia. This was followed by a tripartite conference between China, Russia and Outer Mongolia held in Kiakhta in the fall of 1914, in which China’s suzerainty over Outer Mongolia was confirmed, including the rights of Peking to appoint a high commissioner at Urga, to station a specified number of troops on Mongolian soil, and to confer the title of the Bogd Khan.34 Chinese nationalist historians have long portrayed the Yuan government’s participation in the Kiakhta talks as a traitorous action which failed to protect China’s full sovereignty and rights in Outer Mongolia. However, accounts given by Alexander I. Miller, Tsarist Russia’s chief delegate to the Kiakhta conference, demonstrate that Yuan had actually done a decent job, achieving results which would otherwise have been beyond the reach of his government’s political and military strength in the far north. According to Miller, Peking was unwilling to


Early years and early strategies 9 make any compromises with regards to the Mongolian issue. Although by no means in a position to use military means to subjugate Outer Mongolia as Chiang Kai-shek had suggested, Yuan was sophisticated enough to use the vested interests of other powers, particularly those of Japan and Germany, to prevent exclusive Russian control of the territory. This strategy enabled the young Chinese Republic to limit Russian influence in the north. One notable example, noted Miller, was Peking’s success in demanding that Outer Mongolian railways, postal routes and telegraphs fall under strict Chinese supervision.35 While Peking government officials were preoccupied with post-Qing China’s various ethnic frontier troubles, Sun Yat-sen and his followers were busy consolidating their nascent and vulnerable power bastion in the south. As mentioned above, when the parliament in Peking was dissolved in June 1917, Sun launched a new revolutionary campaign in Canton under the name of the “Constitution Protection Movement.” A military government was duly installed, with Sun as the “Grand Marshal.” But this movement was short-lived; in April 1918, Sun’s political opponents in Canton, backed by the powerful Guangxi clique, effected a governmental reorganization in which his sole leadership was replaced with a seven-man directorate.36 Sun then left for Shanghai and did not return to Canton until October 1920, when he was invited back to resume the military government. During his second administration in Canton in the early 1920s, Sun attempted to influence national politics by way of a northward military expedition. In order to fulfill this grand project, Sun organized a new national government, appointed ministers, and appealed to foreign powers for recognition, self-appointing himself “President of the Chinese Republic.” Yet his plan was not met with favor by Chen Jiongming, the powerful military commander of the Guangdong provincial army who wished to concentrate resources on the development of Guangdong solely and opposed expensive military involvement in national affairs. The incompatibility between the two men’s goals finally led to a coup in June 1922; Chen’s troops attacked Sun’s presidential palace and drove Sun out of Canton. Sun was once again obliged to leave for Shanghai.37 Up to the early 1920s, the frustrated Nationalists under Sun Yat-sen were still burdened with the difficult task of strengthening their precarious position, and even their very survival remained in doubt. As a result, with regards to post- Qing China’s minority and ethnic frontier territorial agendas, they could do little more than produce discourses based primarily on pragmatic concerns relating to the consolidation of Nationalist power. When Sun began devoting his time and energy on writing in Shanghai in the latter half of 1918, after his first expulsion from Canton, one of his main concerns was revising the Revolutionaries’ early “five-nationality republic” theory. Sun now argued that the terms “state” and “nation” meant the same thing in China, because China represented not only a country but also a race of human beings. As for those who did not belong to that race, they should be kept within the Chinese state and urged to merge themselves with the dominant “Chinese” race. In addition, Sun asserted that the name “five- nationality republic” existed only because



There exists a certain racial distinction which distorts the meaning of a single republic. We must facilitate the dying out of all names of individual peoples inhabiting China. . . . We must satisfy the demands of all races and unite them in a single cultural and political whole.38 Very few scholarly works to date have brought attention to the fact that Sun’s well-known “dying-out” theory was constructed at the moment when Republican China’s controversial frontier situation was turning relatively optimistic for the first time since the collapse of the Qing order. In the north, at the outbreak of the civil war in Tsarist Russia in the fall of 1919, the Mongols forfeited their political autonomy and resubmitted themselves to Republican Chinese jurisdiction. This turn of events signified a temporary return of Chinese sovereignty to Outer Mongolia.39 World War I, which stretched from 1914 to 1918, preoccupied the British to the extent that they were unable to deal with developments in Tibet. After Chinese garrison troops in Sichuan were defeated by the Tibetans in a 1917–18 border clash and were at the point of ceding more territorial privileges to Lhasa, the British quickly stepped in and negotiated a ceasefire that prevented the triumphant Tibetans from marching further eastward and retaking the entire Kham region.40 As the war-stricken British were not in a position to interfere with the Sino-Tibetan border conflict, this event inadvertently contributed to the first truly bilateral contact between China and Tibet since 1912. Toward the end of 1919, two middle-ranking officials from the Gansu provincial authorities arrived in Lhasa and met with the thirteenth Dalai Lama on an unofficial basis. An allegedly sincere conversation was held between the two parties, and the hitherto frosty relationship between Tibet and Republican China momentarily showed signs of warming.41

Formulating a northern frontier strategy Sun Yat-sen’s revised ethnic minority theory in the late 1910s was set against such a backdrop that most of the Han people in China proper were anticipating that an effective frontier order could be restored, and that a Han-centered, five- nationality republic would be established in the near future. To the power- limited, southern-based Nationalists, it was natural that they considered it in their best interest to place their significant and yet distant ethnopolitical agenda in the context of a pragmatic politics. It is therefore totally understandable that, shortly after Sun Yat-sen altered his five-nationality republic theory in Shanghai in the late 1910s, he once again changed his tone on China’s ethnic and frontier issues in the early 1920s, when the likely cooperation between the KMT and the Soviets required him to forge a more favorable discourse. In October 1920, only 11 months after the Mongols in Urga resubmitted their authority to Peking, the White Russians encroached on Outer Mongolia from Siberia and drove the already tenuous Chinese influence out of the territory. This event was soon followed by the expulsion of the White Russians from Urga by the Soviets, whose strengthened position in Siberia enabled Moscow to respond to the appeals of the Mongolian nationalists. In March 1921, a new Mongolian


Early years and early strategies 11 People’s Party was established, followed by the formation of a joint Mongolian– Soviet military force. By early July, it had driven the White Russians entirely out of Outer Mongolia, and a new Mongolian People’s Republic (MPR) was inaugurated in Urga under Soviet auspices.42 Back in south China, Sun Yat-sen and his adherents watched these developments with great attention. Despite the geographic distance separating his southern citadel from Siberia and Soviet Central Asia, by the early 1920s Sun had sensed the possibility of capturing warlord-dominated Peking by a joint military effort between his own forces and the Red Army. Sporadic contacts between Sun and members of the Comintern were underway between 1920 and 1922, and shortly before his second flight from Canton in June 1922 Sun’s hopes for direct Soviet assistance had grown to the extent that he began to calculate the terms under which the Soviets might agree to help.43 When Chen Jionming was expelled from Canton by the southwestern regional commanders, Sun Yat-sen once again returned to Canton to resume his southern republic. On January 26, 1923, before setting out for Canton, Sun met with Adolph Joffe, Soviet Russian envoy and plenipotentiary to China to negotiate a treaty with the Peking authorities, in Shanghai. The two soon produced a joint manifesto, in which they expressed their views on matters relating to Sino- Russian relations. Concerning Manchuria, the manifesto stated that both Sun and Joffe agreed that the Chinese Eastern Railway question could be settled only at a Sino-Russian Conference, and that its management should be reorganized by agreement between the two parties without prejudice. Concerning Outer Mongolia, the manifesto stated that it was not the intention of the present Soviet Russian government to pursue an imperialist policy in the territory or to compel it to secede from Republican China. Accordingly, Sun made it clear that he “does not view an immediate evacuation of Russian troops from Outer Mongolia as either imperative or in the real interest of China.”44 The Sun–Joffe manifesto has been depicted as a timely and useful piece of propaganda for the southern Nationalists, who were then desperately in need of a political platform to elevate their nationwide prestige and raise their international visibility. Yet behind the political rhetoric of this manifesto lay a more grandiose and pragmatic frontier strategy for the southern Nationalists vis-à-vis the northern warlords, namely, to use the Soviet position in the north to achieve their revolutionary goal. Toward the end of 1922, before the issuance of the joint manifesto, Sun had proposed to Joffe a secret scheme to lead an army of 100,000 troops from Sichuan in southwest China to Outer Mongolia via Gansu for a drive on the Chinese capital, and Sun wanted money, arms, equipment, and instructions from the Soviets.45 The correspondence between Sun and Joffe in the spring of 1923 further reveals that they were at a point approaching a consensus over the agreement in which the Soviets would assist the Nationalists in building a military and political base in China’s far north or northwest as a first step toward toppling the Peking authorities.46 In September 1923, Sun dispatched Chiang Kai-shek, now his chief of staff in the Canton regime, to Moscow for further discussions. In Moscow, Chiang


12 Early years and early strategies prepared a detailed military proposal for the review of Soviet military leaders. He first described the precarious strategic position of the KMT revolutionary army in Guangdong Province, with hostile Hong Kong on one side and the Yangtze River patrolled by British and American gunboats on the other. As Chiang saw it, the imperialist foreigners would never allow the southerners to decisively defeat Wu Peifu, who then dominated central China. Due to this delicate and uneasy strategic landscape, Chiang stated that his Nationalist comrades were determined to transfer their center of military operations to China’s north and northwest peripheries. According to Chiang, Urga would be the ideal place to establish KMT’s new military base, with Urumqi in Xinjiang as the second- best choice.47 Chiang also revealed a military plan in which, in addition to the proposed 80,000 to 100,000 troops for Sun Yat-sen’s army, Canton would simultaneously seek to organize guerrilla forces in Shanxi Province in northern China and reinforce them with units from the south, thus establishing an anti-warlord concentration along the Inner Mongolian frontier. Sun’s new army was to be composed of Han Chinese from western Manchuria and the eastern Inner Mongolian frontier. The new army was also being assembled on the Sino-Mongolian border not far south of Urga; this new force would have the support of Marshal Zhang Zuolin, leader of Manchuria. As a result, Chiang saw it feasible to launch a double-front campaign against the warlord-dominated Peking government if the Soviets were willing to lend their support.48 Clearly, the Nationalists were enthusiastic about using their increasingly cooperative relationship with Soviet Russia as a way to move the revolution northward toward the northern border.49 Michael Borodin, who would soon become KMT’s most trusted Soviet contact, recalled after his first meeting with Sun Yat-sen in October 1923 that the concept of transforming Mongolia into a KMT power base had always been very attractive to his Chinese Nationalist counterpart. According to Borodin, Sun and his associates clearly regarded Outer Mongolia as a place that “offers great possibilities.” With friendly Soviet Russia at his back and with more followers in northern China than in his current localized satrapy in Canton, Sun optimistically believed that in Mongolia he would be able to carry out a more open and effective policy, and would be in a better position to act freely with respect to Western imperialism in China.50 Efforts made by Chiang Kai-shek to solicit substantial aid from Moscow were ultimately unsuccessful, as the well-calculating Soviets gave him a lukewarm response, merely saying that the proposed military operations would be an adventure doomed to failure. Deeply frustrated by Moscow’s unfavorable response, Chiang became increasingly disappointed by the Soviets’ unreliability. While still in Moscow, Chiang more than once fretted that the Soviets were “unreliable, arrogant and sham,” and that China should depend on no one but itself.51 His unpleasant experience in Moscow might also be one of the reasons why he became bitterly opposed to the Chinese Communists, whom in the decades to come Chiang perceived as the Soviets’ agents in China. Upon his return from Moscow to Canton in late December 1923, Chiang submitted a detailed report to Sun Yat-sen, in which he warned his mentor not to trust


Early years and early strategies 13 Russia. Yet his report was ignored by Sun, who continued to seek cooperation with Moscow.52 Regardless of the Nationalists’ failure to garner Soviet military support, from a historical perspective it may have been their unimplemented strategies which were the most successful in pushing the Nationalist ethnic and frontier agenda to a new horizon. That is, instead of producing eloquent and yet impractical racial discourses, the likely cooperation with the Soviets prompted the Nationalists to begin formulating strategically feasible ethnopolitical démarches. This tendency was best demonstrated in January 1924, when the KMT’s first National Congress was convened in Canton. Apparently in an effort to woo the northern Mongols, Sun declared that his regime and party would help guide the politically disempowered racial groups inhabiting China’s traditional frontiers toward “selfdetermination” (zijue) and “self-government” (zizhi). Sun also promised that those ethnic minorities would enjoy the right to determine their own policies and their own future.53 One piece of research suggests that, during the sessions of the National Congress, Sun more than once stated that Outer Mongolia was now an “independent state” with an advanced governmental structure and a well-trained cavalry.54 Sun’s associates in Canton concurred by claiming that the independence of Outer Mongolia would be a beacon to other nations in the world still striving for freedom from imperialism.55 Perceivably, such wordings were markedly different from Sun’s earlier assimilation theory four years previously. Presumably with a view to seeking support from all ethnic minority groups within the envisioned future Chinese national boundary and expanding its influence into southwest China, the KMT for the first time explicitly specified that Tibet would be the party’s next target for revolutionary cause, after Outer Mongolia. A clear resolution was then adopted in the first National Congress that henceforth all party affairs in Tibet would take place under the supervision of the KMT’s new party branch in Chengdu, Sichuan.56 The reorganized KMT’s new rhetoric about China’s ethnic minority issues had a certain influence in Inner Mongolia, then still in the grip of the northern warlords. Indeed, it was that rhetoric which drew a considerable number of Inner Mongols to turn to the KMT with hopes of eventually establishing their own autonomous government. A group consisting of progressive youth and intellectuals planned to form a leftist party, a strategy that quickly gained Sun Yat-sen’s approval shortly before his death in March 1925. In October of that year, the leftist Inner Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party (IMPRP) was set up in Zhangjiakou, Chahar, under the leadership of Bai Yunti (Serengdongrob), who had been serving as KMT party special appointee in Inner Mongolia since the early 1920s.57 The unusual relationship between the IMPRP and the KMT was to have a significant impact on the Nationalists’ future position in China’s northern steppe: a considerable number of the IMPRP core members such as Bai Yunti, Yu Lanze (Bayantai), and Li Fenggang (Mandaltan), would become progressive participants in Nationalist China’s Inner Mongolian affairs after the Nationalists seized power in 1928.58



The post-Sun Yat-sen era and indecisive frontier designs In March 1925, less than two years after his leaning to the Soviets, Sun Yat-sen died in Peking, where he was to have attended a national reconstruction conference. His death was followed by a bitter struggle for leadership within the KMT hierarchy. By mid-1926, however, it became evident that Chiang Kai-shek was standing out as the most powerful figure both in the party and in the recently reorganized Nationalist government in Canton. In the summer of 1926, the 120,000-strong Nationalist Revolutionary Army (NRA) under Chiang launched the Northern Expedition in an attempt to forcibly unify the whole nation. Strategically, the Northern Expedition was to involve three military thrusts: one up the Canton–Wuhan railway to Changsha, the key city of Hunan Province; one up the Gan River into Jiangxi Province; and one up the east coast into Fujian Province. If all went well, the army would then have two options: to push on north to the Yangtze River and meet in Wuhan, or to move east by river or railway to Nanking and the rich industrial prize of Shanghai. A series of alliances would be worked out with various warlords along the way, and if possible, their troops would be incorporated into the NRA.59 As the NRA rapidly pushed northward and took over the strategic city of Wuhan, tension developed within the Nationalist hierarchy. By late 1926, Chiang Kai-shek favored a drive eastward into Shanghai to seize the industrial and agricultural heartland of China, whereas other Nationalist leaders and their Soviet advisors supported a northward drive up the Wuhan–Peking railway to capture Peking. The result of this disagreement was the formation of yet another KMT party center and regime. In April 1927, soon after Chiang’s troops occupied Shanghai and the lower Yangtze River delta, Nationalist elements associated with Chiang decreed the establishment of another new Nationalist government in Nanking and proscribed the Communists.60 Yet the split between Nanking and Wuhan was only temporary; a few months later, Wuhan also decided to purge the Communists, contributing to the emergence in September 1927 of a new, ostensibly unified, Nationalist government in Nanking. In early 1928, after a short period of retirement, Chiang returned to office more powerful than before. His troops first entered Jinan in Shandong Province in April, and in the early summer captured Peking. From Peking, Marshal Zhang Zuolin hastily retreated to his old power base in Manchuria, but was assassinated by the Japanese en route to Mukden. With Peking now under the Nationalist yoke, Chiang claimed that he had accomplished the Expedition and had unified the entirety of China.61 During the chaotic period of the Northern Expedition between 1926 and 1928, the strategy of embracing northern warlords who did not openly oppose the new nationalist regime was to strongly influence the frontier territorial agenda of the southern-based KMT. In September 1926, Marshal Feng Yuxiang, a warlord who was then commanding the powerful National People’s Army (Guominjun) and whose vast territories extended into the vast north and northwest regions of Henan, Chahar, Suiyuan, Shaanxi and Gansu, joined the Nationalists. Feng’s


Early years and early strategies 15 move was followed in May 1927 by Yan Xishan, another powerful warlord who then controlled Shanxi Province. Both Feng and Yan played crucial roles in defeating Zhang Zuolin’s forces in the final stage of the Northern Expedition.62 From the point of view of the nascent Nationalist regime in Nanking, the acceptance of Feng and Yan into its ranks became a double-edged sword that was closely related to its undefined frontier and ethnopolitical agenda. By absorbing the warlords and their troops, the Nationalists under Chiang Kai-shek might well be able to claim that the reach of their political legitimacy had now extended to China’s far northwest. On the other hand, however, the Nanking- based Nationalists now faced the unprecedented task of demonstrating that their military and political authority indeed reached the north and northwest. The making of a physical presence in the northern peripheries was by no means an easy task. One KMT party document from September 1926 reveals that, shortly after Feng Yuxiang declared his support for the Nationalists and their Northern Expedition, top KMT leaders expressed their pessimism about whether Nationalist influence could maintain an effective presence within Feng’s territorial domain. Their insecurity about their future relations with this new, powerful ally was therefore apparent very early in the alliance. The higher echelons in the KMT fully realized the importance of constructing party authority within the Guominjun so as to build up their still-weak political influence. Nevertheless, serious doubts prevailed among the Nationalists as to whether their power stood up to their rhetoric.63 Despite a lack of confidence on the part of the KMT in asserting its authority over China’s northern provinces, the cooperation between the Nationalists and powerful regional militarists like Feng Yuxiang and Yan Xishan signified the beginning of the KMT’s role in China’s northern frontier practices. Right from the outset, nonetheless, that beginning was overshadowed by the fact that the Nationalists lacked a concrete and coordinated policy toward China’s ethnopolitics and frontier territoriality. As the year 1928 began, officials in Nanking under Chiang Kai-shek were unexpectedly caught in a dilemma with respect to the issue of building closer ties with Outer Mongolia, which Sun Yat-sen had very recently declared an independent state. Reports from Feng Yuxiang’s group indicated that officials from the Mongolian People’s Republic (MPR) had expressed their keen desire to exchange diplomatic representatives with the newly established Nationalist regime in Nanking. Urga also informed Feng that Marshal Choibalsan, who would become top leader of the MPR some years later, was planning a trip southward to China to meet his “revolutionary comrades.” Chiang Kai-shek’s initial response toward this message was positive: a decision was soon made by the Nationalist State Council in Nanking to dispatch a diplomatic representative to Urga, and official instructions were also given to Feng’s camp in the northwest that should Choibalsan visit, he should be warmly welcomed.64 However, there was no emissary sent out from Nanking to Urga, nor did Choibalsan ever have a chance to visit China proper. Perhaps the Nationalist officials in Nanking, who were still getting accustomed to the new central government apparatus and who were still learning to deal with China’s ethnic


16 Early years and early strategies frontier affairs in a sophisticated fashion, recognized that the political status of Outer Mongolia and its relations with Nationalist China were outstanding and politically sensitive issues that should be handled with particular care. A few months later, in July 1928, when the Inner Mongols announced the dispatch of an official delegation to Nanking, Nationalist officials were once again trapped in a difficult situation and did not know how or whether to receive it.65 They were fully aware that the Inner Mongols were beginning to put pressure on the new regime’s still-undecided ethnic and frontier policies. The Nationalists could not have forgotten that, as recently as March 1927, when the KMT Third Plenary Session of the Second National Congress was held in Wuhan, a pledge was loudly extended to their Inner Mongol comrades that the Nationalists would endeavor to “liberate” non-Han ethnic minorities and help them achieve their political autonomy.66 With the emergence of a new and as yet uncertain frontier political landscape in the north, the now ruling Nationalists were not in an easy position to make substantial promises to the Mongols that might be detrimental to China’s legally-defined territorial status quo. As a result, in the summer of 1928 when the Nationalists officially ended their Northern Expedition and had every reason to celebrate their ascendancy, the challenges resulting from the undecided and problematic issue of post-imperial China’s ethnic territorial designs were just about to begin.



Caught between ethnopolitics and warlordism By early 1929, the flag of the new Nationalist regime in Nanking was flying over the entirety of China, from Xinjiang to Manchuria, and from Yunnan to Inner Mongolia. Peking was captured by the NRA in June 1928, leading the previously autonomous regional militarists to publicly recognize Chiang Kai-shek as China’s new supreme leader. On December 29, 1928, the Young Marshal Zhang Xueliang, who succeeded his father Zhang Zuolin as leader of Manchuria, also declared his loyalty to Nanking. The nation which had disintegrated after Yuan Shikai’s death in 1916 finally appeared to have been reunified.1 In the eyes of Chiang Kai-shek and his fellows, however, such unification was precarious and unrealistic. The Nationalists knew all too well that their revolutionary movement had succeeded largely because many of the powerful regional militarists like Feng Yuxiang and Yan Xishan had not been defeated on the battlefields but instead had been conveniently integrated into their campaign.2 During the course of the Northern Expedition, the Nationalists attempted both to unify the nation and to centralize power, and to do so they were obliged to tolerate the semi-independent authority of the warlords-cum-Nationalists who later not only gained membership in the KMT party but also received prestigious posts in the Nanking political hierarchy. In order to achieve his revolutionary goal, Chiang Kai-shek even grudgingly consented to the inauguration of a handful of semi-independent administrative organs in the warlords’ respective satrapies that would allow them to legitimate their regional dominance and ensure their preeminent interests.3 Therefore, when the dust settled after the Northern Expedition, China remained militarily, politically and economically fragmented. By early 1929, the authority of Chiang Kai-shek’s alleged central regime was restricted to the Lower Yangtze Valley, which included Jiangsu, Zhejiang and part of Anhui.4 In north and northwest China, Feng Yuxiang and his Guominjun firmly controlled Henan, Shaanxi, Gansu, Suiyuan and Ningxia, where Nanking exercised only meager influence. Yan Xishan continued to rule his old Shanxi Province undisturbed, and had a great deal of influence in Hebei (including the two key cities of Peking and Tianjin), Chahar, and part of Suiyuan, the extension of Chiang’s control into


18 Frontier politics in metropolitan China which he resisted as late as 1930. In southwest China, the theoretically KMT- aligned but functionally autonomous Guangxi faction, led by Li Zongren and Bai Chongxi, ruled Guangxi Province and had a strong influence in the adjacent Guangdong Province. The other southwestern provinces of Sichuan, Yunnan and Guizhou were controlled by their own semi-independent military leaders, who by 1929 paid little if any attention to the new Nationalist center in Nanking.5 Outside China proper, after the Northern Expedition, Zhang Xueliang continued to dominate Manchuria after the Northern Expedition, despite his earlier declaration of allegiance to Nanking and showed his willingness to turn the conduct of the region’s foreign affairs over to the nascent Nationalist government.6 China’s traditional frontier possessions in Central Asia were no different; by 1929, the vast Xinjiang Province was under the administration of Jin Shuren, who had succeeded Yang Zengxin in the summer of 1928 when Yang was assassinated by his provincial subordinates. Compared with Yang, who between 1911 and 1928 had adopted a closed-door policy vis-à-vis the political chaos of the Chinese Republic, Jin was even less inclined to obey the new central regime in Nanking.7 Regarding Outer Mongolia and Tibet, while other autonomous provincial authorities had recognized, although quite often deliberately ignored, the Nationalist new central authority, ethnic minority leaders of these two territories never gave even ostensible allegiance to Nanking.8 Thus, in a strict sense, the Nanking-based Nationalist government was a geographically localized regime whose power projection capability was weak and whose capacity to implement effective policies throughout the whole nation remained questionable.9 As a result, one vital and imperative challenge confronting Nanking was how to extend its imagined authority over the vast territories beyond its power base in the Lower Yangtze delta. In the early stages of Nationalist rule, since Nanking was in too weak a position to bring the regional warlords under its effective control, calculated strategizing would be more effective than the use of force. Further, the effectiveness of those strategies would increasingly rely on taking into consideration ethnopolitical factors. Writing in his diary in July 1929, Chiang Kai-shek expressed his grave concerns about using the best strategy to infiltrate Nationalist authority into Inner Mongolia. Chiang particularly fretted that while Outer Mongolia under Soviet auspices was now able to reform itself in financial, military and infrastructural terms, the situation in Inner Mongolia under Han Chinese provincial authorities continued to be backward and in serious lack of revolutionary spirit.10 Given a lack of centralized, enforceable power, ethnic and border issues were frequently challenges. In the summer of 1928, without first consulting the Mongols and Tibetans who inhabited the frontier regions, the Nationalists in Nanking hastily announced the creation of six new provinces in Inner Mongolia, Kokonor, and the Sichuan– Tibetan border region in southwest China. According to this new formulation, Inner Mongolia was divided into the four provinces of Rehe, Chahar, Suiyuan, and Ningxia. Kokonor was renamed Qinghai and converted into a regular province, and the Kham district on the Sino-Tibetan borderland was converted into a new Xikang Province (literally “western Kham”).11 The Nationalists’ ideological


Frontier politics in metropolitan China 19 foundation in the old “Five Nationalities” doctrine led to the decision to gradually eliminate all the privileges that the Inner Mongolian nobles had enjoyed in their traditional banner and league system. The imperial legacies, according to the Nationalist rhetoric, were incompatible with the new revolutionary spirit and would inevitably hamper the construction of a modern five-nationality Chinese Republic.12 Regardless of repeated petitions sent by the Inner Mongolian high nobility in an effort to preserve their political autonomy, in early 1929 Nanking legislatively implemented new provincial boundary lines along the vast Inner Mongolian belt which ignored existing Mongolian boundaries, contributing further to the Mongols’ disunity and facilitating their ultimate absorption into the Han cultural and political system.13 There have been many divergent interpretations of the Nationalist political and ideological decision to transform these former frontier “special territories” (tebie quyu) into part of metropolitan China. At one point, it was seen as a clear demonstration of the Nationalists’ desire to consolidate China’s precarious frontier, as well as a strong indication of Nanking’s commitment to bringing China’s strategically vulnerable peripheral territories under its effective control.14 Some Chinese historians did not hesitate to praise such a strategy as an “outstanding achievement” in terms of strengthening modern China’s border security and defense.15 On the other hand, however, recent scholarly works also question whether Nationalist provincialization was an effective means of enhancing its border defense. Justin Tighe, for example, has argued that the resolution of Inner Mongolian frontier issues through provincialization in the late 1920s and early 1930s proved to be problematic for Nanking. Tighe posits that precisely because the provincial system was built to assert Nationalist Chinese power at the expense of the Mongols, thus treating the latter as obstacles to China’s unification, it actually provoked the Mongols to rebel.16 A closer examination of Nanking’s ethnopolitical issues in the early Nationalist era has yielded a very different interpretation. The creation of the new border provinces actually served as a generous reward from Chiang Kai-shek to his northern warlord allies in exchange for the latter’s cooperation at the final stage of the Northern Expedition.17 The creation of the new border provinces was originally a quid pro quo from Chiang to his northern allies when Peking was about to be seized in mid-1928; the warlords in north and northwest China were given the opportunity to maintain their local power by controlling new provincial politics and filling new official posts that had been legitimately proclaimed. In the first months of 1929, both Feng Yuxiang and Yan Xishan were busy placing their own men in the northern provincial governments in their spheres of influence, and were eager to absorb local elites into their respective camps. Yan Xishan, in particular, was so powerful and authoritative that he made key appointments within the new Chahar and Suiyuan provincial governments without consulting with Nanking, and in so doing made the new governors of these two provinces his own puppets.18 Yan Xishan’s political predominance in the affairs of Inner Mongolia and northern China also enabled him to attract many Inner Mongolian political


20 Frontier politics in metropolitan China figures to his side. In the fall of 1929, Prince Lhawangburugji (Ta Wang), then head of Alashaa Banner whose old banner satrapy now fell within the provincial boundary of the new Ningxia Province, was endeavoring to keep his imperially- bequeathed privileges intact. Feeling anxious about his now-threatened authority, Prince Lhawangburugji thought it a matter of urgency to obtain a post within the new Ningxia provincial authorities. Yet, instead of addressing his problem to the Nationalist center, Prince Lhawangburugji unhesitatingly turned to Yan Xishan, whom he also asked for military and financial support in exchange for the full cooperation of his tiny yet strategically important banner.19 Predictably, not every Inner Mongolian noble was pleased with the new administrative arrangement in their homeland. Although the Nationalists in Nanking allowed Feng Yuxiang and Yan Xishan to have free hands in forming the new administrative mechanisms in the northern steppe, they were for the time being unable to define the relationship between the new provincial authorities and the Mongolian hereditary league and banner system, whose traditional interests were in serious conflict with those of the new political regime.20 For example, in a State Council meeting held on October 2, 1928, policy planners in Nanking were caught in a horrible dilemma. On the one hand, the power- restricted Nationalists were unwilling to represent the political transformation of Inner Mongolia as a political reward for their new allies in the north. On the other hand, however, they were still to some extent trapped in their past commitment to support the political autonomy of the Mongols, and therefore the higher echelons in Nanking were inclined to keep the old imperial legacies intact. As a result, it was decided that the annual stipends previously given to the Mongolian nobility would be continued, despite the central government’s continuing financial problems.21 A few weeks later, when a group of Inner Mongolian banners and leagues leaders reached Nanking to discuss their future relations with the Chinese Republic, Nationalist high officials inadvertently demonstrated their naiveté and unsophisticatedness with regards to frontier issues. The Inner Mongols urged Nanking to postpone the intolerable remapping of their steppe homeland, and threatened that such a program would seriously endanger the relationship between the Mongols and the Nationalists. Although Nationalist frontier advisors promised their guests that Nanking would meticulously work out the best solution in Inner Mongolia, they neither cancelled the project nor reneged on their commitments to the northern warlords.22 The new Nationalist regime was destined to suffer from a serious lack of political power with which to manage its ethnic frontier agenda, and deal with the capricious and undecided nature of its ethnopolitics. In the fall of 1929, the relationship between the upper classes of the Inner Mongols and the Nationalists was further exacerbated when Nanking turned down a request made by an influential Inner Mongolian noble. Around September of that year, Prince Shargduriab (Sha Wang), then head of Yekejuu League located in the new Suiyuan provincial boundary, petitioned Nanking to promote his eldest son from fourth- degree to second-degree imperial prince, a practice that was not uncommon in


Frontier politics in metropolitan China 21 the Qing and the early Republican era. Yet the Nationalists decided to shelve the Mongol prince’s plea; Nanking ostensibly explained to the angered Prince Shagdurjab that the granting of such a title was inappropriate in the Nationalist period. Yet the underlying theme was a serious power struggle between Nationalist bureaucrats in Nanking and Yan Xishan in north China over who would have the final say in Inner Mongolian affairs.23 Ironically, it was only after the relationship between Chiang Kai-shek and his northern allies had deteriorated that Nanking’s untenable position in Inner Mongolia finally had a chance to improve. In the spring of 1930, the already strained and irreconcilable relations between Nanking and the major warlord groups intensified. Yan Xishan and Feng Yuxiang, long discontented with Chiang’s attempt to undermine their authority, launched an anti-Nanking movement. Their military campaign was later augmented when Li Zongren and Bai Chongxi in the southwest, equally dissatisfied with Nanking, decided to join and promised to coordinate their attack from the south. These disparate elements soon evolved into the institution of a separate and hostile regime. In July 1930, an Enlarged Conference of the KMT party was convened in Peking. The conference, functionally equivalent to the party’s Central Executive Committee and with Yan Xishan as its chairman, led to the inauguration in Peking of another “Nationalist government” in September.24 In the early 1930s, Nationalist strategists took advantage of China’s delicate and yet precarious frontier landscape in order to gain leverage vis-à-vis their political enemies. In early May 1930, when sporadic military conflicts began to erupt between Chiang Kai-shek’s troops and the northern militarists, Nanking abruptly announced its intention to convene a national Mongolian Affairs Conference (Menggu Huiyi). The idea of holding a nation-wide ethnic minority conference, ideally joined by Tibetan and Mongolian leaders, first appeared in the fall of 1928, when the Nationalists were exasperated at theretofore inability to craft a practicable frontier formula. Officials in Nanking also hoped that the conference would allow them to construct a powerful “five-nationality” national image.25 The conference was postponed, however, when the Tibetan authorities under the thirteenth Dalai Lama categorically rejected the Nationalists’ invitation to send their delegates to Nanking, a move which Lhasa believed would symbolize Tibet’s political submission to China.26 In the spring of 1930, despite the absence of the Tibetans and the war with the warlords, the Nationalists in Nanking surprisingly announced that the Mongolian Affairs Conference was to be held in the national capital to work out a sound frontier policy and to promote a constructive relationship with the Mongols. The timing of this event, taking place between May 29 and June 12, 1930, when a large-scale civil war was imminent, was skillfully tailored by Chiang Kai-shek and his aides to create the impression of having already won the support of the Inner Mongols, who would curb the northern rebels and thus force them to face a double-front menace.27 On hearing about the conference, Feng Yuxiang and Yan Xishan went out of their way to prevent the Inner Mongols from reaching Nanking. The northern rebels feared that the presence of



Figure 2.1 The closing ceremony of the Mongolian Affairs Conference, June 1930 (source: Menggu Huiyi Huibian, 1930).

Mongols in the national capital would add legitimacy to Chiang Kai-shek’s regime. According to Nanking, ultimately more than 60 Inner Mongolian representatives were intercepted in Peking en route to Nanking.28 In retaliation for the warlords’ interference, the Nationalists not only severely castigated the “misconduct” of the northern rebels, but also continued to urge the Hui Muslims and Outer Mongols in China’s far north to rise up against Feng and Yan and to overthrow their “tyrannical rules” in Shaanxi and Shanxi Provinces.29

A new frontier disposition A few weeks after the formation of the anti-Nanking Nationalist regime in Peking, Chiang Kai-shek started to gain an upper hand in the civil war, when he secured critical support from Marshal Zhang Xueliang in Manchuria. In late September 1930, more than 100,000 Manchurian troops poured into the Peking– Tianjin area, resulting in the almost overnight collapse of the anti-Chiang coalition. In early November, Yan Xishan and Feng Yuxiang announced their retreat from the political arena. Feng’s withdrawal bore particular repercussions; his once mighty Guominjun soon collapsed and henceforth lost any potential it may have once possessed to dominate northwest China.30 Yet, as the Manchuria- based Zhang Xueliang was by no means able to swallow up the vast northwest


Frontier politics in metropolitan China 23 right away, the political vacuum left by Yan and Feng’s departure allowed a dozen minor military leaders originally from Yan or Feng’s cliques to fill in and ruled their respective satrapies relatively unconstrained by Nanking or Mukden. General Yang Hucheng, for example, who would kidnap Chiang Kai-shek in Xi’an six years later, rose up as the new strongman of Shaanxi Province. The Ma Tungan-Muslim family of the northwest, who had hitherto served under Feng Yuxiang’s Guominjun, arose as new leaders in the northwestern provinces of Gansu, Ningxia, and Qinghai. General Fu Zuoyi, one of Yan Xishan’s most trusted subordinates in the old Shanxi clique, soon became the most powerful warlord of Suiyuan Province, where he ruled until the eve of Communist take over in 1949.31 At first glance, the Nationalists in Nanking seemed to have gained little from their victory in the civil war in terms of power expansion into northern and northwestern China. However, Nationalist core members expected that the new political landscape after the downfall of Feng Yuxiang and Yan Xishan would be vulnerable to manipulation on the part of Nanking.32 After the convention of the Mongolian Affairs Conference, a plethora of clearly defined policies was formulated in Nanking vis-à-vis the Mongols. As a reward for their siding with the Nationalists during the 1930 civil war, the Inner Mongolian nobles were officially granted the right to organize their own banner militias free from the control of local provincial authorities. To improve their economic situation, the Inner Mongolian banners were encouraged to strengthen their commercial ties with the Mongolian People’s Republic north of the Gobi that was then under Soviet patronage. It was also preliminarily decided in the Mongolian Affairs Conference that Nanking would endeavor to help Inner Mongols increase their political autonomy within Nationalist China’s existing constitutional structure.33 This last decision soon evolved into the implementation of a concrete political démarche allowing the Mongolian nobles to retain their hereditary system free from the interference of the warlord-controlled provincial regimes. The Mongols were also able to keep their grazing lands separate from those of local Han Chinese officials and settlers.34 In the last months of 1931, all of the policies developed at the Mongolian Affairs Conference were officially incorporated into Nationalist China’s legislation.35 In the aftermath of the 1930 civil war, the extent of Nationalist dominance in Inner Mongolia remained questionable. The corollary was that the pro- Mongolian policies implemented by Nanking were interpreted as hollow promises. Yet their verbalized willingness to aid the Mongols was not merely lip service; the Nationalists were actually seeking to consolidate prestige and security for their power base in China’s southeastern corner. From Nanking’s strategic point of view, allowing the coexistence of provincial governments and the traditional league and banner system in Inner Mongolia meant allowing the Mongols to continue managing their own political system. Simultaneously, the administration of the northern provinces was in the hands of the still- uncontrollable regional militarists. Conflicts between the Mongols and the local warlords were therefore inevitable, and in such a deadlocked situation neither


24 Frontier politics in metropolitan China side was likely to become a major threat to Nanking, as Yan Xishan and Feng Yuxiang had done. The Nationalists had astutely engineered a favorable state of divide-and-rule in China’s northern frontiers.36 As one foreign observation report in the early 1930s correctly depicted, the Nationalists presumed that their constitutional framework was the only way to implement political autonomy in Inner Mongolia. As a result, their strategy was to first lay out a political framework, and only once the foundation was in place would they work out the problems of governance.37 Yet this approach inevitably conflicted with the mindset of such proactive Inner Mongols as Prince Demchugdongrob (De Wang), whose goal was genuine political autonomy free from Han Chinese jurisdiction. The conflict between the Nationalists and the Mongols in the earliest days of the 1930s would evolve into the complex Inner Mongolian Autonomous Movement throughout the latter part of the 1930s and the 1940s.38 To understand China’s frontier ethnopolitics after 1928, it is first necessary to review the Nationalists’ general perception of China’s frontier situation as well as their attitude with respect to the pending ethnic frontier problems. As discussed above, when the Nationalist government was first set up in Nanking, China remained militarily and politically divided. Viewed from a practical perspective, the Nationalists understood very well that there was no way to put the “five-nationality” ideal into practice. One should recall that in the early Republican period both Chiang Kai-shek and Dai Chuanxian favored a proactive policy with regards to post-Qing China’s Mongolian and Tibetan issues. In 1928, however, the unstable political situation in China proper combined with a lack of real power in peripheral China led top Nationalist leaders like Chiang and Dai to adopt a very cautious stance vis-à-vis the new regime’s ethnopolitical affairs. Dai, for example, fretted bitterly in the fall of 1928 that it had become “extremely unwise” to seek to settle the Tibetan question before Nationalist influence was able to reach the adjacent provinces of Sichuan, Qinghai and Xikang, where Nanking still did not exercise any real control.39 Moreover, in late 1929, frontier policy designers in Nanking candidly pointed out that one of the most important tasks for a weak central regime was to “maintain the status quo” in the border regions and to leave any reform projects untouched for the time being.40 Given a lack of physical presence in the frontier regions, it is indeed hard to see how the Nationalists at the early stage of their rule would have been capable or prepared to implement an effective and indoctrinated frontier and ethnic policy. Nevertheless, the relative stability, influence, and legitimacy of China’s “central government” allowed the Nationalists more leeway than they otherwise would have had and were thus able to achieve some degree of success in establishing their political footholds in peripheral China. In this regard, Nanking began by launching an institutional reform. In early 1929, the Nationalists first reorganized the former Republican government’s Mongolian and Tibetan Ministry (Meng Zang Yuan) in Peking into a new Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission (Meng Zang Weiyuanhui; MTAC), directly under the Executive Yuan.41 Yan Xishan, having strong influence in Inner Mongolia, was appointed as the first


Frontier politics in metropolitan China 25 head of the MTAC. But as Yan refused to leave his sphere of influence in northern China to resume his new post in Nanking, the MTAC was essentially run by Deputy Head Zhao Daiwen, who remained on good terms with both Yan’s and Chiang Kai-shek’s men. As a result, after 1928 responsibility for China’s frontier policy planning lay largely on Nationalist bureaucrats in Nanking.42 Unlike its predecessors that had generally been viewed as symbolic governmental organs with only marginal significance, the MTAC under the Nationalist regime was purposefully designed to serve as a unique body which, aside from dealing with regular frontier affairs planning, also played a significant role in Chiang Kai-shek’s personal networking with provincial leaders whose spheres of influence were adjacent to the ethnic frontier territories. Since a considerable number of MTAC members were concurrently serving as personal representatives of important regional militarists from Sichuan, Yunnan, Xikang, Ningxia, Suiyuan and Qinghai, direct linkages were established between Nanking and the distant provincial authorities. The MTAC therefore served as a useful bargaining platform on which officials in Nanking and provincial representatives could solve their disputes.43 The newly organized MTAC also allowed the Nanking-centered Nationalists to augment their tenuous authority in the outlying territories. By dispatching its agents to various cities and districts in the remote border regions as “special appointees,” “commissioners,” or “correspondents,” the MTAC sought to establish Nationalist outposts instrumental in keeping an eye on autonomous border provincial authorities. By 1934, despite its relatively low budget, the MTAC had been able to set up functional units and agencies in the frontier cities of Zhangjiakou, Dartsedo (Kangding), Xining, Baotou, and Chifeng, thus enabling Nanking to obtain firsthand information from the border provinces of Chahar, Xikang, Qinghai, Suiyuan and Rehe.44 The MTAC unit in Zhangjiakou even functioned well into the 1940s, after most of the eastern edge of Inner Mongolia had fallen under Japanese control.45 One significant strategy the Nationalists applied to elevate the national prestige of their nascent central regime was to utilize MTAC bureaucrats to engage in clandestine activities in the foreign countries that were adjacent to China’s border regions. One interesting example took place in 1930, when Nanking employed such a strategy in its relationship with Nepal. Since the middle of 1929, relations between Tibet and Nepal had turned sour. In August, a Tibet- born Nepalese was arrested in Lhasa on charges of counterfeiting and smuggling Tibetan copper coins. In the midst of the bureaucratic confusion as to whether Tibet or Nepal should try him, the suspect escaped from Tibetan custody and sought shelter in the Nepalese residency in Lhasa. Eventually the Tibetan police entered the residency and took the suspect away, a move that deeply offended Katmandu. In February 1930, Nepalese Prime Minister Bhim Shamsher ordered the mobilization of troops in preparation for war with Tibet. A military clash between the two nations seemed unavoidable.46 Although at the time unable to directly intervene in the crisis, strategists in Nanking viewed it as an appropriate opportunity to pull some political strings in


26 Frontier politics in metropolitan China the Himalayan region. In the summer of 1930, two middle-ranking MTAC officials masquerading as ordinary merchants secretly traveled to Katmandu via Rangoon and Calcutta. The Nepalese were informed that two Nationalist officials were coming as representatives of the Chinese government to help them settle their dispute with the Tibetans. Although Bhim Shamsher was pleased by the elegant gifts that the two Nationalists had brought with them, he rejected the offer of help, citing his unwillingness to allow the Nationalist regime in Nanking to be involved in any dispute between Tibet and Nepal.47 Nepal’s negative response, however, was not a defeat for the Nationalists in Nanking. The cost of sending two petty officials to India and Nepal was neglig ible; yet in terms of propaganda and reputation, the trip served as a public declaration to the Chinese people that Nanking was determined to protect China’s sovereignty in the distant southwestern frontiers. After the two MTAC officials returned to Nanking, their account of what they reported as a fascinating and advantageous journey to Katmandu was extensively reported throughout China. At one point in the early 1930s, it was generally believed that Nanking’s efforts had not only led to the final peaceful resolution between Tibet and Nepal, but had also contributed to the restoration of an official relationship between the Nationalists and Nepal, a former Qing dependency.48 Dispatching officials also had more palpable political advantages in that it allowed the Nationalist regime to initiate its construction of an intelligence network on the Indian subcontinent and in the Himalayan region. Around the same time that the two MTAC officials were on their way to Katmandu, another middle-ranking MTAC official was accompanying Liang Changpei, Nationalist China’s vice-consul at Calcutta, to embark on a clandestine venture to Raxaul, a small town on the Nepalese–Indian border. They were later discovered by local Nepalese officials to have engaged in such secret activities as recruiting local Tibetan and Nepalese inhabitants to work as Nationalist secret agents.49 According to the British government of India, Nanking’s frontier diplomatic representatives not only attempted to use their diplomatic and party-branch organs in Calcutta to construct a wide intelligence network in South Asia, but even went as far as to engage in secret meetings with the anti-British terrorists in Bengal who were seeking Nanking’s assistance to obtain munitions from the Chinese warlords in Sichuan and Xikang.50 Nanking’s blatant interventionism eventually caused the annoyed New Delhi authorities to expel almost every suspicious Nationalist diplomat in Calcutta from India.51

Institutional links with ethnic leaders Understandably, in the initial stage of their rule, the power-limited Nationalists in Nanking sought out the minimum cost for the maximum benefit. Given their paucity of political influence outside Nanking, however, they did not always succeed. In early 1932, in an attempt to establish a foothold in southwest China, Nanking dispatched a capable and active MTCA member named Kesang Tsering to Xikang. Under the pretext of organizing a KMT party branch in the Kham


Frontier politics in metropolitan China 27 area and spreading Sun Yat-sen’s Three People’s Principle among the Tibetan and Khampa minorities, Kesang Tsering set up a field headquarters in Batang (Pa’an). There he appointed his own Xikang provincial government staff and issued an order to recruit locals into his own militia.52 Furious at Nanking’s bold attempt to undermine his authority, Xikang warlord Liu Wenhui ordered his superior forces to launch an attack. The result was a disaster for both Kesang Tsering and Nanking; the arduously built Nationalist footing in Batang had only lasted for a few months. No longer able to continue conducting his “KMT party affairs” in the southwest, Kesang Tsering fled back to Nanking where he resumed his post in the MTAC under Chiang Kai-shek.53 Realizing that the overall political situation was not yet favorable for Nanking to extend their authority effectively into China’s frontier territories, Nationalist policy designers sought alternative means by which to keep control of the ethnopolitical situation. One strategy was to create institutional links with prestigious ethnic minority leaders. In the eyes of some savvy Nationalists, by supporting and subsidizing influential non-Han religious figures to install offices in the national capital, they could both enhance the regime’s ethnopolitical credibility and reinvigorate the time-honored “five-nationality” ideology. The ninth Panchen Lama, whose rank in the hierarchy of Yellow Hat Buddhists was second only to that of the Dalai Lama, was the first non-Han dignitary to establish an institutional link with the Nationalist regime. Since the mid-seventeenth century, the Dalai and Panchen Lamas were venerated as the supreme religious leaders of Tibetan Buddhism. Yet, the relationship between the two prelates was not always harmonious. The relationship between the thirteenth Dalai Lama and the ninth Panchen Lama was seriously strained in 1923 as a result of differing stances toward Tibetan administrative reform. Their conflict resulted in the Panchen Lama’s flight from Tibet into China proper, where he and his adherents entered into a close relationship with the Han Chinese authorities and thereafter greatly influenced Han Chinese Buddhists as well as Buddhist minorities in Qinghai, Inner Mongolia and Manchuria.54 Not surprisingly, after coming to power in 1928, the Nationalists took note of this reputed Tibetan Buddhist leader who was living in China proper. In early 1929, even before the Panchen Lama had a chance to visit Nanking and meet with the new Nationalist leadership, the Panchen Lama’s representative office had been formally instituted in the national capital, supported financially and technically by the Nationalist center. This was a particularly historically significant move because, as Gray Tuttle has pointed out, it was the first time in the history of modern China that the central government created a special office for a Tibetan Buddhist hierarchy.55 Lobsang Gyentsen, one of the Panchen Lama’s most trusted advisors, became the first head of the Lama’s representative office and was responsible for bridging together the Panchen Lama and the Nationalist regime. To the Panchen Lama, the representative office was a convenient channel through which to assert his spiritual influence and express his personal views to the now ruling Nationalists. To Nanking, apart from creating a functional link with a spiritual dignitary, the representative office was a way to


28 Frontier politics in metropolitan China improve the new regime’s reputation and in so doing reinforce their as yet inchoate and unstable legitimacy of rule.56 Soon after the Nationalists came into power, the thirteenth Dalai Lama in Lhasa, then still at odds with the ninth Panchen Lama, also initiated an institutional link with Nanking. In September 1929, shortly after the inauguration of the Panchen Lama’s representative office, the Dalai Lama instructed Koncho Chungnay, the Tibetan abbot of the Peking Lama Temple (Yonghegong), to communicate several practical economic concerns to the Nationalist leadership. Toward the end of the 1920s, the Dalai Lama urgently needed to increase sources of income by opening up new markets and to reduce governmental expenditure by cutting the size of the Tibetan army. These goals could not be accomplished without first securing a peaceful border between China and Tibet.57 In his meeting with Chiang Kai-shek, Koncho Chungnay expressed the Dalai Lama’s wish to obtain financial and technological support from Nanking. He also expressed the hope that the Nationalists, who had recently completed the Northern Expedition, could help to improve the frosty relationship between Lhasa and the Chinese warlords in the southwest. Koncho Chungnay made it manifest to Nationalist high officials that the unquiet Xikang–Tibetan borderland had caused a tenfold rise in the price of Chinese tea, a change which affected Tibetan nobility as well as commoners.58 By 1929, with hindsight, it was still questionable whether the Nationalists would be able to control the regional militarists in southwest China. The close contact between Chiang Kai-shek and the Tibetan abbot, however, made possible the establishment of a productive relationship between Nanking and Lhasa. Koncho Chungnay was soon appointed by Chiang as his special envoy to return to the Dalai Lama and convey Nanking’s goodwill toward Lhasa. By the time the Tibetan abbot again returned to China proper in the latter half of 1930, the creation of a permanent Tibetan representative office in Nanking was officially announced. This new representative office, like that of the Panchen Lama, was also subsidized partially by the Nationalist government. At the same time, two other branch offices were instituted in Peking and Dartsedo. Koncho Chungnay, who was by then on very good terms with Chiang, was made the first Tibetan Representative to Nationalist China. An official channel of communication between the new Chinese central government and Tibetan leaders that had been suspended for nearly two decades finally seemed to be reopening.59 The amicable relationship between Nanking and the Tibetan leadership was to be a model on which the Nationalists could base new institutional links with other non-Han ethnic leaders. In September 1929, the Nationalists consented to the formation in Nanking of a representative office of the seventh Janggiya Hutuktu, another respected Yellow Hat Buddhist dignitary in Inner Mongolia. This was followed by the inauguration of a similar office in the capital by the seventh Norla Hutuktu, a well-known Tibetan Red Hat Sect prelate from the Kham region. In early 1933, a joint representative office of the seven Hutuktus from the great Kokonor region was formally opened in Nanking. This office, chaired by the Minjur Hutuktu, one of the seven renowned Buddhist spiritual


Frontier politics in metropolitan China 29 leaders in Qinghai, served as the most important channel of communication between the Nationalist authorities and the prominent ethnic elites who exercised tremendous influence in some of the most remote corners of Chinese Inner Asia.60 As a result of these new institutional linkages, toward the end of 1933 Nanking had forged formal connections with almost every influential Tibetan Buddhist figurehead of Inner Mongolia, Qinghai, Kham and Tibet.61 It should be stressed that the creation of institutionalized links between the Nationalists and the Tibetan Buddhist hierarchy was based on a premise of mutual necessity. The authority-challenged Nationalists in Nanking needed non- Han dignitaries to elevate their prestige both in China proper and in the far-flung frontier territories. These ethnic minority celebrities, in turn, needed the secular endorsement and protection of the new Nationalist center to maintain their lay and secular authority in their traditional spheres of influence. In reality, however, incompatible political, economic, and religious goals sometimes made clashes between the Nationalists and the ethnic minority leaders inevitable. One controversy in particular, that took place between the seventh Janggiya Hutuktu and the KMT leadership, is one example of such conflict. Shortly after the Nationalists came to power in 1928, the seventh Janggiya Hutuktu was quick to declare his political loyalty to Chiang Kai-shek. In a telegram sent to Nanking in early 1929, the Hutuktu offered to use his traditional authority to propagate KMT political ideology among the Inner Mongols, thereby paving the way for the Nationalist infiltration of the Mongols. At the same time, however, this politically shrewd Yellow Hat prelate requested that he be given full authority over the lamaseries in Inner Mongolia by replacing the old Peking Lama Seal Office, originally responsible for regulating Inner Mongolian lamaseries, with his newly proposed “Yellow Sect Committee.”62 When the MTAC officials rejected his proposal and, instead, proposed to transfer the Mongolian lamaseries to the jurisdiction of Inner Mongolian banners, the angered and disappointed Janggiya Hutuktu responded by claiming that lamas throughout Inner Mongolia had informed him that, should the Nationalists go through with such a transfer, they would all move to Soviet-dominated Outer Mongolia. The agitated prelate further argued that the new Nationalist government should not “desire momentary satisfaction only to ruin the whole situation,” and avowed that he would not be responsible if something unfortunate happened in Inner Mongolia.63 It remains unclear whether the formation of institutional links between the Nationalist regime and ethnic religious figureheads actually helped to accelerate the extension of the nascent government’s power into China’s outlying frontiers. What is clear, though, is that the establishment of the thirteenth Dalai Lama’s representative offices in Nanking and other key cities in Nationalist-controlled China did not automatically lead to Tibet’s political submission to Nanking. Nonetheless, the policy of fostering institutional and administrative connections with influential non-Han leaders undoubtedly allowed the nascent localized Nationalist regime to bolster its reputation among ethnic minorities. Despite the aforementioned discord over Mongolian lamaseries between Nanking and the


Figure 2.2 The Panchen Lama receiving his devout followers in Qinghai, c.1937. The reputed Tibetan prelate was instrumental in the Nationalist Chinese frontier and ethnic politics (source: Xibei Jiuying Wangshi, p. 118).

Figure 2.3 Inner Mongols prostrated in front of the Panchen Lama’s field headquarters at Bailingmiao, c.1933. The Panchen Lama asserted huge influence among Tibetan Buddhist followers in China’s ethnic frontiers (source: Neimeng zhi Jinxi, 1934).


Frontier politics in metropolitan China 31 seventh Janggiya Hutuktu, in the upper half of the 1930s their relationship was a crucial stabilizing factor in Inner Mongolia against the Japanese-backed Inner Mongolian Autonomous Movement.64 By the early 1930s, in the face of a deteriorating political situation on the Inner Mongolian steppe, both the Janggiya Hutuktu and the Panchen Lama were made high-ranking officials within the Nationalist political hierarchy; the former was appointed special publicity commissioner for the Mongol banners and the latter was made a special publicity commissioner for the western regions, while both were conferred ministerial status. According to the Nationalists, these new positions were created in order to facilitate their “consolatory activities” in the politically unstable Inner Mongolia on Nanking’s behalf. No doubt, the intent of the appointments was also to facilitate their roles as intermediaries between Nanking, the northern Han provincial warlords, and the Mongolian nobles who were increasingly leaning toward Japan.65

Controlling minority education One significant and yet often overlooked aspect of modern Chinese ethnopolitics was the Nationalist attempt to command ethnic minority educational resources. During their rise to power, the Nationalists were clearly aware that, in the long run, it would be next to impossible for them to bolster their influence in the far- flung frontiers without nurturing ethnic minority elites of their own. Consequently, shortly after the NRA conquered Peking in the summer of 1928, active discussions were underway among officials in Nanking as to how to take over the Mongolian and Tibetan Academy (Meng Zang Xuexiao) in Peking and transform it into a useful base of human resources for the new regime.66 The process of controlling the academy was unexpectedly difficult. In 1929, Peking fell within Yan Xishan’s sphere of influence, and the ambitious and clever Yan was equally eager to turn the academy into his own. The result was a bitter closed-door struggle between Yan’s clique and Nanking. The students of the academy, apparently instigated and backed by northern politicians, strongly opposed the new Nanking-appointed president and staff of the academy and boycotted the classes. Nationalist officials tried in vain to persuade the minority students in the academy to resume classes; it was not until late in 1929, when Nanking threatened to shut down the academy because of the chaos, the new president of the academy was finally able to take charge of the school.67 The tenuousness of their control over the Peking Mongolian and Tibetan Academy prompted the Nationalists to think about establishing new minority educational institutions of their own. In November 1930, the Mongolian and Tibetan Class (later becoming a school) was initiated under the KMT Central Political Academy headed by Chiang Kai-shek himself. With full financial and administrative support from the Nationalist center, the Mongolian and Tibetan Class recruited both Han and non-Han Chinese students as the regime’s potential frontier affairs cadets. It also provided the most thorough training for participation in Nationalist China’s frontier ethnopolitics. The resources the Mongolian


32 Frontier politics in metropolitan China and Tibetan Class possessed included a sprawling campus on the outskirts of the Nanking capital, an experimental farm, a clinic, and an elementary school.68 According to one statistical report, by the fall of 1935, 270 cadets were enrolled in the Mongolian and Tibetan Class, most of whom were Han Chinese or Inner Mongols. After the first intake in November 1930, over 90 percent of the Mongolian and Tibetan Class’s graduates either served in government frontier planning bodies or taught frontier politics in China’s institutes of higher education.69 The urgent need to cultivate more frontier and minority affairs experts in the early 1930s drove the Nationalists to set up yet another new institution in March 1933, this time under MTAC’s direct supervision. The newly launched Mongolian and Tibetan Political Training Corps emphasized the teaching of the Mongolian and Tibetan languages, aiming at fostering Nationalist civil servants who could serve in the MTAC or as Nationalist special agents working in the frontier regions.70 Meanwhile, to enlist more minority personnel, Nanking began imposing new regulations so as to attract more non-Han ethnic youths to study in China proper. In 1929, one draft regulation suggested that preferential treatment, including financial subsidies and scholarships, should be extended to any student having Mongolian or Tibetan background and willing to study in China proper.71 By mid-1934, these offers were further extended to encompass virtually all of those potential students whose ethnic backgrounds were not Han Chinese and who came from the loosely defined Chinese borderlands, including Gansu, Ningxia, Suiyuan and Xinjiang provinces. This was an outward strategy to recruit as many as possible ethnic minorities into Nationalist bureaucratic orbit. The strategy, however, floundered shortly afterward, when the financial stringency forced Nanking to suspend its minority educational program altogether.72

Figure 2.4 The first batch of ethnic minority students from Xinjiang to study in Nanking, c.1934 (source: KMT Party Archives).


Frontier politics in metropolitan China 33 The efforts to take over the Mongolian and Tibetan Academy in Peking, to establish new minority educational institutions in the national capital, and to attract a wide range of ethnic minority youths to study in China proper sufficiently demonstrated the Nationalist government’s intention to recruit, develop, and maintain its own frontier bureaucrats. In the first half of the 1930s, when the reach of Nationalist authority barely extended beyond China proper, these educational units had begun to produce ethnic minority elites who, in the decades to come, would play significant roles in China’s frontier and ethic affairs. In the early 1930s, an MTAC-sponsored Mongolian youth called Sechin Jagchid was studying in the National Tsinghua University in Peking. After war broke out between China and Japan in 1937, instead of joining the Nationalist camp in Sichuan, Sechin Jagchid returned to his native Inner Mongolia and served under Prince Demchugdongrob’s puppet regime. When the Sino-Japanese war drew to an end in 1945, being one of the very few Mongolian elites having old connections with the Nationalist regime, Sechin Jagchid became a key figure in bridging the Inner Mongols and the Nationalists.73 Sechin Jagchid was not the only ethnic minority figure to stand out from the Nationalist-nurtured minority education system. Two other such figures merit our attention. Zuo Jiren, a sinicized Yi from Yunnan Province, was only 26 years old in 1933, when he was enrolled as a cadet in the first class of the Mongolian and Tibetan Political Training Corps. In the final years of the 1940s, when Nationalist influence was in decline throughout China, Zuo was appointed as an MTAC special appointee at the strategic stronghold of Chamdo on the Xikang– Tibetan border. By the time of his appointment, Nationalist authority in southwest China was so vulnerable that Zuo became one of very few in that region whom the Nationalist center could fully trust and rely on. His reports and telegrams back to Nanking served as perhaps the most reliable sources of information for Nanking before its final collapse 1949.74 Han Jiaxiang, a native Khampa, was a senior at the Mongolian and Tibetan Academy in Peking in 1935. Having finished his program in the academy, Han return to southwest China. He later developed himself as a vigorous educational reformist in southern Qinghai, where he also served as a crucial figure in advocating Nationalist patriotism during the Sino-Japanese war. In the early 1940s, given his previous connections with the Nationalist regime, Han became an intermediary for the war-stricken Nationalist regime in Chongqing to promote its relations with the Qinghai Muslim provincial authorities as well as with the local Mongolian and Tibetan communities within Qinghai Province. Han continued to play a critical role after the Communist takeover in 1949, when the new PRC relied on his influence to strengthen Communist authority in the southern Qinghai region.75



Moving northwestward In September 1931, the Japanese Kwantung Army engineered an incident that was intended to spark the conquest of Manchuria. On the evening of the eighteenth, Kwantung Army troops demolished a section of Southern Manchuria Railway track on the outskirts of Mukden, blaming saboteurs. The news was immediately telegraphed to Tokyo, along with a claim that Chinese snipers were shooting at Kwantung Army troops and a request for immediate reinforcements. The Japanese troops were quickly mobilized and began to attack the Chinese barracks at Mukden. The Chinese troops in Manchuria under Marshal Zhang Xueliang were not able to put up much resistance, and by the end of 1931 the entirety of northeast China was under Japanese control. A few months later, in the spring of 1932, a Tokyo-sponsored Manchukuo emerged, with the ex-Qing Emperor Puyi as its titular leader.1 The Mukden Incident of September 1931 was soon followed by another serious military clash between China and Japan, this time in Shanghai. On January 28, 1932, under the pretext of protecting their perimeter, Japanese marines stationed in the Shanghai International Settlement suddenly opened fire on the Nationalist troops deployed nearby. The unexpected skirmish soon evolved into a full-scale Japanese bombardment of Shanghai’s Chinese defenders. A Japanese amphibious landing force landed near the mouth of the Yangtze River, where it posed a direct threat to Nanking. Although an armistice was arranged later in May, the Nationalists were forced to accept the establishment of a “neutral zone” around the Shanghai metropolis and to withdraw their troops from that area.2 The Japanese conquest of Manchuria and the subsequent bombardment of Shanghai threatened the very existence of the inchoate Nationalist regime in Nanking. Prior to the Mukden Incident, the Nationalists had suffered a serious rupture due to political disagreements between Chiang Kai-shek and Hu Hanmin, a Cantonese party veteran then serving as head of the Legislative Yuan. The conflict between the two resulted in the establishment of a parallel and autonomous “Nationalist government” by the anti-Chiang faction in Canton in May 1931.3 In the aftermath of the Mukden Incident, almost all of Chiang’s opponents seized upon Chiang’s refusal to take what he perceived to be suicidal military action


In search of a new territorial base 35 against Japan as an excuse to further their own purposes. In December 1931, facing tremendous pressure from mass opinion as well as from his political rivals, Chiang agreed to step down from all of his major posts in Nanking, and to handle the central political mechanism over to the Guangdong clique, designating Sun Fo, Sun Yat-sen’s son, as the new premier of the Nationalist government.4 The reorganization of the central government, however, did not improve the unstable scenario. Only two days after the invasion of Shanghai, the defenseless Nationalist center hastily announced the withdrawal of the national capital from Nanking to Luoyang in Henan Province. As the Japanese military continued to advance through the first months of 1932, it became evident that without Chiang Kai-shek and his brother-in-law, T.V. Soong – one of the very few Nationalist officials capable of securing financial support in the Lower Yangtze Delta – the Chinese central government would be unable to cope with challenges coming both from within and from abroad. As a result, in March 1932, after only a short period of retreat Chiang Kai-shek returned to power, this time as chairman of the newly organized Military Affairs Commission. The re-creation of this organ allowed Chiang to take direct command of Nationalist troops and in so doing exercise greater control over China’s military affairs. Chiang’s status was now more solidified than ever before; yet in order to present a unified political façade, he was compelled to share power with Wang Jingwei, another influential and prominent leader from the Guangdong clique who would replace Sun Fo’s premiership. Meanwhile, as a political compromise to maintain a unified national façade, Chiang had to tolerate the existence of a number of autonomous governmental and party organs in southwest China, where his political rivals continued to administer their provinces free from Nanking’s jurisdiction.5 The Nationalist government was able to gain some respite after signing the inglorious ceasefire with the Japanese in May 1932. Nonetheless, the Nationalists remained fearful of a renewal of hostilities, and therefore it was essential that they seek a new territorial base for the sake of national survival and regime security.6 After the Japanese invasion of Manchuria and the subsequent attack on coastal China, more Chinese intellectuals and government officials came to believe that, in the long run, an all-out Japanese invasion of China seemed inevitable. When it came to safeguarding their precarious regime from the war that they were sure was forthcoming, top Nationalist leaders began feeling the urgent need to find an inland power base capable of withstanding an attack by their enemy from the east.7 It was this crisis-driven and strategically based consideration, rather than the politically and ideologically oriented revolutionary theory, that played the crucial role in the subsequent formulation of Nationalist China’s frontier and ethnic policies. Henceforth, Nationalist leaders would invariably view China’s frontier and ethnopolitical issues as central to the security and survival of their regime. This perspective was best demonstrated in Chiang Kai-shek’s private speech to his top advisors at his residence in Nanchang in March 1934. Under the current circumstance, Chiang articulated candidly, the Nationalist center was utterly


36 In search of a new territorial base incapable of crafting an effective five-nationality republic. Instead, Chiang underlined the importance of using frontier policy to aid in the development of the regime’s national security, while retaining the Three People’s Principle as part of the rhetoric of Nationalist frontier and ethnic policy.8 Between 1931 and 1934, new regulations were adopted by Nationalist military establishment with the goal of facilitating and legitimating their work in the frontier regions. Increasingly, military personnel began receiving special ethnopolitical training as they were prepared to be sent off to border areas where Nanking sought to build up potential power bastions.9 It is noteworthy that, at this juncture, it was China’s far northwest that was the focal point of Nationalist policy, as opposed to the southwest, where the Nationalists would later establish their wartime capital. In the eyes of Chiang Kai-shek and his strategists, targeting the bleak, barren and undeveloped Northwest as their possible power base was a Hobson’s choice.10 The April 26, 1932 editorial of the influential Da Gong Bao (Impartial Daily) of Tianjin made it plain that developing the northwest was “the only way out” for the war-menaced Nationalist government. The editorial asserted that China proper could not be secured if vast Manchuria were to fall to the Japanese. As a result, it was essential to bolster Nationalist power in the northwest, since the southwest was at that time still plagued with ceaseless warfare between local warlords who gave only superficial allegiance to the central authorities in Nanking.11 Indeed, by 1932 the southwestern provinces were either operating independently of the Nationalist centre (such as Sichuan, Xikang, Yunnan and Guizhou), or remained in the hands of powerful anti-Chiang elements who adamantly refused to allow the extension of Nanking’s authority into their domains (such as Guangdong and Guangxi). Although the fertile and easily defensible Sichuan basin was indeed an ideal target candidate for a power base against possible foreign invasions, it continued to suffer from military and political unrests to the extent that by 1932 the trouble-ridden Nationalists were still unable to ameliorate the chaotic situation in the region. More important, from a geo-strategic point of view, the far-flung northwestern regions of Gansu, Xinjiang, and Soviet Central Asia were far more accessible than the Tibetan plateau, and as such seemed more likely to provide the Nationalists with a relatively easy plan of retreat in the event of an all-out Japanese invasion of eastern China.12 The first move signifying Nanking’s determination to convert China’s northwestern peripheries into a possible power base was the designation of Xi’an, the capital city of Shaanxi Province, as Nationalist China’s new “Western Capital” (Xi Jing).13 Toward the end of 1932, when the armistice allowed the Nationalists to move the national capital back to Nanking, they began promulgating a series of new legislation promoting regional economies in the northwestern provinces: industry, forestry, irrigation, road construction, husbandry, mining and other infrastructures.14 Under the new legislation, Nanking launched institutional reforms to fulfill new tasks. A Northwestern Reclamation Committee with ministerial status would be established under the Executive Yuan to undertake related tasks.15 Despite financial constraints, Nationalist finance sectors unhesi-


In search of a new territorial base 37 tatingly declared that a huge amount of resources would be allocated to the Northwestern Reclamation Committee and its staff to facilitate their work.16 In building a new territorial base in the northwest, the Nationalists were given the unprecedented opportunity to truly investigate China’s remote northwestern frontiers. In December 1932, a confidential military proposal submitted to Chiang Kai-shek defined the “northwest” in need of Nationalist power penetration as the five provinces of Shaanxi, Gansu, Qinghai, Ningxia and Xinjiang.17 Chiang’s military aides advocated the immediate political infiltration of these provinces. One measure suggested, for example, was to set up a number of “correspondent stations” or “KMT party branches” in key cities of the northwest for the purpose of setting up Nationalist-controlled local newspapers and other propagandist publications.18 To coordinate the establishment and management of these new agencies, a National Defense Planning Committee, chaired personally by Chiang Kai-shek, was duly created within the Military Affairs Commission. Before long, the ideas presented in the confidential proposal were put into effect as a series of Nationalist covert operations in these northwestern provinces.19 By 1932, Chinese popular opinion and mass media began to echo the Nationalist belief in the importance of developing China’s western borderlands as a buffer against possible Japanese aggression.20 After the Mukden Incident, new societies, study groups and publications focusing on China’s northwestern affairs began flourishing in China proper.21 In 1932 alone, more than a dozen new societies devoted to the research of China’s frontier ethnopolitics were inaugurated in Peking, Nanking and Shanghai. These groups, joined and backed by intellectuals, scholars and political celebrities, published their own journals and books, endeavoring to introduce China’s far northwest to the commoners in China proper. Underlying this effort was an attempt to reinforce among the Han Chinese the image of the border territories as an integral part of Nationalist China. Some well-organized societies, such as the Shanghai-based Study Group of the Northwestern Affairs (Xibei Wenti Yanjiuhui), were able to attract such prominent Nationalist leaders as Dai Chuanxian to join, thus making them influential think tanks for the Chiang Kai-shek government vis-à-vis its northwestern policies.22

Calculated strategy, opportunistic approaches Nanking’s trumpeted intention to develop China’s northwestern frontiers was widely applauded by mass opinion, and was for a time interpreted as having clearly demonstrated the Nationalist determination to transform China’s outlying possessions into a dependable anti-Japanese territorial base. Yet the Chinese mass media in the early 1930s may have inadvertently ignored the fact that the extent of Nationalist influence in the northwest was just as meager as it was in the southwest.23 Since the late nineteenth century the northwestern regions of Gansu, Ningxia and Qinghai had been administered by the Ma family, a local Tungan Muslim family which had assisted Qing general Zuo Zongtang to pacify local revolts. From the beginning of the Chinese Republic until the end of the


38 In search of a new territorial base 1920s, the brothers Ma Qi and Ma Lin had served under Feng Yuxiang’s Guominjun and had ruled the Gansu Corridor and Qinghai, followed in the early 1930s by Ma Qi’s sons, Ma Bufang and Ma Buqing.24 Another branch of the Ma family rose to power in Ningxia and southern Gansu as Ma Hongbin built his own sphere of influence in southern Gansu in the 1920s. In the early 1930s, when Feng Yuxiang’s faction collapsed as a result of the civil war, Ma Hongbin became new governor of Gansu Province. Almost at the same time, his cousin Ma Hongkui took power in Ningxia and soon became governor of that province, where he ruled for the next 15 years.25 Further west of the Ma-dominated territories lay the Central Asian province of Xinjiang. Xinjiang did not become an official province of China until 1884, when Zuo Zongtang re-conquered Qing-controlled Central Asia. Xinjiang was ethnically and culturally distinct, with a large majority of various non-Han peoples, most of whom were Muslims. Xinjiang’s distance from the centers of Han Chinese power and culture together with natural obstacles to communication and transportation made it extremely difficult for Republican Chinese leaders to bind it to the rest of the country.26 After Yang Zengxin’s assassination in the summer of 1928, Jin Shuren, Yang’s erstwhile subordinate in the provincial government, succeeded him as new governor of Xinjiang. Although recognizing Chiang Kai-shek’s new position in Nanking, the provincial authorities under Jin were even less concerned than his predecessor with obeying the new Nationalist center. In the spring of 1933, Jin was toppled from power by a Muslim holy war led by Ma Zhongying, a member of the same Ma family which dominated Chinese Central Asia. Sheng Shicai, then the strongest militarist in the provincial government, quickly seized power and became the new leader of Xinjiang.27 By 1932, Chiang Kai-shek and his associates had clearly sensed that, as long as the Ma Muslims continued to exercise complete control over their satrapies in northwest China, there would be little chance for them to effectively implement their freshly proposed projects and turn the whole region into a new power redoubt.28 It was this knowledge that directly led to Chiang’s bold move in early 1933, when he ordered the mobilization of Nationalist troops into the strategically important southern Gansu area. In February of that year, in a desperate attempt to establish a foothold for Nanking’s military in the northwest, Chiang ordered General Hu Zongnan, one of his favorite students and military subordinates, to move one division stationed around Xi’an westward into southern Gansu to replace the local forces under the auspices of encircling the Chinese Communist forces. The move tested both the patience and the bottom line of the local autonomous authorities, as it suggested a potential clash between Hu’s division and the local troops already stationed there under the command of Yang Hucheng, the powerful Shaanxi militarist.29 Predictably, Yang intensely opposed Chiang’s move and vehemently refused to comply by withdrawing his own forces back to Shaanxi. Despite the grave concerns of the higher military echelons in Nanking, Chiang was determined to replace the warlord’s forces with his own. In March, after narrowly surviving a raid by Yang’s forces on the Shaanxi–


In search of a new territorial base 39 Gansu provincial border, Hu’s division stumbled into Tianshui in southern Gansu, where it established Nanking’s first military stronghold in China’s far northwest. To celebrate this marked achievement, Chiang named Hu’s division in Tianshui as the First Division of the Nationalist Army.30 A few months later, a new opportunity presented itself for the power-limited Nationalists to extend their influence into the Ma-ruled territories. In early 1933, ostensibly to resist Japanese incursion, Feng Yuxiang organized a joint force in Chahar Province.31 Nanking saw through the façade, however, realizing that Feng’s true intention was to build an alliance of politicians and militarists in northern China who opposed Chiang’s leadership. Chiang also perceived the move as a threat to his political legitimacy and therefore sought to quell the campaign at any cost. One military division, then deployed on the strategic Peking– Suiyuan railway led by the perennially unreliable warlord General Sun Dianying, became particularly critical of Chiang’s group. Nanking’s worst fear was that if Sun were to be bribed into siding with Feng’s northern faction, it would be facing a potentially unbeatable alliance. Recognizing the need to remove Sun from the potentially volatile situation, Chiang quickly ordered Sun to transfer his troops westward into the Tsaidam Marsh in northwest Qinghai, citing the need for “colonizing and reclaiming” the wasteland. Sun, realizing that he was being presented with an opportunity to create his own sphere of influence in the northwest, accepted the order without hesitation.32 Chiang Kai-shek’s maneuver was two-pronged. On one hand, he sought to keep Sun Dianying away from Feng Yuxiang’s group. On the other hand, using the favored political slogan of “developing the northwest,” the Nationalists in Nanking were also using Sun to undermine the authority of the Ma family and to establish a military footing in Qinghai. Yet Nanking’s calculated strategy was greeted with tremendous opposition from almost every autonomous regional warlord in the northwest. On learning of the impending arrival of Sun’s approximately 60,000 troops, Qinghai Governor Ma Lin demanded that Chiang withdraw his order. Ma Lin not only instigated local Tibetan and Mongolian groups to send strong protests to Nanking, but also went as far as to threaten to personally resign from his governorship of Qinghai, a move which would suggest a political showdown with Chiang.33 Ningxia Governor Ma Hongkui also made it clear that due to “serious crop failures and lack of food provisions in Ningxia,” he would never allow Sun’s troops to enter his provincial domain en route to their final destination in Qinghai. Ma Hongkui, like Ma Lin, also threatened to resign from his governorship if Nanking did not withdraw its “unwise” decision.34 Faced with enormous pressure from the autonomous Muslim regional leaders, the still weak Nanking authorities were unable to exploit Sun Dianying as a means to infiltrate the northwest. In November 1933, Chiang Kai-shek ordered Sun’s division, then slowly marching toward the Suiyuan–Ningxia provincial border, to halt and await further instructions from Nanking. Sun’s soldiers, however, trapped and plagued with insufficient food provisions, were suffering from terribly low morale and were nearly out of control.35 In 1934, the dire


40 In search of a new territorial base situation prompted Sun to openly disregard Chiang’s orders. Sun instructed his troops to advance westward across the Ningxia boundary, prompting a military clash between Sun’s forces and Ma Hongkui’s Muslim cavalries deployed on the provincial border. Attempting to safeguard their common interests in the northwest, almost all of the influential Ma family members soon sent their own forces to Ningxia as reinforcements in the battle against Sun. Having realized that it was no longer possible to play Sun Dianying against the Ma Muslims, Chiang shifted his tone, publicly urging the Mas to take any “necessary actions” to punish the “obstinate” Sun.36 In the final phase of the conflict, Nanking even provided Ma Hongkui with advanced munitions, including a reconnaissance plane, to aid him against Sun’s forces. In March 1934, Sun was catastrophically defeated. His troops were disarmed and assimilated by local provincial authorities. The farce came to an end.37 The Sun Dianying incident clearly demonstrates Nanking’s opportunism with regards to reinforcing its flimsy authority in northwest China.38 Such an abortive attempt undoubtedly played a role in severely damaging the reputation of the Nationalist government. Yet it was by no means the sole example of Nanking’s calculated and opportunistic approach to power consolidation. The Nationalist plots to get involved in Xinjiang affairs during the turmoil of 1933 and 1934 are also clear evidence that Chiang Kai-shek and his men were ever-willing to get involved in difficult situations. Since the summer of 1932, the fighting between Ma Zhongying and Jin Shuren had significantly intensified. By early 1933, Ma’s force was able to break through Jin’s defense line in Hami and enter Xinjiang from Gansu Corridor, at one point bringing the Muslim forces to within a few miles of Urumqi, the seat of Jin’s provincial authorities.39 Yet on April 12, before Ma was able to capture Urumqi, a group of Xinjiang provincial bureaucrats led by Chen Zhong, Tao Mingyue and Li Xiaotian initiated a coup to topple Jin’s governorship. The governor escaped, returning to China proper via Siberia. Sheng Shicai, Jin’s chief military commander then marshalling provincial forces in eastern Xinjiang, hurriedly returned to Urumqi where he sought to seize power in the midst of the chaos. Without conferring with Nanking, the coup leaders appointed Sheng as Commissioner of the Xinjiang Border Defense, and install Liu Wenlong, a hitherto unknown and powerless veteran provincial bureaucrat, the new governor.40 After the coup, Sheng Shicai’s position in Xinjiang was by no means secure. Liu Wenlong’s ascension to the governorship suggested that the provincial bureaucrats who launched the coup still had the upper hand in Urumqi. They had no intention of yielding any real power to Sheng, whom they regarded as their protégé. Although Sheng had military experience, he was faced with the challenge not only of Ma Zhongying, but also of Zhang Peiyuan, Jin Shuren’s old ally who was then military commander of the Ili region.41 Back in Nanking, having learned that Zhang Peiyuan showed little intention of cooperation with Sheng, and that the Muslim forces under Ma Zhongying constituted the gravest of all possible menaces to the shaky provincial regime in Urumqi, Chiang Kai- shek concluded that it would be beneficial to take advantage of the political con-


In search of a new territorial base 41 fusion to establish Nationalist authority in Xinjiang. In May 1933, without clearly specifying whether it had recognized the legitimacy of the new authorities in Urumqi, Nanking appointed Huang Musong, then deputy Chief of General Staff, as a “pacification commissioner” who would fly to Urumqi to work out a lasting peace between Sheng and Ma. A temporary field commission, staffed by Nationalist frontier, political and military officials, was soon organized in Nanking for the purpose of advising Huang.42 On June 10, Huang arrived in Urumqi, where he was coldly greeted by Sheng Shicai. The true goal of Huang Musong’s mission to Urumqi, as it turned out, was to secure the cooperation of the coup leaders and, if possible, to establish a new provincial mechanism that would adopt a pro-Nanking stance. Moreover, the purpose of the field commission that accompanied Huang was to assist with the creation of a reorganized pro-Nanking provincial government.43 After Huang’s arrival, however, Sheng Shicai began to suspect that, instead of trying to bring peace to Xinjiang and endorse Sheng’s position in the new provincial government, Huang had actually been sent to investigate the coup and to forge a provincial mechanism of his own.44 It was in this highly suspicious atmosphere that on June 26 Sheng suddenly placed Huang and his entourages under house arrest. The three coup leaders who were alleged to have agreed to cooperate with Nanking – Chen Zhong, Tao Mingyue and Li Xiaotian – where arrested near Huang’s temporary residence and immediately executed. Sheng claimed that Huang had been “bewildered by this small group of treacherous officials” who were conspiring together to overthrow the new provincial government and destroy peace and order in Urumqi.45 Three weeks later, the terrified and imprisoned Huang was eventually allowed to return to Nanking unharmed, only after top Nationalist leaders apologized to Sheng for the “misunderstandings” which Huang’s presence in Urumqi had caused, and contritely pledged that Nanking would very soon recognize Sheng’s unique position in Xinjiang.46 At Sheng Shicai’s request, Chiang Kai-shek dispatched another influential figure to Urumqi as a display of Nanking’s goodwill. In late August 1933, Luo Wen’gan, then the Nationalist Chinese Foreign Minister, led the consolatory mission to Xinjiang.47 Ostensibly Luo’s task was to preside on Nanking’s behalf over Sheng’s inauguration ceremony as Commissioner of the Xinjiang Border Defense. Secretly, however, the relentless Nationalists were attempting to use Luo’s visit to Xinjiang to make overtures to Sheng’s two main rivals, Ma Zhongying in eastern Xinjiang and Zhang Peiyuan in Ili.48 As a result of this visit, Luo’s arrival was to usher in a new episode of political tension in China’s far northwest. After completing his ceremonial duties in Urumqi, Luo Wen’gan rushed to Turfan and Ili respectively, where he secretly encouraged Ma Zhongying and Zhang Peiyuan to launch a joint attack against Sheng. As soon as Luo left Xinjiang, war broke out between Sheng’s provincial troops and the forces of Ma and Zhang.49 According to Sheng’s accusation, Luo not only plotted an alliance of Zhang and Ma against him, but also Sheng’s assassination.50 Nanking’s intention to establish a pro-Nationalist political alliance in Xinjiang faltered once again,


Figure 3.1 Luo Wen’gan (seventh from left) met with the newly reformed Xinjiang provincial leaders in Urumqi, September 1933 (source: KMT Party Archives).

Figure 3.2 The welcome ceremony held at Ili by Zhang Peiyuan for Luo Wen’gan, September 1933. Luo had secretly encouraged Zhang to rebel against Sheng Shicai (source: KMT Party Archives).

In search of a new territorial base 43


when in early 1934 Sheng’s better-equipped provincial troops overpowered his two rivals. After their defeat, Zhang committed suicide, while Ma retreated to southern Xinjiang, where he continued to fight against Sheng, now completely leaning toward the Soviets, for a period of time.51

The abortive military démarche Nanking paid a high price for its miscalculations of Sheng Shicai’s military strength. The departure of Luo Wen’gan from Xinjiang also marked the beginning of an era of deep alienation between the Nationalist regime and this far- flung northwestern province. Furthermore, the failure of the Huang and Luo missions to establish a foothold in Xinjiang resulted in a great deal of pressure on Chiang Kai-shek, who had recently lost the entire Rehe Province to the Japanese in February 1933, and who had been forced into signing the infamous and humiliating Tangku Truce in order to prevent further territorial loss of Hebei Province.52 In early 1934, in a desperate attempt to transform the northwest into a much-needed power base, the Nationalists devised one final scheme, a last- ditch effort to bring Xinjiang under their effective control. This time, it was Huang Shaohong, then serving as Nationalist Minister of Home Affairs, who would play the key role. Huang Shaohong, one of the very few figures from the Guangxi clique who were able to gain Chiang Kai-shek’s trust, had experience handling Nationalist China’s frontier and ethnic minority affairs. Shortly after the Japanese annexed Rehe Province in early 1933, a group of Inner Mongolian nobles used the favorable timing of the Sino-Japanese conflict to advocate the political autonomy of Inner Mongolia. Later, in the fall of the same year, a Mongolian Conference for Autonomy was held in Bat-khaalag (Bailingmiao), where the Mongolian nobility demanded greater autonomy from the Nationalist center.53 Chiang Kai-shek appointed Huang Shaohong as his special envoy to visit Bat-khaalag and negotiate with the Mongols on Nanking’s behalf. Huang’s timely visit to Inner Mongolia was not without some temporary success. By promising the Mongols that they would be allowed to establish a Mongol Local Autonomy Political Affairs Committee (Menggu Difang Zizhi Zhengwu Weiyuanhui, MLAPAC) and thus open up a direct communication channel with the Nationalist government, Huang temporarily placated the Mongols. The administrative arrangement, initially designed by Huang, not only momentarily satisfied the Mongols, but also prevented them from siding with the Japanese right away.54 According to Huang Shaohong’s own account, the “successful” – as Huang had claimed – handling of the 1933 Inner Mongolian issue inspired him to attempt new designs on the return of Nationalist authority to other Inner Asian territories. Toward the end of 1933, Huang submitted a detailed analysis to Chiang Kai-shek in which he proposed that military action was the most efficient way to bring the northwest into Nanking’s lasting control. Considering the difficulties in logistics and supplies, and the relative immobility of the infantry, Huang suggested that a new motorized force be established and employed in the



Figure 3.3 Huang Shaohong (fifth from right) meeting with Inner Mongol nobles at Bailingmiao as an effort to prevent the Mongols from tilting toward Japan, November 1933 (source: Neimeng zhi Jinxi, 1934).

northwest, where it would help consolidate Nanking’s vulnerable position. Having previously secured the promise of support from the provincial leaders of Suiyuan and Shanxi while he was in Inner Mongolia, Huang was optimistic about undertaking an effective military operation in China’s far northwest.55 In his report to Chiang, Huang urged that an opportunistic stance should be taken with respect to Xinjiang. That is, upon the arrival of the proposed motorized force on the Gansu–Xinjiang border, it should halt and wait for the most favor able time to act. The motorized force could either side with Sheng Shicai’s provincial troops or join Sheng’s Muslim opponent, depending on which party was willing to cooperate with the Nationalists. To complete his plan, Huang estimated that an expeditionary army of approximately 15,000 troops equipped with armored vehicles and advanced munitions would be sufficient for Nanking to conquer China’s far northwest.56 Huang Shaohong’s proposal was supported by Chiang Kai-shek. In early 1934, Chiang had just suppressed a rebellion in Fujian Province and was now able to turn his attention back to frontier issues. Chiang’s personal diary entries from early 1934 onward reveal that he was indeed deliberating and weighing the implementation of Huang’s plan to create a military base in the northwest, a goal which Chiang believed was just as imperative as improving Nanking’s weak national defense along China’s southeastern coast.57 Top Nationalist military advisors in Nanking were also supportive about Huang’s proposed military démarche, deeming it as a suitable opportunity to build up Nationalist China’s first mechanized and armored force. In their analysis, moreover, Huang’s seem-


In search of a new territorial base 45 ingly feasible frontier expedition to Xinjiang would provide a welcome occasion to put the newly-built force to the real test.58 In January 1934, the Nationalist State Council approved Huang’s scheme under the pretext of developing Xinjiang and the adjacent northwestern provinces. A “Xinjiang Construction and Planning Commission (Xinjiang Jianshe Jihua Weiyuanhui)” was accordingly instituted in Nanking. A liaison office, charged by Huang Shaohong himself, was also inaugurated in Peking to coordinate negotiations with provincial leaders in northern China who were willing to collaborate.59 With full enthusiasm from H.H. Kung (Kong Xiangxi), Chiang Kai-shek’s brother-in-law and then Nationalist Minister of Finance, Huang purchased a batch of foreign-manufactured armored vehicles at one-third of international market price. The munitions were soon imported and re-equipped in an unknown military camp nearby Shanghai.60 To facilitate the deployment of this newly assembled force to the northwest, Chiang Kai-shek instructed the provincial leaders of Shaanxi and Gansu to rapidly reconstruct the strategic roadway connecting Xi’an and Lanzhou.61 To check the cooperation and progress of the regional leaders, Chiang meanwhile sent his most trusted advisors to conduct inspection tours and obtain a more accurate picture of the reconstruction project. In the first months of 1934, reputed Nationalist leaders such as Dai Chuanxian and T.V. Soong were so frequently traveling between Xi’an, Lanzhou and Nanking that even the ordinary mass media in China proper had sensed that something unusual was brewing in the northwest.62 By April 1934, the preparation work had reached the final stage. After completing a secret route survey from Suiyuan to southern Gansu via Ningxia, Nationalist intelligence people suggested that the new-refurbished Xi’an– Lanzhou roadway not be used for transporting the expeditionary force. Instead, for the sake of secrecy and security, they proposed that Huang’s force commence from Guihua in Suiyuan Province and reach its final destination in Hami via the sparsely populated Alashaa and Ejine banners.63 It was also in these final stages of preparation that Huang Shaohong secured a crucial promise from Yan Xishan that, should Huang’s force required aid, the Shanxi army would provide immediate reinforcements.64 Chiang Kai-shek’s secret instructions to Hu Zongnan, urging Hu to designate a regiment of his division in Tianshui as reinforcement for Huang’s force, also served as a key indication that Nanking was serious about it. For Hu, collaborating with Huang had significant advantages: Once the Nanking-backed force won the battle in Xinjiang, his as yet isolated Nationalist military stronghold in the adjacent Gansu area would become more secure. Even if Huang’s causes ultimately failed, Hu’s division might well have been able to augment itself by assimilating the remainder of the expeditionary force.65 In early May, Huang flew from Peking to Lanzhou, where he held a series of meetings with local Gansu officials on the imminent military operation. The whole escapade came to a complete stop in the middle of May 1934, when Chiang Kai-shek ordered Huang Shaohong to halt the expedition right



Figure 3.4 T.V. Soong in Xi’an, where he was greeted by Shaanxi Governor Yang Hucheng and a group of local citizens, April 1934. Soong arrived at the moment when Nanking’s military expedition to Northwest China was about to take off (source Michael Feng).

away. Chiang explained to Huang that, according to reliable information, Soviet troops had already entered Xinjiang and begun assisting Sheng Shicai against Ma Zhongying. Considering the potentially complicated international situation that the government was now facing, Chiang cautioned, Nanking could not afford a collision with the Soviets over the distant and yet still-uncontrollable Xinjiang.66 This was a heavy blow to the well-prepared Huang and his forces. Although Huang reluctantly agreed to stop his operation, he was suspicious of Chiang’s real reason for halting the démarche. Huang was convinced that a small group of Chiang’s core advisors – presumably Dai Chuanxian and General Zhu Shaoliang, who was recently appointed governor of Gansu – were strongly opposed to his expedition. According to Huang, this group of officials feared that once he succeeded in Xinjiang, the vast western frontier province would inevit ably fall into the hands of the Guangxi clique, not the Nationalist center in Nanking.67 In hindsight, however, it is more likely that top Nationalist leaders in their last-minute analysis realistically saw little chance of their taking control of Xinjiang. By May 1934, the provincial mechanism in Urumqi was rapidly falling under the hostile and now pro-Moscow Sheng Shicai, whereas the Nationalists’ most likely ally Ma Zhongying was edging closer to retreat.68


In search of a new territorial base 47

Figure 3.5 T.V. Soong visiting a mosque in Xining, Qinghai, May 1934 (source: Michael Feng).

Whatever the reasons for canceling the operation, Huang Shaohong’s abortive military expedition to conquer Xinjiang was Nanking’s last opportunistic approach in the 1930s with respect to China’s far northwest. More significantly, the failure of the missions of these Nationalist figureheads to create a power base in the northwest had severely damaged the reputation of Chiang Kai-shek and his central officials. In September 1934, in a long personal telegram to Sheng Shicai, Chiang endeavored to mend his tattered relations with the new Xinjiang power by declaring that it was never Nanking’s intention to undermine Sheng’s authority. Running short of words, Chiang unconvincingly defended the missions of Huang Musong and Luo Wen’gan as simply consolatory in nature, whereas Huang Shaohong’s expeditionary army was actually dispatched with the purpose of annihilating Sun Dianying’s “disobedient force” that was then marching slowly toward Qinghai.69 Nanking’s explanations did not convince the suspicious Sheng. Henceforth, Urumqi adopted a policy of close rapport with Soviet Russia, which was able to offer Xinjiang better economic support and more efficient lines of communications than could Chiang. In the latter half of the 1930s, the Soviets provided Sheng with various kinds of technical aid and, on more than one occasion, with military support against Muslim rebellions in Xinjiang. It was not until the early 1940s that the Nationalists, with pressing strategic concerns, once again set their

48 In search of a new territorial base eyes on the northwest to help ensure the survival of their precarious regime in Chongqing.


Turning southwestward It is generally believed that the Communist Long March, commencing in late 1934, provided Chiang Kai-shek with an unprecedented opportunity to extend his military forces and political power into the provinces of Sichuan, Guizhou and Xikang, and that it served to shift the Nationalists’ attention from northwest to southwest China.70 Yet, one previously ignored factor that might have also caused Chiang to turn southwestward was the deteriorating political scenario in Inner Mongolia. Since mid-1934, rumors had been circulating concerning talks taking place between Japan and Prince Demchugdongrob, now Secretary General of the Nanking-approved MLAPAC at Bailingmiao. The Nationalists apparently lacked confidence in their ability to compete with whatever incentives Japan was offering the Inner Mongols. By mid-1934, both the Chinese mass media and foreign diplomats in China were convinced that it was only a matter of time before a functional collaboration between the Japanese and the Inner Mongols materialized.71 Chiang Kai-shek, seriously handicapped by his regime’s limited authority in Inner Mongolia, noted grievously in his diary of February 15, 1934, that, judging by the ethnopolitical situation, Nanking’s only viable policy vis-à-vis the Mongols was to grant them “whatever they desire short of complete political independence.”72

Figure 3.6 Bailingmiao, c.1933, the base of the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Movement in the 1930s (source: Neimeng zhi Jinxi, 1934).


In search of a new territorial base 49 To be fair, by accepting the establishment of the MLAPAC within the Nationalist governmental hierarchy, the Inner Mongols were not hostile to the idea of submitting their authority to Nanking. Nevertheless, their relations with the Han- dominated provincial authorities were thoroughly problematic. In March 1934, attempts made by the Mongols to raise revenues by levying local taxes brought them into serious conflict with the Suiyuan provincial government under General Fu Zuoyi. Both sides sent their troops to intercept goods imported from Gansu, and both sides claimed the right to levy taxes on them.73 This dispute was followed by another incident that resulted in the second large-scale military clash between the Mongols and the Suiyuan provincial authorities. Ironically, this time, the collision originated as an internal dispute among the Inner Mongols themselves. In order to punish Prince Shirabdorji, head of West Duke Banner, for his uncooperative behavior toward the MLAPAC, Prince Yondonwangchug, Chairman of the Committee, revoked Prince Shirabdorji’s title. The angered Prince Shirabdorji then turned to Fu Zuoyi for support. In August 1935, an armed conflict broke out between the Committee’s garrison force and the provincial army near Prince Shirabdorji’s residence.74 Fu Zuoyi, already on bad terms with the Mongols, sought to capitalize on the occasion by forcing it to cede power to his provincial authorities. On the defeated side, Prince Yondonwangchug was so furious at the Nationalists’ failure to effectively intervene in the conflict that he went so far as to threaten to resign from all of his positions and to dissolve the MLAPAC.75 Nationalist high officials perceived the longstanding unrest in the northern steppe as an insurmountable obstacle to penetrating China’s northwest frontier. Owen Lattimore has observed that it was not entirely the fault of Chiang Kai- shek that the Inner Mongols were finally won over by the Japanese in the latter half of the 1930s. Lattimore writes that Chinese military power was entirely dependent on regional militarists, and the militarists’ incompatible goals and perennial uncontrollability made it impossible for the Inner Mongols to negotiate effectively as whole. Every military leader demanded that his own share of the power, and every military leader demanded that all negotiation with Nanking be passed through him.76 Indeed, in the face of these ethnopolitical hurdles, Nationalist policy planners were frequently at their wits’ end. Huang Musong, for example, made it explicit to Chiang Kai-shek that there was nothing the central government could do except to express Nanking’s willingness to offer mediation in Inner Mongolian affairs, although Huang seriously doubted whether such mediation could even be effective.77 The fragile political landscape in northern China and Inner Mongolia, along with the unavailability of necessary political and military strongholds in the northwestern frontier, eventually led the Nationalists in Nanking to abandon their efforts to turn the northwest into their power base. Instead, the Nationalists retreated to the old passive policy of relying almost solely on the good faith of the prominent non-Han ethnic personages, notably the Panchen Lama and the Janggiya Hutuktu, to prevent their regime prestige from deteriorating further. In so doing, the Nationalists turned their energy and resources to the infiltration of their new target: China’s southwestern provinces.78


50 In search of a new territorial base Ironically, it was Chiang Kai-shek’s mortal enemy, the Chinese Communists, who inadvertently offered Nanking an opportunity to establish Nationalist authority in the southwest, where Chiang during the subsequent wartime period established a genuine power base. Once again, the expansion of Nationalist power in the southwest was largely opportunistic and based on considerations that were crucial to the security of the Nationalist regime. Early in December 1932, the remnant forces of the Communist Reds led by Xu Xiangqian and Zhang Guotao descended into northwestern Sichuan from Shaanxi. Although the battle lines stabilized as a result of joint military cooperation between the major provincial military leaders, the beginning of Mao Zedong and Zhu De’s Long March in October 1934 raised the added threat of a Communist invasion of other parts of Sichuan.79 As pressure from the Communists was increasing, the Sichuan economy was collapsing. As the armies’ chronic financial struggle worsened and revenue sources dried up, Liu Xiang, the governor of Sichuan and the most powerful warlord in the province, floated large bond issues and printed paper currency in order to survive. By late 1934 the economic crisis in Sichuan was extremely acute.80 In November 1934, faced with the Communist emergency and the related economic collapse, Liu Xiang personally flew to the national capital in search of support.81 It was an unprecedented development for the Nationalists in Nanking. Liu’s meetings with Chiang Kai-shek and many other top leaders produced a number of significant decisions. A new provincial government was to be established in Chengdu under Liu, replacing the previous one in Chongqing which had never properly functioned. Nanking would provide Liu with financial subsidies to facilitate his campaign against the Communists, and would grant a large central government loan to the newly organized provincial government. In return, Nanking would station a Staff Corps of Nationalist military officers and civilian officials in Chongqing to counsel provincial authorities and plan the anti-Communist campaigns. It was also agreed that the Staff Corps would supervise a variety of political, economic and military reforms, as well as serve as Nanking’s chief link with local militarists in Sichuan.82 It is especially interesting to note that Huang Musong once again played a critical role in Nanking’s power furtherance into the southwestern regions. In April 1934, Chiang Kai-shek appointed Huang as a special envoy of Nanking to visit Lhasa and offer Chiang’s condolences for the death of the thirteenth Dalai Lama, who had died in December 1933. Although the British agreed to let Huang Musong and his entourage travel through India en route to Lhasa, Nanking instead chose the far more arduous and time-consuming route via the malaria-infested lowlands of the southwest. The decision was to have serious political repercussions. Huang’s mission was not only the first Chinese government mission to enter Tibet since the demise of the Qing dynasty, but Huang himself also became the first high-ranking military officer from Chiang’s camp since 1928 to enter Sichuan and Xikang, where the Nationalist center asserted almost no control. In other words, the mission to Tibet provided Huang and the Nationalist center with a unique opportunity to observe the real conditions in


In search of a new territorial base 51 southwest China and to gather firsthand information about the southwestern warlord regimes.83 In order to assess the military capability of the warlords, during his stay in Sichuan and Xikang, Huang required local officers to arrange military drills for him. Huang wrote in his travelogue his careful observations about regional conditions, keeping an eye out for suitable sites for airfields once the Nationalists controlled the southwest. Huang Musong’s mission to Lhasa was widely perceived as Nanking’s attempt to bridge a gap between the Nationalists and the Tibetans. Nonetheless, his role in southwest China was actually similar to the one he had previously played in Xinjiang in terms of building a Nationalist presence in China’s remote inner frontier.84 The arrival of the Staff Corps in Chongqing in January 1935 signaled a new stage of Nanking’s attempt to bring Sichuan under its influence. Under the supervision of the Staff Corps, provincial and local administrations of Sichuan, Guizhou and Xikang were gradually restructured. A huge number of the notorious garrison districts (fangqu) in Sichuan and Guizhou, in which regional militarists were permitted to keep their own satrapies, were incorporated into a dozen newly instituted Special Administrative Inspectorates (xingzheng ducha zhuanyuan qu), whose special inspectors were appointed directly by Nanking.85 The Staff Corps and Liu Xiang’s new provincial mechanism also collaborated in attempts to reduce the size of Sichuan’s bloated regional armed forces. In August 1935, in order to absorb surplus Sichuan troops over the course of the army reduction, and to enlist officers from the southwestern provinces into its own forces, Nanking established a military training academy in Chengdu chaired by Chiang Kai-shek. These efforts marked the beginning of Nationalist military presence in the province.86 Nanking’s push into southwest China was not confined to economic, military and administrative reforms. Chiang Kai-shek’s presence in Sichuan and Guizhou from March until October 1935 played a major role in spreading the ideology of the Nationalists. In order to transform Sichuan into a Nationalist power base, Chiang endeavored to make his central message clear: Sichuan must become the focal point for the regeneration of the Chinese people. He clothed his plea in the rhetoric of national revival, personal purification, and the Three People’s Principle.87 Through his highly publicized activities in Sichuan, Chiang sought to favorably resolve the nagging problem of political legitimacy which the provincial militarists had successfully muted since 1928. The employment of prominent non-Han ethnic minorities also played a significant part in effecting Nanking’s power penetration of the southwestern provinces. In May 1935, Nanking appointed the seventh Norla Hutuktu, the reputed Red Hat Sect prelate in the Kham area who had already been granted an institutional position with the Nationalist regime, as “Consolatory Commissioner” in Xikang Province. The ostensible purpose of his role was to comfort the local Khampas with Tibetan Buddhism and the goodwill of the Nationalist center.88 Yet under the Staff Corps’ covert military and financial support, the Consolatory Commission was actually endeavoring to develop its own sphere of influence and to undermine the rule of local warlords, primarily Liu Wenhui, in southwest


52 In search of a new territorial base China. A force of about 300 soldiers was organized and augmented by recruiting local Khampa bandits into the army. The relationship between the Consolatory Commission and Liu Wenhui seriously deteriorated in early 1936, when the Norla Hutuktu successfully disarmed several regiments of Liu’s Twenty-fourth Division and incorporated them into his private militia. Having defeated Liu’s troops in several counties, at one point the Consolatory Commission was in control of a considerable part of Kham, appointing pro-Nationalist personnel to take charge of local administrative affairs.89 The Staff Corps also utilized the Norla Hutuktu as Nanking’s agent in dealing with the Communists. When the Second and Fourth Front of the Red Army were passing through the Kham borderlands in early 1936, the Consolatory Commission was instructed to encircle and immediately attack them. While Liu Wenhui was attempting to preserve his own forces and avoid confrontation with the Communists, the Consolatory Commission’s militia was fully engaged in the battle against the Communists.90 The blow to Chiang Kai-shek came when the Norla Hutuktu was captured by the Communists on the Xikang–Tibetan border in the early spring of 1936. He was later brought to the Communist-dominated Kanze district, where he died soon after in May 1936. Before long, the whole Consolatory Commission, together with the militia, disintegrated.91 Despite the failure of the seventh Norla Hutuktu’s cause in Xikang, and the inevitable behind-the-scenes power struggles between the Nationalists and local militarists for control of Sichuan, by 1936–7 Nanking had established a rudimentary but relatively credible power base in the southwest. One particularly apt example demonstrating Nanking’s growing authority in that part of China was the unequivocal return of Guangdong Province to the Nationalist yoke. As mentioned above, since the Mukden Incident, the provincial authorities in Guangdong and Guangxi had conducted their affairs without consulting with Nanking. These provinces were able to maintain their formidable political and military power largely because they lay protected behind a geopolitical buffer formed by the semi-independent provinces of Hunan, Guizhou and Sichuan. By the spring of 1936, however, Chiang Kai-shek’s pursuit of the Long March and consolidation of power in the southwest had enabled him to dismantle that buffer.92 In June 1936, General Chen Jitang, then the most powerful militarist in Guangdong, along with leading figures from the Guangxi clique, mobilized their troops northward into Hunan Province with the same old excuse of resisting the Japanese aggression in northern China. Chiang Kai-shek inferred that this force was planning to attack and overthrow his regime in Nanking, and designed a countermove.93 Since the Nationalist presence in the southwest was no longer as tenuous as it had been in the early 1930s, Chiang was confident that the crisis could be averted. First, he bribed the Guangdong provincial air force, and in July it defected to Nanking. Then, with a combination of military threats and offers of official posts to the rebel leaders, Chiang instigated the collapse of the rebellion in September.94 As a result, for the first time in the Nationalist era, Guangdong was brought under the effective administration of Nanking. Guangxi, although retaining some vestiges of its former autonomy, was likewise subdued


In search of a new territorial base 53 and no longer in a position to challenge Nanking. After pacifying Chen’s attempted rebellion, Chiang appointed Huang Musong, his long-time trusted frontier advisor, to serve as the new governor of Guangdong.95 As 1937 began, as a result, Chiang Kai-shek and his Nationalist regime had consolidated political control over a greater part of the nation, most notably the southwestern provinces, where they laid the foundation for the future war with the Japanese. As for Muslim-dominated northwest China, its geographic significance would once again occupy center stage during World War II, when Soviet Russia became the only nation in the world that rendered substantial assistance to the Nationalist regime in Sichuan as it was assaulted by the Japanese. The story will be treated in detail in the following chapters.



The northwest China conundrum The Marco Polo Bridge Incident of July 1937 marked the beginning of Nationalist China’s protracted, bitter War of Resistance against Japan. Not long after the incident, Chiang Kai-shek, as Lloyd Eastman put it, made one of the greatest and most contentious gambles of his career. He and his top aides decided to move the war’s principal battleground from northern China to Shanghai.1 Top Nationalist military advisors like Chen Cheng were convinced that Shanghai was more suited for combat with the Japanese than were the wide-open spaces of the north, as the constricted area of the city would nullify the superior tanks, artillery and logistical capabilities of the Japanese. An attack on the Japanese settlement in Shanghai would also divert Japanese attention from the north, giving the Chinese forces there an opportunity to strengthen their still-vulnerable defenses.2 Such a move would be especially valuable from a long-term strategic point of view since it would provide a chance to transform the easily defensible Sichuan basin into an enduring power base. In effect, the idea was to use China’s expansive geography to buy time and, hopefully, the sympathy of the Western powers. In retrospect, it is clear that this bold strategy achieved at least partial success. In mid-1939, foreign observers reported that although Chinese troops remained badly disorganized, the Nationalists had been successful in extricating the majority of their troops from Central China, whereas the Japanese were unable to win a decisive victory.3 Whatever reasons for Chiang Kai-shek’s and his officials’ risky military strategy, it was clear that in order for it to be successful the Nationalists would have to move the national power center into China’s far western peripheries and fight a protracted war with their enemy. This was to be a great challenge. Their authority in unoccupied and sparsely populated western China was by no means completely secured when the war began. Shortly after the outbreak of war, the Nationalist center hastily set up various “Generalissimo’s Field Headquarters” in almost every provincial capital in southwest China in a desperate attempt to exert its control over regional affairs.4 Once, in the early stages of war, Chiang Kai-shek succeeded in persuading powerful Sichuan Governor Liu Xiang to maneuver his troops from Sichuan to the Japanese front. Yet Chiang’s influence


War and new frontier designs 55

Figure 4.1 Prince Demchugdongrob (De Wang) reviewing his military band at Kalgan, where the Japanese-sponsored “Mongolian Federated Autonomous Government” was headquartered, c.1938 (source: KMT Party Archives).

in Sichuan was not limitless. In early 1938, Liu Xiang suddenly fell ill and died in Wuhan, at which point Chiang immediately announced that Zhang Qun, Chiang’s close confidant and vice premier of the Nationalist government, would succeed Liu as a first step towards complete Nationalist control of Sichuan. Zhang Qun’s appointment was vehemently opposed by almost every local militarist in the southwest. Realizing that the Nationalist center was not yet in a position to accommodate different Sichuan cliques and establish a new balance of power in the region, Chiang Kai-shek was left with no alternative but to personally assume the Sichuan governorship for 14 months between 1939 and 1940.5 The situation did not look better in the western border provinces of Qinghai, Gansu and Ningxia, despite their relative geographical proximity to the nation’s new central position in Sichuan. In late 1937, the Japanese-sponsored “Mongolian Federated Autonomous government,” whose influence extended from Chahar and northern Shanxi to the eastern edge of Suiyuan, was inaugurated in Kalgan. This puppet regime was under the nominal leadership of Inner Mongol Prince Demchugdongrob, who ultimately allied with the Japanese.6 It was also around 1937–8 that rumors began to circulate concerning the creation of a new Muslim state in western Inner Mongolia under Japanese auspices. In order to win the sympathy of local Sino-Muslims, Japanese intelligence operatives in Inner Mongolia had allegedly trained thousands of young Muslims who would


56 War and new frontier designs be sent to Ningxia, Gansu and Qinghai to install a new regime with a strong Muslim identity.7 The rumor was so convincing, and the Nationalist credibility among the ethnic minority communities in these border regions remained so weak, that in early 1939 it was further reported that several Tibetan and Mongolian tribal groups in the Golok and Tsaidam regions in Qinghai would soon agree to recognize Japanese suzerainty. Chiang Kai-shek and his national security advisors in Chongqing were extremely concerned that Japanese penetration into Chinese Inner Asia would result in a domino effect in non-Han communities, particularly in de facto independent Tibet, thus increasing the threat to Sichuan proper.8 In the early stages of the war, the competition between the Nationalists and the Japanese to woo the non-Han ethnic minorities in the western Chinese peripheries was so intense that Chongqing frequently took drastic measures to consolidate its vulnerable position there. For example, in the spring of 1939 Chiang Kai-shek unexpectedly ordered the removal of the Chinggis Khan’s mausoleum from the Ordos in southern Suiyuan to Gansu, where it would be out of the reach of the encroaching Japanese forces.9 Clearly, the Nationalists feared that losing this symbol to the approaching Japanese would upset the Mongols, whose political affiliation at this juncture was still leaning toward Nationalist China.10 Toward the end of 1939, Chiang Kai-shek and his military advisors considered making yet another bold move, this time to quash separatist tendencies in the ethnic frontier communities of Golok and Tsaidam. At one point, Chongqing intended to re-designate the Golok region of southern Qinghai as part of Sichuan Province so that Nationalist troops could be deployed into that unstable tribe without having first to get permission from Ma Bufang in Xining.11 In the first half of the 1930s Chiang Kai-shek attempted many times to gain a strategic footing in Xinjiang. Now, the Nationalists were again in an embarrassing position vis-à-vis Sheng Shicai’s provincial authorities. Shortly after the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, Soviet Russia signed a nonaggression pact with the Nationalists and approved a loan of US$100 million to China. In March 1938, fearing that the Japanese would soon encroach upon Siberia from the east, Stalin signed yet another agreement with Chongqing in which he promised another US$100 million for the purchase of military supplies.12 Further, around 200 Soviet “volunteers” began flying Soviet planes in defense of such Chinese cities as Wuhan, Chongqing, Lanzhou and Xi’an, strafing Japanese shipping on the Yangtze River, and bombing Taipei on Taiwan. Soviet engineers also assisted in the construction of motor highways and air bases. At a time when Great Britain and the United States continued to maintain diplomatic and commercial relations with Japan, Soviet Russia provided substantial and essential aid to the Nationalists.13 Sun Yat-sen’s unaccomplished goal in the early 1920s of rallying the Soviets against the KMT’s major enemy was finally being fulfilled – although in a totally different context and by a very different rationale. Toward the end of 1938, China, now cut off from the sea and without any support from the sea powers, was almost entirely dependent on the overland route through Central Asia in order to receive military supplies from Soviet


War and new frontier designs 57 Russia, a situation which redoubled the strategic importance of Xinjiang. In December 1938, a 5,200-km highway from Khorgos on the Soviet border, across Xinjiang through Hami and Xingxingxia (Ape Pass), and all the way to Lanzhou in Gansu, was completed. Essential war materials were transported into unoccupied China from Central Asia while Chinese tungsten, tea, and wool were shipped to Soviet Russia in return.14 The Soviets not only transported tremendous amounts of war supplies to the war-besieged Nationalists, but even sent troops to Xinjiang to be prepared for a possible Japanese offensive. Shortly before, in June 1937, around 5,000 Soviet troops poured into Xinjiang to help Sheng Shicai put down a Muslim rebellion in Kashgar.15 Some of those Soviet troops returned home one month later, after the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, while a reinforced mechanized brigade unit remained in garrison at Hami at the eastern gateway to Xinjiang, where they could provide a first line of defense in the event of a Japanese thrust into Central Asia.16 The “Eighth Regiment,” as they were known, wore Chinese uniforms; it was not publicly acknowledged by either Moscow or Urumqi that a Soviet force occupied a semi-permanent garrison position in the province.17 The Nationalists certainly had reasons to worry about their predicament in Xinjiang. Chiang Kai-shek desperately needed Soviet aid in the war with Japan, and yet the transport of Soviet war materials into besieged China was at the mercy of the obstinate and unfriendly Sheng Shicai. To make matters worse, the expense of securing Moscow’s support was that the vast Chinese northwestern borderland had virtually become a Soviet dependency.18 By early 1940 it was already no secret that Moscow had been granted substantial control of Xinjiang, as well as a free hand in the economic development of the adjacent Gansu and

Figure 4.2 Sheng Shicai (fourth from right), Soviet Consul-General in Urumqi Garegin Apresov (fifth from right), and Nationalist Minister of Education Chen Lifu (fifth from left) in Urumqi, October 1937. The meeting marked the beginning of Soviet assistance to Nationalist China, and Xinjiang’s new status as a pivot between the two (source: Xibei Jiuying Wangshi, p. 31).


58 War and new frontier designs Shaanxi provinces. In November 1940 Sheng Shicai flew to Moscow, where he signed an agreement in which Xinjiang granted to the Soviets, for a period of 50 years, “exclusive rights to prospect for, investigate and exploit tin mines and its ancillary minerals.” The Soviets were allowed to commence oil and gold mining in Xinjiang, to send their military and political agents into that province, and to construct railways in northwest China all the way up to Lanzhou.19 Confidential reports of the British Consulate-General at Kashgar reveal that, by the fall of 1939, Soviet troops were ubiquitous in both southern and northern Xinjiang, and some Soviet forces had arrived in Gansu from the Mongolian People’s Republic (MPR) to organize defensive measures against Japan.20 At this juncture it was ironically the Nationalist authorities who, obviously aware of these Soviet maneuvers in the border provinces, “whitewashed” for Moscow; presumably in an attempt to avoid creating problems and offending their Soviet patrons, officials in Chongqing dismissed the British reports of Soviet troop activities as merely “groundless Japanese propaganda.”21 In that era of Sino-Soviet collaboration, numerous Soviet advisors and “technicians” were wandering unscrupulously throughout Xinjiang and the other northwestern provinces, frequently putting Chiang Kai-shek and the rest of the Nationalist higher echelons in Chongqing at their wits’ end.22 For example, between 1937 and 1939, when the Muslims under Mahmūd Muhītī and Ma Hushan rebelled against Sheng’s rule, hundreds of British Indian citizens in southern Xinjiang alleged to have supported the Muslim rebels were humiliated and threatened by the pro-Soviet local authorities (see Chapter 5). When in November 1940 the British embassy in Chongqing was instructed by London to negotiate with the Nationalists over the maltreatments the British suffered in southern Xinjiang, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Chonghui had to confess that his government had little or no control over Xinjiang. Wang was forced to tell the British ambassador that Sheng Shicai and his Soviet advisors in Urumqi always ignored instructions or messages from Chiang Kai-shek, and he hoped London would appreciate that officials in Chongqing were as anxious as their British counterparts over the situation in Chinese Central Asia.23 The Soviet influence in China’s Northwest had grown to such an amazing extent that, by the summer of 1941, key Nationalist diplomats like Wellington Koo could not but express their grave concerns to Chongqing that Xinjiang and the adjacent border regions would shortly become Moscow’s virtual dependencies.24

Forming a new frontier order: Xikang and Labrang Faced with a precarious scenario in China’s western frontiers, the war-ridden Nationalists continued to be strategic and opportunistic vis-à-vis their ethnopolitical policies. When the war with Japan first erupted in the early summer of 1937, Nationalist frontier policy designers proposed restoring the imperially bequeathed “league meeting (huimeng)” to strengthen their ties with Mongolian elites in China’s ethnic frontiers. Despite its “counter-revolutionary” nature, a policy was formulated by MTAC bureaucrats proposing that the eight main


War and new frontier designs 59 leagues in Inner Mongolia and Kokonor that remained independent from Japanese control should resume the traditional league meeting ritual on an annual basis under Nationalist supervision. By resuming the league meetings, the Nationalists hoped to strengthen the households of Mongolian leagues and banners, to reorganize independent banner militias, to assert greater control over banner affairs and to mediate cross-banner disputes, and – most significantly – to enhance Nationalist-oriented patriotism among Mongol leagues and banners.25 It was also around the time of the outbreak of the war that the Nationalists began to get involved in the monastic affairs of almost every major Tibetan Buddhist lamasery in Qinghai, Ningxia, Xikang and Gansu. The monkhoods in these border provinces were thoroughly investigated and new regulations were enforced, giving the Nationalists greater control over local lamaseries. All of these changes were made in an attempt to prevent Japanese infiltration and espionage.26 The strategic concerns of the Nationalists over war-beleaguered western China’s ethnic minority and frontier issues were demonstrated by gradual shifts in policy. Just before the war, when Nationalist authority was slowly but effectively spreading through southwest China, a group of core advisors from the MTAC submitted a set of general guidelines to Chiang Kai-shek in which they advocated that the most effective way for the Nationalist center to deal with China’s problematic ethnic minority affairs was to return to the old rationale of assimilation (tonghua). As these hardliners saw it, a centrally mandated political order in China’s western frontiers could only be ensured by a mixed policy of military force and cultural assimilation. These guidelines, labeled top secret, stated that the ultimate goal of Nationalist frontier planning should be to politically indoctrinate frontier ethnic minority peoples, and to administratively incorporate China’s ethnic borderlands. Successfully implementing this policy, claimed Chiang’s advisors, would result in the eventual absorption of far-flung frontier regions into solid Nationalist control.27 As the war with Japan intensified, this fundamentally Sino-centric assimilation philosophy soon gave way to a more realistic strategy. Toward the end of 1939, extremely anxious about the pressing situation in the frontier regions, policy designers from various governmental organs were summoned to develop a plan for building an efficient, manageable Nationalist state in western China. The result of this meeting was the conclusion that the Nationalists, while still not entirely dismissing the importance of cultural assimilation, should still use every possible opportunity to infiltrate frontier areas, where Chongqing needed badly to establish political and military bases. Based on this essentially strategic consideration, the Nationalists also agreed that, so long as the western edge of Inner Mongolia could be kept out of Japanese hands, the local hereditary political system there need not be altered, and that the Mongols themselves should be given the authority to control local political and financial resources. By the same token, so long as it was of strategic value, the besieged Nationalist regime in Sichuan should continue to tolerate the de facto independence of Outer Mongolia and Tibet. That is to say, as long as it was clear that a Nationalist attempt to take control over Lhasa could


60 War and new frontier designs potentially result in a Japanese–Tibetan alliance, then the Nationalists should avoid putting any political pressures on Lhasa.28 The seemingly incompatible and non- ideological nature of these policies demonstrates that the war-endangered Nationalists’ priorities lay primarily with their regime security. In fact, efforts to enhance Nationalist presence in the frontier regions had been underway since the war began. Significantly, Nationalist strategists’ first priority was Xikang, the back door of the war-beleaguered China, where Nationalist authority remained tenuous. Having retreated to Sichuan, Chiang Kai-shek understood very well that without genuine economic, political or military control over the adjacent Xikang Province, his uprooted “central government” would be too weak to effectively handle national defense or to ensure the survival of his regime survival in southwest China and even worse would very likely have to fight the Japanese on two fronts.29 Chiang was therefore determined to declare his goodwill toward Xikang leader Liu Wenhui by allowing the transfer from Sichuan to Xikang of the 17 wealthiest magistracies on the provincial border, and by promising to subsidize Liu generously for infrastructural programs in his province. In exchange for the additional tax revenues from the new territories, Liu agreed to recognize orders and instructions from Chongqing, and pledged to give Chiang his political allegiance.30 This was by no means the only measure taken by the Nationalists to penetrate into Xikang. In March 1939, a special committee chaired by Chiang Kai-shek himself and joined by Chiang’s close advisors, was set up within the KMT that would be in charge of the economic development of both Sichuan and Xikang provinces. By creating this new standing organ within the party structure, Chiang sought to adroitly incorporate Xikang’s economic and financial issues into Chongqing’s administrative mandate, thus enabling his officials to have a hand in that province’s local affairs.31 In order to utilize Xikang’s military and economic resources during wartime, officials in Chongqing proposed a grand project in which eastern Kham would be divided into several wide industrial belts, capitalizing on the region’s unused mining, agricultural, hydroelectric, industrial, and grazing resources.32 In 1940, a series of state-building programs was further enacted by Nationalist high officials in order to strengthen their political and military influence in Xikang. The timing of initiating these programs coincided with the news that several new oil deposits were being discovered along the Upper Yangtze River on the de facto Kham–Tibetan border.33 Accusing the Xikang provincial government of using “backward” administrative, civil and judiciary systems, various Nationalist organs began to urge Liu Wenhui to allow Chiang-appointed personnel to be dispatched to his provincial authorities in order to assist with and supervise a series of new reforms. These included the introduction of new conscription programs, the reorganization of local militia, the recruitment of Khampa aborigines into the Nationalist armies, and the strengthening of the taxation and judicial systems.34 Xikang, however, was not the sole focus of Nationalist frontier policies and institutional reforms during wartime. Chiang Kai-shek and his top advisors were equally concerned about building a new military and political order in the prov-


War and new frontier designs 61 inces of Gansu and Qinghai in order to increase Nationalist presence there. In this regard, Chongqing’s strategy was to develop close ties with the influential and strategically important Labrang Monastery on the Gansu–Qinghai border, the largest Tibetan Buddhism center outside Tibet. From the 1870s through 1916, the Labrang Tibetans under the fourth Jamyang Hutuktu had maintained relatively stable relations with the Qing court, and subsequently with the Republican local authorities. Yet the death of the Hutuktu in 1916 and the resultant interregnum gave the local Tungan Muslims an opportunity to expand their authority into Labrang. In November 1918, in order to take control of Labrang’s abundant tax revenues and valuable local resources, the Qinghai-based Ninghai Army under Ma Qi occupied the monastery and established a military garrison.35 In 1921, when five-year-old Khampa Tibetan Tenpay Gyaltsan (aka Huang Zhengguang) was identified and enthroned as the new fifth Jamyang Hutuktu, Labrang remained under the Ma family’s control. In order to escape Muslim rule, the Labrang Tibetans under the leadership of Lobsang Tsewang (aka Huang Zhengqing), who was Tenpay Gyaltsan’s elder brother, organized their own militia and began to actively seek allies among Tibetan tribes in the Golok and Choni regions. Yet in their subsequent battles with the Ma Muslims in 1925–6, the Labrang Tibetans were severely defeated. This made conditions at Labrang much harsher, and even drove the young Hutuktu to go into exile in the Hezhou grasslands in southern Gansu. It was not until the spring of 1927 that, thanks to the mediation of Feng Yuxiang’s Guominjun, a peace agreement was reached between the Ma Muslims and the Labrang Tibetans.36 Thereafter, the Ninghai Army reluctantly withdrew from Labrang, allowing the exiled Hutuktu and his family to return to the Monastery and resume local administration. In 1928, Huang Zhengqing was appointed Labrang peace preservation officer, commanding a local militia of around 4,000 troops. Huang’s position was made more secure in 1934, when he was promoted to commander of Gansu Provincial Peace Preservation Corps in Labrang. During the 1930s, given his unique blood relationship with the fifth Jamyang Hutuktu, his military strength and his ability to balance Labrang’s political autonomy between the Hui Muslims, the Han Chinese and the Mongols, Huang Zhengqing rose to become one of the most pivotal figures in Chinese Inner Asia.37 Unsurprisingly, Chiang Kai-shek’s intention to create an intimate link with the Labrang authorities was part of a larger political and strategic calculation. To the uprooted and threatened Nationalist center in Chongqing, there were many advantages to forming a coalition with the Labrang Tibetans. The first of these advantages was military; by the time the Sino-Japanese war began, Huang Zhengqing’s own garrison force at Labrang consisted of more than 10,000 troops.38 This force, if combined with the Nationalist division already stationed in Lanzhou and Tianshui in southern Gansu, would be able to exert considerable pressure upon the virtually independent Ma Muslims in Qinghai and the Gansu Corridor, as well as upon the Chinese Communists in the adjacent Shaanxi–Gansu–Ningxia Border Region.39 In terms of ethnic minority affairs, the Nationalists also desperately needed to keep Labrang from siding with the



Figure 4.3 The Labrang Tibetans in Chongqing, where they were treated with great pomp and courtesy, February 1940 (source: KMT Party Archives).

Japanese, and to prevent the further disintegration of Nationalist legitimacy in the region. The importance of Labrang’s political endorsement became particularly clear when in mid-1938 the Ajia Hutuktu, the Tibetan abbot of the equally prominent Kumbum Monastery in Qinghai, was reported to have secretly flown to Peking to conduct secret business dealings with the Japanese.40 Chongqing’s overtures to the Labrang Tibetans achieved preliminary success in late 1938, when Huang Zhengji, a younger brother of Huang Zhengqing and the fifth Jamyang Hutuktu, led a mission to Chongqing to display Labrang Monastery’s unwavering support of the Nationalist center.41 Huang Zhengqing himself also made his trip to Chongqing in early 1940. The visits of the Labrang Tibetans to Chongqing were treated with great pomp and courtesy, and were valuable propagandist events that provided considerable political momentum. Chiang Kai- shek made the fifth Jamyang Hutuktu a member of the MTAC, and appointed Huang Zhengqing as a military councilor of the Military Affairs Commission, the top organ of Nationalist China during the war. In return for Chiang’s goodwill toward Labrang, Huang Zhengqing welcomed the arrival of Nationalist authority in his domain by allowing the expansion of the KMT party branch office at Labrang that had been instituted in 1936.42 Acknowledging the Nationalists’ intention to make Labrang a solid Nationalist power base in southern Gansu, Huang consented to Chiang’s proposal to send young Labrang lamas to Chongqing to join the KMT Youth Corps programs and receive political training.43



Political intrigue in western Inner Mongolia Obviously, as the Nationalists’ marched westward as a result of their war with Japan, they also began to factor frontier and ethnopolitics into their political and institutional thinking. Having preliminarily consolidated their position in wartime China’s western frontiers of Xikang and southern Gansu, the Nationalists turned their attention to Chinese-controlled western Inner Mongolia. After 1937, severe warfare between Japan and China extended beyond the coast all the way to Inner Mongolia. Between late 1937 and early 1940, Japanese troops continued to march westward, capturing the strategic Peking–Suiyuan railway and occupying the key cities of Kökë Khoto (Guihua), Baotou, and Wuyuan.44 In order to further weaken the legitimacy of Nationalist rule and to dismember China both politically and territorially, at the early stages of the war the Japanese continued to seek collaboration with non-Han minorities in Inner Mongolia. For instance, shortly after seizing the important industrial and commercial center of Baotou, the Japanese enthusiastically assisted local Muslim elites in organizing their own militia under the command of a Japanese-supported “Muslim Supervisory Commission.” As a result, the Japanese were now favorably positioned to take control of the abundant local political, economic and industrial resources.45 It should be emphasized that, even before the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, secret contacts were forged between Japan and some influential Muslim elites in Inner Mongolia. governor of Ningxia Ma Hongkui was a particularly ideal partner for the Japanese.46 In the eyes of Tokyo military strategists, by successfully drawing Tungan Muslim leaders in Ningxia to their side, they would gain the ability to further reduce the already-vulnerable Nationalist influence in Ordos. In addition, the Japanese were generally convinced that by controlling Ningxia Province they would be able to resist any military encroachments from the Soviet-dominated Mongolian People’s Republic (MPR) and Xinjiang, and, if needed, to monitor Chinese Communist activities in the Communists’ new power base in Shaanxi and Gansu.47 Therefore, in August 1936, a group of Japanese military officials quietly arrived in Yinchuan, the provincial capital of Ningxia, where they were cordially received by Ma Hongkui. The positive response received from Ma’s authorities at one point inspired Tokyo to consider, given a commonly shared anti-Communist ideology, the possibility of further collaboration with the ruling Hui Muslims in Ningxia.48 The Japanese not only sought to develop stronger ties with the Muslims, but also went to great lengths to lure the Mongol nobles in western Inner Mongolia to their side. In early 1936, a “survey party” was dispatched from the Japanese Kwantung Army Headquarters to Ejine Banner for the purpose of gathering detailed first-hand information.49 With the consent of the Ejine ruler Prince Tobshinbayar (Tu Wang), in September 1936 the Japanese established an intelligence unit in the Mongol prince’s banner regime. To the Nationalists’ dismay, a banner militia was quickly assembled and trained under the sponsorship of the newly arrived Japanese secret agents in Ejine.50 In an even bolder gesture, in late 1937 General Itagaki Seishiro, then Chief of Staff of the Japanese Kwantung


64 War and new frontier designs Army, personally flew to Alashaa Banner to meet with its ruler Prince Darijayaga (Da Wang). During his stay in Bayanhot (Dingyuanying), the seat of the banner, Itagaki Seishiro took advantage of the blood relationship between Manchukuo Emperor Puyi and Prince Darijayaga, who had married one of the Last Emperor’s cousins, to persuade the Alashaa Mongols to collaborate with Japan. After his visit to Alashaa, General Seishiro was granted permission to establish a Kwantung Army intelligence base in Bayanhot and to build an airfield for military purposes.51 From the winter of 1937, as vast territories both east and north of the Ordos region successively fell into the hands of the Japanese, Alashaa Banner became the northwestern front of China’s struggle against Japanese encroachment. The precarious military and political situation in western Inner Mongolia combined with the increasing likelihood of its absorption by the Japanese prompted Chiang Kai-shek to think more seriously about augmenting Nationalist authority in the northern peripheries.52 In a confidential report submitted to Chiang Kai-shek shortly after the start of the war, Nationalist frontier planners aptly described Nationalist China’s sovereignty over its traditional borderlands as nominal at best, and acknowledged that Chinese prestige in some of the border regions was fading. In the face of the unflagging Japanese approach toward the western Inner Mongolia, top military advisors in Chongqing unanimously urged that countermeasures be taken immediately, and that Nationalist military and political authority be established at all costs as the first step toward securing the region.53 Taking the worrisome state of border defense in the northwest as its focal agenda, toward the end of 1937 Chongqing was determined to install military outposts in Ejine Banner and Alashaa Banner, both of which fell within the Ningxia provincial boundary.54 Moreover, in order to counteract rising Japanese influence in the Mongolian steppe, efforts were made by the Nationalists to seek the establishment of semi-official relations with the Soviet-dominated MPR. In spring 1938, the Nationalist government secretly instructed its military commissioner in Ejine Banner to communicate with border officials of the MPR about establishing a possible intelligence network with Ulan Bator (Urga). Chongqing’s goodwill at one point caused MPR officials to contemplate sending a mission to Ejine, a move that prior to the war would have been totally unthinkable to the Nationalist frontier officials.55 For the Nationalists, establishing a military presence in the western segment of Inner Mongolia was by no means easy. By the time the war erupted in mid- 1937, the general political climate in northwest China remained extremely unfavorable to the trouble-stricken Nationalists, who were in no position to openly confront the Ma Muslims in Ningxia. As a result, the Nationalists calculated that it would be more feasible to first establish a footing, not in the provincial capital Yinchuan, but in the two tiny neighboring Mongol banners of Ejine and Alashaa, under the pretext of defending against the Japanese and eradicating local pro- Japanese elements. By establishing Nationalist military footholds in Ejine and Alashaa, the Nationalists clearly sought to place themselves in a better position before reinforcing their authority further in the Ma territorial domains.56 Parallel


War and new frontier designs 65 to this distinctly military strategy was a series of policy changes intended to strengthen Nationalist political and economic control over the area. Among the specific policies intended were the reorganization, along with the effective training, of the two Mongol banner militias under Nationalist supervision, the establishment of tax points to collect tax revenues, and the inauguration of various KMT party branch offices to undertake political training programs and propaganda activities in western Inner Mongolia.57 Nationalist attempts to exercise state control in western Inner Mongolia, predictably, caused serious suspicion among Ma Hongkui’s ruling group in Yinchuan. To Ma, while intimate collaboration with the Japanese was only hypothetical, the influx of Nationalist authority into his domain was real and imminent. Apparently for the sake of resisting the encroachment of Nationalist authority and keeping his preeminence intact, in March 1938 Ma suddenly ordered his troops to attack Bayanhot under the pretext of “annihilating and extirpating pro-Japanese elements in Alashaa Banner.” The ill-equipped banner militia was quickly defeated and disarmed, and Prince Darijayaga was “escorted” to Yinchuan and placed under house arrest for the next eight years.58 Shortly after the coup, Ma Hongkui openly appealed to Chiang Kai-shek to abolish Prince Darijayaga’s “pro-Japanese” banner apparatus for good, and to transfer responsibility for all of the affairs of the former banner, including border security and financial regulation, to Ma’s Ningxia provincial authorities.59 Ma Hongkui’s sudden action surprised Chongqing. Ma’s proposal was tactfully turned down by Chiang Kai-shek, who patiently explained to Ma the necessity of keeping Mongol traditions intact at this critical moment during the war. Yet, before long, Ma challenged Chongqing once again by arguing that, since all the pro-Japanese elements had been expelled from Alashaa Banner after his military action, there should be no need to deploy any Nationalist troops to the banner. This time, Chiang Kai-shek was left with no alternative but to comply, and temporarily abandoned the idea of sending more troops into Alashaa.60 Nevertheless, with the excuse of reinforcing the porous border defense on the Ningxia–MPR border, one battalion of Hu Zongnan’s First Division cautiously advanced eastward from Tianshui and finally entered the adjacent Ejine Banner in the summer of 1938.61 Despite the Ma Muslims’ obstinate resistance to the entry of Nationalist influence into their Ningxia territorial domain, China’s war with Japan inevitably provided Chongqing with a perfect justification to expand Nationalist authority in Chinese-controlled Inner Mongolia. The newly installed Nationalist military commissioner’s offices at Alashaa and Ejine had played a crucial role in supervising the reorganization of local Mongol militias and the transformation of these originally sporadic, disparate non-Han military units into effective guerilla forces under the direct command of Chongqing.62 Confidential Chinese documents in the late 1930s and early 1940s reveal that, halfway through their war with Japan, the Nationalists had been able to establish various Mongolian guerilla units under their control. These ethnic guerilla units were not only instrumental in blockading the Japanese from moving further inland, but their



Figure 4.4 Anti-Japanese Muslim guerrillas in Northwest China, c.1939. At the initial stage of their war with Japan, the Nationalists were endeavoring to woo ethnic minorities to their side (source: KMT Party Archives).

existence also served as propaganda to attract more Mongol soldiers and intellectuals, then in collaboration with Prince Demchugdongrob and the Japanese, to the Nationalist side.63 Around 1939–40, three major war zones, encompassing the territories of Yekejuu League (Ordos), Ulanchab League, and Tumet Banner had been established along the Inner Mongolian front, where at least 1,700 local ethnic minority soldiers were enlisted into Nationalist irregular units. Direct financial subsidies from Chongqing to these newly organized military units allowed the wartime Nationalist government to assert a considerable degree of military penetration into the Mongolian steppe.64 Meanwhile, KMT party branches, intelligence units, telegraph stations, post offices, hospitals and tax offices were installed in key districts in Chinese-controlled Inner Mongolia, where staff dispatched directly from Chongqing began to effectively administer local affairs for the first time since 1928.65 These developments in China’s northern frontiers, as one foreign observer noted much later in 1942, laid the foundation for the subsequent substantiation of Nationalist state control over the expansive Central Asian borderlands. This would be especially true in the wake of Pearl Harbor, when Nationalist China’s ability to contend with Japan was utterly transformed.66



Reforging traditional ties with Tibet The Nationalist regime’s wartime policies vis-à-vis China’s ethnic frontier issues were both strategic and opportunistic. A closer examination of the foregoing discussion suggests that the extent of Nationalist political and military penetration into Labrang, Alashaa, and Ejine as the war developed was chiefly the result of strategic needs, not the least of which was the strengthening of the regime’s ability to protect the vital transportation route between besieged China and Soviet Russia.67 Chongqing’s relatively entrenched position in these border areas also served to spread Nationalist cultural, political and educational influence beyond where they were before the war. By the early 1940s, at least 15 new state-sponsored schools were functioning in Gansu, Ningxia and Qinghai. These included two vocational schools at Labrang, and two primary schools in Ejine Banner and Alashaa Banner, where over 800 ethnic minority students were receiving primary education under Nationalist subsidies.68 Having gradually strengthened their previously tenuous ties with the non-Han ethnic communities in Labrang, Alashaa and Ejine, as well as having preliminarily established themselves as a credible authority in the Kham region in southwest China, the Nationalists considered it an opportune time to enroll more ethnic minority elites in their bureaucratic system. During the first months of 1940, high officials in Chongqing were more determined than ever to recruit and cultivate nonHan KMT party members, as well as to set up local party branches in the border provinces.69 Ethnic minority youths were encouraged to attend Nationalist military colleges and other institutions of higher education and, according to new 1939 regulations, were then preferentially recruited into the governmental structure.70 In addition, Chiang Kai-shek’s national security advisors continued to pay extra attention to the reform of Tibetan Buddhist monastic sectors in China’s western frontiers so as to prevent their exploitation by the Japanese, who they believed might hypothetically use them as bases from which to infiltrate the interior.71 The enthronement of the fourteenth Dalai Lama demonstrated how the shifting domestic and international scenario after 1937 led the Nationalists to take a more pragmatic stance toward building a new frontier ethnopolitical order. Since the seventeenth century the relationship between the Qing dynasty and Tibet had been defined by a unique concept called Cho-Yon (priest–patron).72 The Cho- Yon relationship originated in the thirteenth century, when Kublai Khan accepted Phagspa, then master of the Tibetan Sakya sect, as his religious mentor. This relationship required Kublai to accept the moral superiority of his teacher: as a result, the status of Tibet and the Sakya sect in particular was granted an elevated position within the hierarchy of the Mongol Empire. Phagspa was later promoted to “Imperial Preceptor” in 1259, when Kublai proclaimed himself khan of all Mongol tribes and emperor of the newly created Yuan dynasty. Henceforth, Kublai and his successors would all be secular patrons of Tibetan Buddhism. The Cho-Yon relationship established between Phagspa and Kublai, which has no equivalent in any modern political system, was to become the idealized model for Mongol–Tibetan and Qing–Tibetan relations.73


68 War and new frontier designs Shortly after the start of the Qing dynasty in China, a similar Cho-Yon relationship was established between the Manchu emperors and the Tibetan Yellow Hat sect. In early 1653 the fifth Dalai Lama was invited to visit Peking and met with the Qing Emperor Shunzhi (r. 1644–61). It was obvious that an alliance at that time was in the interest of both parties: the Yellow Hat sect wished to revive the Cho-Yon relationship with the new rising power in China and Inner Asia, while the Qing court needed to use Tibetan Buddhism to strengthen its ties with the Mongols.74 However, when Qing authority in Tibet reached its peak in the latter half of the eighteenth century, the religious element of the Cho-Yon model was reduced to a minimum, and the relationship between the Manchus and the Tibetans became predominantly political. Despite the Manchu emperors’ continued patronage of Tibetan Buddhism, the Qing court was determined to increase the secular power of its residents (amban) in Lhasa. The Qing Residents were henceforth granted authority to supervise the Tibetan administration jointly with the Dalai Lama. In 1792, the Qing court took advantage of the presence of its army in Tibet, which had been dispatched there as a defense against the Nepalese invasion, to conduct a more extensive restructuring of the Qing court’s supervision of Tibet. The Qing amban in Lhasa was elevated above the Dalai Lama and the Kashag (Tibetan cabinet of ministers), taking over responsibility for international relations and defense. Further, the Qing court demanded that the future incarnations of the Panchen and Dalai Lamas, as well as those of other high lamas, be chosen under the supervision of the amban. The Qing court instituted a system of “choosing of lots from the golden urn” ( jinping cheqian) whereby the names of the final candidates for any incarnation were rolled into dough balls, placed in the golden urn and one was picked out of the urn by the Qing amban.75 In essence, these new regulations ensured that the final authority over the selection of high lamas, and by extension over the process of political succession in the Tibetan spiritual leadership structure, belonged to the Qing court. The Cho-Yon relationship between Tibet and the Manchus came to an end when the last Qing emperor abdicated in February 1912. The thirteenth Dalai Lama declared Tibet independent of the new Chinese Republic, viewing the assumed sacred bonds of mutual allegiance no longer existed.76 As Qing rule in China rapidly declined at the turn of the twentieth century, some Tibetan leaders had already begun to seek the establishment of patron-priest relationships with other international powers. The thirteenth Dalai Lama first considered the possibility of such a relationship with the Russians in his communication with a Buryat Mongol named Agvan Dorzhiev, who had been a monk at Drepung Monastery in Lhasa since 1880 before becoming a tutor and confidant of the great prelate. Dorzhiev had convinced Lhasa that the Russian czar was sympathetic toward Buddhism and that Russia as an imperial power would be capable of protecting Tibet against the Chinese or the British while being too distant to pose a threat to Tibet itself. Between 1898 and 1901, Dorzhiev was sent three times by the Dalai Lama to meet with Czar Nicholas II to establish closer relations with Russia. Costly gifts were exchanged, and there was active discussion that the “White Khan” (Russia) might serve as a fine patron of Tibetan Buddhism.77


War and new frontier designs 69 Dorzhiev’s missions to Russia soon aroused the suspicion of the British. Whitehall’s policy in Asia had been focused on the consolidation of the Indian colony, and the British desire to maintain Tibet as a buffer state under loose Chinese jurisdiction. In July 1904, a British expeditionary mission under Colonel Francis Younghusband advanced into Tibet in order to take a more proactive stance in Tibetan affairs. Yet, when Younghusband’s mission reached Lhasa, he discovered that the thirteenth Dalai Lama and Dorzhiev had fled to China proper via Kokonor and Mongolia.78 Notwithstanding a very different religious and cultural background, the Tibetans at one time sought an essentially Cho-Yon relationship with Great Britain. In 1910, the Dalai Lama had become deeply frustrated by the presence of the Qing troops and their series of unwelcome political reforms. Having just returned to Lhasa after six years in exile, he decided to flee once again, this time to British India. Before long, the Chinese Revolution terminated the Qing dynasty along with its Tibetan reform programs and in 1912 the Dalai Lama returned to Lhasa, restoring his mandate in Tibet with the strong support of the British.79 From the late 1910s throughout most of the 1920s, the thirteenth Dalai Lama began to initiate a series of modernization projects in Tibet under British patronage. The British not only assisted the Kashag with huge projects such as hydroelectric projects and road construction, but also undertook the construction of a well-equipped Tibetan army capable of defending itself. In order to keep Tibet’s autonomy and security intact, the British twice intervened in Tibet’s border disputes: once in 1917–18 with China and again in 1929–30 with Nepal.80 As both Soviet Russia and the Chinese Republic had their own troubles to deal with at home, the de facto independent Tibet was able to maintain a close and amicable relationship, free from intervention, with the British government of India. The death of the thirteenth Dalai Lama in late 1933, followed by the death of the ninth Panchen Lama one year later, left a huge political vacuum in Tibetan leadership. Concurrently, around 1938–9, Japan dominated a large portion of East Asia and endeavored to spread their influence even farther. A previously ignored fact is that around this time some Tibetan leaders were considering the possibility of cooperation with, if not patronage from, imperial Japan. In order to show their goodwill towards Tibetan Buddhism and to facilitate their governance over the Mongols in Manchuria and eastern Inner Mongolia, the Japanese went to great lengths to make overtures to the Ngagchen Hutuktu. In late 1938, the Hutuktu, a close confidant of the late ninth Panchen Lama who commanded much respect from the Buddhist minorities in China, was cordially invited by the Manchukuo Emperor Puyi to pay an official visit to Manchuria, where the Hutuktu advocated “pan-Buddhist unity” under the aegis of Japan.81 With Japanese sponsorship, the Hutuktu traveled around northern China and Inner Mongolia before returning to Lhasa where the British were concerned that he would promote Japanese interests.82 The Nationalists in Chongqing were so anxious about the possible return of the Ngagchen Hutuktu to Tibet that the Waijiaobu tried vainly to persuade the British not to issue his reentry visa.83


70 War and new frontier designs Perhaps the most striking example of how a patron-priest relationship might have emerged between Japan and Tibet took place in 1939, when Tokyo zealously attempted to gain Lhasa’s cooperation in a plot to establish a new incarnation of the Jebtsundamba Hutuktu in Inner Mongolia. When the eighth Jebtsundamba died in Urga in 1924 following the Communist takeover in Outer Mongolia, the Soviets forbade a search for the next in line and prevented the installation of the ninth incarnation. After 1937, however, the Japanese understood the utility of creating a new Jebtsundamba in Inner Mongolia under their auspices: a Japanese-controlled Jebtsundamba would legitimize Japanese policies and facilitate the reforms Tokyo hoped to accomplish throughout the fragmented parts of Mongolia.84 In the meantime, in order to manipulate the Jebtsundamba issue and to strengthen their relations with Tibet, the Japanese persuaded some influential Tibetan Buddhist dignitaries in Lhasa to allow the discovery of the new Hutuktu within the Tibetan boundary. One such dignitary, the Outer Mongolian Dilowa Hutuktu, had been close to the previous Jebtsundamba before his death in 1924, and had escaped into Japanese-dominated Inner Mongolia when the Soviets initiated their brutal purges of the Outer Mongolian lamas in the mid-1930s.85 By the summer of 1939, under Japanese sponsorship, the Dilowa Hutuktu was preparing a trip to Lhasa where he intended to persuade the Tibetan high authorities to announce that the next incarnation of the Jebtsundamba had been born in Lhasa. Yet the Dilowa never reached Lhasa; Nationalist intelligence units, having been alerted to the Hutuktu’s plan, surreptitiously diverted him to Chongqing from Hong Kong en route to Tibet. The Dilowa was later treated with great courtesy in Sichuan, although for the rest of the war he was detained by the Nationalists.86 On the other hand, feeling extremely uneasy about a potential Japanese infiltration of Tibet, officials both in Chongqing and in the British government of India began to exert tremendous pressure upon Lhasa, ultimately causing the Japanese to abandon their plans to install a new Jebtsundamba.87 Japan’s abortive attempt to advance its influence into Tibet in 1937–8 produced a far-reaching consequence in the formation of the modern Sino-Tibetan relationship. The Japanese failure to reinforce their presence in Tibet combined with the British preoccupation with the war in Europe presented the Chinese Nationalists with an ideal opportunity to renew the traditional Cho-Yon relationship with the Tibetans by way of presiding over the installation of the new Dalai Lama. By the end of 1938, it became apparent that four-year-old boy Lhamo Dondrup, discovered by the Tibetan survey team in Qinghai, was the most likely candidate to become the fourteenth Dalai Lama.88 The discovery offered Qinghai Governor Ma Bufang a welcome opportunity to exercise his political strength in Chinese Central Asia. When Lhasa urged Xining to send the child candidate back to Tibet, Ma Bufang took advantage of the situation by extorting from Lhasa 400,000 silver coins, a 108-volume Kangyur written in gold, and a full set of the Tengyur. Although the Tibetans informed Ma that they could not afford to pay his demand due to financial stringency, Ma insisted, and detained two of the Tibetan officials in the search party as hostages under the pretext of inviting them to stay as the Tibetan representatives in Qinghai.89


War and new frontier designs 71 At the initial stage of bargaining between Lhasa and the Ma Muslims, the Nationalists in Chongqing could do little more than “fully authorize” Ma Bufang to deal with the matter on behalf of the central government, and Ma continued to have an upper hand. Yet the Nationalists were able to take full control when in the spring of 1939 Chiang Kai-shek paid the 400,000 silver coins Ma Bufang required on Lhasa’s behalf.90 As American and British archival source materials have revealed, the Nationalists were willing to pay the bill because they sought to avoid triggering Tibetan animosity toward China and, more significantly, to convince Lhasa to allow a high-profile Chinese mission to join the new Dalai Lama’s enthronement ceremony. In their observation reports, both American and British diplomats in wartime China wrote that the Nationalists did not attempt to conceal their desire to be conspicuously present in Tibetan politics under the fourteenth Dalai Lama.91 The Nationalists’ policy toward the inauguration of the new Dalai Lama was fundamentally opportunistic and strategic, much as it was with regards to their other frontier dealings. When it was reported in the fall of 1938 that a likely candidate had been found in Qinghai, officials in Chongqing, unprepared and inexperienced in handling such events, hastily enacted a new law stipulating that the MTAC would play the same role as the now-defunct Qing Lifanyuan in dealing with the inauguration of the new Dalai Lama.92 Nationalist officials would travel to Lhasa by sea and enter Tibet overland via British India. Under other circumstances, what followed would have been unthinkable: in order to gain access to Tibet via India, Chongqing would have to accept a precondition set by the British. The British insisted that visas would be granted to the Nationalist officials only after the Tibetans confirmed that the officials had been invited. Despite objections from some Nationalist foreign policy planners, Chongqing finally agreed to the precondition.93 In the face of questions about the nature of the Chinese mission in Lhasa, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Chonghui was instructed to assure the British that, apart from ceremonial and religious functions, there was no other political purpose for the Nationalist presence in Lhasa.94 However tolerant and pragmatic the Nationalists’ behaviors appeared, their mission to Tibet was the result of careful political calculations. The mission was led by the sophisticated Wu Zhongxin, then head of the MTAC and one of Chiang Kai-shek’s closest and most trusted frontier advisors. After Wu arrived in Lhasa in January 1940, he was informed that the Tibetans had unilaterally announced that Lhamo Dondrup from Qinghai was the true reincarnation of the late thirteenth Dalai Lama, and his status was no longer merely that of a “candidate.” In so doing, Lhasa avoided the possible use of the Qing-instituted “golden urn” selection process, and simultaneously avoided claims that the Chinese had participated in choosing the new Dalai Lama.95 Considering that the Chinese were not in a position to publicly veto the candidate or to force Lhasa to arrange a “golden urn” selection ritual, Wu instead shrewdly asked Lhasa to arrange a personal meeting with Lhamo Dondrup in order to “examine” the qualities of this young candidate before the enthronement ceremony. Wu’s proposal was


72 War and new frontier designs refused by almost all of the Tibetan high officials, who insisted that the choice of the new Dalai Lama had been made by the Tibetan National Assembly and could not be changed. It was the Radreng Hutuktu, the Regent of Tibet, who, presumably intending to maintain his own monastery’s traditional friendship with China, apologized to the infuriated Wu and arranged a private “examination meeting” that took place on January 31. The Nationalist government in Chongqing announced four days later that, after examining the Qinghai candidate in Lhasa, they had approved him as the new fourteenth Dalai Lama.96 Before leaving Lhasa, Wu Zhongxin also sought to strengthen Nationalist Chinese presence in Tibet by formalizing the Chinese mission to Lhasa. When Huang Musong led a mission to offer China’s condolences for the death of the late thirteenth Dalai Lama in 1934, he left two officials and a liaison office in Lhasa. Wu’s visit to Lhasa in 1940 was thus an opportunity for Chongqing to upgrade and reconstitute the original liaison office. Yet Wu’s request to formalize his mission to Lhasa was turned down by the Regent of Tibet, who explained that the internal situation of Tibet was too delicate and complex to accept the presence of such a permanent Chinese Mission.97 In the end, Wu simply notified the Tibetan government in writing of his intention to inaugurate a Chinese Mission in Lhasa as a branch office of the MTAC. The Tibetans did not explicitly agree to the new office, but neither did they actively object to it. When Wu set out for Chongqing in April 1940, Kong Qingzong, a capable member of the mission who had earned his doctorate in Belgium, stayed on and became Nationalist China’s new Representative in Lhasa.98 There has been much debate as to whether Wu Zhongxin’s mission in Lhasa could be accurately described as “presiding over” the fourteenth Dalai Lama’s enthronement ceremony. Yet perhaps the most significant aspect of the mission was that the Nationalists were triumphant in capitalizing on the new Dalai Lama’s inauguration as a propagandist tool to develop their Tibetan agenda. The alleged examination and confirmation of the young candidate as the new Dalai Lama, the presence of Nationalist high officials at the ceremony, the conferral of honorary titles to the Tibetan high authorities, the offering of gifts and “pious money” to the great monasteries, and the enlargement of the Chinese representative office in Lhasa all enabled the Nationalists to claim that, despite their bitter ongoing war with Japan, they still exercised full authority in Tibet. As one American diplomat in southwest China perceived scrupulously in 1940, the psychological and propagandistic effect of Wu’s visit to Lhasa was significant. The finalization of the new Dalai Lama’s enthronement, and the presence of Nationalist high officials in the event, had established the striking image of a Tibet that was subservient to Nationalist Chinese political interests.99 This was despite the fact that, though the Nationalists were successful in seizing an opportunity to display a convincing and coherent ethnopolitical image during the war, their authority over Tibet remained fundamentally illusory.



China’s ethnopolitics in a new international milieu Since mid-1937 the embattled Nationalists had searched for a change in the international status quo that could provide a way out of their military predicament. As described in the previous chapter, at the early stages of the Sino- Japanese war Soviet Russia was the only foreign power that substantially assisted the Nationalists. Yet Nationalist high officials were in reality hoping for a direct confrontation between the Japanese and their Soviet patrons, believing that such a conflict would relieve pressure on their own thinly-stretched forces.1 This hope was partly realized when in July 1938 the Russians clashed with the Japanese on Zhanggufeng Hill in the disputed area between Siberia and Japanese-controlled Korea. This incident was followed by another short, albeit bitter, battle in the summer of 1939 in Nomonhan (Khalkin Gol), another disputed section of the Manchuria–Mongolia border.2 The Nationalists watched these incidents in North Asia with rapt attention, for they hoped that these clashes might flare up into a full-scale war between Russia and Japan. Yet in April 1941, to Chiang Kai-shek’s great disappointment, Tokyo and Moscow entered into a nonaggression pact, which ruled out the possibility of war between Japan and Soviet Russia.3 The year of 1941, however, saw two striking developments that would dramatically change the political landscape of Central Asia and shift the position of the Nationalists in China’s frontier regions. In June, Nazi Germany launched its blitzkrieg against Soviet Russia. At first, the Germans appeared to be unstopp able; by November 1941, they had begun the siege of Leningrad, pushed to within 30 miles of Moscow, and thrust deep into the Ukraine. On December 7, one month later, the Japanese launched a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, precipitating the American declaration of war on Japan. These events brought together Nationalist China, the United States, Soviet Russia, and Britain as allies united against the Axis Powers. These events had a great impact on China’s frontier and ethnic territorial policy. China’s war with Japan and the changing international situation reshaped the power balance between the Nationalist center and the warlord regimes in China’s western frontiers. It also changed the priorities and strategies of the


74 War and opportunities Nationalists in Chongqing as well as those of the border provincial leaders, thus bringing China’s frontier and ethnic politics to a new stage. The Soviet Russians, now struggling to repel the German onslaught, were forced to concentrate all their available military power on the European front, and as such were no longer able to play a significant role in Asian developments. By contrast, the beleaguered Nationalists in China’s southwestern corner, now backed by their new military, economic and diplomatic American ally, were no longer alone in their battle against the Japanese. Anticipating that Germany would soon defeat Soviet Russia, Sheng Shicai, the governor of Xinjiang, changed from a pro-Moscow to an anti-Communist stance and endeavored to patch up his relationship with Chiang Kai-shek. The Nationalists were thus given yet another unexpected opportunity to move further west, extending their previously tenuous authority into the Central Asian peripheries. Their perennial goal to bring Xinjiang into the Nationalist fold now had a chance to materialize. In the spring of 1942, while the Soviets were launching an ill-fated counter offensive against the invading Nazis, covert negotiations between Chongqing and Urumqi were underway to return Xinjiang to Nationalist control. Shortly thereafter, when the Caucasus and Crimea successively fell to the German army in July 1942, Sheng Shicai was visited by two powerful emissaries from Chiang Kai-shek: General Zhu Shaoliang, then commander of the Nationalist Eighth

Figure 5.1 The KMT party headquarters holding its political activities in Urumqi, c.1942. The Nationalist authority was greatly strengthened in Xinjiang as a result of Sheng Shicai’s shift of political stance in 1942 (source: KMT Party Archives).


War and opportunities 75 War Zone headquartered in Lanzhou, and Nationalist Minister of Economic Affairs Weng Wenhao. Zhu and Weng bore with them a major proposal from Chiang, offering that in exchange for a declaration of allegiance from Sheng, Chongqing would support the continuation of Sheng’s governorship in Xinjiang.4 Two months later, accompanied by General Zhu, Madame Chiang Kai- shek flew to Urumqi and met with Sheng on Chiang’s behalf. She pledged that Chiang would entirely “forgive Sheng’s past misdeeds” and reassured Sheng that his position would remain intact. As a gesture of goodwill and generosity, Chiang secretly instructed his finance minister, H.H. Kung, to remit US$100,000 to Sheng under the pretext of aid to his provincial government in Urumqi.5 The result of these negotiations was an evident triumph for Chongqing; shortly after Madame Chiang’s visit, Sheng openly declared his full allegiance to Chiang Kai-shek and the Nationalist center. Sheng requested that all Soviet military and technical personnel leave Xinjiang without delay, and that the well- known “Eighth Regiment” stationed at Hami since 1937 withdraw.6 A KMT provincial party headquarters was allowed to be established in Urumqi, and various party branches were set up in important cities and districts throughout Xinjiang. Chongqing was able to dispatch its special commissioner to handle Xinjiang’s external affairs directly, and was even ready to link the local Xinjiang currency to that of the Nationalist government. For the first time since 1928, the national flag of the Nationalist government and the KMT party flag could be seen flying throughout the province.7 In Lanzhou, the Soviet influence was equally being reduced. Local Soviet “consular activities” were restricted, and the newly arrived foreign affairs commissioner, Lu Tonglun, handpicked by Chiang Kai-shek personally, began dealing with Gansu Province’s relationship with Russia according to Chongqing’s guidance.8 Chiang was so excited over Xinjiang’s return to the Nationalist fold that, on December 31, 1942, he wrote the following words in his diary: The territory from Lanzhou in Gansu to Ili in Xinjiang, covering a distance of 3,000 kilometers, with an area twice as large as Manchuria, has now come under Central control. With Xinjiang under Central control, our rear areas have been consolidated.9 Indeed, in the first years of the 1940s, foreign diplomats in Chongqing had generally regarded Xinjiang’s return to the central government’s control to be a singular achievement of the Nationalists. The return of Nationalist direct control from the Xinjiang authorities over the five Chinese consular posts in Soviet Central Asia – Alma Ata, Tashkent, Andijan, Zaisan, Semipalatinsk – thus hugely strengthening Chongqing’s political, diplomatic and intelligence positions in Euraisa, was particularly impressive.10 Yet, to the military depleted Nationalist center in Sichuan, such a return could not have been possible without first substantiating its authority in the border regions adjacent to Xinjiang in 1941–2. With hindsight, it is possible to see that opportunism and pragmatism played important roles in this consolidation. As early as mid-1941, Chiang


76 War and opportunities Kai-shek had become aware that Ma Bufang, the powerful Muslim governor of Qinghai, was on extremely bad terms with his brother Ma Buqing, then garrison commander of Gansu Corridor, whom the former perceived as a potential rival among his other Ma family members. Considering it imperative to secure the Gansu Corridor, the site of the strategic Yumen oil field and the vital international supply line, Chiang endeavored to persuade Ma Bufang to collaborate with the Nationalists, and in particular to help Chongqing gain control over the Gansu Corridor and establish military airfields in Qinghai and west of Lanzhou.11 In return, Chiang promised Ma Bufang that he would help him taking over Ma Buqing’s cavalry, a move which would signify the end of Ma Buqing’s military and political career in northwest China.12 Chiang also promised Ma that, once the deal was made, more financial subsidies from Chongqing to Xining could be expected. Chiang also assured Ma that the KMT would soon begin to invest a considerable amount of money in Ma’s personal enterprises in Qinghai.13 Ma Bufang was apparently satisfied with Chongqing’s overtures and decided to cooperate. Then, suddenly, in July 1942, Chiang Kai-shek instructed Ma Buqing to transfer his troops in the Gansu Corridor to the Tsaidam Marsh in northwest Qinghai for the purpose of “colonizing and guarding” the Tsaidam wasteland.14 Astonished by Chiang’s order, the ill-prepared Muslim general turned to his brother Ma Bufang for aid. Predictably, he did not receive it. Unable to secure the support of the other influential Ma family members, the disheartened Ma Buqing was forced to comply.15 Nationalist forces stationed in southern Gansu quickly moved into the now-unprotected Gansu Corridor along the road to Xinjiang, garrisoning the long strip of land west of the Yellow River. As one foreign observer noted, Nationalist forces began to appear “in every district city as far west as the further outposts of Kansu [Gansu] Province in the sands of Central Asia.”16 By mid-1943, the Muslim forces under Ma Buqing had been replaced by four Nationalist divisions deployed in every key oasis of the Gansu Corridor. Meanwhile, officials in Chongqing planned to add two more divisions to those already stationed in the Gansu Corridor in order to strengthen their bargaining position vis-à-vis Sheng Shicai’s Xinjiang, Soviet Central Asia, and the Chinese Communist-controlled border region in Shaanxi, Gansu and Ningxia provinces.17 It is noteworthy that the newly deployed forces in Gansu Corridor became the primary Nationalist military presence in Xinjiang when they replaced the Soviet regiment after its expulsion in late 1943 and early 1944. The reassertion of Nationalist influence in these border regions was so politically monumental that it momentarily attracted worldwide questions as to whether Chongqing would consider restoring Chinese predominance in other traditional borderlands such as Outer Mongolia and Tibet.18 In the summer of 1942, the confidence inspired by the successful removal of Ma Buqing from the Gansu Corridor and the resultant disintegration of the Muslim bloc in the northwest led Chiang Kai-shek to launch a grandiose inspection tour of the Gansu Corridor and nearby warlord domains in Qinghai and Ningxia.19 During his visits to these border regions, Chiang negotiated with the


War and opportunities 77

Figure 5.2 A street view of Wuwei, an important oasis in the Gansu Corridor, before Chiang Kai-shek’s inspection, August 1942. The reassertion of Nationalist influence in Gansu Corridor paved the way for Xinjiang’s return to the Nationalist fold (source: KMT Party Archives).

usually obstinate Muslim militarists to ensure that they would cooperate with Chonqging and fight against the Japanese. In Qinghai, in particular, Chiang spent time addressing local Muslim tribesmen and Mongolian and Tibetan nobility, who had heretofore only barely recognized Chinese sovereignty and who had the tendency to opportunistically shift their political allegiance from China to Japan.20 Chiang’s inspection tour to Qinghai also allowed the Nationalist highest echelons to review wartime China’s border defense in the southwest. When meeting with Ma Bufang and Ma Buqing, Chiang cautioned that the Ma Muslim troops should never cross the border and invade Tibet proper. Instead, Chiang regarded the borders between Qinghai, Xikang and Tibet as Nationalist China’s “last lines of defense.” Apparently Chiang was convinced that wartime China’s best policy toward Tibet was not to provoke the Tibetans lest Lhasa joined the Axis Powers, causing Chongqing to face a two-front threat.21 While visiting Ningxia, Chiang Kai-shek openly appealed to the local Muslim leadership to fully cooperate with the Nationalist center. Just as he had to Ma Bufang, Chiang promised Governor Ma Hongkui that more financial resources could be expected from Chongqing. In exchange, Chongqing would henceforth have greater authority in the military and political affairs of the province.22 It was not difficult to see that these political and military maneuvers increased Nationalist authority in China’s northwestern frontiers. One direct side-effect of this new authority was a series of institutional reforms in China’s western border regions. Shortly after Chiang Kai-shek’s inspection tour, a flurry of Nationalist officials, military advisors, and new governmental organs began to emerge not



Figure 5.3 Chiang Kai-shek (right) met with Ma Bufang (second from left) and Ma Buqing (first from left) at his temporary residence in Xining, August 1942 (source: KMT Party Archives).

only in the newly secured Gansu Corridor, but also in Qinghai and Ningxia provinces with the purpose of supervising local affairs and recruiting more KMT party members. A number of KMT party branch offices and military field headquarters were even established in the most remote district on the Sino-MPR border.23 Toward the end of 1942 Chongqing’s presence in Ningxia had become so overwhelming that the stubborn-minded Muslim governor Ma Hongkui was obliged to instruct all Muslim ahongs (clerks) in his province to adopt Nationalist ideology and patriotism in their daily sermons.24 As their authority in the west grew, the Nationalists began implementing infrastructure improvement and state-building programs that were of strategic



Figure 5.4 Chiang Kai-shek, Ma Hongkui (second from right) and Ma Hongbin (second from left) in Ningxia, August 1942. The Nationalist government’s influence over China’s western frontiers greatly strengthened as a result of its war with Japan (source: Xibei Jiuying Wangshi, p. 42).

necessity during wartime. The development of the Yumen oil field in the Gansu Corridor was a prominent example. Around the time of the outbreak of the Marco Polo Bridge Incident in mid-1937, a group of foreign technicians was granted permission to survey the Yumen oil deposits and the adjoining areas of Gansu and Qinghai. Their reports to the Nationalists were favorable, but the Ma control of the Gansu Corridor prevented the Nationalists from taking any substantial action. When Ma Buqing and his Muslim cavalry were removed from the Gansu Corridor, the Nationalist government began to exploit the Yumen oil fields, with the assistance of American geologists and technicians. A new Gansu Oil Mining Administration was then established under the direction of the Nationalist center in Chongqing. According to a British report in 1943, despite the difficulties arising from the field’s remote location and lack of essential equipment and materials, the Nationalists had been able to make steady progress. By October 1943, four oil wells were functioning properly in Yumen, and the fifth oil well, on which the American technicians were working, was expected to


80 War and opportunities be nearing completion. According to Chongqing’s best-case scenario, a daily production of 2,000 barrels of crude oil a day could be expected from the newly constructed wells. Such a capability provided a substantial boost to Nationalist Chinese morale as well as providing the military with much-needed raw materials.25 The development of China’s infrastructure in the far West took another leap forward in late 1942, when Chongqing launched a large-scale land settlement project on the eastern edge of Xinjiang. According to Chinese archival materials, it was estimated that between 1942 and 1944 around 11,400 Han Chinese refugees, ex-soldiers and unemployed workers from Henan, Shanxi and Shaanxi provinces were moved to Hami and Turfan to undertake reclamation work.26 A series of economic and colonization projects was also initiated, aimed at relieving overpopulation in unoccupied southwest China and simultaneously strengthening Nationalist administrative control. One notable example was the establishment of several military colonization zones in eastern Xinjiang, the Gansu Corridor, Ningxia and Qinghai to accommodate the new Han Chinese immigrants from China proper. Immigrants were assigned to road construction, irrigation, forestry, and land reclamation projects. Supervision of the refugees and the colonization projects fell to officials dispatched from Chongqing; the result was a reinforcement of Nationalist influence in the vital border regions.27 The Nationalist regime also encouraged its party members, public servants and young intellectuals in southwest China to go to serve in the border provinces. According to one statistical report during wartime, by mid-1943 at least 7,200 new KMT party cadres were being relocated to Xinjiang, where they were employed by the newly instituted KMT party organs.28 Expecting that more people would be coming to serve in these border provinces, the Nationalist center also established new codes and regulations for personnel relocation. Training courses were also set up in Chongqing to prepare public servants for their new lives in Xinjiang.29 In addition, Nationalist ministerial officials began routinely flying between Sichuan proper and the outlying provinces to inspect. Between 1942 and 1943, visits of higher-ranking officials from Chongqing to the northwest were so frequent that General Zhu Shaoliang, responsible for the security of the party and government officials, complained to Chiang Kai-shek about his new and unexpected burden.30 By early 1944, when it became clear to Sheng Shicai that a Soviet defeat in Europe was unlikely, he attempted to once again reverse his stance by appealing to Moscow. His failure to obtain Soviet confidence was due in large part to the fact the Soviets no longer trusted him after his history of switching sides. With the increased Nationalist military and political presence in Xinjiang, Sheng’s governing days were numbered. Ultimately, in the fall of 1944, Chiang Kai-shek recalled Sheng and replaced him with Wu Zhongxin, then head of the MTAC. From a long-term historical perspective, the Nationalist attempt to take control of Xinjiang in the early 1940s had its roots in Chinese state-building policies of the late 1800s as well as in the eighteenth century, during which the Qing court established control of the Xinjiang region. Indeed, the existing literature on this


War and opportunities 81 period in Chinese history overwhelmingly argued that in a broad historical context, Chiang’s removal of Sheng represented the instatement of direct central governmental control over China’s far northwest for the first time since 1911.31 However, it was more than a continuity of Qing territorial expansion in Central Asia, for this time Chiang and his associates were establishing the potentially long-term control of a Han-dominated, twentieth-century nationalist party-state.

Roads and politics From a geo-strategic perspective, the establishment of Nationalist control over the Central Asian peripheries was particularly significant. As mentioned earlier, after the Japanese cut off China’s access to the sea, China became dependent upon overland routes through Central Asia for receiving military supplies. By 1942–3, with their increased authority in Xinjiang and elevated influence in Tibet, the Nationalists had begun considering the construction of several roadways connecting their power base in southwest Chinese to the outside world by way of the border regions. Around the spring of 1942, the Nationalists and the British agreed on plans to build a motor road from Assam in northeast India, through Myithyina in Burma, and then to Longling in Yunnan Province, thus enabling lend-lease goods from the United States to be transported into Sichuan proper.32 Although this plan was aborted in May 1942 due to deteriorating war conditions in Burma, the opening of an alternative Sino-India pack route via Tibet continued. At first Lhasa rejected the plan, believing that such a route would endanger Tibet’s political autonomy. However, with strong political pressure from the British, along with the increased Nationalist Chinese military presence in southwest China, the Tibetans eventually backed down. The Chinese Expeditionary Force, having retreated into northeast India after the fall of Burma to the Japanese in May 1942 and now headquartered in Ramgarh, Assam, especially posed new pressure on Tibet’s external policy making. As newly available source materials indicate, top Nationalist military chiefs in Ramgarh were in close contact with Nationalist officials in Lhasa, and the Tibetans were fully aware of the implication such contacts had brought about.33 In summer 1942, Lhasa grudgingly approved the route under the condition that it only be used to transport “nonmilitary” items. Toward the end of 1943, the new infrastructure was completed.34 Tibet’s rugged geography prevented the delivery of more than about 1,000 tons of goods per year via the new route. Nevertheless, to the Nationalists the new route had immense political and strategic implications. New infrastructures and local institutions were established along the route, and Chongqing was able to dispatch “technical experts” and other personnel to supervise its operation. A new pack-transport firm, operated by Khampa-Tibetan traders but covertly backed by Chongqing, was accordingly set up in Dartsendo to manage the route.35 A new branch of the Bank of China was also opened in Kalimpong in northeast India to take advantage of the dramatically increased commercial and


82 War and opportunities economic activity that accompanied the route. There was even serious discussion about the possibility of opening yet another branch office in Lhasa.36 In addition, with the inauguration of the pack route, more Chinese troops were deployed on the Xikang–Tibetan border, ostensibly for the purpose of assuring the security of pack transport.37 By early 1945, the substantial penetration of Nationalist influence into China’s southwestern frontier, together with the rapid augmentation of Nationalist jurisdiction over that area, had allowed Chongqing to establish four oil pipelines between Calcutta and Yunnan Province, a development that greatly enhanced southwest China’s defense capability in the final days of World War II.38 The coming of Xinjiang and the Gansu Corridor to the Nationalist yoke also contributed to the extension of several international supply lines between Sichuan proper and Soviet Central Asia. With hesitant American and British support, Chongqing attempted to establish an infrastructure for transporting lend-lease goods into China through Iran or Karachi. One proposed route was from Baluchistan through Iran, Soviet Turkestan and Kazakhstan into Xinjiang.39 By late 1942, Moscow and Chongqing had generally agreed to a trade deal on a ton-to-ton basis: 2,000 tons of lend-lease goods per month would be sent to China from Soviet Russia in exchange for 2,000 tons of Chinese raw materials. The goods would be moved by rail and then by lorry from India, via Mashhad in Iran to Askabad on the Russian trans-Caspian railway. The Russians would then take over the service from Askabad to Alma Ata in Eastern Turkestan by rail and then by lorry to Hami in eastern Xinjiang. The Nationalists would then assume responsibility for the goods as they were transferred from Hami to Lanzhou in Gansu and beyond.40 In mid-1943, the American lend-lease authorities provided 500 trucks for use in the Xinjiang sector, and the British supplied a similar number via India. Yet when the first convoys reached Mashhad in the fall of 1943, the Russians refused to allow their entry, apparently unwilling to arouse Japanese suspicion.41 It was not until one year later, in the fall of 1944, that Moscow finally gave permission for a convoy of vehicles to enter Xinjiang via Soviet Central Asia. For reasons that still remain unclear, however, the convoy did not reach southwest China via the newly opened Stilwell Road (Ledo- Kunming) until early 1945.42 The Nationalists were now confident, and proposed more infrastructural projects apart from the Central Asian routes, including several connecting Xinjiang and British India.43 In a meeting in Urumqi with M.C. Gillett, the British Consul General in Kashgar, Nationalist high officials from Chongqing strongly urged the British to open an air service between China and Peshawar via Yarkand, and to consider the establishment of two more routes between southern Xinjiang and India, including a Gilgit–Hunza–Kashgar line via the Kilik Pass and Tashkurghan, and a Leh–Karakoram line via Yarkand and Khotan. Although the British were somewhat doubtful of the practicability of the routes, they were impressed by the fact that none of Sheng Shicai’s representatives were actually present. The Nationalists had managed to “keep the party clean” and as a result the British were convinced that the Nationalists’ new route schemes were “great


War and opportunities 83 possibilities.” In their final analysis, the British Consular officials in Urumqi favored supporting these route plans on the condition that the full cooperation of the Xinjiang provincial government be ensured. But meanwhile they also made it plain to the Xinjiang local authorities that the project “can only be secured through the Chinese central government.”44 It was indeed evidence of increased Nationalist central authority in Central Asia. The favorable outcome of the negotiations over roadways connecting southern Xinjiang with British India via Kashmir and the Pamirs left the higher authorities in London and New Delhi with the belief that it was possible to use the routes to impress upon the Nationalists that “their British ally is doing something to help them.”45 Despite the extreme weather and difficult geographic conditions along the proposed routes, both the Nationalists and the British seemed convinced that the new routes might well serve their respective interests. The besieged Nationalists in southwest China were eager to obtain as many international supply routes as possible for the sake of regime security. They may also have expected that the routes would bring lucrative international trade and commerce to Xinjiang.46 For their own part, the British were enthusiastic about using the Sino-Indian trade for the revenue that would come from the local business involved in transporting China’s desperately needed war materials.47 The Nationalists’ eagerness to develop new trade routes in Central Asia also brought about their intention to have direct control over Xinjiang’s customs and tax revenues. In January 1944, Chongqing established a Xinjiang customs office in Urumqi, and a new inspector-general was posted to Xinjiang under the Nationalist government’s direct supervision. In addition, Chongqing planned to establish five branch stations at Chuhuchak (Tacheng), Ili, Turfan, Kashgar and Sharasume (Ashan), and nine substations north, east, and south of Tian Shan. As one foreign observer noted at that time, these customs posts were well placed to control trade with Soviet Central Asia, India and the Mongolian People’s Republic, once Nationalist China’s trade between these territories and Xinjiang was resumed and new international trade routes were opened.48 The new customs posts surely enabled the Nationalists to increase their tax revenues in Central Asia. In the fall of 1944, the Muslim rebellion against Nationalist rule in Xinjiang erupted, causing the nascent Nationalist provincial authorities in Urumqi to lose control of a large portion of northern Xinjiang and the suspension of trade between Xinjiang and Soviet Russia (see Chapter 6). Despite these difficulties, the recently instituted Nationalist customs offices in other parts of Xinjiang continued to operate, providing Chongqing with over 50 million Xinjiang dollars in revenue for the fiscal year of 1945. As the British Consulate in Urumqi commented, For the last four years since 1941 [the Nationalist revenue in Xinjiang] has never exceeded eleven million [Xinjiang dollars], so this must be considered satisfactory, even allowing for the fall in the value of the Xinjiang dollar, especially in view of the interruption of communications with both India and Soviet Russia.49


84 War and opportunities Throughout wartime, technical and geographical difficulties prevented the Leh–Karakoram and Gilgit–Hunza–Kashgar routes to play a major role in the transportation of essential war materials to China. Nevertheless, for the Nationalists, the most significant aspect of the new trade routes may have been their political implications rather than their actual operations. To conduct firsthand investigations of the supply lines, Chongqing organized several survey teams, consisting of not only technicians, but also military and intelligence personnel. One of these teams was dispatched in July 1943, and in the two months that followed it surveyed the remotest corner of the Sino-Pamir borderland, a poorly demarcated and highly contested area claimed by the Chinese, the British, and the Russians.50 As Chinese archival materials now reveal, Nationalist strategists in Chongqing, in trying to take full advantage of the opening of the trans-Pamir pack transport route, originally sought to construct a light-track railway nearby in order to facilitate the transfer of Nationalist troops into the Pamir region. It was also in Chongqing’s plan to mobilize at least 100,000 laborers and engineers to build another motorway linking Yarkand and the Kilik Pass, with the possible technical and financial help of British India.51 Chiang Kai-shek’s military advisors meanwhile proposed the construction of several other domestic highways that would connect southern Xinjiang with the Gansu Corridor for the purposes of troop maneuvering and long-term national defense. However, given Chongqing’s financial limitations, Chiang was compelled to make the road connecting Keriya (Yutian) to Dunghuang his first priority.52 The new routes across southern Xinjiang, however embryonic, increased the Nationalists’ influence in Central Asia in unintended ways. Until the Nationalists re-imposed the central government authority in Xinjiang, customs revenues on trade between British India and Xinjiang accrued to Sheng Shicai. The route by way of the Pamirs gave the Nationalists the opportunity to take control of the customs by negotiating with British India a new customs rate to be levied at China’s border with Kashmir.53 By a provisional agreement of March 1943, the customs levied on routes between British India and southern Xinjiang would be collected by officials appointed from Chongqing, not Urumqi. Leh, in Kashmir, would be the sole point of entry; border checkpoints and customs would be regulated jointly by the Nationalist government and the British government of India; and Nationalist officials might travel between southern Xinjiang and Kashmir.54 Higher echelons in Chongqing surely had reasons to celebrate their apparently successful power penetration into the Central Asian borderlands. Yet, it is important to note that the British welcomed the new balance of power largely because they believed that greater Chinese Nationalist influence in Xinjiang was in their best interest. In a confidential analysis written in the spring of 1943, officials at Whitehall argued that the Russians had easy access to Xinjiang by means of the Turkistan Railway and, if they were able to oust Chinese authority, would be able to rapidly assimilate Xinjiang into their existing Central Asian territories. Therefore, the British were convinced that


War and opportunities 85 While it is true that imperialistic tendencies in the policy of the KMT may cause future difficulties for the British in Asia, and while our 20-year treaty of alliance with Russia holds out the prospect of long term friendly relations with that power, the Chinese are less likely than the Russians to be in a position, if they so desired, to make Sinkiang [Xinjiang] a base for political infiltration towards India.55 Despite their comparative disinterest in the infiltration of India, the impending completion of the Sino-Indian supply lines gave the Nationalists their first opportunity to contemplate the redrawing of the boundary of the Pamirs.56 Apparently aware of the potential disputes that the new routes might elicit, Nationalist policy planners began to feel an urgent need to define the hazy national boundaries dividing southern Xinjiang, Kashmir and the Pamirs. Around 1942–3, a flurry of study groups on Central Asian boundary issues were created within various governmental departments in Chongqing to devise possible ways to solve the problem. In order to secure the administration of the routes, increasing numbers of Nationalist military leaders, including Chiang Kai-shek himself, began to take a hard-line attitude, believing that Chongqing should aggressively pursue negotiations for the immediate re-demarcation of the disputed boundaries between China, British India, and Soviet Russia.57 When meeting with Owen Lattimore in November 1942, Chiang was convinced that the Pamirs would become the pivot of the Eurasian continent in the postwar period. To Chiang, it was conceivable that whoever controlled the areas surrounding the Pamir region would dominate the Eastern Hemisphere.58 Not surprisingly, according to internal memoranda from around late 1943, the growing Nationalist infiltration in Central Asia had many officials in Chongqing convinced that China should now proactively renegotiate its traditional position in the Pamirs. These documents reveal that when the time was right to settle the boundary issue, Chongqing would on one hand refuse to recognize any previous agreements between the Russians and the British, and on the other hand dispatch even more survey teams to the area and consolidate Chinese presence there.59 As World War II neared its end toward the latter part of 1944, Nationalist China’s intention to construct a motorway connecting Yarkand and the Kilik Pass was also fading away. In their final analysis, top officials in Whitehall refused to render technical and financial support to Chongqing, arguing that the road would never be commercially successful and that “with the revival of more accessible routes which will follow on the defeat of the Japanese, the value of this route is likely to decline.”60 Nonetheless, since early 1944, the revival of the Leh–Karakoram and Gilgit–Kashgar lines had caused local commerce to flourish in southern Xinjiang. The volume of trade between southern Xinjiang and Ladakh via these pack routes, for example, rose nearly 170 percent from 1940–1, when the routes were sealed by Sheng Shicai, to 1944–5, when they were reopened by the Nationalists. The trade volume across the Sino-Kashmir border continued to grow another 143 percent in 1945–6, on the eve of the British withdrawal from the Indian subcontinent.61


86 War and opportunities Nationalist political and military presence along the borders between southern Xinjiang and Kashmir as a result of China’s war with Japan was also significant. In the oasis city of Tashkurghan on the Sino-Pamir border, for example, toward the end of 1944 almost all of the principal officials, including the magistrate, the police chief, the head of customs and the head of the postal office, were appointed directly by Chongqing.62 By January 1945, four months after Wu Zhongxin assumed governorship of Xinjiang, most of the oases in the southern part of that province were administrated by newly-arrived Nationalist bureaucrats. In addition to paramilitary police forces, regular Nationalist ground forces were deployed in key oasis cities outside of Kashgar, such as Aksu, Bai, Karghaliq, Toqsun and Qarashahr.63 The military and political strength of the Nationalists in Central Asia continued to grow as World War II drew to a close. In the summer of 1945, at least three Nationalist army divisions which had originally been deployed in Xi’an and Lanzhou had been stationed at the remote Misgar Pass, where they were able to watch over Kashmir and keep the Russian menace in check.64 In Khotan, as the British observed, although the hereditary Khotan chief Noor Beg remained influential among the local ethnic population, it was evident that the administration of the district was now largely under Nationalist control. The British were meanwhile surprised to discover that the quality of the local Nationalist officials was “decidedly higher than is usually found in south Sinkiang [Xinjiang] and the population seems to be generally satisfied with their authorities.”65 Nationalist military and political presence grew to such an extent that, shortly after the war, the war-exhausted British Indian authorities complained to London that the Nationalist-dominated provincial authorities in Urumqi who had succeeded the notorious Sheng Shicai, were now threatening to monopolize trade between India and Xinjiang.66

Guns, gold, and Muslim generals One interesting and hitherto untold story that poignantly illustrates the ebb and flow of Nationalist influence in Central Asia was that of the intricate interrelations between Chongqing, Sheng Shicai, British India, and two prominent Muslim generals in southern Xinjiang. When Sheng defeated Ma Zhongying in 1934, his military woes did not end. Two other Muslim militarists with radically different political ideologies from Sheng soon assumed the mantle of his defeated rival. One was Mahmūd Muhītī, a Turfan Uighur who, between 1934 and 1937, predominated over the oases of Kashgar and Yarkand in southern Xinjiang under the name of the self-appointed “Kashgar division commander.” The other was Ma Hushan, a Tungan Muslim who was once Ma Zhongying’s second in command until he became the de facto ruler of the vast “Tunganistan” (southern Xinjiang) after Ma Zhongying fled to Soviet Russia in 1934.67 When the military clash between Sheng Shicai and Ma Zhongying ended in 1934, Mahmūd Muhītī used his position as the leading Uighur figure in southern Xinjiang to establish a semi-secret organization, ostensibly for the protection of Islam but in actuality for the purpose of “checking the increase of Soviet influ-

War and opportunities 87 ence in the Kashgar area.” Unable to tolerate Mahmūd Muhītī’s behavior, by late 1936 Sheng had begun taking actions to undermine his political activity. As the province’s supreme leader, Sheng appointed a large number of Soviet-trained officers to subordinate albeit influential positions within the Kashgar garrison. Extremely suspicious that Sheng intended to remove him, Mahmūd Muhītī decided to stop fighting and flee. In April 1937, Mahmūd Muhītī, along with 20 associates and a supply of ammunition, fled to India via Yangi Hissar and Yarkand, reaching Srinagar on May 24.69 Shortly after Mahmūd Muhītī’s unexpected flight to British India, his exasperated troops in Kashgar rose against the provincial authorities in the southern oases and proceeded to execute all officials appointed by Urumqi. An autonomous Turkic administration was promptly set up in the rebel area under the command of Mahmūd Muhītī’s highest-ranking subordinates.70 The Nationalists in Nanking, whose political influence at this juncture did not come close to reaching Xinjiang, viewed the situation as a chance to draw the rebellious ethnic groups closer to their side. Considering Mahmūd Muhītī’s prestige and influence in southern Xinjiang, particularly his capacity to lead local Muslims against Sheng Shicai, top Nationalist policy planners soon devised ways to draw him into their influence.71 Secret contacts were made in Ladakh between Mahmūd Muhītī and Nationalist Chinese diplomats posted to Calcutta. By June 1937, it was widely reported that the exiled Muslim general had been granted a Chinese entry visa and would soon fly to Nanking to meet with Chiang Kai-shek. It was also alleged that Mahmūd Muhītī, who maintained close relations with Yolbaz Khan in Hami and Sharif Khan in Altai, both warlords antagonistic to Sheng Shicai, would cooperate with the Nationalists and help to launch a revolt against Sheng’s administration in Xinjiang.72 The possible alliance between Mahmūd Muhītī and the Nationalists generated strong protests from Urumqi and suspicion from British India. The agitated Sheng Shicai severely criticized Nanking for “allowing rebellion and intrigue to happen in Xinjiang,” and warned that Mahmūd Muhītī’s alliance with the Nationalists would seriously jeopardize the relationship between Nanking and Urumqi.73 For their part, the British, whom Sheng had long suspected of covertly supporting Mahmūd Muhītī against Sheng’s pro-Soviet provincial regime, were equally concerned about the possibility of cooperation between Mahmūd Muhītī and the Nationalists. The British worried that Sheng would consider collaboration between Nationalist and Muslim forces in Central Asia to be yet another “evil device” orchestrated by the British to undermine his authority, thus further endangering their already frosty relations with Urumqi.74 The Nationalists in Nanking, lacking the actual influence to dominate the political landscape in Central Asia, decided at the last minute to withdraw the entry visa granted to Mahmūd Muhītī and his followers, stranding them in Ladakh. The frustrated Muslim general decided to turn to the Japanese for assistance. In the spring of 1939, in the throes of the Sino-Japanese war, Mahmūd Muhītī secretly flew to Tokyo from Bombay, where he was treated with considerable courtesy. His political tilt toward the Japanese became one of the greatest political embarrassments for the Nationalists,


68


88 War and opportunities whose original intention was to prevent the Muslim general from turning to the enemy.75 Yet the story did not end there. For almost two months following Mahmūd Muhītī’s flight to India in April 1937, Ma Hushan, Sheng’s other rival, remained at his power base in Khotan carefully watching the situation. Persuaded by his chiefs of staff, Ma decided to strike northward against Kashgar, filling the political vacuum left by Mahmūd Muhītī’s sudden departure.76 In early June 1937, his Tungan troops captured Kashgar, where they quickly absorbed Mahmūd Muhītī’s remnant forces and prepared for a war with Sheng Shicai’s provincial army. In Kashgar, Ma Hushan claimed that his Tungan forces were acting in covenant with the local Turkic-speaking Muslims and that they intended to overthrow the provincial government and replace it by a Muslim regime that would “offer strict allegiance to the Nationalist government in Nanking.”77 In Urumqi, as in 1934, Sheng Shicai once again turned to his patrons in Moscow for assistance. In mid-June, as mentioned in the previous chapter, some 5,000 Soviet troops, backed by an air unit and an armored regiment, moved across the Soviet–Xinjiang border and launched a counterattack against the Muslim rebels. Toward the end of August 1937, Sheng’s provincial forces backed by Soviet units had pacified the Tungan troops in southern Xinjiang, causing the collapse of Ma Hushan’s short-lived regime in Kashgar. In early September, unable to continue fighting, Ma deserted his men in Kashgar and Khotan and fled across the Pamirs to India.78 Highly suspicious that the Muslim rebellions had been instigated by the British in response to his pro-Soviet stance, Sheng instructed Kashgar local authorities to retaliate. The British Consulate General at Kashgar was seriously damaged, its services were boycotted, and regular courier service was suspended. Many local British Indian citizens were arrested, beaten and even murdered, and their properties were confiscated. Sheng’s rule now extended to southern Xinjiang for the first time since 1934, and his newly arrived provincial officials at Kashgar used the opportunity to circulate anti-British propaganda.79 The anti-British sentiment in southern Xinjiang intensified to such an extent over the next two or three years that, in the fall of 1940, London had begun to seriously consider the withdrawal of its consular post at Kashgar, which had been until then the only Western diplomatic office in Central Asia.80 The Nationalists would have been silent observers to these chaotic events were it not for Ma Hushan’s appeal for assistance. When Ma and his party reached Kashmir in September 1937, the ammunition and gold bars they had carried from Kashgar, amounting to 14,119 tolas (approximately 450,000 rupees), were retained by the British. The British insisted that these gold bars were loot taken by Ma from the Xinjiang provincial government and private individuals, including British subjects. In response to Sheng Shicai’s request for the gold to be returned, the British government retained a “suitable part” of it as compensation for the loss of its officials and citizens in Kashgar during the turmoil between May and November 1937.81 Unwilling to lose face over such an arrangement, Ma Hushan turned to the Nationalists for help. He requested that



Figure 5.5 British Consulate General at Kashgar. From the 1910s until the early 1940s, it was the only Western diplomatic stronghold in Central Asia (source: Xibei Jiuying Wangshi, p. 140).

the Nationalist government, now temporarily headquartered in Wuhan before its withdrawal to Chongqing, to use the influence of its “central government” to demand the return of the gold bars. In return, Ma promised that he would contribute the entirety of the gold bars to the war-laden and financially depleted Nationalist center.82 The Nationalists were tempted by Ma’s offer and decided to take action. First, they asked the British to avoid negotiations with Sheng’s provincial authorities over the gold issue and asserted that they were willing to accept the preconditions proposed by the British concerning the return of the gold bars. Second, the Nationalists informed Urumqi that the entire issue would be settled by the Nationalist center, and reminded Sheng that his provincial government had no right to enter into international agreements. In order to secure Sheng’s goodwill, officials in Chongqing further informed Urumqi privately that a considerable portion of the returned gold bars would be shared with Sheng if they were returned by the British.83 In early 1939, it was agreed among Chongqing, Urumqi and New Delhi that the gold bars, minus a sum of 110,000 rupees as compensation for the British, would be returned to the Nationalist government. In April 1939, a senior official from the Nationalist Finance Ministry was sent to Calcutta, where he was to meet with his British Indian counterpart and finalize the agreement.84 The whole matter proceeded smoothly until July 1939, when the British suddenly announced to the Nationalists that they would not return the gold unless


90 War and opportunities the security condition of their subjects in Xinjiang was guaranteed. The British also condemned Sheng Shicai once again for his continuous persecution of British interests in southern Xinjiang, as well as for his anti-British propaganda campaign which extended throughout the province. It was decided in London and New Delhi that the gold issue be settled with Urumqi directly, and not with the Nationalists in Chongqing.85 Recognizing that the gold bars could be used as a bargaining chip to improve their situation in Central Asia, the British had no intention to return the gold to the Nationalists so easily. Although Chongqing proposed that the issue be settled at its embassy in London, the British refused. Given their substantial lack of influence in Xinjiang, Nationalist high officials were obliged to temporarily defer to the desire of the British.86 It was not until Sheng Shicai turned to the Nationalists in 1942, when anti- Communist sentiment in Xinjiang was rampant, that the gold issue was settled. In the fall of 1942, Chongqing broached the issue to the British, who ceded to the previous agreement which had been reached in early 1939.87 Recognizing the growing Nationalist presence in Xinjiang, it was clear to officials in London and New Delhi to whom the gold should be returned. In November 1943, the remaining gold bars, equal to 7,418.70 tolas, and the 66,633 rupees gained from the gold already sold in India, were finally returned to the Nationalists.88

Nationalist China facing the Middle East One unintended and yet far-reaching consequence of wartime Nationalist China’s westward power extension was that it made possible a Chinese diplomatic outreach to the Middle East, which would allow the Nationalists to establish new political and economic ties with the rest of the world. Around the middle of 1939, Chongqing sent two prominent Hui Muslim leaders, Isa Yusuf Alptekin and Ma Fuliang (F.L. Ozbek Ma), to Turkey, Syria and Egypt for the purpose of extending Chiang Kai-shek’s goodwill and soliciting sympathy and support for Nationalist China’s war cause.89 On their way back to Chongqing in early 1940, the two Muslim emissaries paid a short visit to Afghanistan, where they secretly met with Muhammad Amīn Bughra, a powerful Uighur figure who had led the Muslim uprising of 1932–4 in Khotan. Both Isa Yusuf Alptekin and Ma Fuliang encouraged Muhammad Amīn Bughra to return to Chongqing and help strengthen Nationalist China’s relations with the Muslim world.90 In order to sway Muhammad Amīn Bughra’s decision, Chiang Kai-shek instructed his staff to offer him covert financial support. When Muhammad Amīn Bughra was detained in June 1942 by the British police in Peshawar for his alleged espionage for the Japanese, Chongqing went out of its way to rescue him. Muhammad Amīn Bughra ultimately arrived in Chongqing in the spring of 1943, where he and Isa Yusuf Alptekin began work editing influential Muslim journals under Nationalist patronage.91 When the Xinjiang coalition government was formed in mid-1946, Muhammad Amīn Bughra became a provincial commissioner under Zhang Zhizhong. In 1949, he was appointed the last Nationalist vice chairman of the Xinjiang provincial government before the Communist takeover.


War and opportunities 91 As Nationalist China’s influence waxed in Xinjiang and the Sino-Pamir borderland, Chongqing was in a favorable position to help the exiled Muslims return to their homes in Xinjiang. For example, between 1938 and 1941, more than 7,000 Kazakh nomads migrated from the steppes of northern Xinjiang through Gansu and into the Tibetan Kokonor plateau in order to escape from Sheng Shicai’s political oppression. Some 2,000 of these Kazakhs eventually crossed the Sino-Indian border and reached Ladakh in Kashmir, where the British authorities prevented them from making permanent settlement.92 In mid-1943, the Nationalist government instructed its diplomats in India to contact the leaders of the exiled Kazakhs and determine whether they were willing to return to their homeland in northern Xinjiang. Chiang Kai-shek urged Sheng Shicai to find a way to help the Kazakhs return home. Chongqing also attempted to negotiate with the British in order to free several Kazakh figures who had been imprisoned in Peshawar due to their previous links with the Soviets.93 Yet, the exiled Kazakhs refused to return to Xinjiang, and authorities in New Delhi eventually allowed them to settle in Hyderabad and Bhopal. Nonetheless, officials in Chongqing were generally convinced that their effort to aid the exiled Kazakhs, however belated and unsuccessful, had helped to bolster their image among Muslims both at home and abroad.94 The effort to open new international supply routes connecting Sichuan with Iran and Karachi via Central Asia also helped to strengthen Nationalist China’s diplomatic ties with the Middle East. In May 1942, the Nationalist government installed a legation in Teheran, where Li Tiezheng, Chongqing’s new minister to Iran, was busy negotiating with his American and British counterparts over the transport of lend-lease goods to China.95 The first Nationalist diplomatic foothold in Teheran allowed the dispatch of the first Chinese students and technicians to study drill techniques in Iran. By late 1943, Chongqing had become eager to send its personnel abroad to learn the technique of oil drilling and the management of oil fields as part of the great Nationalist project of opening the famous Yumen oil field in the Gansu Corridor and exploiting potential reserves in bordering regions.96 At first, conservative elements in the Iranian government were hesitant to embrace Chongqing’s proposal. Yet the increased Nationalist presence in Iran and Central Asia, along with the Nationalist effort to improve their relations with the Muslim world, had paid off. In March 1944, two young Chinese technicians arrived in Teheran, where they studied Farsi and prepared for practical training in Abadan and Masjed-Esuleiman.97 During wartime, as Nationalist authority in Central Asia steadily increased and China’s new power and status allowed it a place among the Big Four, Chongqing found itself in a better position to reinforce its position in the Middle East. Top advisors in Chongqing calculated that the return of Xinjiang to their control and the opening of Central Asian trade routes would help secure Nationalist China’s link to the Middle East, whose abundant oil reserves and geo- strategic importance in postwar years had become a focus of international interest.98 Since 1942, several official Chinese delegations, both political and military, had been dispatched to the Middle East in order to build up potential


92 War and opportunities military and intelligence networks. One such mission, consisting of high military officers from the Chinese Chief of Staff and the Air Force, was sent to India, Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Turkey and Egypt in March 1943. This mission became modern China’s first high-ranking military delegation to the Middle East.99 It was also decided among higher officials in Chongqing that news about Nationalist China’s war efforts, along with an elucidation of the Three People’s Principle, be translated into Uighur and Arabic so as to enhance the Muslim world’s understanding of wartime China and its political ideology.100 Between 1942 and 1944, Li Tiezheng and his legation staff in Teheran more than once conducted diplomatic missions to Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Egypt, where they were treated with great courtesy and discussed the strengthening of the relationship between China and the Middle East.101 These were successful, dramatically improving modern China’s relationship with that part of the world. In March 1943, Nationalist China’s first legation was inaugurated in Baghdad, and Li Tiezheng was appointed modern China’s first minister to Iraq. Since then, the Iraqi royal house maintained amicable relations with Chiang Kai-shek.102 In the summer of 1945, lavish gifts were exchanged between Chongqing and Baghdad. Chiang awarded honorary decorations to Prince Abdulilah, Regent of Iraq, and his court officials. An enhanced relationship between China and Iraq was clearly in the interest of both countries. Iraq needed China, now one of the Great Five, to boost their international prestige in the postwar era, while the Chinese Nationalists could use Iraq as a springboard from which to launch other diplomatic projects in the Middle East.103 In December 1944, Chongqing officially recognized Syrian and Lebanese independence from France. Eager to elevate their international visibility, Syria and Lebanon subsequently sought Chongqing’s support for their membership in the United Nations. On April 13, 1945, the two countries were officially invited to join the first United Nations Conference in San Francisco. The Chinese Nationalists were ready to use their new highly favorable relationship with these Middle Eastern countries to augment postwar China’s influence in the region.104 Thus, in retrospect, it could be argued that the Sino-Japanese war provided the Nationalists with an opportunity to push their influence beyond Xinjiang, extending modern Chinese relations to the Middle East, and, through the Middle East, to the rest of the world.


6 Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality

The summit, rising prestige, and grand planning In the fall of 1943, when Chiang Kai-shek was invited to meet with Allied leaders at the Cairo Summit and stood recognized as one of the Big Four, the Nationalist regime had every reason to believe that its prestige and influence had reached historic heights. In January of that year, Chongqing signed treaties on an equal basis with the United States and Britain, its two major Allied powers, who officially relinquished the privileges they had enjoyed in China during the past century, the most important of which included extra territoriality and the rights in China’s “treaty ports.” At the Cairo Summit, Chiang Kai-shek and his top aides secured Allied support for recovering China’s lost territories of Manchuria, Taiwan and the Pescadores from the Japanese.1 These developments were universally recognized to be outstanding achievements for the Nationalists, allowing China to recover much of the status it had lost over the past century. At this juncture, it seemed that the pendulum of the Nationalist ethnopolitics had swung back from pragmatism to its grandiose, idealistic end. Ultimately, China’s bitter war with the Japanese extended the Nationalists’ influence westward, thus giving them an unexpected opportunity to reinforce their hitherto tenuous control over China’s westernmost frontiers. By the time of the Cairo Summit, Nationalist ground and air forces had been deployed in the strategically vital Gansu Corridor and eastern Xinjiang, and the resignation of Xinjiang autocrat Sheng Shicai was only a matter of time. As international circumstances began to turn in favor of Nationalist China, confident officials in Chongqing began to plan postwar China’s ethnic frontier territoriality and new policies of national security and border defense. It was against this backdrop that Chiang Kai-shek’ treatise, China’s Destiny, elicited mixed reactions both domestically and internationally. Chiang depicted a “physical configuration” of postwar China that would form an integral defense system. According to Chiang, peripheral areas of the system including Manchuria, Taiwan, Inner and Outer Mongolia, Xinjiang and Tibet, were all strategically essential for national defense. As supreme leader of Nationalist China, Chiang argued that to cut off any of these territories would gravely endanger China’s security.2


94 Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality Chiang’s confidence and optimism rose after his inspection tour of Chinese western border provinces in the summer of 1942. Upon completing the tour, Chiang architected an ideal border security landscape for postwar China in his personal diary. In the west, he wrote, the Tian Shan and Kunlun ranges in Xinjiang, shielded by the Altai and Himalayan ranges in the outer areas respectively in the north and the south of that province, should be developed into new defensive bases. In the east, Manchuria and Taiwan should be returned to the Chinese control with the exception of allowing the formerly Japanese naval and air bases in the two territories to be used by the United States as a way of strengthening China’s postwar relationship with Washington.3 In retrospect, Chiang’s tour and his spatial imaginary of the nation that was then articulated in China’s Destiny, as James Leibold argues, was the fact that the Chinese nation was perceived among Han Republican elites as a territorial construct or geo-body first and foremost.4 In the midst of World War II, however, Chiang’s blunt enthusiasm for extending Chinese control was a clue for the international community about the seriousness of the Nationalists’ plans for power consolidation in the years to come. To be sure, many of the territories which Chiang extolled for their defensive utility overlapped with similar interests of foreign countries, including those of wartime China’s British and Russian allies.5 In China’s Destiny, Chiang Kai-shek drew an idealized and yet vague picture of postwar China’s frontier landscape. Yet his close advisors and policy planners, who were inspired and emboldened by China’s newfound international status and their regime’s nationwide prestige, began to articulate Chiang’s idealized vision into a detailed and concrete scheme that would enhance postwar China’s ethnopolitical cause. In Xinjiang, as discussed in the previous chapter, several Nationalist infrastructural development programs had been underway even before the removal of Sheng Shicai in the fall of 1944. Since its inauguration, Wu Zhongxin’s new provincial government had been overwhelmed by the Muslim rebellion in Ili. Andrew Forbes’s work has made it clear that after Sheng’s break with Soviet Russia, Xinjiang’s deteriorating economic situation, widespread corruption in local government, and profound animosity toward Chinese rule among non-Han peoples in the province led to the revolt in Ili and the subsequent establishment of an “East Turkestan Republic” (ETR) in the fall of 1944.6 Fortunately for Wu Zhongxin, Ma Bufang’s Qinghai cavalries arrived in Urumqi as reinforcement in late 1944 and allowed his government to retain enough strength to maintain at minimum the façade of Nationalist administrative control in China’s far northwest.7 Regime security and power extension, as always, were central to the Nationalist government’s ethnopolitical policy formulations. In order to reinforce their tenuous governance in Chinese Central Asia, in mid-1945 officials in Urumqi and Chongqing began to consider dividing Xinjiang into two, three or four smaller provinces with Urumqi, Kashgar, Khotan and Hami as new regional capitals.8 Additionally, as Xinjiang was finally coming under Nationalist sway, the theme of developing China’s far northwest once again took center stage. The industrialization of Xinjiang and the exploitation of northwest China’s rich


Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality 95 natural resources were loudly advertised and propagandized internationally. One foreign observer indicated that these political advertisements were strategically employed by the Nationalists as a way to secure more economic assistance from their wartime allies.9 Around 1943–4, with their newfound authority in China’s western peripheries, along with the waning of British rule on the Indian subcontinent, the Nationalists became increasingly concerned about their position in Tibet. The first policy to be implemented was to increase Nationalist presence in Tibet by enlarging the existing Chinese representative office in Lhasa. In August 1944, Chiang Kai-shek appointed Shen Zonglian, a trusted senior advisor who was then serving in his office of aides, as Nationalist China’s new representative to Tibet. Chiang handpicked Shen because he believed that the practical-minded Shen, with political sophistication and English fluency, might be able to outmaneuver the British over the intricate Tibetan issues.10 Whether or not Shen Zonglian fulfilled Chiang’s expectation remains open to discussion. Yet during Shen’s tenure in Lhasa, the Chinese representative office in Lhasa was developed into a well-organized bureaucratic mechanism comprised of political, intelligence, meteorological and agricultural branches. The upgraded office also included a wireless station and a Chinese primary school which were under direct Nationalist command. The augmented representative office in Lhasa, with little doubt, greatly facilitated the Nationalist political and ideological infiltration in that territory. By mid-1945, there were more Han Chinese officials, experts, secret agents and merchants working and living in Tibet than at any other time since the collapse of the Qing in 1911.11 Chongqing’s second policy change aimed at strengthening its role in Tibet was to secretly cultivate pro-Nationalist underground movements in the Kham region, Tibet proper and northern India. On the eve of the Cairo Summit, a secret scheme was drafted and approved in Chongqing to render clandestine support to pro-Nationalist underground forces led by a Khampa Tibetan named Pandatsang Rapga.12 Around September 1943, Rapga appealed to Chiang Kai-shek to organize a Khampa militia against the Tibetan troops. He also sought Chongqing’s assistance to build a pro-China, pro-KMT Tibetan Revolutionary Party aimed at overthrowing the existing Lhasa authorities, which Rapga regarded as “hopelessly ill-suited for the modern world.”13 Although higher echelons in Chongqing were cautious about Rapga’s true intensions and the feasibility of his ambitions in southwest China, Chiang ultimately approved a monthly stipend of 100,000 yuan to be paid to Rapga and his adherents. Chiang also instructed his secret service agents in Tibet, Xikang and northern India to work closely with Rapga, who carried an official Chinese passport after his return to India from Chongqing in late 1943.14 The appointment of Shen Zonglian, the expansion of Nationalist institutions in Lhasa, and the support of Rapga were intended to tighten Nationalist control over Tibet. Although at this juncture the Nationalists as a whole did not intend to immediately convert Tibet into a regular province, they did contemplate ways to change Tibet’s social and political façade, and in particular to abolish its


96 Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality traditional theocratic system. A Nationalist internal memorandum drafted in mid-1944 reveals that, after winning a propagandist coup and reassuring their traditional ties with Tibet by “presiding over” the installation of the fourteenth Dalai Lama in 1939, the Nationalists’ primary concern was to bring the de facto independent Tibet within postwar China’s constitutional framework. Although key policy designers were inclined to maintain Tibet’s political autonomy, they were adamant that such autonomy be allowed only under the condition that Tibet dismantled its theocratic system, and that the region’s external and defense affairs be handed over to the Nationalists.15 Not surprisingly, this Han-centered attitude was common among Nationalist high officials around 1943–4. For example, in a private conversation with a senior British diplomat in Chongqing in June 1944, K.C. Wu, then Nationalist Vice Foreign Minister, revealed to his British counterpart that the Nationalists intended to reestablish China’s ethnic minority regions, including Tibet, as semi- autonomous political entities much like Soviet Russia’s soviet republics. To the British, who were glad to keep their relationship with Tibet intact in the postwar era, Wu’s message was doubtless reassuring. Yet to the disappointment of the British, Wu emphasized that such autonomy would preclude the right to deal with foreign entities.16 In the eyes of Chiang Kai-shek, Inner and Outer Mongolia were also inseparable parts of postwar China’s integral defense system. During wartime, as Nationalist influence waxed along the Inner Asian frontiers, Western observers seemed to agree on the eventuality of the return of the greater Mongolia to the Chinese fold. Stanley Hornbeck, for example, argued in a memorandum to the Department of State in Washington that China possessed “ultimate sovereignty” over Soviet-sponsored Outer Mongolia.17 In London, the British Foreign Office likewise depicted China’s jurisdiction over the northern steppe in 1942 as stronger than it had been at the time of the Kiakhta talks of 1915. The Nationalists, the British were convinced, would take full advantage of their rising influence to claim Outer Mongolia back if an opportunity arose.18 During wartime, however, Chiang’s aides were less optimistic than foreign observers about the prospect of Outer Mongolia’s eventual return to China. As revealed in Chapter 4, in the initial phase of the Sino-Japanese war clandestine contacts were made between Nationalist military officials in western Inner Mongolia and the MPR concerning possible cooperation against the Japanese. To some top Nationalist policymakers, as long as Soviet Russia and China shared opposition to the Japanese, they were convinced that Outer Mongolia under Soviet control might be a more effective means of checking the Japanese in the northern frontiers. In addition, Nationalist frontier policymakers from the Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission (MTAC) generally agreed that the radical social and political reforms carried out by the Soviets in Outer Mongolia had eradicated all hope of reestablishing Chinese hegemony.19 At the same time, Nationalist foreign policy planners were concerned about the difficulty of integrating an “already Sovietized” Outer Mongolia into postwar China’s political domain. Some of Chiang’s pragmatic-minded officials even argued that Outer


Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality 97 Mongolia had already become an “independent state,” and that as a result its absorption by Nationalist China would be extremely problematic and should be preceded by a process of “de-Sovietization.”20 Despite these hesitations, work continued to solidify Nationalist China’s gossamer connections with the Outer Mongols. Ironically, during the war the Nationalists had no alternative but to cooperate with the Dilowa Hutuktu, who in 1938–9 had played a major role in establishing a pro-Japanese ninth Jebtsundamba in Tibet with the intention of relocating it to Tokyo-controlled Inner Mongolia. According to MTAC officials, the Dilowa, who had been in Chongqing since mid-1939 after his abortive attempt to reach Lhasa, was one of the very few leaders capable of uniting the 20,000 Outer Mongolian refugees and migrants then scattered throughout western Inner Mongolia, a group which Chongqing thought might be used as a bridge between Nationalist China and Outer Mongolia.21 MTAC bureaucrats also broached the idea of using Feng Yuxiang and his erstwhile subordinates in the Guominjun, who had dealt closely with the Outer Mongols back in the 1920s, as intermediaries with the ruling authorities in Ulan Bator.22 Some Nationalist military strategists even hoped for a Soviet–Japanese war so that Chongqing could bargain with Moscow over Outer Mongolia’s relations with China.23 Compared to their equivocal stance with respect to postwar China’s position in Outer Mongolia, in the later years of the war the Nationalists were assertive about Inner Mongolia. In early 1940, an interdepartmental policy planning meeting was held in which the Nationalists generally agreed that the traditional league and banner system, both in Japanese-occupied and unoccupied sections of Inner Mongolia, should be abolished and replaced with provincial and county governments. This kind of dramatic political change in Inner Mongolia after the war with Japan, the Nationalists believed, would finally destroy the dual political system that in the prewar years had caused numerous painful conflicts between local Han Chinese provincial leaders and Mongol ruling elites.24 Armed clashes between Nationalist forces and Inner Mongols in Yekejuu League in the spring of 1943 led officials in Chongqing to abandon their idealism. In 1941–2, when Nationalist authority in the unoccupied west was growing rapidly, Chiang Kai-shek ordered the dispatch of some 20,000 troops to Yekejuu League within the Suiyuan provincial boundary with the dual purpose of halting the Japanese and silencing the Chinese Communists. In order to accommodate the newly arrived troops, General Chen Changjie, then commander of the Nationalist forces in Yekejuu, implemented a series of plans to cultivate more farmland in the region. A great number of Han Chinese peasant farmers were simultaneously brought into the league from adjacent provinces, causing the local Mongols to protest against Chen’s cultivation program.25 The Mongols’ dissatisfaction culminated in an armed clash in late March 1943 between Chen’s troops and the Mongolian league militia. Chen’s vastly superior forces quickly suppressed the insurgents, driving Prince Shagdurjab, then head of Yekejuu League, to flee from his palace and go into temporary exile in the Communist- controlled Western Uushin Banner. Concerned that the Communists might try to


98 Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality use Prince Shagdurjab for anti-Nationalist propaganda, Chongqing decided to capitulate. Chiang Kai-shek not only ordered the suspension of the land reclamation program in Yekejuu, but also recalled Chen Changjie from his post. In addition, two Nationalist high officials were immediately sent to Yekejuu to comfort the panicked and angered Mongol prince. Accepting Chiang’s conciliatory gesture, Prince Shagdurjab returned to his league in October 1943.26 The Yekejuu incident taught the Nationalists a good lesson; the situation in the Nationalist-dominated section of Inner Mongolia was by no means as secure as they had hoped. The incident also invited fierce criticism from within Chongqing’s political circles. Many blamed the failure of Nationalist military leaders in the frontiers to consider the welfare of local ethnic minority communities. Many more urged the government to work out a sound policy toward Inner Mongolia in order to prevent a deteriorating situation after the war.27 Considering it crucially important to conciliate the Inner Mongols after the war without alienating them, frontier policy planners in Chongqing began to depict the disassembly of the Mongolian hereditary system as a long-term and gradual process. Even Nationalist extremists, who had previously encouraged a hard-line policy toward the Mongols, were now convinced that it might best serve the Nationalist interest to abolish the leagues first, while leaving the banners intact for the time being.28

The tide reversed In 1943, when the Nationalists were exhilarated by their rising international reputation and initiated their grand design of postwar ethnopolitical and frontier order, they probably did not expect that within two years their confidence would be crushed by unexpected and unprecedented challenges. When US President Roosevelt met with Stalin at Yalta in February 1945, American policy designers had already recognized that Soviet Russia was to play a prominent role in the political reconfiguration of postwar Northeast Asia. In essence, it was Washington’s policy to use concessions by China to induce Soviet Russia to enter the war against Japan. It was agreed at Yalta that the status of Outer Mongolia would be maintained, but the agreements neglected to define precisely what its status was. The old tsarist structures in Manchuria, including railways and key ports of trade, would be partially restored to the Soviets in the form of joint Sino-Soviet management. In return, the Soviets would pledge to recognize Chiang Kai- shek’s regime as the sole legitimate central government of China, and to give the Nationalists – not the Chinese Communists – political support and military aid.29 Chiang and his associates were kept completely in the dark with respect to these negotiations, and were not informed of the Yalta accord until mid-June 1945, two months after the death of President Roosevelt. The revelation of the Yalta agreement was a striking blow to the Nationalists; Chiang Kai-shek was so indignant at and aggrieved by the secret business dealings between Washington and Moscow that he blamed the late Roosevelt, whom Chiang depicted in his personal diary as “foolish, fatuous and muddle-headed,”


Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality 99 and should be held responsible for bringing China into a “Dark Age.”30 In July 1945, in return for Soviet Russia’s entry into the Asian-Pacific war, Chongqing entered into talks with Moscow and eventually recognized the legal independence of Outer Mongolia in early 1946. There is no shortage of literature which describes how the Nationalists bargained in vain in Moscow to protect their rights in Outer Mongolia, and especially to prevent this territory from being separated from China’s territorial domain.31 Yet Chiang’s pragmatic stance and calculated decision-making with regards to the loss of Outer Mongolia should not be overlooked. It is conceivable that to Chiang, relinquishing Nationalist authority over Outer Mongolia was a steep albeit acceptable price to pay for maintaining postwar China’s territorial and strategic interests in Manchuria and Xinjiang, and for Stalin not to support the Chinese Communist Party.32 Privately, Chiang Kai-shek encouraged Wang Shijie, the newly appointed Chinese Foreign Minister who at first refused to sign away Outer Mongolia, to take up the new post by comforting Wang that “Outer Mongolia has not been in the Nationalist domain for a long time.”33 Seemingly willing to exchange idealism for realism, Chiang wrote in his diary in August 1945 that Outer Mongolia’s independence was actually in the best interest of the Nationalist government.34 When learning, two months later, that a plebiscite had revealed that the majority of Outer Mongols favored independence, Chiang quickly approved the official recognition of Outer Mongolia as a sovereign state, despite pleas from both within and outside the government that he should reconsider the decision.35 Thus with Chiang’s tacit consent, the Waijiaobu was prepared to establish full diplomatic relations with the former dependency when an official mission of the new Mongolian People’s Republic reached Chongqing in February 1946.36 In spite of Chiang Kai-shek’s realistic approach to the Outer Mongolian issue, the political and psychological impact of the loss of the northern borderland was colossal.37 Outer Mongolia’s de jure independence enormously overshadowed the war victory which the Nationalists had arduously achieved and shook their confidence in managing China’s other problematic frontier issues in Inner Asia. Upon his return to Chongqing after the talks in Moscow in August 1945, Foreign Minister Wang Shijie was relentlessly chastised by his Nationalist associates for “selling out” such a large piece of Chinese territory to a foreign power. One group of representatives at the People’s Political Council was so displeased by Wang’s “disgraceful” performance in Moscow that they insisted upon forging new treaties with Britain and France to replace the political interest lost by the signing of the Sino-Soviet treaty.38 Later, when the practical-minded foreign policy planners in the Waijiaobu proposed exchanging ambassadors with the newly independent MPR, Nationalist military advisors vehemently opposed the trade and insisted that no official ties be established between China and the MPR before the new national boundary was precisely demarcated.39 One political repercussion of Mongolian independence was an immediate domino effect of various non-Han ethnic minorities in peripheral China lodging similar requests with the Nationalist center. When addressing his staff and explaining why he was willing to grant Outer Mongolia independence, Chiang


100 Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality Kai-shek first argued that Outer Mongolian and Tibetan ethnic groups had always been geographically isolated and were therefore totally different from the groups inhabiting the border provinces that mixed freely with Han Chinese. Further, Chiang proclaimed that if other frontier minority groups had the capacity for self-government and a strong desire for independence, the Nationalists should help them realize that goal and treat them as equals of China. Chiang particularly specified that if the Tibetans expressed a desire for self-government, he would grant them a very “high degree of autonomy.” Chiang went even further by stating that in the future if the Tibetans fulfilled economic requirements for independence, the Nationalists would help them to attain the same status as that of the Outer Mongols.40 Chiang Kai-shek did not forget to explain to his fellow subordinates that his statement was politically motivated. In other words, by allowing Tibet some measure of political autonomy, the Nationalists might be able to prevent the Tibetans from turning to the British for full political independence. Having said that, Chiang’s bold message still shocked many of his associates, while at the same time inspired ethnic minority groups on the frontier.41 The Tibetans, who since the collapse of the Qing dynasty had kept themselves politically aloof from the Chinese republic, decided to send a mission to Nanking in order to discuss their future status with the Nationalists.42 During their stay in China proper, the Tibetan delegates more than once reasserted their claim that Tibet was an independent state. In order to reaffirm Tibet’s place outside of China’s political domain, the Tibetans stated that they would issue their own passports, henceforth restricting the entry into Tibet of all foreign nationals, including the Chinese. Lhasa meanwhile requested the return of the warlord-administered Qinghai and Xikang provinces to its jurisdiction and asked for the withdrawal of Chinese officials from Tibet.43 Furious about these requests, Chiang decided not to make any commitment at this point. Unable to work out a practicable response to the Tibetans’ requests, the Nationalist center offered only a vague answer, stating that they would continue to take measures to establish Tibetan autonomy.44 Pressure from the Uighurs in Xinjiang for political independence was equally vociferous. Between late 1944 and mid-1945, fighting between the Nationalist forces and the ETR regime in Ili was fierce and ruthless. At one point in early 1945, the Soviet-backed ETR forces under the leadership of Ali Han Töre won a series of rapid and unexpected military victories that caused acute panic in Urumqi.45 The situation in Central Asia improved after a coalition provincial government in Xinjiang under Nationalist general Zhang Zhizhong and several former ETR members was set up in the summer of 1946. However, according to both Chinese and British firsthand reports, by the fall of 1946 the ETR remained outside of Urumqi’s effective control. The ETR national flag could be seen flying throughout the Ili district, and the Nationalist provincial officials were prohibited from interfering with the former ETR region.46 The ETR separatists and the Tibetans were not the only ones to answer Chiang Kai-shek’s message, as other non-Han ethnic groups within Xinjiang under Urumqi’s provincial jurisdiction also petitioned strongly to the Nationalist


Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality 101 center for a higher degree of autonomy. Shortly after Chiang delivered his famous speech about rendering “high-degree autonomy” to the Tibetans, a group of reputed Uighur leaders demanded that Xinjiang received the same treatment. They maintained that the Nationalists should not exclude Xinjiang from the possibility of “high-degree autonomy” simply because Xinjiang had already become a regular province. On the contrary, the Uighur leaders warned Nanking that if not given fair treatment, the ethnic minority peoples in Central Asia would very likely rise against Nationalist rule and forcibly win their independence.47 Just as in the case of the Tibetan mission to China, top Nationalist officials were unable to reach a consensus as to how to properly respond to the Uighur leaders’ demands. Generally speaking, frontier and domestic affairs planners from the Executive Yuan and its subordinate ministries were willing to consider granting more autonomy to the minority peoples in Xinjiang. Yet officials from military and national defense sectors, forced to consider the point of view that China’s border security in Central Asia would be jeopardized by frontier instability, opposed granting any form of political autonomy to the province.48 Worse, by mid-1948, when the Xinjiang provincial government was under the governorship of Masud Sabrī, a Uighur native of Ili, even the Nationalist-dominated provincial mechanism in Urumqi began petitioning Nanking for more autonomy in managing the province’s foreign affairs.49

From grand planning to great debate Whether the Nationalist government had a consistent policy toward postwar China’s ethnic frontiers was in serious doubt. Around the time of the Cairo Summit, the pendulum Nationalist frontier ethnopolitics was on its idealistic end. After the Japanese surrender, however, the war-torn Nationalists were obliged to swing their ethnopolitical pendulum back to pragmatism. The regime’s pyrrhic victory over Japan did not bring about a coherent strategy toward postwar China’s territorial reconfiguration. Instead, as ethnic frontier troubles appeared almost as early as the war ended, the Nationalists had to practically deal with each individual ethnic frontier region case by case. Realistically, as the Nationalists had never ruled any part of Outer Mongolia since the collapse of the Qing dynasty, there was virtually nothing to lose, except face and prestige, from its perpetual separation from China. Yet more importantly, Outer Mongolia’s de jure independence was a catalyst for the reformulation of Nationalist policy with respect to other Inner Asian frontier territories that were still legally within the Chinese domain. The grand debate among the Nationalists about their postwar administration of Inner Mongolia and Manchuria in fact demonstrates how the unanticipated new territorial landscapes of Central Asia after the war forced the Nationalists to rearrange their strategic thinking, as well as how deadlocked debates over policy ultimately threatened the very existence of the postwar Nationalist regime. By the end of World War II, the wide belt of Inner Mongolia had been administered by three different regimes. Territories east of the Khinggan Range,


102 Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality including the Hulun Buir and Rehe areas, became part of the Manchukuo regime starting in 1932. The traditional Chahar, Shilingol and Ulanchab leagues later constituted the Autonomous Mongolian State under Prince Demchugdongrob. Further westward, Yekejuu League (Ordos), Alashaa Banner and Ejine Banner which comprised most of Suiyuan and Ningxia provinces remained under Nationalist jurisdiction throughout the war. When Outer Mongolia became independent, a reinvigorated nationalism emerged from Inner Mongolia. In the fall of 1945, a group of eastern Mongols previously under the Manchukuo regime issued a declaration of their autonomy, and established an Inner Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party in Hailar. In January 1946, the same group was renamed the Eastern Mongolian People’s Autonomous Government in Wangyiemiao (Wangiin Sume), where it declared itself to have a “high-degree of self-government” but still named the Chinese Republic as its suzerain.50 Almost at the same time as the institution of the Inner Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party, a group of Inner Mongols who had originally served in Prince Demchugdongrob’s regime inaugurated the Provisional Government of the Inner Mongolian Republic in Sönid Right Banner of Chahar.51 Later in November 1945, an Alliance of the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Movement was organized under Chinese Communist patronage in Zhangjiakou. In April 1946, delegates from Wangyiemiao and Zhangjiakou met in Chengde, Rehe Province, where the two movements agreed to coordinate their campaigns and form a joint commission with Ulanfu, the Communist figurehead of the Mongols, as their leader.52 The domino effect of autonomous and separatist movements in Inner Mongolia after the war forced the unprepared Nationalist frontier advisors to retreat from their previously proactive attitude toward postwar frontier and territorial designs. In the face of an increasingly problematic and uncontrollable Inner Mongolia, officials from agencies directly involved in ethnic frontier affairs were compelled to grant the Inner Mongols the higher degree of autonomy that they demanded. Officials from the MTAC and the Ministry of Home Affairs decreed that, given the deteriorating scenario in Inner Mongolia, the traditional league and banner system would be unconditionally restored to its prewar status, and that the Mongolian leagues and banners would be promoted to the same level as that of provincial and county mechanisms.53 They also suggested that a Mongolian Political Council be established directly under the Executive Yuan as a coordinating body for Inner Mongolian affairs. They meanwhile favored the recruitment of more Inner Mongol elites into the KMT hierarchy as a means of placating increasingly dissatisfied Inner Mongolian nationalists.54 This relatively conciliatory policy toward postwar Inner Mongolia, however, was totally unacceptable to another group of higher-ranking Nationalists, chiefly from the Military Affairs Commission and the Ministry of Military Ordinance, who viewed the restoration of the traditional league and banner system as an unendurable “retrogression” that would seriously damage the existing provincial structure. Some military officials even argued that the existence of various Inner Mongolian banners was the direct result of Japan’s “sinister devise” in the pre-


Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality 103 1937 period, and therefore the “outmoded” Inner Mongolian political tradition should never be restored.55 Han Chinese provincial authorities in Inner Mongolia, such as governor of Suiyuan Fu Zuoyi and governor of Xing’an Wu Huanzhang, also vehemently opposed granting more political rights to the local Inner Mongols. Military officials in Nanking as well as Han Chinese regional politicians in the northern frontier categorically refused to recognize the existence of the dissent growing in Inner Mongolia, and they were convinced that the implementation of any “high-degree autonomy” in Inner Mongolia would only re-fragment China’s border territories.56 Some of Chiang Kai-shek’s hard-line military subordinates from the Nationalist General Staff even threatened him by refusing to take responsibility for the security of the Inner Mongolian border if Nationalist control of the vast territory was lost to local ethnic minorities.57 Conspicuously, the debate over postwar China’s policy vis-à-vis its northern frontier produced deep fault lines within the highest circles of the Nationalist government. The controversy over postwar frontier planning in Inner Mongolia was exacerbated as the Nationalists tried in vain to agree on a policy toward the vast territory of Manchuria. At the Cairo Summit, Chiang Kai-shek insisted upon China’s recovery of Manchuria, a stance which was officially supported by the United States and Britain. Yet the Nationalists’ attempt to restore their authority over Manchuria came rather late, as compared with their parallel attempts to secure Xinjiang, Tibet and Mongolia. In the last days of the war, top officials in Chongqing generally perceived that domestic and international factors would impede their establishment of effective control of Manchuria. On the eve of the Japanese surrender, the highest authorities in Chongqing preliminarily agreed that administration of Manchuria should be granted to the Political Study Group (Zheng Xue Xi), at the time one of the most powerful cliques within the KMT party. Accordingly, Xiong Shihui and Chang Kia-ngau, two prominent figures within the clique, were given responsibility for postwar China’s military and economic restoration operations in Manchuria.58 However, it was not until the Japanese officially surrendered in mid-August 1945 that a more concrete policy toward China’s far northeast was formulated. Ironically, as the Nationalists had never fully controlled any part of the Manchurian territories before, they had no experience with the region’s political landscape and were forced to improvise. While developing what would become their Manchurian policy, the Nationalists showed no intention of restoring the defunct “Three Eastern Provinces” model that existed under the Old and the Young Marshals before 1931. Nor did they wish to continue the political legacy left by the Japanese-sponsored Manchukuo. Instead, the Nationalists divided the whole region into nine new provinces, roughly following the previous administrative demarcation of the Manchurian puppet regime.59 In doing so, the Nationalists grouped several formerly separate Manchukuo provinces and re-incorporated them into one single new province, and the outcome was a Manchuria now with nine new provinces. However, given a serious lack of firsthand knowledge, the policy was made without any regard for topographic or strategic considerations,


104 Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality and was severely criticized by the Chinese mass media.60 Further, the problematic administrative demarcation of Manchuria generated serious conflicts among Chiang Kai-shek’s military and civil leaders as to how to resolve the complicated scenario in the region. The major conflict began when Chiang Kai-shek’s field headquarters in Manchuria and north China struggled over the control of local resources in the two regions. When Chiang appointed General Xiong Shihui to head the newly installed Northeast Field Headquarters in Manchuria, he also appointed General Li Zongren, the leader of the Guangxi clique who would later became vice president, to take charge of the North China Field Headquarters in Peking. A conflict soon developed between the two generals as to which office had the right to control the abundant military, political and financial resources of Rehe Province. Unable to accommodate both strong-willed figures and failing to determine whether Rehe belonged to north or northeast China, Chiang decided that Xiong would control military and financial resources in Rehe, while Li would control the province’s political and administrative affairs.61 The chaotic and divided process of regulation produced by Chiang’s decision prompted the unsatisfied and disappointed Rehe local Han and non-Han elites to appeal to the Nationalist center for a clarification. By mid-1947, when Nationalist control of Manchuria was in rapid decline, Nanking received a stream of petitions from local pro-KMT ethnic minority communities for an immediate change of policy to prevent Communist infiltration. The Nationalists, however, were too paralyzed by mismanagement and internal conflict to reverse the unfavorable situation in China’s northeast corner.62 In vivid contrast to the Nationalists’ indecisive and capricious stance toward postwar Inner Mongolia, the Chinese Communists were able to strengthen their relationship with the Mongols in Manchuria and Inner Mongolia. By promising the local Mongols in the northeast that they would be allowed to establish a unified autonomous government, the Communists quickly consolidated support from local population in Rehe, Chahar and western Manchuria, and as result were able to appoint their own provincial governors and local officials.63 As early as mid-1946, when facing an increasingly precarious position in Inner Mongolia, Chiang Kai-shek and his core advisors in Nanking could do little more than urge Nationalist officials in northern China to frantically recruit anti- Communist Mongols and to financially subsidize those leagues and banners that remained loyal to the Nationalist center.64 But this strategy simply did not work. In May 1947, a Chinese Communist-backed Inner Mongolian autonomous government was proclaimed in Wangyiemiao, officially signifying Inner Mongolia’s departure from the Nationalist sphere of control and realignment with the revolutionary Chinese Communists.65 Belatedly, toward early 1947, when the Nationalists’ great internal debate about Inner Mongolia cooled down, Chiang Kai-shek approved a more feasible and mutually acceptable scheme. According to the new consensus, Nanking would create a preparatory commission for Inner Mongolian affairs, while preserving the traditional league and banner system on an equal level with provincial

Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality 105 and county government. The Nationalists’ decision came too late, however, and the plan was never realized. Nanking’s failure to forge a clear and timely policy toward Inner Mongolia may not have been the primary factor resulting in the Nationalists’ eventual defeat in 1949, but the Communists’ newfound foothold in Inner Mongolia certainly presaged the greater changes that were to come.67


66

A shifted concept of border defense Certainly, the most far-reaching consequence of Nationalist China’s loss of Outer Mongolia was a shift in the concept of China’s postwar border defense. The new paradigm, however, cannot be divorced from the state of Nationalist authority in China’s frontiers during the Sino-Japanese war. Within just two years – between 1943 and 1945 – Outer Mongolia’s role changed from that of an essential building block in Chiang Kai-shek’s imagined national defense system to that of an alien nation under the influence of potentially hostile Soviet Russia. As a result, the domestic provincial boundary separating Outer Mongolia from the neighboring provinces of Xinjiang, Gansu and Inner Mongolia was suddenly in the postwar years an international border. This change monumentally transformed the Nationalists’ concept of national border defense. For a period of time after the war, top echelons in the Nationalist bureaucracy struggled with the process of redefining China’s border security, recognizing that at stake were the very survival of China and the Nationalist regime.68 Around late 1946, Chiang Kai-shek was so vexed at postwar China’s problematic ethnopolitics that he confessed in his diaries that he had no idea what to do both to consolidate China’s northern and northwestern border defense and to satisfy local ethnic minorities’ demands for more political rights as a result of Outer Mongolia’s de jure independence.69 Forced to recognize the now independent MPR north of the Gobi and to cope with the Soviet-backed ETR on the northwestern edge of Xinjiang, the Nationalists deemed it a top priority to strengthen their military presence in the Central Asian borderlands. As the situation in Xinjiang calmed somewhat after the formation of the coalition provincial government in July 1946, Chiang Kai-shek appointed his trusted lieutenants to crucial military posts in the province. Nationalist garrison forces were augmented and reinforced in the greater Urumqi area and the strategic oases of Hami and Turfan in the east. In southern Xinjiang, existing troops and local paramilitary forces in every strategically significant oasis were replenished with new ammunition and equipment. By the end of 1946, a system of military patrols had been instituted in the areas between Keriya, Khotan and Yarkand. The local police who had previously guarded local trade routes were replaced by Nationalist regular troops, who also undertook the construction of new motorways for the movement of military supplies.70 In early 1946, in order to protect the Yumen oil field, by 1945 capable of producing 66,000 tons of crude oil per year,71 and other undeveloped oil fields in the Gansu Corridor and Xinjiang, the Nationalist center proposed the creation of a secret military zone in China’s Central Asian heartlands for the establishment of


106 Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality military and intelligence headquarters and the garrison of Nationalist force. This zone, dubbed the Xinjiang–Qinghai Border Region (Xin Qing bianqu), fell roughly within the area bordered by the northwestern tip of the Gansu Corridor, the Tsaidam Marsh in northwestern Qinghai, and Lop Nor in eastern Xinjiang. The implication of setting up this Region and deploying more troops there was presumably to keep away any potential ethnic instability on China’s Central Asian borderland from China proper. It is worth noting that the recently uncovered People’s Republic of China’s extensive nuclear missile site is located within this zone, roughly between Delingha and Tsaidam in northwestern Qinghai Province. Back in the late 1940s, this Xinjiang–Qinghai Border Region, as Chiang Kai-shek’s confidential documents reveal, would serve as a base for the protection of the greater Urumqi area, to safeguard against a possible invasion of Outer Mongols from the north, to reinforce the Nationalist forces already stationed in the politically unstable southern Xinjiang, as well as to preserve vital economic and strategic resources.72 Jin Zaiyie, a Whampoa Military Academy graduate serving for the Nationalist secret service, was handpicked by Chiang to become the Region’s first special commissioner.73 In December 1945, the Nationalist National Resources Commission signed an agreement with three major American oil companies – Standard-Vacuum, Shell, and the California-Texas Oil Company – establishing joint development of the petroleum industry in Gansu and Qinghai provinces. According to the agreement, the newly proposed Border Region, along with southern Gansu and the Gansu–Ningxia border districts, would be included in a 40-year oil exploitation enterprise. The Nationalist government, it was agreed, would control 55 percent of its shares.74 Chiang Kai-shek’s top strategists in the Ministry of National Defense were convinced that the establishment of the Xinjiang–Qinghai Border Region would be essential to China’s economic development and the military reinforcement of the Gansu Corridor and the Inner Mongol banners on the Gansu Corridor’s northeastern side. The Nationalists’ two military outposts in Alashaa Banner and Ejine Banner had originally been built to check the advance of the Japanese during the war. Yet despite the end of the war, the Nationalist center showed no signs of downsizing or dismantling the outposts. Instead, the outposts’ postwar geo-strategic value prompted the Nationalists to devote more resources to the continued expansion. According to a new regulation issued in late 1946, Nationalist military commissioners posted to Alashaa Banner and Ejine Banner were granted the right to deal with urgent matters without consultation with their superiors in Nanking, including the banners’ external relations with the MPR.75 The importance of these two strongholds became even more apparent, when in mid-1947 alarming reports began to arrive about MPR military drills on the Sino-MPR border and the alleged intrusion of MPR border patrols into Shilingol League in Suiyuan Province.76 The importance of Alashaa Banner and Ejine Banner has carried through to the present day, as the modern People’s Republic of China maintains one of its largest military bases in Ejine as the location of the famous Jiuquan missile launch site.


Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality 107 The lack of definition of China’s national boundaries was a major cause of anxiety for the Nationalists. Not long after Outer Mongolia’s independence in early 1946, Nationalist high officials from various governmental bodies were summoned to work out a strategy for resolving China’s boundary disputes. When the Nationalist center recognized the independence of the MPR in January 1946, the boundary between the two nations remained unsettled.77 Gravely concerned that postwar China’s border defense would be compromised by an unacceptable boundary, Nanking decided to take countermeasures. On one hand, in their official announcements, the Nationalists continued to insist that the disputed Soviet-controlled territories of Tannu Tuva and Khobdo between the MPR and northern Xinjiang remain under Chinese jurisdiction. On the other hand, through diplomatic channels, they pushed for new border negotiations with the Soviets and the British over the equally unsettled national boundaries on the Pamir, Yunnan–Burmese and Sino-Indian borders.78 Facing a volatile border situation, officials from Nationalist military sections proposed the installation of more military commissioner’s offices with a predetermined number of troops in the contested border regions. The first of these was instituted in early 1946 in Atuntze on the Yunnan–Xikang border where Nanking sought to fortify its position on the disputed Sino-Burmese and Sino-Indian borders.79 In early 1947, with similar geo-strategic reasoning, Chiang Kai-shek instructed the installation of a second new military commissioner’s office with two extra regiments in Aksu in southern Xinjiang. Meanwhile, battalions in Kashgar, Yarkand and Tashkurghan were reinforced. With these new measures, the Nationalist government sought to improve its military presence as well as its troop maneuverability along the Central Asian border.80 Despite their efforts to strengthen their border defense capability in Central Asia, tough challenges remained for the Nationalists. The fluid and porous national boundary between China and the MPR was still unresolved and represented a potential crisis, which finally materialized as a large-scale armed border conflict in the spring of 1947. In May, MPR officials claimed that a division of 300 Nationalist troops, consisting of Chinese and Kazakh troops under the leadership of local Kazakh tribal leader Osman Bator, had illegally entered their territory at Baitak Bogdo (Beitashan) on the border between Xinjiang and the MPR and captured several soldiers stationed on the Mongolian border. The MPR issued a joint ultimatum to the Xinjiang provincial authorities in Urumqi and the Nationalist center in Nanking, demanding that the arrested soldiers be returned without delay. The Nationalist high officials did not immediately reply to the MPR’s ultimatum, presumably because it proved difficult for Nanking to verify events on the distant and tumultuous Sino-Mongolian border. On June 5, the MPR sent four planes on a surprise bombing mission to the Nationalist border patrol base at Baitak Bogdo. Bombing continued throughout the following days, during which more than 30 Chinese soldiers were reported killed or wounded.81 As the national boundary between Xinjiang and the MPR remained in dispute, both the Nationalists and MPR officials had reasons to assume that the border at Baitak Bogdo fell within their respective territorial domains. As a matter of fact,


108 Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality long before the independence of the MPR in early 1946, both Xinjiang provincial authorities and Mongol troops held guard posts at Baitak Bogdo. It is therefore credible that a group of local Kazakh soldiers, recruited into the Xinjiang provincial garrison forces after the Sino-Japanese war, had unknowingly moved beyond the provisional and endlessly shifting “line of control” in the Baitak Bogdo region, thus provoking the MPR into issuing their ultimatum of May 1947.82 As noted, Nationalist officials in the distant Nanking were in a nearly impossible position to discover what was actually happening along the remote Xinjiang–MPR border, and their only course of action was to hastily arrange press conferences in which they announced to the whole world that the MPR and its Soviet patrons had “invaded” China.83 As the summer of 1947 passed by, conflicts in the Baitak Bogdo region decreased, but sporadic scuffles continued for at least another year. The exception was one battle that took place in January 1948, when an armed detachment of as many as 700 Xinjiang cavalry allegedly penetrated 75 km into the MPR- controlled Khobdo region. According to one piece of British intelligence source, the Xinjiang cavalry attacked the local Mongol inhabitants in an attempt to restore Chinese authority to the ferociously contested border.84

The last struggle for Central Asia By 1947, the Nationalists were in the midst of a civil war. The Sino-Japanese war had enabled them to extend their reach far into the Eurasian heartlands, and the Nationalists were taking every possible measure to hold on. Whether the Nationalists believed that maintaining their influence in Central Asia would help them defeat the Communists remains unclear. Nevertheless, it is certain that their relatively consolidated position in China’s far western frontiers did provide the Nationalists with much needed room to maneuver in the complex postwar political situation. First of all, the Nationalist regime sought to build up a resilient intelligence network by strengthening its consular posts in Central Asia. In mid-1945, the Nationalists proposed that their consulate in Alma Ata be elevated to a consulate-general as a first step toward upgrading their five consular posts in Soviet Central Asia; the proposal was rejected by Moscow. In fact, the augmentation of their consulates in Soviet Central Asia was actually part of a secret Nationalist plan to dispatch more secret agents along the Sino-Soviet border.85 In the fall of 1947, the Nationalists lodged a similar request with the newly independent government of India to establish a consular post in Srinagar, Kashmir. Presumably interpreting the plan as an intention to stretch Chinese influence into Central and South Asia, New Delhi rejected the proposal and stated that it would only be accepted after the status of Kashmir was finally settled.86 In the latter phase of the Chinese civil war, the general situation in China proper was rapidly worsening for Chiang Kai-shek and his Nationalist regime. Nonetheless, they continued to attempt to consolidate their grasp of Central Asia. Part of this continued but ultimately ill-fated effort can be explained by the Nationalists’ perennial proclivity for searching for territorial bastions in China’s


Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality 109 western frontier. At this stage, Nanking continued to apply the strategy of convincing as many as possible influential non-Han ethnic minority figureheads to side with the Nationalists. One such target was Torgut Mongol Prince Minjur, the nominal chief of East Torgut League in the Altai region of northern Xinjiang. In late 1946, Isa Yusuf Alptekin, the prominent Turkic Muslim leader who had been close to the Nationalists during wartime, secretly approached Prince Minjur in Peking on Chiang Kai-shek’s behalf. According to Isa Yusuf Alptekin, who met with Chiang and other top Nationalist officials before reaching Peking, the Nationalist government had generally agreed that Prince Minjur would be Xinjiang’s future leader so long as he agreed to cooperate fully with the Nationalists. Prince Minjur tentatively consented to the proposal, on the conditions that he was allowed to fly to Xinjiang and investigate the political situations there and that he had the support from General Zhang Zhizhong. Prince Minjur urged the Nationalists to restore their control over the ETR-controlled “Three Districts,” as his previous headquarters at Ussu was now under Soviet control.87 Although Prince Minjur did fly to Lanzhou and Urumqi to conduct his inspection tour in early 1947, his governorship of Xinjiang never materialized. On the eve of the Communist takeover of Xinjiang, Prince Minjur fled from Xinjiang after secretly depositing a sum of money with the British Consulate in Urumqi for withdrawal in pounds sterling at a foreign British consulate.88 Nationalist overtures to Central Asian non-Han ethnic leaders also extended to those who were living abroad. In line with this strategy was Nanking’s attempt to aggregate support from disparate and widespread overseas non-Han groups – particularly the Muslim communities – and to transform these groups into a strong pro-Nationalist base that could be unleashed against the Communists. Toward the end of 1947, a group of around 100 Kazakhs originally from Tashkurghan but who had been forced to leave during Sheng Shicai’s regime during the 1938–9 unrest in Xinjiang, were able to return to their homeland from India with Nationalist sponsorship. The group’s leader, Hamga Haji Wagir, who had spent ten years in exile in Calcutta and whose influence extended to other exiled Kazakh communities in India, Pakistan and Afghanistan, later became a loyal supporter of the Nationalist regime. In the final days of Nationalist rule in China, he endeavored to foster anti-Communist sentiment among his fellow Kazakhs both within and outside Xinjiang.89 Under Nanking’s instruction, Nationalist diplomats stationed on the Indian subcontinent also sought to forge closer ties with the local Kazakh-Muslim associations. One should recall that around 1943, the Nationalist regime in Chongqing tried in vain to lure the exiled Kazakhs in India back to Xinjiang Province. After the Sino-Japanese war, Nationalist strategists began to devise ways, including financial incentives, to encourage the Muslim ethnic communities in India and the Middle East to return to the Chinese Inner Asian borderlands, where they might serve as important anti-Communist assets for the Nationalists.90 These efforts did have some measure of success. By the spring of 1948, two of the most influential Xinjiang Kazakh groups based in Karachi and Srinagar had steadfastly rendered their support to the deteriorating yet – compared to the


110 Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality Communists – religiously tolerant Nationalist regime.91 In the fall of 1948, after vocal appeals from leaders Haji Mohammed Amin and Syed Beg Haji, hundreds of exiled Kazakhs returned to Xinjiang where they later collaborated with the local Kazakh guerilla forces that would fight against the Chinese Communists in the years to come.92 The Nationalists’ drive to sustain their interests in Central Asia was exemplified by their abortive attempt to establish a political presence in Kashmir. In the early days of the postwar era, fearing that the Soviets would take advantage of the British departure from India and the resultant political vacuum to infiltrate the Pamirs, Kashmir and southern Xinjiang, Nationalist security advisors found it imperative to woo the Muslim tribal groups in Kashmir to their side and create a new political order favorable to China’s western border defense.93 By strengthening their ties with such tribal states in the Kashmir and Pamir regions as Hunza, Ladakh, Chitral, Yasin and Nagar, the Nationalists tried to put themselves in a better position to bargain over the poorly delimited Sino-Pamir border. The strategy was implemented in the early months of 1947, evidently with the direct consent of Chiang Kai-shek.94 An opportunity presented itself to the Nationalists half a year later: In September 1947, shortly after the transfer of power in India and the subsequent war between India and Pakistan, the Mir of Hunza Mohammad Jamal Khan secretly sent his envoys across the Pamirs to Kashgar seeking a possible connection with the Nationalists. According to the Mir, the uncertainty of Kashmir’s political future after the British withdrawal prompted him to seek Chinese aid in case of any threat to his small tribal court. In order to secure his court, the Mir suggested that he was willing to submit part of his authority to the Nationalists in the form of restoring the traditional “tributary relations” with China that could be traced back as far as the Qing dynasty.95 Upon learning of the arrival of the Hunza envoys in Kashgar, Chiang Kai- shek summoned his frontier, foreign and national defense advisors for a careful analysis. Despite some difficulties verifying the Mir’s intentions toward China, Nanking was generally convinced that a closer contact with Hunza would contribute to the goal of consolidating China’s position in Central Asia. A detailed plan, including four principles for negotiations with Hunza, was drawn up in late 1947; Hunza was to be incorporated into an autonomous district under Xinjiang’s legal jurisdiction, and Hunza’s foreign and military affairs would be handed over to the Nationalist center.96 Negotiations between China and Hunza over Hunza’s status soon began in Kashgar between the Hunza envoys and General Zhao Xiguang, the deputy commander-in-chief of Nationalist garrison forces in Xinjiang Province. Yet just a few days before the close of 1947, with the discussions in Kashgar nearing the final stage, Nanking suddenly commanded General Zhao to cease the negotiations.97 Almost simultaneously, reports began arriving of a coup at Gilgit, a development which caused much anxiety for the Nationalist center in Nanking. On October 16, 1947, the ruler of Kashmir announced his state’s accession to India, further accentuating tensions in the Muslim-dominated areas of Kashmir.


Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality 111 In early November, Muslims in northwestern Kashmir surrounded the residence of the Indian-appointed Hindu governor at Gilgit, forcing him to surrender. A couple of weeks later, the Pakistan government sent its own Muslim officials to take control of the entire Gilgit region. Rulers of adjacent tribal states, including Hunza, reportedly expressed their desire to accede to Pakistan.98 Uncertain whether the Mir of Hunza had changed his mind and decided to join Pakistan, the Nationalist center felt it necessary to take a more cautious stance with respect to the Hunza issue.99 Nevertheless, on January 7, 1948, a modus vivendi based on the points raised by Nanking, was signed in Kashgar by General Zhao Xiguang and the Hunza envoys without Nanking’s final approval.100 In the following months, contacts between the Nationalist local officials in southern Xinjiang and Hunza were cautiously underway. In February, and then in June 1948, two Xinjiang delegations were dispatched by General Zhao Xiguang from Kashgar to Hunza to meet with Mir Mohammad Jamal Khan and his court officials. On both of these occasions, the Mir admitted that he had kept in close touch with the Pakistan government after the coup in Gilgit, and had even secured Pakistan’s political and military support. The Mir also informed the Nationalist envoys that he had mobilized his troops, now equipped with Pakistani ammunition, to join the Pakistan army’s fight against India.101 Although the Mir again expressed his desire to restore “traditional friendship” with China, he had also made it explicit that Hunza “had always been independent” of foreign powers, and that as a result he would not agree to an unconditional submission to the Chinese control. When envoys from Xinjiang suggested signing another treaty to formally establish the relationship agreed upon during the pre-Gilgit negotiations, the Mir tactfully declined.102 By early 1948, Nehru’s new government in India decided to seek a peaceful settlement in their dispute with Pakistan over Kashmir, and the Kashmiri issue was referred to the United Nations. In the first months of 1948, the United Nations Security Council held at least eight meetings on the India–Pakistan conflict, in which a free and impartial plebiscite under UN observation was considered as a means of determining Kashmir’s political future.103 In the face of an increasingly internationalized Kashmiri issue, and their worsening position in the civil war, the Nationalists no longer viewed the Hunza relationship as a priority, and instead decided to wash their hands off the matter entirely. After the second Kashgar mission returned to Kashgar from Hunza in August 1948, General Zhao Xiguang and his staff in southern Xinjiang urged Nanking to consider the official recognition of Hunza as an “independent state.” Despite Zhao’s argument that such a strategy would win the favor of Mir Mohammad Jamal Khan and simultaneously help to secure China’s position against the growing Pakistani influence in that region, foreign and frontier affairs officials in Nanking had changed their priorities, and scarcely offered a response.104 As Nationalist political legitimacy was weakening both within and outside China, Nanking’s unfinished attempt to bring the small Kashmiri tribal state into its sway was ultimately neither realistic nor imperative. Perhaps more significantly from a center-periphery analytical perspective, General Zhao Xiguang’s


112 Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality unilateral action of sending two missions to Hunza, together with Nanking’s disregard of Zhao’s final proposal, reflected the Nationalists’ embarrassing lack of control over China’s frontier issues. Although still functioning as a “central government,” toward the end of 1948 the Nanking-based Nationalist regime was already seriously handicapped when it came to effectively commanding its officials in China’s distant border regions. Lacking the ability to verify reports from the frontier, the highest authorities in China proper were unwilling to trust their subordinates in remote southern Xinjiang.105 As top policymakers in Nanking might have been clearly aware at this juncture, Nationalist China’s frontier strategies were already in their final throes, and the Nationalists’ arduous two-decade journey to Central Asia was about to halt. Nevertheless, the Nationalists would continue to perceive China’s western heartlands to be their last power base against the Communist threat. Indeed, the effect of the Nationalist consolidation of China’s Central Asian frontiers would continue to be felt after the Communist takeover of October 1949.

Epilogue


The end of the journey

The Suiyuan Peace In March 1949, shortly after Nationalist General Fu Zuoyi surrendered to the Chinese Communists in Peking, Mao Zedong and his core advisors planned a démarche that was to have a critical impact on the subsequent “liberation” of China’s far-flung frontier territories. In order to avoid unnecessary bloodshed and to exploit their maximum strength while destroying the Nationalist remnants in China proper, the Communists decided to come to terms with the existing Nationalist military and civil bureaucracy in the border regions. This strategy was originally devised as a means of dealing with the 100,000-odd Nationalist troops still deployed in the strategically important Suiyuan Province, which lay on the road to Central Asia and was still outside the control of the Communists. According to this formula, dubbed the “Suiyuan Peace,” Communist forces would temporarily cease fire against Suiyuan to give the local Nationalist leaders time to accept a “peaceful liberation.” In return for the Suiyuan Nationalists’ declaration of allegiance, Mao Zedong was prepared to preserve the entirety of the local Nationalist military establishments and civil bureaucracy in Suiyuan, but would wait to incorporate them fully into the new Communist order until an opportune time.1 The Suiyuan overture manifested the Communists’ double-sided strategy at the final stage of the civil war. In China proper, the Communists would continue to use their military predominance to overpower the remaining Nationalist troops. In the vast outlying ethnic territories, however, the Communists sought to enlist Nationalist defectors and to absorb local military and civil resources. This strategy, reasoned the Communists, would benefit both sides: it would allow the outnumbered Nationalist military leaders to preserve their influential positions while enabling the Communists to avoid a prolonged and expensive offensive against the entrenched Nationalists troops. The Communist overtures to Suiyuan provincial authorities ultimately proved effective. On April 29, 1949, a provisional agreement was reached between the Communists and Nationalist General Dong Qiwu, then governor of Suiyuan Province. According to the agreement, communication and commerce between Communist-controlled north China and Suiyuan would continue despite the


114 Epilogue ongoing civil war, a compromise which apparently caused much anxiety in the crumbling high echelons of the Nationalist hierarchy.2 Chiang Kai-shek dispatched General Xu Yongchang, his long-time trusted military advisor and former Minister of Military Ordinance, to fly to Suiyuan in a futile attempt to prevent local Nationalist leaders from defecting.3 On September 19, Dong Qiwu formally declared his allegiance to the Communists, and the Nationalist provincial troops in Suiyuan, including the various Inner Mongol banner militias in the strategic Ordos region, were reorganized and integrated into the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). By and large, top Nationalist regional leaders and provincial bureaucrats retained their positions, and would later play an important role in the peaceful extension of Communist authority across the Inner Mongolian steppe.4 The Suiyuan démarche also had a significant impact on China’s other Inner Asian borderlands that around mid-1949 were still under the nominal jurisdiction of the Nationalists. In the adjacent Ningxia Province, although anti- Communist Governor Ma Hongkui insisted on continuing to fight with the Communists, other Ma family members such as his cousin Ma Hongbin and nephew Ma Dunjing were tantalized by the Communists’ offers. On the same day that Dong Qiwu capitulated, Ma Hongkui was in Chongqing discussing with Chiang Kai-shek the possibility of a military counterattack in western Inner Mongolia. Yet back in Ningxia, without Ma Hongkui’s authorization, Ma Dunjing signed a unilateral agreement with a PLA delegate from Suiyuan for a peaceful transfer of power. The following day, realizing that Ningxia’s provincial lines of defense could no longer be sustained without Ma Dunjing’s division on the border, other major provincial military leaders announced their surrender.5 Angered and frustrated, Governor Ma Hongkui never set foot on Ningxia again.6 Further westward in the Gansu Corridor and Xinjiang, where in the summer of 1949 about 150,000 Nationalist troops still held the line, the Suiyuan formula was just as effective. In August and September, while Nationalist forces under Hu Zongnan and Ma Bufang in Shaanxi, Gansu and Qinghai strained to hold back the approaching PLA, Nationalist military and civilian leaders in Xinjiang were already contemplating a peace agreement. According to James Z. Gao, in the early months of 1949, Soviet Russia had been in secret contact with General Tao Zhiyue, commander-in-chief of the Nationalist garrison forces in Xinjiang, suggesting that he declare Xinjiang’s independence. The Soviets promised Tao that Moscow would stop the PLA from marching toward Xinjiang. Yet by June 1949, Stalin had redirected Soviet policy vis-à-vis Xinjiang, urging instead an early march of the PLA to that province. To Stalin, a Muslim area controlled by Chinese Communists meant following the Soviet model of a multinational state to suppress any pan-Turkish and anti-Soviet revolts, thus ensuring Chinese and Soviet territorial security.7 Toward the end of September, a compromise was reached between those who wished to side with the Communists and those who refused. In order to avoid massive losses, major Nationalist provincial bureaucrats, including Governor Burhan Shahīdī, decided to follow the patterns of Suiyuan and Ningxia by


Epilogue 115 signing a peace agreement with the Communists. Their decision was probably influenced by Tao Zhiyue and his deputy, General Zhao Xiguang, two of the most influential military figures in Chinese Central Asia. According to the compromise, those who refused to surrender were allowed to go into exile via southern Xinjiang and Kashmir. After an arduous journey, most of them eventually reached Taiwan in the spring of 1950.8

Non-Han ethnic resistance in peripheral China To a considerable degree, the implementation of “Suiyuan Peace” accelerated and facilitated the Communist takeover of China’s distant western and southwestern borderlands.9 Yet the fast pace of Communist power penetration in China’s ethnic minority territories also generated resentment of the Communists that would linger for years to come. In July 1949, when the Nationalist regime was rapidly disintegrating, the Tibetan government closed the Chinese representative office in Lhasa that had been augmented in 1940 and expelled all Nationalist officials from Tibet. Aware of the Suiyuan Peace, the Tibetans stated that the decision had been made in fear that if the Nationalist regime collapsed, the remaining Nationalist officials in Lhasa would side with the Communists and enable the Communists to infiltrate the whole of Tibet. On July 20, all Nationalist officials and Han Chinese residents were expelled from Lhasa and forced to flee to India.10 The ailing Nationalist center protested, but was too weak to take action against Lhasa. This dramatic episode resulted in the eradication of all Han Chinese authority in Tibet, leaving Sino-Tibetan relations in the same cold state in which they had been from 1912 to the mid-1930s. In the final days of the KMT–CCP power struggle, anti-Communist campaigns also gained momentum in Inner Mongolia. In the early summer of 1949, Prince Demchugdongrob, who had collaborated with the Japanese during wartime and had recently been released from his house arrest by the Nationalists, endeavored to create an anti-Communist bastion in the western portion of Inner Mongolia under the pretext of promoting Inner Mongolian autonomy.11 With Nationalist consent and words of support from an American intelligence agency in China, a “Mongolia Autonomous Government” was inaugurated in Alashaa Banner on August 10, 1949. Yet, due to a serious lack of subsequent military and logistical support, the new regime lasted for a short five weeks and finally dissolved on September 20.12 While other crucial members of the Mongolia Autonomous Government surrendered, including Vice Chairman Prince Darijayaga, Prince Demchugdongrob managed to escape northward into the Mongolian People’s Republic. Ironically, the former members of the short-lived anti- Communist regime later occupied key posts in the Communist-operated People’s Government of Alashaa, cooperating with the newly-arrived PLA in pacifying local Nationalist remnants, or now “agent-provocateurs” and “bandits.”13 Resistance to the Communists by non-Han ethnic groups was not limited to Inner Mongolia. Within months after the Xinjiang provincial government submitted to the Communists, various Uighur and Kazakh guerilla forces began to


116 Epilogue rebel against the PLA. Osman Bator, the Kazakh tribal leader who led guerilla warfare against Soviet and MPR troops in the 1947 Baitak Bogdo incident, was one prominent example. Toward the end of 1949, Osman’s tribal forces had moved to Lake Barkol in the Baitak Bogdo area where he was later joined by Jānim Khan, a former key member of the 1946 Xinjiang coalition provincial government under General Zhang Zhizhong.14 Another group of Kazakh anti- Communist irregulars under Qali Beg was based on the eastern edge of Tian Shan. In the winter of 1949–50, both groups, amounting to 6,000, repeatedly fought guerrilla battles against the PLA. The guerrilla forces under the leadership of Osman Bator and Jānim Khan mobilized thousands of local Uighers and Kazakhs to fight with the Communists, momentarily causing the new Communist authorities in Xinjiang to be at their wits’ end.15 It was not until around the summer of 1950 that the militarily superior PLA pacified the insurgents in eastern Xinjiang. Osman Bator was arrested and later executed in Urumqi in March 1951. Yet, this was not the end of ethnic resistance in China’s far northwest. In the early days of the 1950s, the ruling Communists continued to face rebellions from local ethnic forces. By early January 1950, another anti-Communist guerilla force under Yolbas Khan, a Uighur leader who had served as Nationalist-appointed commissioner in Hami in the early 1930s, rose against the PLA in eastern Xinjiang. Yolbas fought a guerilla war against the Communists from early 1950 up to the spring of 1951, when a lack of ammunition forced him to flee to the Tibetan plateau and then to Taiwan via India.16 For the exiled Nationalists in Taiwan, Yolbas’s defeat represented a significant setback. While in Xinjiang in the early days of the 1950s, Yolbas’s mobile headquarters frequently provided the exiled regime with information about Communist activity in the far northwest via wireless radio, giving Chiang Kai-shek and his followers the intelligence needed to plan for the construction of new bases of resistance.17 With Yolbas went some of the Nationalists’ final hopes for a return to the mainland.

The Communist façade and Nationalist legacies The sweeping defeat of their forces in China proper did not prevent the Nationalists from endeavoring to secure their last power bastions in peripheral China. The seemingly abrupt decision to install a new tenth Panchen Lama in the summer of 1949, for example, clearly demonstrates the extent of the Nationalists’ determination to control the Central Asian heartland as a power base and helps to provide a perspective on the extent to which the politics of peripheral China had become central to Nationalist policy in their decades of rule. In August 1949, four months after Nanking fell to the Communists and the Nationalist government withdrew to Canton, the Nationalist center dispatched a ministerial mission to the Kumbum Monastery in Qinghai where its officials presided over the enthronement ceremony of the tenth Panchen Lama.18 When the ninth Panchen Lama passed away in late 1937, both the late Lama’s followers and the Lhasa authorities immediately began searching for the next reincarnation. By


Epilogue 117 1943, three possible candidates had been found – one in Xikang and two (one of whom later died in mid-1948) in Qinghai. The Tibetan government insisted that the final choice be made in Lhasa; the Nationalists claimed the right to preside over the ceremony, as they had done for the fourteenth Dalai Lama in 1940. In early 1944, the late Panchen Lama’s entourage brought one of the two Qinghai candidates to the Kumbum Monastery, who asserted that he was the true reincarnation. Both Lhasa and the Nationalists refused to recognize the legitimacy of the enthronement ceremony, which was performed at the Kumbum Monastery by the adherents of the late Lama.19 As World War II ended, the Tibetans sought every possible means to liberate themselves from the political domination of the Chinese, and as far as officials in Lhasa were concerned, as long as the Qinghai candidate remained under Nationalist patronage, the Chinese would continue to manipulate Tibetan politics. Such concerns even led a group of radical officials in Lhasa to propose the utter abolition of the Panchen Lama’s lineage.20 From 1943 until the spring of 1949, the Nationalists were at their wits’ end as to how to resolve the Panchen Lama issue. However, on June 3, 1949, the besieged Nationalist regime in Canton suddenly declared its full recognition of the Qinghai candidate as the legitimate tenth Panchen Lama. Moreover, they announced that Guan Jiyu, then head of the MTAC, would fly to the Kumbum Monastery to preside over the enthronement ceremony. On August 10, the ceremony was carried out in the presence of Guan, Ma Bufang’s representatives and other local officials. Only three weeks later, Qinghai fell to the Communists.21 The approval of the new Panchen Lama indicates that both Chiang Kai-shek and Acting President Li Zongren were willing to make last-ditch efforts to counteract the domino effect of the Suiyuan model. High officials in the Nationalist regime were convinced that the cooperation of the new Panchen Lama, the influence that he would carry with him in the greater ethnographic Tibetan areas of Gansu, Qinghai and Xikang, along with the inauguration of the anti-Communist Mongolian regime in Alashaa under Princes Demchugdongrob and Darijayaga, would combine to provide the Nationalists with the political capital they would require to safeguard China’s far western territories.22 The Nationalists received further encouragement when they secured promises of support from several other non-Han ethnic leaders in the border provinces, all of whom having maintained close relations with the Nationalists over the past decades. In early August 1949, a new démarche was suggested by Chiang Kai- shek’s adherents: a power base would be constructed in the strategically significant Labrang Monastery in southern Gansu under the leadership of Huang Zhengqing, a former strongman of the Labrang Tibetans. According to the plan, Huang would collaborate closely with the Mongols in Alashaa and Ejine and the Tungan Muslims in Qinghai to organize a joint line of defense across China’s far northwest.23 A simultaneous proposal suggested that, with the support of the new Panchen Lama and his entourage, at least three army divisions of the anti-Communist Khampa Tibetans could be mustered in southwest China. These Khampa


118 Epilogue divisions, backed by Nationalist forces in Sichuan, would march into Tibet, where Chiang Kai-shek’s advisors sought to create China’s “last anti-Communist base in the high plateau.”24 This momentary optimism about creating a potential territorial base in the southwest might be the result of Chiang’s belief that the Communists might delay their advance into that part of China as a result of their ostensible determination to take over the northwest and connect themselves with the Soviets as their top military and strategic priority.25 Be it true or not, as their days on the Chinese mainland were numbered, the three points that had been so crucial during the Sino-Japanese war – Labrang, Kham, and Alashaa – turned out to be the final, potential refuges for the Nationalist forces as they struggled to hold back the Communist advance. These last-minute attempts to salvage the Nationalist regime turned out to be futile, but their repercussions were not insignificant. Shortly after the inauguration of the new Chinese People’s Republic on October 1, 1949, the newly enthroned Panchen Lama openly declared his allegiance to Chairman Mao Zedong and the new Communist central regime in Peking.26 Lhasa’s refusal to recognize the new Panchen Lama created tension between Lhasa and the new Communist regime, just as it had with the Nationalists. When in November 1949 Radio Peking publicized the new Panchen Lama’s calls to “liberate” Tibet, the Communists saw it as an opportunity to advance their Tibetan agenda. The fourteenth Dalai Lama and his entourage were en route to exile in India and recognized the possibility that the Communists would safeguard the Panchen Lama’s return to Tibet. The Dalai Lama, wishing to preserve the few ties he had left with Peking, understood the position he was in and officially recognized the new Panchen Lama. Thus, the tension between Lhasa and the Qinghai Panchen Lama which had been established in the final months of the Nationalist regime played directly into the hands of the Communists, enabling them to maintain their political ties with the Tibetans and force them into subsequent negotiations for the “peaceful liberation” of Tibet.27 Doubtlessly, the Panchen Lama’s decision to recognize the Communists was a severe blow to the Nationalists on the Chinese mainland. In late 1949, when the Nationalist soldiers and former officials in Xinjiang who refused to surrender were retreating into exile in India and Pakistan via Kashmir, Chiang Kai-shek hoped against hope to establish cooperation between his Nationalist cohorts on Taiwan and anti-Communist sympathizers in India and Pakistan.28 Chiang calculated that the exiled Nationalist remnants from Xinjiang settled on the Kashmir– Xinjiang border could work closely with the anti-Communist Muslim communities on the subcontinent to build an influential Nationalist presence in Central and South Asia. Yet the Nationalists’ hopes to build an officially recognized Nationalist base in that part of Asia evaporated when both India and Pakistan recognized the new Communist regime in January 1950.29 However, it should also be emphasized that Chiang’s abortive attempt to promote Nationalism on the subcontinent likely served as crucial factors that kept alive anti-Communist momentum in Central Asia, exerting considerable pressure on the Communists in Xinjiang in the following years. Ethnic minority leaders might only consider


Epilogue 119 allying with the retreating Nationalists as a last-ditch effort to resist a new and threatening power. They might place achieving their political autonomy as their priority, rather than genuinely helping the return of Nationalist authority in the mainland. Nevertheless, political dynamics of the ethnic minority communities in China’s border regions as a result of the Chinese civil war undoubtedly had added much trouble to the nascent Communist rule in the frontiers.30 The transition from Nationalist to Communist government in China’s western territories was complex, and frequently depended on the extent to which the Suiyuan Peace worked. In areas where local Nationalists surrendered to the Communists, power transitions were expectedly smoother and more peaceful, with formerly Nationalist military and civil bureaucrats often playing an important role in paving the way for the Communist takeover. In Xinjiang in 1950, for example, the majority of the Nationalist troops under Tao Zhiyue and Zhao Xiguang that were deployed after the war with Japan to strengthen China’s border defense were reorganized and incorporated in the PLA as the Twenty- second Army Corps. A large portion of the Twenty-second Army Corps later became the Xinjiang Wilderness Reclamation Army (Xinjiang Tunken Jun), the forerunners of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps.31 The Twenty- second Army Corps, together with 45,000 former Nationalist civil servants in Xinjiang, played a significant role in the region’s post-transition political and socioeconomic development, as well as in the new People’s Republic’s Central Asian border security. As Donald H. McMillen observes, these Nationalists veterans served both as a useful “coercive reserve” for the nascent Communist authority and as a model and manpower base for technological and collective transformation in China’s far west.32 In Qinghai and southern Gansu, former Nationalist bureaucrats functioned as a bridge between the Communists and local ethnic communities. After 1949, in districts such as Yushu, Golok and Choni, where local power largely rested with local ethnic leadership, the political infrastructures created during the Nationalist era were kept largely intact, and the Communists extensively relied on formerly Nationalist local officials to facilitate the construction of a new sociopolitical order.33 In some areas within the Ningxia, Qinghai and Gansu provinces – where the anti-Communist legacy remained strong and where regional unrest continued to be widespread even after 1949 – even those local officials who had willingly joined the Communists were obliged to join the Communist training corps for ideological conditioning.34 As the foregoing discussion has shown, in the southern and eastern part of Xinjiang in the late 1940s and early 1950s, where ethnic minority groups continued to resist the Communists, the new regime did not hesitate to use military force to pacify and stabilize the region when local forces refused to defect. Those who continued to resist the Communist takeover quickly found themselves overrun by the powerful PLA. It is therefore one of the great historical ironies that, whether through defection or through continued resistance, the legacy of the Nationalists’ long and arduous journey into China’s far west paved the way for the Communists’ unprecedented victory.

120 Epilogue


Afterword This book began with an examination of the early Han Chinese revolutionaries’ amorphous ethnic and frontier territorial discourse in the years before the collapse of Qing dynasty in 1912. As has been shown, from the outset there was no universal strategy among the Han Revolutionaries-turned-Nationalists with regards to post-imperial China’s ethnic frontier territoriality. During the chaotic Republican era before 1928, the southern Nationalists under Sun Yat-sen constantly struggled for their very survival. As the regime sought to stabilize itself from within, external pragmatic considerations also came to the fore, and the Nationalists began to understand that China’s ethnic minority and frontier issues were instrumental in their agenda setting and prestige building. It is therefore unsurprising that at different points in time the Nationalists’ frontier and ethnopolitical policies shifted and evolved. Southerly-based Nationalist leaders severely criticize Yuan Shikai’s “false steps” toward Tibet and Outer Mongolia when they felt the need to degrade Yuan’s political legitimacy. Then, the very same group of figures welcomed the involvement of foreign powers in China’s ethnic border regions when doing so allowed them to obtain critical support from abroad. The opportunistic nature of Nationalist ethnic and frontier policy continued to be a salient feature after the Nationalist regime gained international recognition in 1928 as the legitimate central government of China. Using ethnopolitical considerations as a means to achieving military and broader political ends were an obvious and inevitable choice for the early Nationalists. The ostensibly “central” Nationalist regime was in fact cornered in the Lower Yangtze River Delta, and the politically still-vulnerable Nationalists had to make the most of the resources under their control in order to expand their nascent authority to other parts of China’s legal territorial boundary. Not accidentally, at the initial stages of the Nationalist era, China’s frontier politics was a topic that was discussed in government halls far from the fields of Inner Asia. As this study has elucidated, the Nationalists used all the tools at their disposal – from the Mongolian conference to the establishment of minority representative offices in the capital – to militarily and politically secure the frontier territories. Several events of the early 1930s, such as the Mukden Incident, the Japanese attack on Shanghai and the fabrication of a Japan-dominated Manchukuo, served as watersheds in Nationalist China’s frontier ethnopolitics. These perceived crises prompted the Nationalists to turn westward and to seek a new power base for the sake of regime security and survival. The fall of Manchuria into Japanese hands did not change the political reality that Manchuria remained out of the effective control of the Nationalists. However, for Chiang Kai-shek and his associates in Nanking the Young Marshal Zhang Xueliang was far less threatening than the Japanese, who constituted a military threat of the highest order. This research has revealed that China’s far northwest was the first place the Nationalists sought to establish a territorial bastion. In the early years of the 1930s, the Nationalists explored every possible opportunity to strengthen their tenuous


Epilogue 121 authority in China’s northwestern provinces. Yet these first efforts met with little success; it was Chiang Kai-shek’s pacification of the Chinese Communists in the latter half of 1934 that ultimately opened a new path for the Nationalists into the southwest, which served as Nationalist China’s wartime power base against the Japanese. Between 1934 and 1937, ethnic minority issues became central to the Nationalists’ assertion of control over China’s southwestern frontiers. Although the Sino-Japanese war in 1937–45 caused the Nationalists to lose control of the eastern part of China, it also provided the Nationalists with a chance to push their authority further westward into the Central Asian heartlands. Again, with an eye to regime survival and national security the Nationalists targeted Alashaa Banner and Ejine Banner in western Inner Mongolia, Labrang Monastery in southern Gansu, and Xikang Province in southwest China. Controlling the western edge of Inner Mongolia would enable the Nationalists to check the Chinese Communists, the Japanese, and the local Ma Muslims; controlling the traditional homelands of the Labrang Tibetans would pacify the ethnic communities of Qinghai and Gansu, who threatened to ally with the Japanese at the early stage of the war; and to control Xikang and the local Khampa Tibetans would be to protect the whole of Sichuan, the wartime headquarters of the Nationalists. More significantly, their journey westward as a result of the Japanese invasion also urged the Nationalists to factor frontier and ethnopolitics into their wartime strategic thinking and institutional reforms. Taking advantage of the international situation after Pearl Harbor, the Nationalists managed to extend further their control over the strategic Gansu Corridor, leading to the return of Xinjiang Province to the Nationalist fold in 1943–4. The Nationalists’ reinforced position in Central Asia along with the political vacuum left in Tibet during World War II also provided the Nationalists with an unexpected opportunity to renew China’s traditional Cho-Yon relationship with Tibet. The presence of Nationalist high officials in the fourteenth Dalai Lama’s enthronement ceremony was a symbolic moment which has allowed the Nationalists in the 1940s as much as contemporary Chinese nationalist historians to claim that Tibet was – and still is – an integral part of modern China. To a great extent the Sino-Japanese war of 1937–45 and its repercussions caused a re-definition of modern China’s border security and defense in both northwestern and southwestern China. Moreover, the war with Japan turned the Nationalists westward, a new perspective which shifted the power relationship between the Nationalists and China’s frontier regional leaders. This historical phenomenon meanwhile resulted in the extension of Nationalist power to, as well as the building of new institutions and infrastructures, in the remotest corner of Central Asia. It also contributed to modern China’s first official contact with the Middle East. The westward expansion during wartime, more significantly from a long-term historical perspective, also transformed modern China, at least during World War II, from a maritime economy rooted in East Asian trade to a continental one based on overland trade routes through the heartland of Asia. However, it was also this same swiftly changing international environment that forced the Nationalists in early 1946 to officially relinquish their sovereignty


122 Epilogue over Outer Mongolia. This change did not merely represent the loss of an ethnic borderland; it represented the lengths to which the Nationalists were willing to go to preserve the security of their regime. Indeed, the Nationalists’ pragmatism may well explain their willingness to relinquish Outer Mongolia (and even Tibet) in exchange for protecting their interests in other frontier territories such as Xinjiang, Manchuria and Inner Mongolia. Yet the Nationalists perpetually faced the critical issue of how to effectively defend these border regions. In order to consolidate their uneasy position in postwar Central Asia, the Nationalists sought to keep intact their strategic wartime outposts in Inner Mongolia, Gansu and Xinjiang. In response to the potential threat of Soviet Russia, they approved covert military and diplomatic operations including the establishment of a vast military zone in the northwest and the attempt to pull Kashmiri tribal states into postwar China’s political sphere of influence. The Chinese civil war, however, prevented these ambitious covert designs from materializing fully. As has been discussed, in the latter phase of the civil war, it became clear that the Nationalists had unwittingly facilitated the Communist takeover of China’s vast ethnic borderlands. The defection of local Nationalists combined with fierce but insufficient resistance from loyal Nationalists hastened the Communists’ capture of local infrastructures. In Tibet, after the expulsion of the Han Chinese in the late 1940s, the Communists in the 1950s had to resort to military pacification in order to take full control of the territory. Chen Jian’s research has suggested that the Communist takeover of Tibet was a complex process that was closely related to Tibet’s military, international and domestic conditions at that time.35 But clearly, the absence of former Nationalist officials and Han Chinese citizens in Tibet precluded the Suiyuan Peace, a situation which caused the Communist takeover of Tibet to be more protracted and difficult than anywhere else in the Chinese frontier territories.36 Despite their futile attempt to create anti-Communist power bastions in Central Asia in the last days of the 1940s, Nationalist military and political legacies did generate momentum for subsequent anti-Communist guerilla activities and espionage in the 1950s. On the Yunnan–Burmese border in May 1951, for example, former Nationalist General Li Mi’s combined force of Nationalist remnants and local Karen and Mon tribesmen, managed to thrust into southern Yunnan and capture several border cities and counties.37 One year later in the spring of 1952 Chiang Kai-shek was so eager to reinvigorate his connections with ethnic minority groups on China’s western borderlands that he approved various covert schemes for cooperation. As mentioned in the Prologue, former Tibetan Buddhist leaders who had been exiled to Taiwan were mobilized to spread anti-Communist propaganda to their followers, and airdrops to local underground forces in the southwest were sent.38 At the time, secret contacts between exiled Nationalist leaders and local ethnic military forces in Gansu and Qinghai were particularly effective in the sense that they put a great deal of pressure on local Communist authorities. The guerrilla activities of Ma Yuanxiang and Ma Liang irritated the Communists to such an extent that, in early 1953, Mao Zedong decided to take drastic actions to suppress them once and for all.39


Epilogue 123 While the PLA quickly annihilated the Muslim forces, other ethnic guerilla forces in China’s western peripheries with covert Nationalist support continued to pose a nuisance and an irritant, if not a threat, to Mao’s regime. Ma Liang’s forces were still receiving airdrops from the Nationalists and continued their underground activities.40 In addition, beginning in the mid-1950s, Chiang secretly dispatched special agents from Taipei to Kalimpong on the Indian– Tibetan border for the purpose of cementing Nationalist relations with the Tibetans and the Khampas. The role that the exiled Nationalists played in the subsequent Tibetan rebellions may thus have been significant, and is a topic which surely deserves further scholarly exploration.41 This book has argued that the extension of Nationalist influence into China’s Central Asian frontiers and the ethnopolitics that emerged from it grew out of multiple external and domestic factors that each in their own way posed a threat to the burgeoning Nationalist regime. From the beginning, the revolutionary Nationalists depended on the ethnic territorial landscape bequeathed by the Qing dynasty to facilitate the consolidation, security and maintenance of their regime. Likewise, the military, political, and institutional legacies left by the Nationalists when they fled mainland China unwittingly provided the Communists with a way to establish their nascent bases of control in China’s inner frontiers. Throughout the Nationalist era, China’s policy on the border has been constrained, or even driven, by the regime’s internal factors. As this research has demonstrated, rather than being the results of the sorts of deep ecological and socio-economic forces that previous scholars have proposed as explanations, it appears many Nationalist Chinese ethnic-political decisions about border policy have been determined by domestic political struggles, regime security, and power consolidations. Although pragmatism, survivalist and opportunism might best characterize Nationalist Chinese frontier ethnopolitics, in this work I emphasize that China’s traditional imperialist territorial designs and legacies remained influential to the Nationalist leadership. As a result, the ethnopolitics in the Nationalist era was like a pendulum that swung between idealism and pragmatism. In this process of ethnopolitics formulation, the very expansiveness of post-imperial China’s ethnic borderlands provided the Nationalists with potential room to outmaneuver their enemies and accomplish their political objectives. In this way, Nationalist China’s ethnopolitics played a central role in shaping the ethnic landscape and frontier defense of the present-day People’s Republic of China. By the same token, in February 1952, as Chiang Kai-shek contemplated possible underground collaborations with non-Han Chinese irregulars on the mainland, the Taiwan- based Nationalists’ use of ethnopolitics as a weapon against the Communist regime cannot be divorced from the pragmatism and opportunism with which they had approached China’s ethnopolitics since before the Chinese Revolution of 1911.


Glossary of names and terms

Ajia Hutuktu 阿嘉呼圖克圖 an’nei rangwai 安內攘外 Bai Chongxi 白崇禧 Bai Yunti (Serengdongrob) 白雲梯 Burhan Shahīdī 包爾漢 Chang Kia-ngau 張嘉璈 Chen Changjie 陳長捷 Chen Cheng 陳誠 Chen Jiongming 陳炯明 Chen Jitang 陳濟棠 Chen Zhong 陳中 Chiang Kai-shek 蔣介石 Chinggis Khan 成吉思汗 Cho-Yon (patron–priest relationship) 檀越關係 Da Wang (Darijayaga) 達王 Dai Chuanxian (Dai Jitao) 戴傳賢 (戴季陶) De Wang (Demchugdongrob) 德王 Dilowa Hutuktu 迪魯瓦呼圖克圖 Dong Qiwu 董其武 Duan Qirui 段祺瑞 Executive Yuan 行政院 fanbu 藩部 fangqu 防區 Feng Yuxiang 馮玉祥 Fu Zuoyi 傅作義 Guan Jiyu 關吉玉 Guominjun 國民軍 Guoshi Gongjihui 國是共濟會 Han Jiaxiang 韓家祥 He Guoguang 賀國光 He Yaozu 賀耀組 Hu Hanmin 胡漢民 Hu Zongnan 胡宗南


Glossary of names and terms 125 Huang Musong 黃慕松 Huang Shaohong 黃紹紘 Huang Xing 黃興 Huang Zhengguang 黃正光 Huang Zhengji 黃正基 Huang Zhengqing 黃正清 huimeng 會盟 Isa Yusuf Alptekin 艾沙 Itagaki Seishiro 板垣征四郎 Jamyang Hutuktu 嘉木樣呼圖克圖 Janggiya Hutuktu 章嘉呼圖克圖 Jānim Khan 賈尼木汗 Jebtsundamba Hutuktu 哲布尊丹巴呼圖克圖 Jin Shuren 金樹仁 Jin Zaiyie 金在冶 jinping cheqian 金瓶掣籤 K.C. Wu 吳國楨 Kang Youwei 康有為 Kanjurwa Hutuktu 甘珠爾瓦呼圖克圖 Kashag (Tibetan cabinet) 噶廈 Kawakami Kyoshi 河上清 Kesang Tsering 格桑澤仁 KMT (Kuomintang) 國民黨 Koncho Chungnay 貢覺仲尼 H.H. Kung (Kong Xiangxi) 孔祥熙 Kublai Khan 忽必烈 Kumbum Monastery 塔爾寺 Labrang Monastery 拉卜楞寺 Legislative Yuan 立法院 Li Fenggang (Mandaltan) 李鳳崗 Li Mi 李彌 Li Tiezheng 李鐵錚 Li Xiaotian 李笑天 Li Yuanhong 黎元洪 Li Zongren 李宗仁 Liang Changpei 梁長培 Lifanyuan 理藩院 Liu Bocheng 劉伯承 Liu Kuiyi 劉揆一 Liu Wenhui 劉文輝 Liu Xiang 劉湘 Lobsang Gyentsen 羅桑堅贊 Lu Tonglung 呂同崙 Luo Wen’gan 羅文榦 Ma Bufang 馬步芳


126 Glossary of names and terms Ma Buqing 馬步青 Ma Dunjing 馬惇靖 Ma Fuliang 馬賦良 Ma Hongbin 馬鴻賓 Ma Hongkui 馬鴻逵 Ma Hushan 馬虎山 Ma Liang 馬良 Ma Lin 馬麟 Ma Qi 馬麒 Ma Yuanxiang 馬元祥 Ma Zhongying 馬仲英 Mahmūd Muhītī 麻木提 Mao Zedong 毛澤東 Masud 麥斯武德 Matsunaga Anzaemon 松永安左衛門 Meng Zang Xuexiao 蒙藏學校 Meng Zang Yuan 蒙藏院 Menggu Difang Zizhi Zhengwu Weiyuanhui 蒙古地方自治政務委員會 Menggu Huiyi 蒙古會議 Military Affairs Commission 軍事委員會 Minchuan Bao 民權報 Minjur Hutuktu 敏珠爾呼圖克圖 Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission 蒙藏委員會 Muhammad Amīn Bughra 伊敏 National Defense Planning Committee 國防設計委員會 Ngachen Hutuktu 安欽呼圖克圖 Ninghai Army 寧海軍 Norla Hutuktu 諾那呼圖克圖 Northwestern Reclamation Committee 西北拓殖委員會 Osman Bator 烏斯滿 Palgonchrinle 華爾功成烈 Pandatsang Rapga 邦達饒幹 Phagspa 八思巴 Qali Beg 哈力別克 Radreng Hutuktu 熱振呼圖克圖 ryo yu 領有 Sha Wang (Shagdurjab) 沙王 Shen Zonglian 沈宗濂 Sheng Shicai 盛世才 Shi Qingyang 石青陽 Shi Wang (Shirabdorji) 石王 Shunzhi 順治 Song Jiaoren 宋教仁 Su Yonghe 蘇永和 Sun Dianying 孫殿英


Glossary of names and terms 127 Sun Fo (Sun Ke) 孫科 T.V. Soong 宋子文 Ta Wang (Lhawangburugjil) 塔王 Tao Mingyue 陶明樾 Tao Zhiyue 陶峙岳 tebie quyu 特別區域 Tian Songyao 田頌堯 tonghua 同化 Tongmenghui 同盟會 Tu Wang (Tobshinbayar) 圖王 Ulanfu 烏蘭夫 Waijiaobu (Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs) 外交部 Wang Chonghui 王寵惠 Wang Jingwei 汪精衛 Weng Wenhao 翁文灝 Wu Huanzhang 吳章煥 Wu Peifu 吳佩孚 wuzu gonghe 五族共和 Xi Jing 西京 Xibei Gonglunshe 西北公論社 Xibei Gongxueshe 西北公學社 Xibei Wenti Yanjiuhui 西北問題研究會 Xibei Xieshe 西北協社 Xin Qing bianqu 新青邊區 xingzheng ducha zhuanyuan qu 行政督察專員區 Xingzhonghui 興中會 Xinjiang Jianshe Jihua Weiyuanhui 新疆建設計劃委員會 Xinjiang Tunken Jun 新疆屯墾軍 xinzheng 新政 Xiong Shihui 熊式輝 Xu Xiangqian 徐向前 Xu Yongchang 徐永昌 Yan Xishan 閻錫山 Yang Du 楊度 Yang Hucheng 楊虎城 Yang Yong 楊勇 Yang Zengxin 楊增新 Yin Changheng 尹昌衡 Yolbas Khan 堯樂博士 Yonghegong 雍和宮 Yu Lanze (Bayantai) 于蘭澤 Yuan Shikai 袁世凱 Yun Wang (Yondonwangchug) 雲王 Zhang Guotao 張國燾 Zhang Peiyuan 張培元


128 Glossary of names and terms Zhang Qun 張群 Zhang Xueliang 張學良 Zhang Zuolin 張作霖 Zhang Zhizhong 張治中 Zhao Xiguang 趙錫光 Zheng Xue Xi 政學系 zhongzu 種族 Zhu Shaoliang 朱紹良 zijue 自決 zizhi 自治 Zuo Jiren 左極仁 Zuo Zongtang 左宗棠


Notes

Prologue 1 Mao Renfeng (Head of Military Intelligence Bureau of Ministry of National Defense) to Chiang Kai-shek, February 29, 1952, TD/JMBZ, vol. 103, no. 58121. 2 A 1951 Nationalist intelligence report indicates that the total anti-Communist irregulars in China’s far northwest amounted to 130,000. This figure, albeit lacking empirical accuracy, provided the Nationalists in Taiwan with enough confidence to revive their hope of establishing a power base in the northwest. See Daily Information from the Sixth Commission of the KMT Central Reform Committee, February 9, 1951, TD/ YZ/1951, vol. 1, no. 39122. 3 Mao Renfeng to Chiang Kai-shek, May 7, 1952, TD/JMBZ, vol. 103, no. 58123. 4 J. Brown, “From Resisting Communists to Resisting America: Civil War and Korean War in Southwest China, 1950–51,” in J. Brown and P. Pickowicz, eds., Dilemmas of Victory: The Early Years of the People’s Republic of China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007), pp. 105–29. 5 Lai Mingtang (Head of G-2, Ministry of National Defense) to Chiang Kai-shek, April 25, 1952, TD/JMBZ, vol. 103, no. 58125; Chiang’s instruction to Yang Yong as commander-in-chief of Southwestern Anti-Communist National Salvation Army, May 1, 1952, TD/JMBZ, vol. 103, no. 58124. It should be noted that whether Chiang’s secret agents had exaggerated their secret approaches toward Yang remains open to careful examination. 6 Brown, “From Resisting Communists to Resisting America,” pp. 116–17. 7 See, for example, Chung Chien-peng, Domestic Politics, International Bargaining and China’s Territorial Disputes (London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2004); M. Fravel, Strong Borders, Secure Nation: Cooperation and Conflict in China’s Territorial Disputes (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008). 8 On the Qing territorial expansion into Inner Asia, see, for example, J. Millward, Beyond the Pass: Economy, Ethnicity and Empire in Qing Xinjiang, 1759–1864 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998); P. Perdue, China Marches West: The Qing Conquest of Central Eurasia (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2005); J. Fletcher, “Ch’ing Inner Asia c.1800,” in J. Fairbank and D. Twitchett, eds., Cambridge History of China, vol. 10, part 1, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978), pp. 35–106. 9 On the Qing world order and its dual dynastic system, see: J. Fairbank, ed., The Chinese World Order: Traditional China’s Foreign Relations (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1968). 10 On the success of Manchu rule in China proper and the ethnic frontiers, see: J. Hevia, Cherishing Men From Afar: Qing Guest Ritual and the Macartney Embassy of 1793 (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1995); E. Rawski, The Last Emperors: A Social History of Qing Imperial Institutions (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998);


130 Notes P. Crossley, The Manchus (Oxford: Blackwell, 1997); M. Elliott, The Manchu Way: The Eight Banners and Ethnic Identity in Late Imperial China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001); Chen-main Wang, “Meiyou Jiaoji de Duihua: Lun Jinnianlai Xuejie dui Manzu Hanhua zhi Zhengyi (A Dialogue without Focus: Review of the Recent Debate on Manchu Sinicination),” in Wong Young-tsu and Lin Guanqun, eds., Huren Hanhua yu Hanren Huhua (Collected Essays on Sinocization and De- sinocization) (Chiayi, Taiwan: The Taiwan Institute for the Humanities, National Chung Cheng University, 2006), pp. 57–81. 11 This character is well demonstrated in L. Newby’s work on Qing’s relations with Central Asian khanate of Khoqand. See L. Newby, The Empire and the Khanate: A Political History of Qing Relations with Khoqand, c.1760–1860 (Leiden: Brill, 2005). 12 On the zhongzu discourse in the early period of the Chinese Revolution, see: F. Dikötter, The Discourse of Race in Modern China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992); Chen Shaobai, “Xingzhonghui Geming Shiyao (A Concise History of the Revolution of the Revive China Society),” in China Historical Association, ed., Xinghai Geming (The 1911 Chinese Revolution) (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1957), vol. 1, pp. 21–76. 13 Shending Yingfu (Fukamachi Hideo), Jindai Guangdong de Zhengdang, Shehui, Guojia: Zhongguo Guomindang ji qi Dangguo Tizhi de Xingcheng Guocheng (Political Party, Society, and Nation in Modern Guangdong Province: The KMT and the Formation of its Party-State System) (Beijing: Shehui kexue chubanshe, 2003), esp. chapter 1. 14 J. Millward, “A Uyghur Muslim in Qianlong’s Court: The Meanings of the Fragrant Concubine,” Journal of Asian Studies, vol. 53, no. 2 (1994), p. 446. 15 O. Lattimore, Studies in Frontier History: Collected Papers, 1928–1958 (Paris: Mouton, 1962). 16 This historical feature is admirably demonstrated in J. Leibold’s work, in which he describes the Qing Empire, including its frontier and indigenes, as “imprimatur” for the construction of modern Chinese nationalities and territoriality. See Leibold, Reconfiguring Chinese Nationalism: How the Qing Frontier and its Indigenes Became Chinese (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), pp. 24–9. 17 On the traditional Chinese frontier politics and policy making, see also A. Waldron, The Great Wall of China: From History to Myth (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990). 18 J. LeDonne, The Russian Empire and the World, 1700–1917: The Geopolitics of Expansion and Containment (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), pp. 368–9. 19 Teiwes, “The Establishment and Consolidation of the New Regime, 1949–57,” in R. MacFarqhar, ed., The Politics of China, Second Edition: The Eras of Mao and Deng (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), p. 52. 20 Discussions on the KMT general national minority policy can be found, for example, in: J. Dreyer, China’s Forty Millions: Minority Nationalities and National Integrity in the People’s Republic of China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1976), pp. 15–41; L. Benson, The Ili Rebellion: The Moslem Challenge to Chinese Authority in Xinjiang 1944–1949 (New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1990), pp. 10–18; C. Mackerras, China’s Minorities: Integration and Mobilization in the Twentieth Century (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1994), pp. 54–61; Xiaoyuan Liu, Frontier Passages: Ethnopolitics and the Rise of Chinese Communism, 1921–1945 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2004), pp. 21–5. 21 W. Kirby, “The Internationalization of China: Foreign Relations at Home and Abroad in the Republican Era,” in F. Wakeman, Jr. and R. Edmonds, eds., Reappraising Republican China (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), pp. 183–5. 22 J. Esherick, “How the Qing Became China,” in Esherick, H. Kayali and E. Young, eds., Empire to Nation: Historical Perspectives on the Making of the Modern World (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2006), pp. 321–67.

Notes 131


1 Early years and early strategies 1 E. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k’ai: Liberalism and Dictatorship in Early Republican China (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1977), pp. 52–9. 2 For a careful consideration of race and revolution in late Qing and early Republican China, see P. Crossley, A Translucent Mirror: History and Identity in Qing Imperial Ideology (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999), pp. 337–61. 3 Wang Jingwei, “Minzu de Guomin (Nationals of the Nations),” in Zhang Nan and Wang Renzhi, eds., Xinhai Gemin qian Shinianjian Shilun Xuanji (Selected Works on Current Events during the Ten-Year Period before the 1911 Revolution) (Beijing: Sanlian shuju, 1963), vol. 2, no. 1, pp. 82–113. 4 Yang Tianshi, “Cong ‘Pai Man Geming’ dao ‘Lian Man Geming’ (From ‘Driving out the Manchus to Revolt’ to ‘Uniting the Manchus to Revolt’),” in Yang, ed., Minguo Zhanggu (The Anecdotes of Republican China) (Beijing: Zhongguo qingnian chubanshe, 1993), pp. 19–21. 5 This idea was best illustrated in Sun Yat-sen’s presidential inaugural in early 1912. See KMT Historical Committee, ed., Geming Wenxian (Documents of the Revolution), vol. 69 (Taipei: KMT Historical Committee, 1976), pp. 25–6. A detailed discussion on the debate among the revolutionaries on nationality issues during the Tongmeng Hui period can also be found in Li Yunhan, Zhongguo Guomindang Shishu (A Historical Narrative of the KMT) (Taipei: KMT Historical Committee, 1996), vol. 1, pp. 199–260. 6 Zou Lu, Zhongguo Guomindang Shigao (Draft History of the KMT) (Shanghai: Commercial Publishing Ltd., 1938), p. 128; Li, Zhongguo Guomindang Shishu, vol. 2, p. 87. 7 For a detailed discussion on the Mongolian question throughout the Chinese Republic, especially how war, revolution, and great-power rivalries played crucial roles on the formation of Chinese nationhood and territoriality, see Xiaoyuan Liu, Reins of Liberation: An Entangled History of Mongolian Independence, Chinese Territoriality, and Great Power Hegemony, 1911–1950 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2006). 8 C. Bawden, The Modern History of Mongolia (London: Kegan Paul International, 1989), pp. 187–90. 9 Baabar, Twentieth Century Mongolia (Cambridge: White Horse Press, 1999), pp. 148–54. 10 Chiang Kai-shek, “Zheng Meng Zuozhan Chuyi (My Preliminary Opinions about Launching a Military Campaign against Outer Mongolia),” December 1912, in ZJSYZ, vol. 35, pp. 37–55. 11 See: Dai Chuanxian, “Zheng Meng yu Ju E (Conquering the Mongols and Defending the Russians),” dated October 29 and November 3, 1912, and his “Mengshi zhong di Bamianguang (Various Perspectives on the Mongolian issue),” dated November 18, 1912, in Tang Wenquan and Sang Bin, eds., Dai Jitao Ji (The Collected Works of Mr. Dai Jitao) (Wuchang: Huazhong shifang daxue chubanshe, 1990), pp. 539–55. 12 On the late Qing reform programs in the Kham region, see: E. Sperling, “The Chinese Venture in K’am,” Tibet Journal, 1: 2 (1976), pp. 10–36. 13 On the Sino-Tibetan relationship in the early Republican period, see: A. Lamb, Tibet, China and India 1914–1950: A History of Imperial Diplomacy (Hertfordshire, England: Roxford Books, 1989); M. Goldstein, A History of Modern Tibet, 1913–1951: The Demise of the Lamaist State (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989). 14 On the Simla Talks of 1913–14, see A. Lamb, The McMahon Line: A Study in the Relations between India, China and Tibet, 1904–1914 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1966). 15 See Wang Gengxiong, ed., Sun Zhongshan Shishi Xianglu (1911–1913) (Detailed Historical Records of Sun Yat-sen, (1911–1913)) (Tianjin: Tianjin renmin chubanshe,


132 Notes 1986), pp. 325–32. On Sun Yat-sen’s idea of modernizing and developing China’s ethnic frontiers, see also: Jin Chongji, Sun Zhongshan he Xinhai Geming (Sun Yat- sen and the 1911 Revolution) (Guangzhou: Guangdong renmin chubanshe, 1996), pp. 230–44; Lin Jiayou, Sun Zhongshan yu Zhongguo Jindaihua Daolu Yanjiu (A Study of Sun Yat-sen and China’s Approaches to Modernization) (Guangzhou: Guangdong jiaoyu chubanshe, 1999), pp. 512–32. 16 Chiang, “Meng Zang Wenti zhi Genben Jiejue (The Complete Settlement of Mongolian and Tibetan Questions),” in ZJSYZ, vol. 35, pp. 16–22. 17 Dai, “Chuan Dian Bianfang Wenti (Issues Relating to the Border Defenses of Sichuan and Yunnan),” in Dai Jitao Ji, pp. 412–14. 18 The intricate interrelation between Yuan Shikai’s government and the provincial authorities in the southwest concerning the Tibetan issues are revealed in a series of telegram exchanges between the two sides. See Minyuan Zangshi Diangao (A Compilation of Telegrams relating to Tibetan Affairs in the First Year of the Republic of China) (Lhasa: Xizang renmin chubanshe, 1982). 19 Kang Youwei, “Meng Zang Aici (Elegy for Mongolia and Tibet),” in Jingshi Wenshe, ed., Mingguo Jingshi Wenbian (Collections of the Republican Statecraft) (Taipei: Wenhai chubanshe, 1971 reprint), vol. 5, p. 2235. 20 See: Zhang Nanxian, “Dudufu zhi Zuzhi Shezhi ji Renxuan (The Organization and Personnel of the Wuchang Military Government),” in China Historical Association, ed., Xinhai Geming, vol. 5, p. 208; Cao Yabo, “Wuchang Qiyi (The Wuchang Uprising),” ibid., pp. 151–3. 21 Shang Binghe, “Beijing Zhengfu Chengli (The Establishment of the Peking Government),” in Xinghai Geming, (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1957), vol. 8, pp. 541–3. 22 See: Guo Tingyi, Jindai Zhongguo Shigang (The Essence of Modern Chinese History) (Hong Kong: Chinese University of Hong Kong Press, 1986), pp. 399–402; Guan Dulu, ed., “Nanbei Yihe Shiliao (Source Materials Relating to the Peace Conference between the South and the North),” in Xinhai Geming, vol. 8, pp. 69–102. 23 See: Xu Shishen, ed., Guofu Dangxuan Linshi Dazongtong Shilu (Veritable Records of the Election of Sun Yat-sen as Provisional President) (Taipei: Guoshi conglunshe, 1967), vol. 2, pp. 201–59; Pu Wei, “Rangguo Yuqian Huiyi Riji (Daily Records of the Imperial Meetings to Concede the Dynasty),” in Xinhai Geming, vol. 8, pp. 110–5; Gan Yi, “Xinhai Heyi zhi Mishi (A Secret History of the 1911 Peace Conference),” ibid., pp. 116–19. 24 Xie Bin, “Minguo Zhengdang shi (A History of Republican China’s Political Parties),” in Xinhai Geming, vol. 8, pp. 578–82. 25 M. Bergère, Sun Yat-sen (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998), pp. 269–76; Jin, Sun Zhongshan he Xinhai Geming, pp. 288–320. 26 See Sun’s conversation with the well-known Japanese socialist Kawakami Kyoshi, dated September 15, 1917, in Chen Xulu and Hao Shengchao, eds., Sun Zhongshan Jiwaiji (Supplementary Collections of Sun Yat-sen) (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1990), p. 228. 27 Ibid., p. 236. See also Chen Xiqi, ed., Sun Zhongshan Nianpu Changbian (Chronological Biography of Sun Yat-sen) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1991), p. 1133; Yang Tianshi, “Sun Zhongshan yu ‘Zurang Manzhou’ Wenti (Sun Yat-sen and the Question of ‘Conceding Manchuria’),” in Yang, ed., Cong Dizhi Zouxiang Gonghe (From Monarchy to Republic) (Beijing: Shehui kexue wenxian chubanshe, 2002), pp. 273–89. The availability of new evidence showing Sun Yat-sen’s conciliatory stance toward Republican China’s frontier issues has invited many Chinese scholars to reevaluate Sun’s position in modern China, as well as the nature of the 1911 Revolution. See, for example, Yuan Weishi, Wan Qing Dabianju zhong di Sichao yu Renwu (Thoughts and Figures in the Late Qing Revolution) (Shenzhen: Haitian chubanshe, 1992). 28 Lamb, Tibet, China and India 1914–1950, pp. 1–21.


Notes 133 29 See MTAC’s compiled source materials concerning the British policy toward Tibet and the tripartite talks at Simla, in YXZG, vol. 6, pp. 2419–22. 30 Goldstein, A History of Modern Tibet, pp. 74–5. 31 Unpublished manuscript on Tibetan affairs by Shi Qingyang (Head of MTAC), May 1933, TD/XW, vol. 58, 4/11–4/14. 32 On the Chinese perception of the Simla talk based on abundant Chinese archival materials, see Feng Minzhu, Jindai Zhong-Ying XizangJiaoshe yu Chuan-Zang Bianqing (Sino-British Negotiations over the Tibetan Issue and the Sichuan–Tibetan Border Situation in the Modern Era) (Taipei: National Palace Museum, 1996), pp. 307–50. 33 Zhang Qixiong, Wai Menggu Zhuquan Guishu Jiaoshe, 1911–1916 (Disputes and Negotiations over Outer Mongolia’s National Identity, Unification or Independence, and Sovereignty, 1911–1916) (Taipei: Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica, 1995), esp. chapter 2; Baabar, Twentieth Century Mongolia, pp. 154–5. 34 Ibid., pp. 162–7; R. Rupen, How Mongolia is Really Ruled: A Political History of the Mongolian People’s Republic, 1900–1978 (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1979), pp. 5–22. 35 On Miller’s account on the Kiakhta talks, see G. Friters, “The Prelude to Outer Mongolian Independence,” in Pacific Affairs, vol. 10, no. 2 (1937), pp. 168–89. 36 M. Wilbur, Sun Yat-sen: Frustrated Patriot (New York: Columbia University Press, 1976), pp. 29–30. 37 Ibid., pp. 31–2; Bergère, Sun Yat-sen, pp. 294–304. 38 Sun Yat-sen, Memoirs of a Chinese Revolutionary (Taipei: China Cultural Service, 1953), p. 80. 39 Liu Xueyao, Waimenggu Wenti (The Outer Mongolian Question) (Taipei: SMC Publishing Ltd., 2001), pp. 30–7; Bawden, The Modern History of Mongolia, pp. 193–235. 40 A full account of this border conflict can be found in E. Teichman, Travels of a Consular Officer in Eastern Tibet (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1922). Teichman, then serving as British consular agent at Kangding (Dartsedo), stepped in and negotiated a ceasefire for the Tibetans and the Chinese. 41 C. Bell, Portrait of a Dalai Lama: The Life and Times of the Great Thirteenth (London: Wisdom Publications, 1987), pp. 245–8; Feng, Jindai Zhong-Ying Xizang Jiaoshe, pp. 408–11. On the Gansu mission’s report of its trip to Lhasa, see YXZG, vol. 6, pp. 2453–6. 42 Baabar, Twentieth Century Mongolia, pp. 207–26. 43 Yin Chengshan and Feng Yachun, Sun Zhongshan yu Zhongguo Guomindang (Sun Yat-sen and the KMT) (Changchun: Jilin wenshi chubanshe, 1991), pp. 372–83; Zhang Lei, Sun Zhongshan Pingzhuan (A Critical Biography of Sun Yat-sen) (Guangzhou: Guangzhou chubanshe, 2000), pp. 130–46. 44 Sun Yat-sen, Sun Zhongshan Quanji (Collected Works of Sun Yat-sen) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1985), vol. 7, pp. 51–2; Chen, ed., Sun Zhongshan Nianpu Changbian, p. 1564. 45 Wilbur, Sun Yat-sen, p. 152. On Sun’s keen overture-making to the Soviets, including a possible military cooperation between Canton and Moscow, see also G-2 Report entitled “Russia in the Chinese Nationalist Movement,” June 2, 1927, in USMIR, reel 10. 46 Li Yuzhen, ed., Ma Lin yu Diyici Guogong Hezuo (Maring and the First Kuomintang- Communist Cooperation) (Beijing: Guangming ribao chubanshe, 1989), pp. 171–4; Chen, ed., Sun Zhongshan Nianpu Changbian, pp. 1623–4. 47 Chiang Kai-shek’s memorandum entitled “New Prospects of the Chinese Revolution,” September 1923, quoted from Yang Tianshi, “Yi-jiu-er-san nian Jiang Jieshi di Sulian zhi xing ji qi Junshi Jihua (Chiang Kai-shek’s 1923 Trip to Soviet Russia and his Military Plan),” in Yang, ed., Jiangshi Midang yu Jiang Jieshi Zhenxiang (The Secret Files and the Truth of Chiang Kai-shek) (Beijing: Shehui kexue wenxian chubanshe, 2002), pp. 93–4.


134 Notes 48 See: Chiang Kai-shek’s diary, entries for October 5 and 6, 1923, CKSD, Box 4; Mao Sicheng comp., Minguo Shiwu Nian Yiqian zhi Jiang Jieshi Xiansheng (Mr. Chiang Kai-shek before 1926) (Chongqing, 1936), pp. 223–4 and 231; Qin Xiaoyi comp., Zhongtong Jianggong Dashi Changbian Chugao (The Preliminary Draft of Collected Materials Describing the Activities of President Chiang Kai-shek), vol. 1 (Taipei: KMT Historical Committee, 1978), p. 62. 49 Memorandum of miscellaneous information obtained by Major Phillon (US Legation in Peking) on a trip to northwest China, dated January 18, 1923, in USMIR, reel 4. 50 N. Mitarevsky, World Wide Soviet Plots (Tientsin: Tientsin Press, 1927), pp. 130–1. For a general discussion on Soviet policy toward China during 1923–7, see also E. Carr, The Russian Revolution From Lenin to Stalin 1927–1929 (London: Macmillan, 1979), pp. 95–105. 51 See Chiang’s diary, entries for November 11, 12, 28 and 29, 1923, CKSD, Box 4. See also Yang, “Yi-jiu-er-san nian Jiang Jieshi di Sulian zhi xing ji qi Junshi Jihua,” pp. 102–5. 52 M. Wilbur and Julie Lien-ying How, eds., Documents on Communism, Nationalism, and Soviet Advisers in China 1918–1927 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1956), pp. 143–4. 53 On Sun’s statement in the KMT First National Congress, see Sun Zhongshan Quanji, vol. 2, p. 525. On the shift of Sun’s ethnic minority policies, see Mackerras, China’s Minorities, pp. 53–6. 54 The Editorial Board of the Lingnan Collections and the Association of Promoting the Chinese Nation and Culture Guangdong, eds., Sun Zhongshan Wencui (The Essential Writings of Sun Yat-sen) (Guangzhou: Guangdong renmin chubanshe, 1996), vol. 2, p. 688. 55 On the Nationalist advocacy of the Mongolian independence in the early 1920s, see Ao Guangxu, “Yi-jiu-er-ling Niandai Guonei Menggu Wenti zhi Zheng (Controversies over the Mongolia Issue in China in the 1920s),” in Jindaishi Yanjiu (Modern Chinese History Studies) (Beijing) vol. 4 (2007), pp. 55–73. 56 Sun Zihe, “Minguo Shisan nian yilai zhi Zhongguo Guomindang yu Xizang (The Relationship between KMT and Tibet since 1924),” in Sun, Xizang Yanjiu Lunji (Collected Papers on Tibetan Studies) (Taipei: Taiwan Commercial Publishing Ltd., 1989) p. 91; Zou, Zhongguo Guomindang Shigao, pp. 379–80. 57 On Bai’s relations with the KMT, see Sechin Jagchid, “Ershi Niandai de Neimenggu Guomindang (The Inner Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party in the 1920s),” in Zhongguo Bianzheng (China’s Frontier Politics) (Taipei), vol. 96 (1986), pp. 9–17. 58 On the IMPRP and its relations with the KMT in the 1920s, see C. Atwood, Young Mongols and Vigilantes in Inner Mongolia’s Interregnum Decades, 1911–1931 (Leiden: Brill, 2002), pp. 77–113. 59 “Memorandum on China,” prepared by US War Department, February 1929, in USMIR, reel 4. On the Northern Expedition and its historical significance of modern China’s social and political mobilization, see also D. Jordan, The Northern Expedition: China’s National Revolution of 1926–1928 (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1976), and H. Van de Ven, War and Nationalism in China, 1925–1945 (London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2003), pp. 94–130. 60 Li Yunhan, ed., Zhongguo Guomindang Yibai Zhounian Dashi Nianbiao (Chronological Events of the 100-Year Anniversary of the KMT) (Taipei: KMT Historical Committee, 1994), vol. 1, pp. 221–2; E. Moise, Modern China: A History (New York: Longman, 1991), pp. 63–6. 61 Qin comp., Zhongtong Jianggong Dashi Changbian Chugao, vol. 1, pp. 232–3. On the final stage of the Northern Expedition, see Lloyd E. Eastman, Jerome Ch’en, Suzanne Pepper, Lyman P. Van Slyke, The Nationalist Era in China 1927–1949 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), esp. chapter 1.


Notes 135 62 Cao Jianlang, Guomindangjun Jianshi (A Concise History of the Nationalist Army) (Beijing: Jiefangjun chubanshe, 2004), vol. 1, pp. 51–61. 63 “A Proposal of Initiating Party Affairs in the Guominjun of the Northwest,” submitted by Xu Qian, dated September 11, 1926, in Second Historical Archives of China, ed., Zhongguo Guomindang Zhongyang Zhixing Weiyuanhui Changwu Weiyuanhui Huiyilu (Minutes of the Standing Committee of the KMT Central Executive Committee) (Guilin: Guangxi shifan daxue chubanshe, 2000), vol. 3, pp. 223–4. 64 See Minutes of the Fifty-fourth Meeting of the Nationalist State Council, dated April 13, 1928, in Hong Ximei, ed., Guomin Zhengfu Weiyuanhui Huiyi Jilu Huibian (A Compilation of Minutes of the State Council of the Nationalist Government) (Taipei: Academia Historica, 1999), vol. 2, p. 215. 65 Minutes of the Eightieth Meeting of the Nationalist State Council, dated July 17, 1928, ibid., p. 356. 66 Zhou Kuntian, Sanmin Zhuyi de Bianjiang Zhengce (Frontier Policies under the Three People’s Principle) (Taipei: MTAC, 1969), pp. 24–5. 2 Frontier politics in metropolitan China 1 Eastman et al., The Nationalist Era in China, p. 9. 2 Hung-mao Tien, “Factional Politics in Kuomintang China, 1928–1937: An Interpretation,” in F. Gilbert Chan, ed., China at the Crossroads: Nationalists and Communists, 1927–1949 (Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1980), pp. 19–36. 3 Annual Report of Events in China for the year 1929, Sir Miles Lampson (British Minister to China) to Foreign Office, dated June 25, 1930, pp. 2–3, in FO 371/14740 F4284/2826/10. 4 Report from John MacMurray (US Minister to China) to State Department, March 18, 1929, in FRUS 1929, vol. II, pp. 141–4. 5 On Feng Yuxiang and the Guominjun, see Gao Xingya, Feng Yuxiang Jiangjun (Marshal Feng Yuxiang) (Beijing: Beijing chubanshe, 1980), pp. 127–56. On Yan Xishan, see Jiang Shunxing and Li Liangyu, Shanxi Wang Yan Xishan (Yan Xishan: The Master of Shansi) (Kaifeng: Henan renmin chubanshe, 1990), pp. 92–111. On the southwestern provincial warlords in the late 1920s, see R. Kapp, Szechwan and Chinese Republic: Provincial Militarism and Central Power, 1911–1938 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1973), pp. 62–86. 6 “China (Military): Situation report on Manchuria,” by US War Department, dated January 1, 1929, in USMIR, reel 8. 7 A. Forbes, Warlords and Muslims in Chinese Central Asia: A Political History of Republican Sinkiang 1911–1949 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), pp. 33–41; Chen Huisheng and Chen Chao, Minguo Xinjiang Shi (A history of Republican Xinjiang) (Urumqi: Xinjiang renmin chubanshe, 1999), pp. 221–54. 8 On Sino-Tibetan relations in the early Chinese Republican period, see Goldstein, A History of Modern Tibet, esp. chapter 7. On Sino-Mongolian interactions in the 1910s and 1920s, see Bawden, The Modern History of Mongolia, esp. chapters 5 and 6. 9 “Miscellaneous Notes on Military Activities in China,” prepared by Major John Magruder, Military Attaché in China, dated September 18, 1928, in USMIR, reel 8; “China (Military): Situation Report,” US War Department, dated June 5, 1929, ibid. 10 Academia Sinica, ed., Jiang Zhongzhen Zongtong Dang’an: Shilue Gaoben (The Chiang Kai-shek Collections: The Chronological Events), vol. 5 (Taipei: Academia Sinica, 2003), pp. 146–7. 11 Zhongyang Zhoubao (KMT Central Weekly) (Nanking), no. 20 (October 22, 1928), pp. 4–5. 12 “Political Resolutions on Mongolian, Tibetan and Xinjiang Affairs,” KMT Central Executive Committee, March 27, 1929, in ZMDZH, vol. 5, no. 1, Politics (2), pp. 84–5.


136 Notes 13 Regarding petitions made by the Mongols, see: Zhang Ji (Member of the KMT Central Committee) to Chiang Kai-shek, November 16, 1928; “Petition by the Aokhan Banner to the KMT Central Executive Committee,” February 7, 1929; Chiang Kai-shek to De Wang (Prince of Silingol League), May 22, 1929, in ZMDZH, vol. 5, no.1, Politics (5), pp. 39–41. 14 See, for example, H. Richardson, Tibetan Précis (Calcutta: Government of India, 1945), pp. 36–7, in OIOC, L/P&S/20/D222; Lamb, Tibet, China and India, pp. 191–3; W. Smith Jr., Tibetan Nation: A History of Tibetan Nationalism and Sino-Tibetan Relations (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1998), pp. 226–30. 15 See Guo Qingyou, “Minguo Zangshi Tongjian Bianzhuan Lungang: Jinxiandai Minzushi Yanjiuzhong de jige Lilun Wenti de Tantao (The Main Theme for Compiling A General Examination of Republican China’s Tibetan Affairs: A Discussion of the Theories of Modern and Contemporary National Minority Historical Studies),” in Zhongguo Bianzheng (China’s frontier politics) (Taipei), no. 128 (June 1995), pp. 24–35. 16 See J. Tighe, Constructing Suiyuan: The Politics of Northwestern Territory and Development in Early Twentieth-Century China (Leiden: Brill, 2005). 17 On the intricate relationship between Chiang Kai-shek and the northern warlords, see Liu Ji, “Jiang-Feng-Yan Guanxi he Zhongyuan Dazhan (The Relationship between Chiang Kai-shek, Feng Yuxiang and Yan Xishan and the Central Plain War),” in Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji (Selections of literary and historical materials), ser. 4, vol. 16 (1986), pp. 1–31. 18 Yan Xishan to Wang Jiexia (Secretary-General of Suiyuan Provincial Government), January 26, 1929, YXSP, 20200013A, 90/1247; Yang Aiyuan (Governor of Chahar Province) to Yan, January 30, 1929, ibid., 90/1247–90/1248. 19 Wang Ping (Director of MTAC Branch Office in Peking) to Yan Xishan, September 15, 1929, YXSP, 20200013A, 90/1278–1279; Yan to Wang, September 16, 1929, ibid., 90/1278. 20 For a succinct account of how the Inner Mongols had gradually lost their land and other privileges to the Han Chinese since late Qing period, see U. Bulag, The Mongols at China’s Edge: History and the Politics of National Unity (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2002), pp. 105–35. 21 Hong, ed., Guomin Zhengfu Weiyuanhui Huiyi Jilu Huibian, vol. 2, pp. 481–2. 22 Liu Xueyao, Meng Zang Weiyuanhui Jianshi Xubian (The Second Compendium of the Concise History of the MTAC) (Taipei: MTAC, 1996), p. 12. 23 Yan Xishan to MTAC, September 25, 1929, YXSP, 20200013A, 90/1306; Confidential letter from MTAC Branch Office in Peking to Yan, September 27, 1929, ibid., 90/1307. 24 “China: Annual Report 1930,” pp. 2–10, enclosed in Lampson to Foreign Office, dated July 23, 1931, FO 371/15838 F5633/1672/10. On the Peking “Enlarged Conference” and Yan’s role in it, see Zhou Dai, “Yan Xishan Fadong Fan Jiang Zhongyuan Dazhan Gaishu (A General Discussion on Yan Xishan’s Launching anti-Chiang Kai- shek Civil War),” in Literary and History Materials Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, ed., Jiang Jieshi yu ge Paixi Junfa Douzheng Neimu (Inside Stories of the Power Struggles between Chiang Kai-shek and Various Warlord Factions) (Beijing: Zhongguo wenshi chubanshe, 2001), pp. 1–20. 25 Liu, Meng Zang Weiyuanhui Jianshi Xubian, pp. 11–3; Zhongyang Zhoubao, no. 104 (June 2, 1930), p. 24. 26 Reports from Liu Puchen (Counselor of MTAC) to Yan Xishan, August 23 and 31, 1929, YXSP, 20200013A, 90/1254–1258; Zhongyang Zhoubao, New year supplementary, (January 1930), pp. 81–6. 27 Jiang Xingde, “Meng Zang Wenti yu Meng Zang Huiyi (Mongolian–Tibetan Issues and the Mongolian and Tibetan Conference),” Dongfang Zazhi (Eastern Miscellany)


Notes 137 vol. 27, no. 6 (March 1930), pp. 21–31. Chiang Kai-shek himself was so concerned about the propagandistic effect of this conference that he instructed his officials to welcome the Inner Mongol attendants with greatest pomp and honor. See Chiang to Tan Yankai (Premier of Nationalist Government), May 1930, CB, 03–0036. 28 Zhongyang Zhoubao, no. 103 (May 26, 1930), pp. 5–7; no. 104 (June 2, 1930), p. 24; Boyan Mandu (Buyanmandukhu), “Wo Canjia Nanjing Menggu Huiyi di Huiyi (My Recollections about Participating in the Nanking Mongolian Affairs Conference),” in Neimenggu Wenshi Ziliao (Selections from Inner Mongolian Literary and Historical Materials), vol. 16 (1985), p. 151. 29 Observation report by the Office of Military Attaché, US Legation in China (Peking), dated July 1, 1930, USMIR, reel 8; “China (Military): Situation Reports,” by War Department, received June 24, and July 14, 1930, ibid. 30 Wang Xiang, ed., Yan Xishan yu Jinxi (Yan Xishan and the Shanxi Clique) (Nanjing: Jiangsu guji chubanshe, 1999), pp. 120–40; Yong Gang and Jun Cai, Feng Yuxiang yu Jiang Jieshi─ Cong Baxiongdi dao Sididui (Feng Yuxiang and Chiang Kai-shek: from Sworn Brothers to Deadly Enemies) (Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian chubanshe, 2000), pp. 305–25. 31 For a discussion about Chiang Kai-shek’s relations with his warlord-turnedNationalist subordinates in north and northwest China, see: Guo Xuyin, ed., Guomindang Paixi Douzhengshi (A History of KMT’s Internal Power Struggles) (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1992); Wu Wanshan and Zhang Yufeng, Xibei Jindai Shilue (A Concise History of Modern Northwest China) (Lanzhou: Gansu renmin chubanshe, 1991). 32 This mindset was best revealed in a confidential survey report by Chen Cheng, one of Chiang Kai-shek’s most trusted military strategists in the early Nationalist era. See Chen to Chiang concerning the situation in the Northwest, dated June 25, 1931, in Shih-sou Collections, Telegram (Jia Group), pp. 24–9. 33 See: MTAC, ed., Menggu Huiyi Huibian (Compilation of the Mongolian Conference) (Nanking: MTAC, 1930), part ii, pp. 1–53; Huang Fensheng, ed., Meng Zang Xinzhi (New Gazetteer of Mongolia and Tibet) (Nanking: Zhonghua shuju, 1936), pp. 361–75. 34 China: Annual Report, 1930, p. 12, enclosed in Lampson to Foreign Office, July 23, 1931, FO 371/16234 F5633/1672/10; Boyan Mandu, “Wo Canjia Nanjing Menggu Huiyi di Huiyi,” pp. 152–5. 35 See “League and Banner Organic Law of the Nationalist Government,” October 12, 1931, in ZMDZH, 5: 1, Politics (5), pp. 45–9. 36 “Political-Military Situation along the Inner Mongolia Frontier,” British Military Attaché in China, dated April 11, 1931, FO 676/67, Dossier 85; Chen Shaowu, “Neimeng De Wang he Jiang Jieshi di Guanxi (The Relationship between Inner Mongolian Prince De’s and Chiang Kai-shek),” in Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji, ser. 13, vol. 39 (1986), pp. 114–38. 37 Foreign Office minute paper, dated October 13, 1931, FO 676/67 Dossier 85. 38 On the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Movement in the 1930s and the complicated relationship between the Nationalists and the Inner Mongols, see S. Jagchid, The Last Mongol Prince: The Life and Times of Demchugdongrob, 1902–1966 (Bellingham, WA: Western Washington University, 1999), pp. 60–92; Bulag, “Going Imperial: Tibeto-Mongolian Buddhism and Nationalism in China and Inner Asia,” in Empire to Nation, pp. 368–426. 39 Zhongyang Zhoubao, no. 17 (October 1, 1928), pp. 4–5. 40 Zhongyang Zhoubao, no. 82 (January 3, 1930), pp. 81–6. 41 Zhang Xingtang, Bianjian Zhengzhi (Frontier Politics) (Taipei: MTAC, 1962), pp. 125–6; Liu, Meng Zang Weiyuanhui Jianshi Xubian, pp. 7–8. 42 Wang Shengfu and Du Peiling, Zhao Daiwen Pingzhuan (A Critical Biography of Zhao Daiwen) (Beijing: Wenwu chubanshe, 2002), pp. 128–30.


138 Notes 43 For a careful analysis of the MTAC in Nationalist China, see Hsiao-ting Lin, Tibet and Nationalist China’s Frontier: Intrigues and Ethnopolitics, 1928–49 (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2006), pp. 32–8. 44 Huang, ed., Meng Zang Xinzhi, pp. 212–15. 45 Statutes concerning the dispatches of MTAC special appointees to the border regions, in Meng Zang Yuebao (Mongolian and Tibetan Monthly Report), 9: 3/4 (December 31, 1938), pp. 1–3. 46 News report, enclosed in Colonel Weir (British Political Officer in Sikkim) to Government of India, April 30, 1930, OIOC, L/P&S/10/1088; Memorandum entitled “Political and Related Conditions in Yunnan during April 1930,” enclosed in Culver B. Chamberlain (US Consul at Yunnanfu) to State Department, July 25, 1930, USFR, 893.00 PR Yunnan/19, in USDS 1930–1939, reel 45. 47 Government of India to India Office (London), October 11, 1930, OIOC, L/P&S/12/3048; India Office memorandum entitled “Précis: Chinese Mission to Nepal,” dated December 20, 1930, ibid. 48 See, for example, “Nationalist China Re-establishes Relations with the Kingdom of Nepal,” Chinese Weekly Review (Shanghai), December 20, 1930. 49 Report received by the Intelligence Bureau of Government of India, October 4, 1930, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2451; Confidential dispatch from the British Legation in Nepal to Government of India, December 5, 1930, ibid. 50 Reports by the Intelligence Bureau of Government of India, dated September 27, 7 and October 15, 1930, ibid.; Government of India to India Office, June 1, 1931, ibid. 51 “Summary of Information against C.F. Lu (Chinese Consul-General at Calcutta),” enclosed in Government of India to India Office, March 6, 1931, ibid.; “Grant of Exequatur to Mr. Liu,” enclosed in Chief Secretary to Government of Bengal to Government of India, April 10, 1931, ibid.; Report from Government of India to India Office, May 11, 1931, ibid. 52 “China (Military): Situation Reports,” by US War Department, dated May 10 and 25, and June 9, 1932, USMIR, reel 9; Stark Toller (British Consul-General at Chongqing) to British Legation (Peking), April 13, 1932, OIOC, L/P&S/10/1228; Zhongyang Zhoubao, no. 203 (April 25, 1932), pp. 11–13. 53 “Review of Political Condition in the Yunnanfu Consular District during the Month of April 1932,” enclosed in Harry E. Stevens (US Consul at Yunnanfu) to State Department, May 12, 1932, USFR, 893.00 PR Yunnan/43, in USDS 1930–1939, reel 44. 54 Issues surrounding the Dalai-Panchen rupture in the 1920s have been addressed extensively in the related literature. See, for example, Goldstein, A History of Modern Tibet, pp. 252–309; Smith Jr., Tibetan Nation, pp. 215–19; Hsiao-ting Lin, “A Reassessment of the Issue of the 9th Panchen Lama’s Return to Tibet, 1934–1937,” in Journal of Asian History, 37: 2 (2003), pp. 129–54. 55 G. Tuttle, Tibetan Buddhists in the Making of Modern China (New York: Columbia University Press, 2005), pp. 132–3. 56 Huang Yingjie, Minguo Mizong Nianjian (Chronicle of the Tantrism in Republican China) (Taipei: Quanfo chubanshe, 1995), pp. 234–5. 57 Lin, Tibet and Nationalist China’s Frontier, pp. 52–5. 58 According to Chinese archival materials, Chiang Kai-shek and Koncho Chungnay held two secret talks respectively on September 10 and 13, 1929. See: Report from Zhao Daiwen (Deputy Head of MTAC) to Yan Xishan, September 10, 1929, YXSP, 20200013A, 90/1266–90/1267; Minute of conversation between Koncho Chungnay and Chiang Kai-shek, enclosed in Zhao to Yan, September 14, 1929, ibid., 90/1280–90/1281. 59 Report from Government of India to India Office, May 7, 1930, OIOC, L/P&S/10/1088; “Review of the Political Situation,” enclosed in Colonel Weir to Government of India, May 25, 1930, ibid.; Zhongyang Zhoubao, no. 122 (October 6, 1930), pp. 12–13.


Notes 139 60 Huang, ed., Meng Zang Xinzhi, pp. 219–35. 61 Memorandum prepared by the British Legation in China entitled “China: Inner Mongolia,” enclosed in Sir Lampson to Foreign Office, October 23, 1933, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2287. 62 Janggiya Hutuktu to Chiang Kai-shek, January 22, 1929, enclosed in Nationalist Government to Executive Yuan, February 6, 1929, in ZMDZH, 5: 1, Politics (5), pp. 148–50. 63 Janggiya Hutuktu to Nationalist Government, enclosed in Nationalist Government to MTAC, May 27, 1930, in ZMDZH, 5: 1, Politics (5), pp. 42–3. 64 Nanking obviously believed that a “pro-KMT” seventh Janggiya Hutuktu was capable of using his traditional position in Inner Mongolia to counteract the growing Japanese influence in this territory. See: Dispatches from Janggiya Hutuktu to Chahar Provincial Government and Leagues and Banners of Inner Mongolia, October 3, 1933, TW, vol. 2, no. 22015646; Confidential report from Janggiya Hutuktu to Chiang Kai-shek, October 16, 1933, ibid., no. 22005671; Chiang’s confidential dispatch to Janggiya Hutuktu, November 19, 1933, ibid., no. 22051052. 65 On the Nationalist employment of ethnic minority leaders to stabilize its precarious position in Inner Mongolia in the early 1930s, see Lin, Tibet and Nationalist China’s Frontier, pp. 86–106. 66 See: Minutes of the Ninety-fifth and Ninety-sixth meeting of the State Council, dated September 18 and 21, 1928, in Hong (ed.), Guomin Zhengfu Weiyuanhui Huiyi Jilu Huibian, vol. 2, pp. 464–5 and 469–70. 67 Letter from Zhao Daiwen (Deputy Head of MTAC) to Yan Xishan, September 13, 1929, YXSP, 20200013A, 90/1277; Liu Puchen (Councilor of MTAC) to Yan, November 24, 1929, ibid., 90/1332–90/1334. 68 Report submitted by He Yushu (Director of the Mongolian and Tibetan School, KMT Central Political Academy) to Chiang Kai-shek, dated May 10, 1934, TW, vol. 3, no. 23031864. 69 “A General Profile of the Mongolian and Tibetan School of the KMT Central Political Academy,” Nanking, December 1935, TD/YB, vol. 65, no. 42544. 70 Huang, ed., Meng Zang Xinzhi, pp. 616–19. 71 Tan Yankai (Premier of the Nationalist Government) to Chiang Kai-shek, June 29, 1929, ANG, 200000000A, 330/0682–330/0690. 72 Executive Yuan to Nationalist Government, August 9, 1934, ibid., 330/0698–330/0708; Executive Yuan to Nationalist Government, June 19, 1935, ibid., 330/0716–330/0721. 73 Prince Demchugdongrob’s political activities in the Nationalist period and his relations with Sechin Jagchid are perhaps best illustrated in Jagchid’s The Last Mongol Prince. On Jagchid’s political career in the final stage of the Nationalist rule in the late 1940s, see also Hsiao-ting Lin, “Lengzhan Bianyuan: Erci Dazhanhou Meiguo zai Zhongguo Bianjiang Diqu de Mimi Huodong (1947–1951) (The Cold War on the Periphery: American Underground Activities in China’s Borderlands during the post- World War II Period, (1947–1951)),” in Zhongyang Yanjiuyuan Jindaishi Yanjiusuo Jikan (Bulletin of the Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica) (Taipei), no. 53 (2006), pp. 103–48. 74 Huang, ed., Meng Zang Xinzhi, p. 621; Gao Changzhu, Xizang Gaikuang (A General Profile of Tibet) (Taipei: MTAC, 1953), pp. 84–91. 75 Cai Renjia, “Huiyi Ma Bufang Shiqi di Meng Zang Wenhua Jiaoyu (Recollections of Mongolian and Tibetan Culture and Education during Ma Bufang’s Period),” in Qinghai Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji (Selections from Qinghai Literary and Historical Materials), vol. 11 (1984), pp. 245–53; Li Zonghua and Li Yankai, Anduo Zangzu Shilue (A Historical Sketch of the Tibetans in Amdo) (Xining; Qinghai renmin chubanshe, 1992), pp. 199–211.

140 Notes


3 In search of a new territorial base 1 S. Wilson, The Manchurian Crisis and Japanese Society, 1931–33 (London: Routledge, 2002), pp. 13–29. On the historical root of Japanese infiltration of Manchuria and Chinese nationalism in Manchuria, see: R. Mitter, The Manchurian Myth: Nationalism, Resistance, and Collaboration in Modern China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000); Y. Matsusaka, The Making of Japanese Manchuria, 1904–1932 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003). 2 W. Beasley, Japanese Imperialism 1894–1945 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), pp. 199–203. 3 “China: Annual Report, 1931,” pp. 2–9, enclosed in Lampson to Foreign Office, May 3, 1932, FO 371/16234 F4981/4981/10. 4 Mr. E. Ingram (British Legation in China) to Foreign Office, May 26, 1932, FO 371/16193 F5568/27/10. For discussions about the Nanking-Canton split, see also: Guo, Jindai Zhongguo Shigang, pp. 579–89. 5 These politically independent organs included: the Southwest Political Council, the Southwest Headquarters of the KMT Central Executive Committee, and the Southwest Military Affairs Commission. The authority of the Nationalist government under Chiang Kai-shek remained weak in Guangdong and Guangxi provinces throughout the first half of the 1930s. See Liu Weikai, Guonan Qijian Yingbian Tucun Wenti zhi Yanjiu (Issue of Expediency for National Survival) (Taipei: Academia Historica, 1995), pp. 399–417. 6 This idea was no doubt closely related to Chiang Kai-shek’s prominent policy of “pacifying the interior before fighting a strong foreign foe (an’nei rangwai).” Chiang was convinced that the pacification of internal enemies would provide the Nationalist government with solid interior power bases vis-à-vis the Japanese. See Chiang’s speech of May 8, 1933, in ZZSC, vol. 1, no. 3, pp. 36–46. 7 This viewpoint is best illustrated in the works of Jiang Baili, one of Chiang Kai-shek’s most respected military advisors in the 1930s. See Jiang’s correspondence with Chiang, in Jiang Fucong and Xue Guangqian, eds., Jiang Baili Xiansheng Quanji (Complete Works of Mr. Jiang Baili) (Taipei: Zhuanji wenxue chubanshe, 1971), vol. 1, pp. 159–65. 8 Chiang Kai-shek, “Dong Ya Dashi yu Zhongguo Fuxing zhi Dao (The General Situation of East Asia and the Path to China’s Revival),” in ZJSYZ, vol. 12, pp. 95–9. 9 See: Zhang, Bianjiang Zhengzhi, pp. 158–9; Zhongyang Zhoubao, no. 276 (September 18, 1933), pp. 1–2; Meng Zang Yuebao, vol. 3, no. 4 (July 31, 1935), pp. 68–70. 10 Ma Min and Wang Yude, eds., Zhongguo Xibu Kaifa de Lishi Shenshi (A Historical Examination of the Development of West China) (Wuhan: Hubei renmin chubanshe, 2001), pp. 344–52; Yang Jinzhi, Jianshe Xibei Gan-Qing-Ning Sansheng Chuyi (A Rustic Opinion about Constructing Northwestern Provinces of Gansu, Qinghai and Ningxia) (Nanking: Xibei Xueshe, 1932), pp. 166–9. 11 Da Gong Bao (Tianjin), April 26, 1932, Editorial entitled “On the Construction of the Northwest.” 12 See: He Yingqin’s Speech on Developing the Northwest, March 21, 1932, Zongyang Zhoubao, no. 199 (March 28, 1932), pp. 3–7; “Scheme for Developing the Northwest,” prepared by KMT Central Executive Committee, December 19, 1932, in Geming Wenxian, vol. 89, pp. 7–8. See also Shen Sherong, “Jiang Jieshi de Xibei Zhanlueguan (Chiang Kai-shek’s Strategic View about Northwest China),” Guyuan Shizhuan Xuebao (Journal of Guyuan Teachers College) vol. 24, no. 1 (2003), pp. 53–8. 13 “Important Resolutions Adopted in the 4th KMT Central Committee,” March 5, 1932, in ZMDZH, vol. 5, no.1, Politics (2), p. 365. 14 T.V. Soong was one of the main architects and the keenest advocates of developing the northwest. See Wu Jingping, Song Ziwen Sixiang Yanjiu (A Study of T.V. Soong’s Thoughts) (Fuzhou: Fujian renmin chubanshe, 1998), pp. 16–39.


Notes 141 15 National Economic Committee, ed., “Xibei Jianshe Shishi Jihua ji Jinxing Chengxu (Programs for Constructing the Northwest and their Procedures),” Geming Wenxian, vol. 89, 211–18. 16 “Outlines of the Scheme for the Development of the Northwest,” December 19, 1932, in ZMDZH, vol. 5, no. 1, Politics (2), pp. 391–2; See also working report of the National Economic Committee (July 1934), in Geming Wenxian, vol. 90, pp. 449–59. 17 This geographical range was slightly different from the proposal made by civilian officials of the Executive Yuan, who defined the northwest as the aforementioned five provinces plus Suiyuan Province. See “Instructions given by Executive Yuan Concerning Developing the Northwest,” December 20, 1932, in ZMDZH, vol. 5, no. 1, Finance and Economics (7), p. 70. 18 Statistical Scheme for the Development of the Northwest, Proposed by the KMT Central Military Academy, dated December 26, 1932, TD/YB, vol. 65, no. 42539. This document was an enclosure of the 1941 frontier colonization project proposed by the MTAC. 19 On the National Defense Planning Committee and the role it played in opening up the northwest, see Shen Xiaoyun, “Liuxue Guiguo Rencai yu Guofang Sheji Weiyuanhui de Chuangshe (Personnel Returning from Studying Abroad and its Relations to the Founding of the National Defense Planning Committee),” in Jindaishi Yanjiu (Modern Chinese History Studies) (Beijing), vol. 3 (1996), pp. 241–58. 20 See, for example, Ma Hetian, “Kaifa Xibei zhi Buzou yu Fangfa (Steps and Methods toward the Development of the Northwest),” and Liu Zhenhua, “Kaifa Xibei Jihuashu (A Blueprint for Developing the Northwest),” both in Geming Wenxian, vol. 89, pp. 142–211. These works, written and published in 1932–3, emphasized the strategic importance of transforming the far-flung Northwest into a solid base vis-à-vis the Japanese. 21 See: Dai Chuanxian et al., Xibei (Northwest China) (Nanking: New Asian Society, 1933), pp. 13–40; Shen Sherong, “Jiu-yi-ba Shibian hou Kaifa Xibei Sichao di Xingqi (The Rise of the Trend of Thought on Developing the Northwest after the Mukden Incident),” Ningxia Daxue Xuebao (Journal of the University of Ningxia), vol. 4 (1995), pp. 9–15. 22 Other important societies pertaining to China’s northwestern affairs in this period included the Northwest Association (Xibei Xieshe) and Society for the Northwest Public Studies (Xibei Gongxueshe) in Peking, the Developing the Northwest Association (Kaifa Xibei Xiehui) in Nanking, and the Northwest Public Forum Association (Xibei Gonglunshe) in Shanghai. 23 On the Nationalist government’s relations with the Ma family of the northwest and its policy toward Xinjiang in the 1930s, see: Qinghai Provincial Government, ed., Qinghai San Ma (The Three Mas in Qinghai) (Beijing: Zhongguo wenshi chubanshe, 1988); Huang Jianhua, Guomindang Zhengfu de Xinjiang Zhengce Yanjiu (A Study of the KMT Government’s Xinjiang Policy) (Beijing: Minzu chubanshe, 2003). 24 Wu Zhongli and Liu Qinbin, eds., Xibei Wu Ma (The Five Mas in the Northwest) (Zhengzhou: Henan renmin chubanshe, 1993), pp. 176–231. 25 On the history of the Ma family in Northwest China, see: J. Lipman, Familiar Strangers: A History of Muslims in Northwest China (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1997), esp. chapters 4 and 5; A.D. Barnett, China’s Far West: Four Decades of Change (Boulder: Westview Press, 1993). 26 The most comprehensive investigation of the history of Republican Xinjiang in Western literature remains Forbes’s Warlords and Muslims in Chinese Central Asia. On Yang Zengxin’s political careers in Xinjiang based on Chinese archival materials, see also Li Xincheng, Yang Zengxin zai Xinjiang (Yang Zengxin in Xinjiang) (Taipei: Academia Historica, 1993). 27 See: A. Whiting and General Sheng Shih-ts’ai, Sinkiang: Pawn or Pivot? (East


142 Notes Lansing, Michigan: Michigan State University Press, 1958), pp. 3–20; Mackerras, China’s Minorities, esp. chapter 4. 28 Such a concern was clearly revealed in Chiang Kai-shek’s correspondence with his advisors in the General Staff. See: Chiang to Deputy Chiefs of Staff Huang Musong and He Yaozu, January 6, 1933, TW, vol. 1, no. 22059122; Summary of Confidential Report from Mao Qingxiang, Wang Guangyan and Dong Yumao to Chiang Kai-shek, 1933 (n.d.), TD/GBJ, part 1, no. 43008. 29 Jing Shenghong, Xibeiwang Hu Zongnan (Hu Zongnan, Master of the Northwest) (Kaifeng: Henan renmin chubanshe, 1995), p. 72; Hu Shangjiang Zongnan Nianpu (Chronicle of General Hu Zongnan) (Taipei: Wenhai chubanshe, 1972), pp. 49–51. 30 Hu’s achievement was later brought up frequently with another of Chiang’s successes in persuading his old rival, Yan Xishan, into cooperating with Nanking against Japan by launching a series of state-building projects in Shanxi Province. See Wang and Du, Zhao Daiwen Pingzhuan, pp. 200–6. 31 “China (Military): Situation Report,” by US War Department, May 31, 1933, USMIR, reel 5. 32 See: “China (Military): Situation Reports,” US War Department, July 19, and August 10, 1933, ibid., reel 9; Sun Dianying’s dispatches to Lin Sen (Chairman of Nationalist Government) and Premier Wang Jingwei, June 17, 1933, in Minguo Dang’an (The Republican Archives) (Nanjing), 1994, no. 4, p. 27. 33 Ma Lin to Chiang Kai-shek and Wang Jingwei, June 30, 1933; Qinghai Provincial Government to Nationalist Government, July 2, 1933; Ma Lin to Lin Sen, July 5, 1933, ibid., pp. 28–9. 34 Ma Hongkui to Nanking, September 21, 1933, Letter from the Ningxia Provincial Government to the Executive Yuan, October 10, 1933, ibid., pp. 33 and 35. 35 Sun Dianying to Wang Jingwei, October 11, 1933, ibid., p. 36. 36 Chiang Kai-shek diary, entries for January 28 and 29, 1934, CKSD, Box 37. 37 See: Wang Jianping, “Xibei Si Ma Heji Sun Dianying di Huiyi (A Reminiscence of the Joint Attack on Sun Dianying by the Four Mas of the Northwest),” in Government of Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, ed., Ningxia San Ma (The Three Mas in Ningxia) (Beijing: Zhongguo wenshizhe chubanshe, 1988), pp. 169–80; Shen Sherong and Guo Yingchun, “Sun Dianying Tunkun Qinghai Wenti zai Renshi (Reconsidering the Issue of Sun Dianying’s reclamation of Qinghai),” in Guyuan Shizhuan Xuebao (Journal of Guyuan Teachers College), Ningxia, 1998, no. 5, pp. 18–22. 38 For criticism of Nanking’s mishandling in the Sun Incident, see, for example, Li Qingchen, “Tunken Qinghai yu Kaipi Xibei (Colonizing Qinghai and Opening up the Northwest),” Da Gong Bao, October 4, 1933. 39 Report of R. Joyce of the China Inland Mission from Urumqi, dated April 18, 1933, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2331; Report submitted by MTAC to Executive Yuan, January 30, 1933, in ZMDZH, vol. 5, no. 1, Politics (5), pp. 476–8. 40 Report from Chinese Embassy in Moscow to Executive Yuan, May 4, 1933, ibid., pp. 495–7; Kashgar Diary for May 1933, enclosed in British Consulate-General at Kashgar to Government of India, June 5, 1933, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2332. 41 Chen and Chen, Minguo Xinjiang Shi, pp. 260–2; F.G. Chan, “Regionalism and Central Power: Sheng Shih-ts’ai in Sinkiang, 1933–1944,” in Chan, ed., China at the Crossroads, pp. 132–5. 42 Huang Musong to Chiang Kai-shek, May 3, 1933, TW, vol. 3, no. 22003411. 43 See: Jin Shaoxian, “Guomindang Fandong Shili Jinru he Tongzhi Xinjiang (The KMT Reactionary Force Entered and Ruled Xinjiang),” in Xinjiang Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji (Selections from Xinjiang Literary and Historical Materials), vol. 2 (1979), pp. 18–20; Gong Bicheng, “Guomindang zai Xinjiang de Huodong Diandi (Miscellaneous Records on the KMT Activities in Xinjiang),” ibid., vol. 5 (1980), pp. 56–70. 44 A. Wu, Turkistan Tumult (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1984 reprint), pp. 170–89.


Notes 143 45 Report from Sheng Shicai to Nationalist Government, June 27, 1933, in ZMDZH, 5:1, Politics (5), pp. 573–4; Lampson to Foreign Office, July 9, 1933, FO 371/17063 F5501/26/10. 46 See: Chiang Kai-shek to Sheng Shicai, July 7, 1933, TW, vol. 3, no. 22052922; Sheng to Nanking, July 19, 1933, in ZMDZH, vol. 5, no. 1, Politics (5), pp. 578–9; Lampson to Foreign Office, September 6, 1933, FO 371/17064 F6809/26/10. 47 Chen Feng, “Huang Musong, Luo Wen’gan Xianhou zai Xin de Huodong (The Successive Activities of Huang Musong and Luo Wen’gan in Xinjiang),” in Xinjiang Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji, vol. 6 (1980), pp. 110–12. 48 Chiang Kai-shek to Luo Wen’gan, August 26, 1933, TW, vol. 3, no. 22058888; Luo to Chiang, September 7, 1933, ibid., no. 22012949; Luo’s report to Chiang, September 13, 1933, ibid., no. 22013613. 49 Wu, Turkistan Tumult, pp. 190–200; Chen and Chen, Minguo Xinjiang Shi, pp. 269–73. 50 Minutes of Conversation between Sheng Shicai and Bu Daoming (Head of Asiatic Affairs Department, Waijiaobu), dated March 7, 1950, AMFA-2, 197/1. See also Sheng, “Mubian Souyi: Jiantao Peng Zhaoxian Xiansheng Shida Cuowu (Random Notes on my Service in the Frontier: An Examination of Mr. Peng Zhaoxian’s Ten Great Mistakes),” in Zhang Dajun et al., Wushinian Zhenghai Fengyun: Tianshan Nanbei (Fifty Years of Political Turmoil: South and North of Tianshan) (Taipei: Chunqiu chubanshe, 1967), pp. 78–9. 51 “Kashgar Diary for January 1934,” enclosed in British Consulate-General at Kashgar to Government of India, February 1, 1934, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2332; Report from Sheng Shicai to Nationalist Government, January 6, 1934, TW, vol. 3, no. 23019882. 52 Liu, Guonan Qijian Yingbian Tucun Wenti zhi Yanjiu, pp. 95–178. 53 Fu Zuoyu (Governor of Suiyuan) to MTAC, October 14 and 16, 1933, in ZMDZH, vol. 5, no. 1, Politics (5), pp. 105–7; Lampson to Foreign Office, October 23, 1933, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2287; Minute paper by Political Department of India Office, dated September 3, 1934, ibid. 54 Prince Yondonwangchug (Head of Ulanchab League) to Chiang Kai-shek, November 21, 1933, TW, vol. 3, no. 22005992; US Legation in China to State Department, November 8, 1933, USFR, 893.01 Inner Mongolia/8, in USDS 1930–1939, reel 55. 55 Huang Shaohong, Wushi Huiyi (Reminiscences at Age Fifty) (Hong Kong: Fengyun chubanshe, 1969), pp. 286–7. 56 Ibid. 57 Chiang Kai-shek diary, entries for January 20 and 24, 1934, CKSD, Box 37; Academia Historica, ed., Jiang Zhongzheng Zongtong Dang’an: Shilue Gaoben, vol. 24, pp. 209, 224. 58 Pan Jilu, “Guomindang zai Nanjing Chengli Xinjiang Jianshe Jihua Weiyuanhui de Daindi Huiyi (Some Recollections of the Establishment by the KMT of the Committee for Xinjiang Construction and Planning in Nanking),” in Xinjiang Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji, vol. 5 (1980), pp. 79–84. 59 Huang, Wushi Huiyi, pp. 287–9; Guo Tingyi comp., Zhonghua Minguo Shishi Rizhi (Daily Chronology of Historical Events in the Republic of China) (Taipei: Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica, 1976–), vol. 3, p. 347. See also Chiang Kai-shek’s speech in the fourth meeting of the fourth plenary session of the KMT Central Executive Committee on January 23, 1934, in which he revealed Nanking’s intention to infiltrate Xinjiang. Qin, ed., Zhongtong Jianggong Dashi Changbian Chugao, vol. 3, pp. 5–6. 60 See: Chiang Kai-shek’s instruction to Zhu Peide concerning Huang Shaohong’s expedition to Xinjiang, February 7, 1934, CB, 05–1631; Chiang’s instruction to H.H. Kung concerning military supplies to Huang’s expeditionary forces, February 7, 1934, CB, 05–1634.


144 Notes 61 Gansu Provincial Government Secretariat, ed., Gansu Shengzhengfu Xingzheng Baogao (Administrative Report of the Gansu Provincial Government) (Lanzhou, 1935), part 7; Zhongtong Jianggong Dashi Changbian Chugao, vol. 3, p. 17; Huang Shaohong, “Wo yu Jiang Jieshi he Guixi de Guangxi (My Relationship with Chiang Kai-shek and the Guangxi Clique),” in Jiang Jieshi yu ge Paixi Junfa Douzheng Neimu, (Beijing: Zhongguo wenshi chubanshe, 2001), pp. 306–7. 62 See: Guo comp., Zhonghua Minguo Shishi Rizhi, vol. 3, pp. 359–60, 363–7; editorials of Da Gong Bao on May 10, July 6 and August 1, 1934. 63 Huang, Wushi Huiyi, p. 291; Pan “Guomindang zai Nanjing Chengli Xinjiang Jianshe Jihua Weiyuanhui de Daindi Huiyi,” p. 80. 64 Huang, Wushi Huiyi, pp. 291–3. 65 Hu Shangjiang Zongnan Nianpu, p. 52; Jing, Xibeiwang Hu Zongnan, p. 76. 66 Academia Historica, ed., Jiang Zhongzheng Zongtong Dang’an: Shilue Gaoben, vol. 26, pp. 25, 29–30; Huang, Wushi Huiyi, pp. 293–4; Hu Shangjiang Zongnan Nianpu, pp. 52–3. 67 Huang, “Wo yu Jiang Jieshi he Guixi de Guangxi,” p. 307. 68 This kind of viewpoint was taken up by Western diplomats in China of that time. See, for example, Report from the US Consul at Hankou (E. Stanton) to Nelson T. Johnson (US Minister in China), July 27, 1934, FRUS 1934, vol. III, pp. 228–30; “Kashgar Diary for July 1934,” enclosed in British Consulate-General at Kashgar to Government of India, August 1, 1934, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2332. 69 Chiang Kai-shek to Sheng Shicai, September 26, 1934, in ZJSYZ, vol. 37, pp. 105–7. 70 A careful analysis of prewar China’s strategy vis-à-vis Japan, based on reports of Alexander von Falkenhausen, Chiang Kai-shek’s German military advisor, can be found in Van de Ven, War and Nationalism in China, pp. 157–60. 71 See, for example, British Military Attaché in China to A. Cadogan (British Minister in China), August 14, 1934, FO 676/175; US Navy Department Report on Inner Mongolia, dated October 9, 1935, USFR, 893.01 Inner Mongolia/50, in USDS 1930–1939, reel 55. 72 Academia Historica, ed., Jiang Zhongzheng Zongtong Dang’an: Shilue Gaoben, vol. 23, pp. 429–30. 73 US Legation in China to State Department, April 18, 1935, USFR, 893.01 Inner Mongolia/36, in USDS 1930–1939, reel 55; Zhongyang Zhoubao, no. 352 (March 4, 1935), pp. 15–16; no. 354 (March 18, 1935), pp. 16–17. 74 Nationalist Chief of General Staff to Chiang Kai-shek, September 27, 1935, TD/MB, vol. 50, no. 41282; Fu Zuoyi to Chiang, September 28, 1935, ibid., no. 41814. 75 US Consulate in Tianjin to US Embassy in China, December 7, 1935, USFR, 893.01 Inner Mongolia/52, in USDS 1930–1939, reel 55; MTAC to Chiang, September 29, 1935, TD/MB, vol. 50, no. 41815. 76 See: O. Lattimore (Fujiko Isono comp.), China Memoirs: Chiang Kai-shek and the War against Japan (Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press, 1990), pp. 28–32. 77 Huang Musong to Chiang Kai-shek, September 14, 1935, TD/MB, vol. 50, no. 41796. 78 On the Nationalist policy of using non-Han Chinese personages to enhance state- building programs in Chinese Inner Asia, see Lin, “A Reassessment of the Issue of the 9th Panchen Lama’s Return to Tibet.” 79 “China: Annual Report 1933,” p. 23, enclosed in Mr. Ingram (British Embassy in China) to Foreign Office, January 1, 1934, FO 371/18142 F1261/1261/10; Wu Jinhang, “Yi-jiu-san-wu nian Canmoutuan ru Chuan qianhou (Before and After the Staff Corps Entered Sichuan in 1935),” in Jiang Jieshi yu ge Paixi Junfa Douzheng Neimu, (Beijing: Zhongguo wenshi chubanshe, 2001), pp. 164–73. 80 Cadogan to Foreign Office, March 30, 1935, FO 371/19307 F3126/427/10; R. Kapp, “Provincial Independence vs. National Rule: A Case Study of Szechwan in the 1920’s and 1930’s,” in Journal of Asian Studies, vol. 30, no. 3 (1971), pp. 539–40.


Notes 145 81 Qin, ed., Zongtong Jiangong Dashi Changbian Chugao, vol. 3, p. 130; Guo comp., Zhonghua Minguo Shishi Rizhi, vol. 3, p. 415. 82 He Guoguang, ed., Guomin Zhengfu Junshi Weiyuanhui Weiyuanzhang Xingying Canmoutuan Dashiji (Chronological Events of the Staff Corps of the Generalissimo’s Field Headquarters, Military Affairs Commission of the Nationalist Government) (Chongqing, 1937), part i, pp. 268–75. 83 “Review of Political Conditions in the Yunnanfu Consular District during the Month of August, 1934,” in Charles S. Reed (US Vice Consul in Yunnanfu) to State Department, September 1, 1934, USFR, 893.00 PR Yunnan/71, in USDS 1930–1939, reel 44. 84 For a detailed discussion of the Huang Musong mission to Tibet and its implications for Nationalist China’s prestige building in the southwest, see Hsiao-ting Lin, “The 1934 Chinese Mission to Tibet: A Re-examination,” in Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, vol. 12, no. 3 (2002), pp. 327–42. 85 He, ed., Dashiji, part i, pp. 450–6, and part ii, pp. 465–80; “China (Military): Situation Report,” by US War Department, April 9, 1935, USMIR, reel 9. 86 Cadogan to Foreign Office, June 25, 1935, FO 371/19307 F5110/427/10; “China (Military): Situation Report,” by US War Department, November 19, 1935, USMIR, reel 9; He, ed., Dashiji, part i, pp. 457–9. 87 See, for example, Chiang’s speech given at Chengdu on June 5, 1935 entitled “The Way to Exterminate the Bandits and Reform the Army,” in ZJSYZ, vol. 13, p. 223. 88 He, ed., Dashiji, part ii, pp. 794–7; Jiang Anxi et al., “Nuona Hutuketu zai Xikang (The Norla Hutuktu in Xikang),” Sichuan Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji (Selections from Sichuan Literary and Historical Materials), vol. 29 (1983), pp. 64–8. 89 Liu Xiang to Chiang Kai-shek, January 25, 1936, TW, vol. 4, no. 25005223; Gu Zhutong (Director of Generalissimo’s Field Headquarters in Sichuan) to Chiang, February 21, 1936, ibid., no. 25005199; Gu to Chiang, March 5, 1936, ibid., no. 25005193. 90 “Political Report (Yunnanfu Consular District) for April 1936,” enclosed in Aruthur R. Ringwalt (US Vice Consul in Yunnanfu) to State Department, May 4, 1936, USFR, 893.00 PR Yunnan/91, in USDS 1930–1939, reel 44; Gu Zhutong to Chiang Kai-shek, January 30, 1936, TW, vol. 4, no. 25005219. 91 “Political Report for June 1936,” enclosed in Ringwalt to State Department, July 7, 1936, USFR, 893.00 PR Yunnan/93, in USDS 1930–1939, reel 44; Yang Yongtai (Governor of Hubei) to Chiang Kai-shek, June 30, 1936, TW, vol. 4, no. 25009087. 92 Confidential report from R. Howe (Peking) to Foreign Office, April 15, 1936, FO 371/20249 F3009/166/10. 93 Howe to Foreign Office, July 31, 1936, FO 371/20251 F5612/166/10. See also Chiang’s speech in the second Plenary Session of the fifth KMT National Congress, July 13, 1936, in ZZSC, vol. 1, no. 3, pp. 667–8. 94 “China: Annual Report, 1936,” pp. 2–7, in H. Knatchbull-Hugessen (British Ambassador to China) to Foreign Office, April 8, 1937, FO 371/12006 F2836/2836/10. 95 A detailed account of the 1936 Guangdong incident can be found in Liu Fei, “Liang Guang Liuyi Shibian (The June 1 Incident of Guangdong and Guangxi Provinces),” Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji, ser. 1, vol. 3 (1986), pp. 1–30; Liu, Guonan Qijian Yingbian Tucun Wenti zhi Yanjiu, pp. 399–417. 4 War and new frontier designs 1 Eastman believes that Chiang decided to attack Japanese positions in Shanghai in a bid to gain Western support. Yet not every scholar accepts such a view. Ch’i Hsi- sheng, for example, argues that Western military intervention on China’s behalf was unlikely, and the Nationalists were fully aware of this reality. For detailed discussions, see Van de Ven, War and Nationalism in China, pp. 175–6. See also Ch’i, Nationalist China at War: Military Defeats and Politics Collapse, 1937–45 (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1982), pp. 41–5.


146 Notes 2 See: Chen Cheng, Kangzhan Fanglue (A General Plan for the War of Resistance), March 1939, in Shih-sou Collections, Monographic Series; Society of the Historical Study of the War of Resistance against Japan and Chinese People’s Anti-Japanese War Museum, eds., Zhongguo Kangzhan Junshi Shi (A Military History of China’s War of Resistance against Japan) (Beijing: Beijing chubanshe, 1995), pp. 372–81. 3 Sir A. Clark-Kerr (British Ambassador to China) to Foreign Office, July 5, 1939, FO 371/23443 F8767/797/10. 4 Xu Chaojian, ed., Chongqing Guomin Zhengfu (The Chongqing Nationalist Government) (Chongqing: Chongqing chubanshe, 1995), pp. 14–42. 5 British Consulate-General in Chongqing to Foreign Office, August 26, 1939, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4182; Society of the Historical Study of the War of Resistance against Japan and Chinese People’s Anti-Japanese War Museum, eds., Kangzhan Shiqi di Xinan Dahoufang (The Great Southwestern Rear Area during the War of Resistance) (Beijing: Beijing chubanshe, 1997), pp. 81–8. 6 See: Confidential Report from KMT Central Executive Committee to Executive Yuan, February 21, 1939, in ZMDZH vol. 5, no. 2, Appendix (2), pp. 1–5; Report submitted by Ma Hetian (MTAC Special Commissioner in Chahar) regarding the Mongolian Federated Autonomous Government, June 1940, in ZZSC, vol. 6, no. 2, pp. 346–87. 7 Confidential report from He Yaozu (Acting Governor of Gansu) to Chiang Kai-shek concerning the creation of a Muslim state, September 4, 1937, TW, vol. 5, no. 26034167; Confidential dispatch entitled “Political and Economic Conditions in Inner Mongolia,” enclosed in British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, December 29, 1938, FO 371/23495 F1930/489/10. 8 Li Tiezheng (Waijiaobu Special Commissioner in Gansu) to Waijiaobu, February 3, 1939, AMFA-1, 172–1/1402–7; British Political Office in Sikkim to Government of India, March 30, 1939, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2305. See also D. Bodde, “Japan and the Muslims of China,” Far Eastern Survey, vol. 15, no. 20 (1946), pp. 311–3; Ando Junichiro, “Japan’s ‘Hui-Muslim Campaigns’ in China from the 1910s to 1945: An Introductory Survey,” in Annual Bulletin of Japan Association for Middle East Studies (Tokyo), vol. 18, no. 2 (2003), pp. 39–54. 9 Meng Zang Xunkan (The Mongolian and Tibetan Tri-monthly) (Chongqing), 1:22/23/24 (June 1939), pp. 16–17; Xie Zaishan, “Cheng-ji-si-han Lingqing Gaikuang yu Neiqian Jingguo (The General Condition of the Chinggis Khan’s Mausoleum and the Course of its Removal to the Interior),” in Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji, ser. 27, vol. 79 (1986), pp. 151–60. 10 See: Minute of Conference on Nationalist Government Frontier Policy Planning, dated October 18, 1939, AMFA-1, 172–1/0996; Memorandum by L. Lamb (Assistant Secretary to British Embassy in China) to Foreign Office, July 14, 1939, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2305; N. Hanwell, “Japan’s Inner Mongolian Wedge,” in Far Eastern Survey, vol. 8, no. 13 (1939), pp. 147–53. 11 Petition submitted by the Golok tribal leader Kang Wanqing to Nationalist Government, April 1, 1939, ANG, 20000000A, 213/0937–213/0953; Generalissimo’s Field Headquarters in Chengdu to Chiang Kai-shek, November 27, 1939, ASNDC, 003/919. 12 Yang Jie (Deputy Minister of Military Ordinance) to Chiang Kai-shek, March 29, 1938, in ZZSC, vol. 3, no. 2, pp. 483–91; “Special Survey of Intelligence: Conditions in Soviet Central Asia and Sinkiang [Xinjiang], October 1939–January 1940,” by Office of Deputy Director, Intelligence, Government of India, January 17, 1940, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2275. 13 O. Clubb, China and Russia: The “Great Game” (New York: Columbia University Press, 1971), pp. 306–18; Wang Zhen, Dongdangzhong di Tongmeng: Kangzhan Shiqi di Zhong-Su Guanxi (The Alliance in Turbulence: Sino-Soviet Relations during the War of Resistance) (Guilin: Guangxi Shifan Daxue chubanshe, 1993), pp. 75–134.


Notes 147 14 H.H. Kung (Premier of Nationalist China) to Chiang Kai-shek, December 9, 1938, in ZZSC, vol. 3, no. 2, pp. 507–9; Clark-Kerr to Foreign Office, July 5, 1939, FO 371/23443 F8767/797/10. 15 On the 1937 Muslim rebellion at Kashgar and the Soviet intervention, see Forbes, Warlords and Muslims in Chinese Central Asia, pp. 135–52. See also Chapter 5. 16 By the fall of 1939, the Japanese claimed that at least 300,000 Soviet troops had entered Xinjiang. Yet the US government was convinced that, given the poor conditions of the highways from the Trans-Siberia Railway to northern Xinjiang, the alleged number of Soviet troops was highly unlikely. See US Embassy in Japan to State Department, October 5, 1939; and US Embassy in China to State Department, October 7, 1939, both in Stanley H. Hornbeck Papers, Box 389. 17 “Special Survey of Intelligence: Conditions in Soviet Central Asia and Sinkiang [Xinjiang], 1939,” Office of Deputy Director, Intelligence, Government of India, October 13, 1939, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2275; Minutes of conversation between Sheng Shicai and Bu Daoming (Head of Western Asiatic Affairs Department, Waijiaobu), March 2 and 4, 1950, AMFA-2, 197/1. 18 Confidential memorandum regarding Soviet Russia’s attitudes toward China, 1938 (n.d.), TD/DSW, no. 49828. See also Chen and Chen, Minguo Xinjiang Shi, pp. 327–34. 19 Clark-Kerr to Foreign Office, May 24, 1940, FO 371/24698 F3882/1064/10; Shen Shicai’s report to Nationalist Government, July 10, 1942, TD/XinW, vol. 53. 20 Reports from British Consulate-General at Kashgar to Government of India, October 18, 21 and November 22, 1939, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2395. 21 Clark-Kerr to Foreign Office, October 27, 1939, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2395. 22 The Nationalist government’s appeasement toward Soviet activities in the northwest was momentarily causing wide dissatisfaction among Chinese local officials and Waijiaobu Special Commissioners in these areas. See: Li Tiezheng to Waijiaobu, July 23, 1938, AMFA-1, 172–1/1402–3; Lu Tonglun (Waijiaobu Special Commissioner in Gansu) to Waijiaobu, October 31, 1941, AMFA-2, 110/2. 23 Clark-Kerr to Foreign Office, November 6, 1940, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2358; Memorandum by Waijiaobu to H.H. Kung, November 8, 1940, AMFA-1, 172–1/0051–2. 24 Wellington Koo (Chinese ambassador to Britain) to Waijiaobu, August 12, 1941, AMFA-1, 108/2144. 25 MTAC draft proposal concerning the revival of League annual meeting, July 29, 1937, in ZMDZH, vol. 5, no. 2, Politics (4), pp. 20–3. 26 See: Chiang Kai-shek to Nationalist Government, April 7, 1936, ANG, 200000000A, 331/0494–331/0528; “A Revised Ordinance Regarding Monastic Regulations in the Border Provinces,” enclosed in Chiang Kai-shek to Nationalist Government, September 15, 1938, ibid., 331/0533–331/0540. 27 Proposal submitted by Wu Zhongxin (Head of the MTAC) to Chiang Kai-shek, June 21, 1937, GW/BW, vol. 34, pp. 81–90. 28 A draft scheme for frontier policy planning submitted by Wu Zhongxin to Chiang Kai-shek, August 1939, TD/YB, vol. 64, no. 42538; Minutes of conference held by SNDC, enclosed in Ministry of Home Affairs to Waijiaobu, October 30, 1939, AMFA-1, 172–1/0996. 29 Proposal concerning national defense in the southwestern frontier by He Yaozu to Chiang Kai-shek, October 19, 1940, TD/GBJ, part 2. According to this proposal, top Nationalist security advisors sought to transform Xikang into a military base that was capable of keeping intact their line of communications with outside world after the Japanese invaded southwest China. 30 Liu Wenhui, “Zoudao Renmin Zhenying di Lishi Daolu (The Historic Path of my Walking toward the Masses’ Side),” Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji, ser. 11, vol. 33 (1986), pp. 9–17; Kangzhan Shiqi di Xinan Dahoufang, pp. 90–4; Reports by British Consulate-General in Chongqing, dated August 8 and December 14, 1938, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4182.


148 Notes 31 See: Chiang Kai-shek’s confidential dispatch to Zhang Qun, September 21, 1939, CB, 08–1992; Chiang’s handwritten instruction to the staff of his Field Headquarters in Chengdu, October 23, 1939, ibid., 08–2111. 32 Memorandum by British Consulate-General in Chongqing, April 26, 1939, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4182; Chiang Kai-shek’s instruction to He Yaozu (Director of Investigation and Statistics Bureau) concerning industrial and national defense programs in southwest China, December 4, 1940, CB, 09–0694. 33 Liu Wenhui to Kong Qingzong, August 2, 1940, ACROT, E-25; Kong to MTAC, August 2, 1940, ibid.; MTAC to Kong, August 26, 1940, ibid. 34 Report from Generalissimo’s Field Headquarter in Xichang to Chiang Kai-shek concerning reform programs in Xikang, September 27, 1940, ASNDC, 003/732; Schemes for developing Sichuan and Xikang provinces, enclosed in Executive Yuan to SNDC, October 14 and November 3, 1940, ibid., 003/315. 35 Huang Zhengqing, “Huang Zhengqing di Huiyi (Huang Zhengqing’s Recollections of the Past), in Gansu Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji (Selections from Gansu Literary and Historical Materials),” vol. 30 (1989), pp. 19–30. 36 Suo Dai, La-bu-leng Si Fojiao Wenhua (The Buddhist Culture of the Labrang Monastery) (Lanzhou: Gansu minzu chubanshe, 1992), pp. 10–17; P. Nietupski, Labrang: A Tibetan Buddhist Monastery at the Crossroads of Four Civilizations (New York: Snow Lion Publications, 1999), pp. 86–91. 37 For a general account of Huang Zhengqing and the Labrang Tibetans under him, see also J. Rock, The Amnye Ma-chhen Range and Adjacent Regions: A Monographic Study (Roma: Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente, 1956), pp. 33–50. 38 Gao Changzhu, “La-bu-leng zhi Jinkuang ji Kaifa Yijian (The Recent Situation in Labrang and the Opinions about Developing that Area),” part i and ii, in Meng Zang Yuebao, vol. 9, no. 2 (October 31, 1938), pp. 1–14, and vol. 9, nos. 3/4 (December 31, 1938), pp. 8–16. 39 See: Chiang Kai-shek’s instruction to Zhu Shaoliang (Governor of Gansu), January 23, 1938, CB, 08–0541; Wu Zhongxin to Chiang Kai-shek, August 1939, TD/YB, vol. 64, no. 42538. 40 See: Meng Zang Xunkan, no. 151/152 (July 7, 1938), p. 36; Meng Zang Yuebao, vol. 9, nos. 3/4 (December 31, 1938), pp. 1–3. Chiang Kai-shek’s fear of the Japanese using pan-Asiatic identity to further penetrate China’s ethnic borderlands was revealed in his diary of late 1938. See Chiang’s diary, entries for December 2 and 4, 1938, CKSD, Box 40. 41 Meng Zang Xunkan, vol. 1, nos. 4/5/6 (December 31, 1938), pp. 18–19; Huang Zhengqing, “Huang Zhengqing di Huiyi,” p. 60. 42 Wu Zhongxin, “Kangzhan yu Meng Zang (The War of Resistance and its Relations with Mongolia and Tibet),” in Chen Xiaowei, ed., Kangzhan Di San Nian (The Third Year of the War of Resistance) (Hong Kong: Observatory Semi-Weekly Review, 1939), pp. 44–6. 43 Ibid., pp. 60–1; US Embassy in China to State Department, February 16, 1944, USFR, 893.00 Tibet/72, in USDS, 1940–1945, reel 7; Report from Sir Horace Seymour (British Ambassador to China) to Foreign Office concerning Nationalist penetration in Gansu, January 2, 1945, FO 436/16995 F449/186/10. 44 Report from G.P. Young (Peking) to Foreign Office, July 26, 1938, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2305. See also Hao Weimin, ed., Neimenggu Jindai Jianshi (A Concise History of Modern Inner Mongolia) (Hohhot: Neimenggu Daxue chubanshe, 1990), pp. 199–202; 45 Huang Fengsheng, Kangzhan Yilai zhi Bianjiang (China’s Frontier since the War of Resistance) (Chongqing: Shixue shuju, 1940), pp. 8–19; Chen Yuning, ed., Ningxia Tongshi: Jinxiandai Juan (A Comprehensive History of Ningxia: Modern and Contemporary Period) (Yinchuan: Ningxia renmin chubanshe, 1993), pp. 187–9. 46 “Note on Inner Mongolia,” by Charles Bell, March 1937, OIOC, Mss. Eur. F80/213;


Notes 149 Memorandum entitled “Political and Economic Conditions in Inner Mongolia,” enclosed in British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, December 29, 1938, FO 371/23495 F1930/489/10. 47 Investigative Report from Wangyal to Charles Bell, December 26, 1936, OIOC, Mss. Eur. F80/213; Wei Xiaoqiang, “Ri Jiandie zai wo Bianjiang Huodong di Gaikuang (A General Survey of the Japanese Underground Activities in our Border Territories),” in Bianjiang Banyuekan (Frontier Semi-Monthly), vol. 3, nos. 10/11/12 (April 30, 1938), pp. 4–6. 48 These Japanese military advisors included Major Hayama, Major Ishida Mitsuro, and Major Kumoda Toshio. See Chen, ed., Ningxia Tongshi, p. 184. Regarding Japanese westward advanced activities in Inner Mongolia, see also Jagchid, The Last Mongol Prince, pp. 122–67. 49 Report from Nelson Johnson (US Ambassador to China) concerning situation in Inner Mongolia, dated September 1, 1936, USFR, 893.01 Inner Mongolia/1, in USDS, 1940–1945, reel 7; Hu Pingsheng, Minguo Shiqi di Ningxiasheng (Ningxia Province in the Republican period) (Taipei: Xuesheng shuju, 1988), pp. 20–2. 50 Li Xiaosu, “Riben Duiyu Menggu zhi Jiandie Gongzuo (Japanese Intelligence Activities in Mongolia),” in Bianjiang Yuekan (Frontier Monthly), vol. 5 (May 1941), pp. 9–11; Sun Hanwen, “Ningxia E-A Lianqi di Weiju (The Precarious Situation of Ejine and Alashaa Banners in Ningxia Province),” in Gansu Provincial Library, ed., Xibei Minzu Zongjiao Shiliao Wenzhai: Gansu Fence (Selections from National and Religious Source Materials in the Northwest: The Gansu Fascicle) (Lanzhou: Gansu Provincial Library, 1986), pp. 85–91. 51 Chen, ed., Ningxia Tongshi, pp. 189–90; Report from Allan Archer (Peking) to Foreign Office, December 29, 1938, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2305. 52 See: MTAC Special Commissioner’s Office in Chahar, ed., Wei Meng Junzheng Gaikuang (General Conditions on the Military and Politics of the Mongolian Puppet Regime), 1941 (n.d.), in ZZSC, vol. 6, no. 2, pp. 422–72; Report from J.D. Greenway (Peking) to Foreign Office on the Situation in Inner Mongolia, June 17, 1938, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2305. 53 Wu Zhongxin to Chiang Kai-shek, August 1939, TD/YB, vol. 64, no. 42538. 54 See: Memorandum by Military Commissioner’s Office at Alashaa Banner, October 1939, AKMT, 510/13; Meng Zang Yuebao, vol. 6, no. 6 (March 31, 1937), pp. 6–8; and vol. 9, nos. 3/4 (December 31, 1938), pp. 4–5. 55 Memorandum by the Ejine Banner authorities to MTAC, Top Secret, enclosed in Executive Yuan to Waijiaobu, August 7, 1947, AMFA-2, 112/93. 56 Hao, ed., Neimenggu Jindai Jianshi, pp. 210–11; Ye Qianyun, “Xibei Guofang Qianxian: Alashan Qi (Alashaa Banner: The National Frontline of the Northwest),” in Xibei Minzu Zongjiao Shiliao Wenzhai: Ningxia Fence, (Lanzhou: Gansu Provincial Library, 1986), pp. 81–4. 57 Memorandum by MTAC concerning wartime administration in the frontier territory, April 1939, ASNDC, 003/103; Qi Tao, “Gaishu Guomindang Zhengfu dui yuan Alashan Qi di Tongzhi (A General Narration of the KMT Governance in the Former Alashaa Banner),” in Alashan Meng Wenshi (Alashaa League Literary and Historical Materials), vol. 2 (1986), pp. 49–80. 58 “China (Military): Situation Report,” by US War Department, received April 19, 1938, in USMIR, reel 9; G.P. Young (Peking) to Foreign Office, May 14, 1938, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2305; Report from Li Tiezheng (Lanzhou) to Waijiaobu, March 3, 1938, AMFA-1, 172–1/1402–1. 59 Report from Lu Bangdao (Nationalist Military Commissioner at Alashaa) to Chiang Kai-shek, November 9, 1944, AAH, 202000000A, 2/1104–2/1110. See also Luo Yongshou, Zhang Wendi and Zhang Shijie, “Alashan Wang Dalizaya Shengping (Life and Career of Prince Darijayaga of Alashaa),” in Neimenggu Wenshi Ziliao, vol. 32 (1988), pp. 50–88.


150 Notes 60 Lu Bangdao to Chiang Kai-shek regarding the situation of Ningxia under Ma Hongkui, May 1, 1943, AAH, 202000000A, 2/1091–2/1092. 61 Chiang Kai-shek to Zhu Shaoliang, January 23, 1939, CB, 08–1408; Report on the nine-year planning and military schedule of Ejine Banner, enclosed in Executive Yuan to Waijiaobu, August 7, 1947, AMFA-2, 112/93. 62 Memorandum entitled “Conditions in Ningsia [Ningxia] Province,” enclosed in British Military Attaché in China to War Office, August 15, 1942, WO 208/2873. See also Wu Zhongxin, “Kangzhan yu Meng Zang,” pp. 46–7. 63 General Chen Cheng to Chiang Kai-shek, February 2, 1939, GW/DZ, vol. 34, p. 78; SNDC to Executive Yuan, April 23, 1941, ASNDC, 003/1497; Executive Yuan to SNDC, June 9, and July 24, 1941, ibid. 64 MTAC Annual Report for the year 1938–9, enclosed in SNDC to Executive Yuan, April 4, 1939, ibid., 003/020; MTAC Annual Report for the Year 1941, May 1942, AKMT, 510/52. See also Zhang Wenzhi, “Suiyuansheng Guomindang Zhengquan Junzheng Tegong Zuzhi (The KMT Military and Political Intelligence Units in Suiyuan Province),” in Neimenggu Wenshi Ziliao, vol. 15 (1984), pp. 207–14. 65 “Proposal for Training Nationalist Cadets to be sent to Shaanxi, Gansu, Qinghai and Ningxia Provinces,” dated May 2, 1940, in Zhongyang Zhixing Weiyuanhui Changwu Weiyuanhui Huiyilu, vol. 29, pp. 373–5. 66 Memorandum entitled “Chinese Moslems,” enclosed in Seymour to Foreign Office, April 9, 1942, FO 436/17087 F3512/113/10. 67 See: Chiang Kai-shek’s confidential instructions concerning war strategy at the second stage of war, January 7, 1939, and “Draft Plan for Military Operation,” Military Affairs Commission, July 1939, in ZMDZH, vol. 5, no. 2, Military Affairs (1), pp. 660, 653. 68 “A Statistic Table of the Government-Sponsored Schools in the Frontier Regions,” dated August 27, 1943, in ZMDZH, vol. 5, no. 2, Education (1), pp. 187–92. 69 See: Zhongyang Dangwu Gongbao (Gazette of Central Party Affairs), vol. 2, no. 5 (February 3, 1940), p. 33; and vol. 2, no. 6 (February 10, 1940), p. 10; Statutes Promulgated by Military Affairs Commission, January 17, 1940, in ZMDZH, vol. 5, no. 2, Military Affairs (1), pp. 547–9. 70 Executive Yuan to Nationalist Government, June 10, 1939, ANG, 20000000A, 330/0728–330/0733; Military Affairs Commission to SNDC Concerning Ethnic Minority Education in the Border Regions, September 3, 1941, ASNDC, 003/1763. 71 Military Affairs Commission to KMT Central Committee Concerning Reforming Tibetan Lamaseries, January 30, 1940, in ZMDZH, vol. 5, no. 2, Cultural Affairs (2), pp. 790–1. 72 On the origins of the Cho-Yon relationship and its historical significance, see: T. Wylie, “The First Mongol Conquest of Tibet Reinterpreted,” in Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, vol. 37, no. 1 (1977), pp. 103–34; S. Lingpa, “A Brief Survey of the Relationship between Drogon Chogyal Phagpa and Emperor Sechen Kublai Khan,” in Tibet Journal, vol. XV, no. 1 (1990), pp. 67–76. 73 L. Petech, Central Tibet and the Mongols: The Yuan-Sa-Skya Period of Tibetan History (Roma: Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente, 1990), pp. 5–40. 74 Z. Ahmad, Sino-Tibetan Relations in the Seventeenth Century, Serie Orientale Roma, XL (Roma: Instituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente, 1970), pp. 155–67. 75 H. Richardson, Tibet and its History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1962), pp. 43–60; W. Shakabpa, Tibet: A Political History (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1967), pp. 140–82. 76 See “Dalai Lama’s Proclamation,” quoted in ibid., p. 246. See also Wang Yuanda, Jindai Eguo yu Zhongguo Xizang (Modern Russia and China’s Tibet) (Beijing: Sanlian chubanshe, 1993), pp. 216–28. 77 Dorzhiev’s argument that Tibet should seek the protection of the Russian Empire may have evoked Tibetan Buddhist mythology in which the paradise of Shambhala was supposed to lie to the north. See: C. Bell, Portrait of a Dalai Lama: The Life and


Notes 151 Times of the Great Thirteenth (London: Wisdom Publications, 1987), pp. 391–2; J. Snelling, Buddhism in Russia: The Story of Agvan Dorzhiev, Lhasa’s Emissary to the Tsar (Rockport, MA: Element, 1993), pp. 53–89. On the Russian Buddhists in Tibet and its political implications, see also A. Andreyev, “Russian Buddhists in Tibet, from the End of the Nineteenth Century to 1930,” in Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, vol. 11, no. 3 (2001), pp. 349–62. 78 A. Lamb, British India and Tibet, 1766–1910 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1986), pp. 222–55; T. Shaumian, Tibet: The Great Game and Tsarist Russia (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), pp. 16–45. 79 Tibetan Précis, pp. 12–5, OIOC, L/P&S/20/D222; Goldstein, A History of Modern Tibet, pp. 65–88. 80 Memorandum entitled “Recent Events in Tibet,” by Political Department of Government of India, June 27, 1935, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4181. 81 Report from British Consular-General at Mukden to Foreign Office, November 25, 1937, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4187; British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, December 22, 1937, ibid. 82 See: Who’s Who in Tibet (Calcutta: Government of India, 1938), entry for the Ngagchen Rimpoche, OIOC, L/P&S/20/D220/1; British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, March 24, 1938, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4187. 83 India Office Minute Paper Concerning Anchin [Ngagchen] Lama’s Return to Tibet from China, dated April 5, 1939, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4187; US Embassy in China to State Department, November 13, 1940, USFR, 893.00 Tibet/67, in USDS, 1940–1944, reel. 6. 84 Clark-Kerr to Foreign Office, Top Secret, February 28, 1939, FO 371/23443 F3662/53/10; P. Hyer, “Japanese Expansion and Tibetan Independence,” in L. Narangoa and R. Cribb, eds., Imperial Japan and National Identities in Asia, 1895–1945 (London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2003), pp. 81–4. 85 Ibid., p. 82; Jagchid, The Last Mongol Prince, pp. 271–2. On Japanese designs on Tibet in the 1930s and the 1940s, see also Qin Yongzhang, “Jindai Riben Shentou Xizang Shulun (A Discussion of Japanese Penetration into Tibet in the Modern Era),” in Jindaishi Yanjiu (Modern Chinese History Studies) (Beijing), no. 3 (2005), pp. 144–69. 86 Memorandum submitted by Wu Zhongxin to Chiang Kai-shek Concerning the Situation in Outer Mongolia, August 1939, TD/YB, vol. 64, no. 42538; Jin Shaoxian, “Yishu Guomindang Yuanlao Wu Zhongxin (A Memorial Narration of the KMT Veteran Wu Chung-hsin),” Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji, vol. 118 (1989), pp. 75–6. 87 British Political Officer in Sikkim to Government of India, April 14, 1941 and January 5, 1942, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2305. 88 Radreng Hutuktu (Regent of Tibet) to Chiang Kai-shek, April 29, 1939, TW, vol. 5, no. 28049347; “Political Report for July 1939,” enclosed in US Consulate in Yunnanfu [Kunming] to State Department, August 17, 1939, USFR, 893.00 Yunnan/129, in USDS, 1930–1939, reel 45. 89 Report from Government of India to India Office, April 29, 1939, FO 676/417. See also Khemey Sonam Wangdu, “Discovery of the Fourteenth Dalai Lama: An Eyewitness Account,” in Wangdu, Khemey Sonam, Sir Basil J. Gould, and Hugh E. Richardson, Discovery, Recognition and Enthronement of the 14th Dalai Lama (Dharamsala: Library of Tibetan Works and Archives, 2000), pp. 22–34. 90 British Mission in Lhasa to British Political Officer in Sikkim, April 26, 1939, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4165. 91 Government of India to India Office, April 26, 1939, FO 676/417; “Political Report for February 1940,” enclosed in US Consulate in Yunnanfu to State Department, March 6, 1940, USFR, 893.00 Yunnan/137, in USDS, 1940–1944, reel 10. 92 Executive Yuan to Nationalist Government, September 15, 1938, ANG, 200000000A, 331/0533–331/0536.


152 Notes 93 See: Guo Taiqi (Chinese Ambassador to Britain) to Waijiaobu, June 2, 1939; Note from Waijiaobu to MTAC, August 18, 1939; Memorandum by Department of East Asiatic Affairs, Waijiaobu, August 26, 1939; and MTAC to Waijiaobu, September 4, 1939, AMFA-1, 172–1/0010. 94 Minutes of conversation between Wang Chonghui and British Ambassador Clark- Kerr, March 5, 1940, AMFA-1, 172–1/0010; Tibetan Précis, p. 67. 95 Wu Zhongxin, Xizang Jiyao (A Summary of My Mission to Tibet) (Taipei: China Culture Service, 1953), pp. 28–32. 96 Ibid., pp. 32–3; Wang Jiawei and Nyima Gyaincain, The Historical Status of China’s Tibet (Beijing: China Intercontinental Press, 1997), pp. 158–67; US Embassy in Chongqing to State Department, February 23, 1940, USFR, 893.00 Tibet/49, in USDS, 1940–1944, reel 6. 97 Wu, Xizang Jiyao, pp. 40–2. 98 Basil Gould (British Political Officer in Sikkim) to Government of India, April 15, 1940, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2309; “Political Report for the Month of June 1940,” enclosed in US Consulate-General in Yunnanfu to State Department, July 9, 1940, USFR, 893.00 Yunnan/138, in USDS, 1940–1944, reel 11. 99 Memorandum by Troy L. Perkins (US Vice Consul in Yunnanfu), March 6, 1940, USFR, 893.00 Tibet/53, in USDS, 1940–1944, reel 6. 5 War and opportunities 1 See: Wang Zhen, Dongdangzhong di Tongmeng, pp. 75–86; J. Garver, “Chiang Kai- shek’s Quest for Soviet Entry into the Sino-Japanese War,” in Political Science Quarterly, vol. 102, no. 2 (1987), pp. 295–316. 2 “Manchukuo: Annual Report 1939,” enclosed in British Consulate-General at Mukden to Clark-Kerr, January 3, 1940, OIOC, L/P&S/12/177. On the Nomonhan incident, see also A. Coox, Nomonhan: Japan against Russia, 1939 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1985). 3 State Department Confidential Memorandum entitled “Present Status of Mongolia,” December 9, 1942, Stanley Hornbeck Papers, Box 300. 4 Memorandum Concerning the Negotiation with Sheng Shicai, June 1942, CB, 09–1413; Zhu Shaoliang to Chiang Kai-shek, July 30, 1942, TW, vol. 5, no. 31043989. 5 Chiang’s Confidential Instruction to Kung, August 26, 1942, CB, 09–1439. 6 See: Chiang Kai-shek diary, entry for August 20, 1942, CKSD, Box 42; Clubb, China and Russia, pp. 326–8; Forbes, Warlords and Muslims in Chinese Central Asia, pp. 159–62. 7 See: Liang Hancao (Deputy Head of KMT Central Propaganda Department) to Chiang Kai-shek, September 13, 1942, TW, vol. 5, no. 31044014; Chiang to Sheng Shicai, July 24, 1942, ibid., no. 31043988; Sheng to Chiang, October 30, 1942, ibid., no. 31044029; Seymour to Foreign Office, October 5, 1942, FO 436/16373 F7411/1689/10. 8 Chiang Kai-shek diary, entry for August 27, 1942, CKSD, Box 42; Instruction from Executive Yuan to Waijiaobu, September 25, 1942, AMFA-1, 172–1/1402–2. 9 Chiang’s diary, entry for August 31, 1942, CKSD, Box 42. See also Keiji Furuya, Chiang Kai-shek: His Life and Times (New York: St John’s University, 1981), pp. 744–5, for the English translation. 10 See, for example, Memorandum by British Military Attaché in China to Government of India, October 22, 1942, WO 208/268; Report on the journey of Eric Teichman (Councilor of the British Embassy in China) to Sinkiang [Xinjiang], enclosed in British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, September 24, 1943, FO 436/16605 F6275/254/10. On the history of the five Chinese consular posts in Soviet Central Asia, see also Liu De’en, “Zhu Sulian Xinbian wu Lingshiguan chuqi gaikuang (A

Notes 153


11

12

13

14

15

16

17 18

19

20

21

22

Profile of the Five Chinese Consular Posts in Soviet Central Asia at the Preliminary State of their Establishments),” Xinjiang Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji, vol. 3 (1979), pp. 180–200. See: Chiang’s Instructions to General Zhou Zhirou (Director of National Aeronautic Affairs Commission), Top Secret, dated June 6 and September 15, 1941, GW/ZJ; Liu Jin, Zhongxin yu Bianyuan─Guomindang Zhengquan Gan-Ning-Qing Shehui (Center and Margin: The Nationalist Regime and the Societies of Gansu, Ningxia and Qinghai) (Tianjin: Tianjin guji chubanshe, 2004), pp. 154–5. Diao Baoshi, ed., Minguo Wu Liqing Xiansheng Zhongxin Nianpu (A Chronicle of Mr. Wu Zhongxin’s Life) (Taipei: Taiwan Commercial Publishing Ltd., 1988), pp. 117–18; Jin, “Yishu Guomindang yuanlao Wu Zhongxin,” pp. 118–19; Wu and Liu, Xibei Wu Ma, pp. 232–52. Office of Military Attaché of the British Embassy in China to War Office, November 12, 1942, WO, 208/268; Report from Teichman in Lanzhou to Seymour, September 3, 1943, enclosed in Seymour to Foreign Office, September 14, 1943, FO 436/16518 F5103/254/10; Yang Xiaoping, Ma Bufang Jiazu di Xingshuai (The Rise and Fall of the Ma Bufang Family) (Xining: Qinghai renmin chubanshe, 1986), pp. 190–212. Chiang Kai-shek to Zhu Shaoliang, June 2, 1942, CB, 09–1329; Chiang to Ma Buqing, July 19, 1942, CB, 09–1406; British Embassy in China to Foreign Office Concerning Nationalist Penetration in Gansu Corridor, November 24, 1943, FO 436/16605 F6275/254/10. See: Chiang Kai-shek diary, entries for July 15, August 28 and 29, and September 1, 1942, CKSD, Box 42; Memorandum entitled “Moslem Soldiers in Tsaidam Basin: Guarding Flank of China’s Northwest Road,” October 24, 1942, WO 208/428; MI6 Political Report entitled “China: Political and General Conditions in Kansu and Chinghai Provinces,” June 28, 1943, WO 208/408. Report from Teichman in Urumqi, dated September 24, 1943, enclosed in the British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, November 14, 1943, FO 436/16605 F6275/254/10; “Weekly Summary for November 1943,” enclosed in British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, December 6, 1943, FO 436/16605 F6692/254/10. Chiang Kai-shek described the return of Gansu Corridor to the Nationalist fold as “one of the greatest achievements of Nationalist China’s war cause.” See Chiang’s diary, entry for August 22, 1942, CKSD, Box 42. “Table of Nationalist Forces Stationed in Gansu Corridor,” dated September 21, 1943, in ZMDZH, vol. 5, no. 2, Politics (2), p. 804. See, for example, Memorandum entitled “Present Circumstances and Future Prospects of the Chinese Government and Future Trends of Chinese Policy,” enclosed in British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, October 27, 1943, FO 436/16605 F5611/74/10. Chiang Kai-shek diary, entries for August 9 and 12, 1942, CKSD, Box 42; “China News,” issued by London Office of Chinese Ministry of Information, dated September 22, 1942, WO 208/268; Seymour to Foreign Office, October 5, 1942, FO 436/16373 F7411/1689/10. See also Liu, Zhongxin yu Bianyuan, pp. 158–9. See: Chiang Kai-shek’s speech to the minority elites in Xining, in ZJSYZ, vol. 19, pp. 216–18; Zhongyang Dangwu Gongbao, 4:19 (September 1942), pp. 23–4; Zhongyang Zhoubao, 5:19 (December 17, 1942), special issue on the Generalissimo’s visit to the Northwest. Chiang Kai-shek’s diary, entry for August 28, 1942, CKSD, Box 42. On wartime China’s pragmatic stance toward its Tibetan issues, see also Hsiao-ting Lin, “War or Stratagem? Reevaluating Nationalist China’s Military Advance in Tibet, 1942–1943,” in China Quarterly, no. 186 (2006), pp. 446–62. Chiang, “Ningxia Junshi Huibao Xunci (A Speech of Admonition for the Military Briefing in Ningxia),” September 2, 1942, in ZJSYZ, vol. 19, pp. 219–28; Seymour to Foreign Office, October 5, 1942, FO 436/16373 F7411/1689/10.


154 Notes 23 Travel report by Eric Teichman, enclosed in Seymour to Foreign Office, September 14, 1943, FO 436/16518 F5103/254/10. See also Qi Tao, “Gaishu Guomindang Zhengfu dui Yuan Alashan Qi di Tongzhi,” pp. 49–80. 24 Wu Zhongli, ed., Ningxia Jindai Lishi Jinian (The Chronological History of Modern Ningxia) (Yinchuan: Ningxia renmin chubanshe, 1987), pp. 286–91; Hu Pingsheng, Minguo Shiqi di Ningxiasheng, pp. 153–85. 25 Report from Eric Teichman in Yumen Oil Field, enclosed in British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, October 6, 1943, FO 436/16605 F5542/11/10; Government of India to India Office, November 22, 1943, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4620. 26 SNDC to Executive Yuan Concerning the Removal of Refugees from Henan, Shanxi and Shaanxi Provinces, December 31, 1942, ASNDC, 003/2352; Executive Yuan to SNDC, February 22, 1943, ibid., 003/2361; Meng Zang Yuebao, 15: 3/4 (April 1943), p. 10. See also Yan Dongkai and Zhang Li, “Minguo Kaifa Xibei zhong Yici Weijun de Yimin Jihua – Yi-jiu-si-er nian zhi Yi-jiu-si-si nian de Xinjiang Yimin (An Unfinished Immigration Project during the Period of Republican China – The Immigration to Xinjiang in 1942–1944),” in Minguo Dang’an, 2006, no. 3, pp. 105–12. 27 SNDC to Executive Yuan, December 30, 1942, ASNDC, 003/2359; Report of Executive Yuan Concerning the Execution of Immigration and Colonization Projects in the Border Provinces, May 7, 1943, ibid.; “Blueprint for the Construction of the Northwest for the Fiscal Year 1943,” proposed by the Central Planning Bureau, November 1, 1942, T.V. Soong Papers, Box 25. 28 “Statutes Concerning Public Servants in the Frontier,” issued by the Nationalist Government, May 18, 1943, ANG, 0128.12/3611.01–02. 29 KMT Central Executive Committee, ed., Zhengling Xuanchuan Jiyao (A Summary of Government Decrees and Propaganda) (Chongqing: KMT Central Executive Committee, 1943), pp. 64–6. When addressing those who would be serving in Xinjiang, Chiang Kai-shek particularly emphasized that they should avoid clashes with Sheng Shicai’s staff, and should pay full respect to local minority peoples. See: Chiang, “Dui Paifu Xinjiang Gongzuo Tongzhi zhi Zhishi (Instructions to the Party Cadres Dispatched to Xinjiang),” in ZJSYZ, vol. 19, p. 403. 30 KMT Central Executive Committee to SNDC, March 19, 1943, ASNDC, 003/2439. 31 Forbes, Warlords and Muslims in Chinese Central Asia, pp. 157–62; S. Soucek, A History of Inner Asia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), pp. 271–2. 32 Waijiaobu to Chinese Embassy in London, March 23, 1942, AMFA-1, 172–1/0100–1; “China: Political Review, 1942,” enclosed in Seymour to Foreign Office, June 22, 1943, FO 436/16363 F3456/1535/10. 33 See: MTAC to Chinese Representative Office in Lhasa, October 19 and December 8, 1942, ACROT, T-11; Kong Qingzong to Generals Luo Zuoying and Sun Liren (in Ramgarh), November 2, 1942, ibid. 34 Lin, Tibet and Nationalist China’s Frontier, pp. 126–36. 35 “Constitution of the Xikang-Tibet Pack-Transport Firm,” dated January 29, 1944, AMFA-1, 172–1/0008. 36 Seymour to Foreign Office, July 26 and August 12, 1942, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4205; Government of India to India Office, August 26, 1942, ibid. 37 It was estimated that, by spring 1944, roughly 9,060–10,250 Chinese troops were newly deployed on the Sino-Tibetan border. See “Tibetan Intelligence Report,” no. 13/44, dated May 29, 1944, enclosed in British Political Officer in Sikkim to Government of India, July 21, 1944, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4210. 38 Executive Yuan to Waijiaobu, July 11, 1945, AMFA-1, 172–1/0035; Waijiaobu to Chinese Commission in India, July 18, 1945, ibid.; Zhou Yishi, Zhongguo Gonglu Shi (A History of China’s Highways) (Taipei: Wenhai chubanshe, 1957), pp. 222–3. 39 Waijiaobu to Ministry of Military Affairs, Top Secret, July 18, 1942, AMFA-1, 172–1/0103.


Notes 155 40 Waijiaobu Memorandum, dated October 21, 1942, AMFA-1, 172–1/0103; Chinese Embassy in Moscow to Waijiaobu, January 26, 1943, ibid.; US Ambassador to China (Gauss) to State Department, January 2, 1943, in FRUS, 1943: China, pp. 590–1. 41 Eric Teichman’s travel report from Kashmir, enclosed in Foreign Office to India Office, dated January 10, 1944, FO 436/16605 F6691/11/10; Chinese Embassy in Moscow to Waijiaobu, September 12 and 13, 1943, AMFA-1, 172–1/0103. 42 See: Seymour to Foreign Office, February 6, 1945, FO 436/16995 F1221/186/10; A. Young, China and the Helping Hand, 1937–1945 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1963), pp. 252–3. 43 Ministry of Communications to Waijiaobu, July 29, 1942, AMFA-1, 172–1/0102–1; Memorandum from Waijiaobu to Military Affairs Commission, January 23, 1943, ibid. 44 Extract from a report by M.C. Gillett (British Consul-General in Kashgar) on his recent visit to Urumqi, enclosed in British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, November 18, 1942, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4617. 45 Memorandum by Foreign Office, dated February 3, 1943, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4609; Minute by G.P. Young of Foreign Office, dated July 23, 1943, ibid., L/P&S/12/757. 46 Memorandum from Waijiaobu to Ministry of Communications, December 7, 1942, AMFA-1, 172–1/0104; Analytical report from Waijiaobu to Executive Yuan, December 25, 1943, ibid. 47 According to the agreement between the Chinese and the British, the pack transport business would be monopolized by two British Indian firms, the Central Asian Trading Company and the Pekin Syndicate Ltd. See Shen Shihua (Chinese Commissioner to India) to Waijiaobu, March 23 and April 30, 1943, AMFA-1, 172–1/0102–1. 48 Reports from British Consulate in Urumqi to British Embassy in China, January 13, and February 21, 1944, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2406; Note from Office of Chinese Deputy Inspector-General of Customs and Concurrent Commissioner of Xinjiang Custom to British Consulate in Urumqi, February 12, 1944, ibid. 49 British Consulate in Urumqi to British Embassy in China, April 4, 1946, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2405. 50 Ministry of Communications to Waijiaobu, May 21, 1943, AMFA-1, 172–1/0102–2; Chinese Embassy in London to Ministry of Communications, May 17, 1943, ibid. 51 Report on the Survey of Southern Xinjiang, Prepared by Ministry of Communications, January 1944, AMFA-1, 172–1/0102–2; Chiang Kai-shek’s Instruction to Waijiaobu, March 14, 1944, ibid.; Waijiaobu’s Memorandum to Chiang and Ministry of Communications, March 22, 1944, ibid. 52 Memorandum by General He Yingqin (Chief of General Staff ) to Chiang Kai-shek Concerning the Routes in Southern Xinjiang, January 13, 1944, AMFA-1, 172–1/0102–2; Military Affairs Commission to Waijiaobu, March 31, 1944, ibid. 53 Chinese Commission in India to Waijiaobu, March 23, 1943, AMFA-1, 172–1/0102–1; Notes from Waijiaobu to Ministry of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance, and Ministry of Military Ordinance, dated March 27, 1943, ibid.; Xinjiang Provincial Government to Waijiaobu, April 16, 1943, ibid. 54 Report from Shen Shihua to Waijiaobu, March 25, 1943, AMFA-1, 172–1/0102–1; Ministry of Economic Affairs to Waijiaobu, April 26, 1943, ibid.; Waijiaobu to Military Affairs Commission, May 6, 1943, ibid. 55 India Office to Government of India, March 2, 1943, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4609; India Office minute paper, dated June 2, 1943, ibid. 56 On the demarcation of, and the territorial dispute over, the Pamir region between China, Russia and Britain, see, for example, I. Klein, “The Anglo-Russian Convention and the Problem of Central Asia, 1907–1914,” in Journal of British Studies, vol. 11, no. 1 (1971), pp. 126–47; J. Garver, “The Sino-Soviet Territorial Dispute in the Pamir Mountains Region,” in China Quarterly, no. 85 (1981), pp. 107–18;

156 Notes 57


58 59

60 61

62 63 64 65 66 67 68

69 70

71 72

73

K. Warikoo, Central Asia and Kashmir: A Study in the Context of Anglo-Russian Rivalry (New Delhi: Gian Publishing House, 1989). Ministry of Military Ordinance to Waijiaobu, January 15, 1942, AMFA-2, 112/923; Chiang Kai-shek to T.V. Soong (Minister of Foreign Affairs), April 1, 1943, ibid. Chiang’s diary, entry for November 17, 1942, CKSD, Box 42. Waijiaobu Memoranda, dated November 11, and December 14, 1943, AMFA-2, 112/923. Nationalist China’s marked presence in the Pamirs and the adjacent regions during wartime became one crucial factor leading to the Soviets’ territorial and administrative realignments in Central Asia. See O. Roy, The New Central Asia: The Creation of Nations (London: I.B. Tauris, 2000), pp. 66–8. Note from the British Embassy in Chongqing to K.C. Wu (Vice Foreign Minister), October 20, 1944, AMFA-1, 172–1/0102–2; General He Yingqin to Chiang Kai- shek, November 3, 1944, ibid. Memorandum from the British Resident in Kashmir, no. D.7910/41, August 27, 1941, OIOC, L/P&S/12/3289; “Annual Trade Report: Ladakh 1944–1945,” dated August 30, 1945, ibid.; “Annual Trade Report: Ladakh 1945–1946,” dated December 10, 1946, ibid. Travel reports by K. Menon (Indian Agent-General to China) to Government of India, October 25, December 19 and 29, 1944, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2407; Note from Xinjiang Provincial Government to Waijiaobu, April 5, 1944, AMFA-1, 172–1/0104. Among these newly stationed Nationalist troops in southern Xinjiang, one brigade was deployed at Aksu, two regiments at Karghaliq and Qarashahr, and one battalion at Bai. See Gillet to Government of India, January 5, 1945, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2402. Journey report by Etherington-Smith (British Consul-General at Kashgar), enclosed in British Embassy in China to Government of India, August 23 1945, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2407. Etherington-Smith to Government of India, November 21, 1946, OIOC, L/P&S/ 12/2402. British Consulate in Urumqi to British Embassy in China, September 2, 1945, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2405. Chen and Chen, Minguo Xinjiang Shi, pp. 307–12; Forbes, Warlords and Muslims in Chinese Central Asia, pp. 135–44. “Report of a conversation with Mahmūd in Peshawar,” July 2, 1937, enclosed in Deputy Director of Intelligence, Peshawar, to Government of India, July 22, 1937, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2386; “Chinese Turkestan: Annual Confidential Report, June 1937–38,” prepared by British Consulate-General at Kashgar, 1938 (n.d.), ibid., L/P&S/12/2357. Government of India to India Office, April 7, 1937, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2386; British Resident in Kashmir to Government of India, May 26, 1937, ibid.; Sheng Shicai to Chiang Kai-shek, May 4, 1937, AMFA-1, 172–1/0141. Government of India to India Office, April 8, 1937, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2386; British Consulate-General at Kashgar to Government of India, April 8, 1937, ibid.; India Office minute paper dated April 12, 1937, ibid.; Waijiaobu to Military Affairs Commission and Ministry of Military Affairs, June 9, 1937, AMFA-1, 172–1/0141. Chiang Kai-shek’s instruction to Wang Chonghui (Foreign Minister), June 14, 1937, AMFA-1, 172–1/0141; Ministry of Military Affairs to Waijiaobu, June 1937, ibid. Letter from Mahmūd Muhītī to Chinese Consulate-General at Calcutta, enclosed in the Deputy Director of Intelligence, Peshawar, to Government of India, dated July 7, 1937, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2386; British Resident in Kashmir to Government of India, July 13, 1937, ibid.; General He Yingqin (Minister of Military Affairs) to Executive Yuan, June 1937, AMFA-1, 1721-/1041. British Resident in Kashmir to Government of India, July 22, 1937, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2386; Memorandum by Waijiaobu, dated July 3, 1937, AMFA-1, 172–1/0141.


Notes 157 74 According to British archival materials, by the spring of 1937 British India had supplied Mahmūd Muhītī with 1,800 tolas of gold and 3 checks on the Imperial Bank of India totaling approximately 3,000 rupees. See British Resident in Kashmir to Government of India, May 26, 1937, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2386. 75 Military Affairs Commission to Waijiaobu, November 8, 1937, AMFA-1, 172–1/0141; Chinese Vice Consul in Bombay to Waijiaobu, April 7 and May 2, 1939, ibid.; Copy of letter no. NGO/ADI/13666, enclosed in British Intelligence Peshawar to Government of India, December 6, 1939, WO 208/268. 76 Chinese Consulate-General in Calcutta to Waijiaobu, October 22, 1937, AMFA-1, 172–1/0141; Statement given by Ma Hushan, dated October 23, 1937, enclosed in British Resident in Kashmir to Government of India, November 1, 1937, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2386. 77 “Kashgar Diary for June 1937,” enclosed in British Consulate-General at Kashgar to Government of India, July 1, 1937, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2332; Report from British Resident in Kashmir to Government of India, October 23, 1937, ibid., L/P&S/12/2386. 78 “Kashgar Diary for September 1937,” enclosed in British Consulate-General at Kashgar to Government of India, October 7, 1937, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2332; British Consulate-General at Kashgar to Government of India, September 30, 1937, ibid., L/P&S/12/2386. 79 “Kashgar Diary for the Month of January 1938,” enclosed in British Consulate General at Kashgar to Government of India, February 10, 1938, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2332; Government of India to India Office, January 30, 1939, ibid., L/P&S/12/2358; Note from General Chiang Yu-feng (Jiang Youfeng) (Kashgar Administrative Commissioner) to H.H. Johnson (British Consul-General at Kashgar), February 8, 1939, ibid. See also Ren Dingting, “Pa-mi-er Gaoyuanshang de Fandi Douzheng – Huiyi Sanling Niandai mo Puli Bianwu Banshichu (The Anti-Imperialist Struggle on the Pamirs: My Recollections about the Border Affairs Office in Tashkurghan in the Late 1930s),” in Xinjiang Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji, vol. 19 (1991), pp. 175–85. 80 India Office to Government of India, September 16, 1940, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2332. 81 British Resident in Kashmir to Government of India, November 22, 1937, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2386; Government of India to India Office, January 15, 1938, ibid.; Government of India to British Consulate-General at Kashgar, September 26, 1938, OIOC, L/P&S/12/241; India Office minute paper, written by Mr. Crombie, dated January 3, 1939, ibid. 82 Ma Hushan’s statement, dated December 28, 1937, AMFA-1, 172–1/0051–1; Ma’s letter to Chinese Consulate-General at Calcutta, December 29, 1937. 83 Military Affairs Commission to Waijiaobu, June 15, 1938, AMFA-1, 172–1/0051–1; Waijiaobu to Military Affairs Commission, August 24, 1938, ibid.; Government of India to India Office, January 31, 1938, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2386. 84 Government of India to Chinese Consulate-General at Calcutta, January 16, 1939, OIOC, L/P&S/12/241; Chinese Consulate-General at Calcutta to Waijiaobu, March 18, 1939, AMFA-1, 172–1/0051–1. 85 India Office minute papers, dated June 3 and 19, 1939, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2386; Memorandum from Waijiaobu to Military Affairs Commission, July 17, 1939, AMFA-1, 172–1/0051–1. 86 Military Affairs Commission to Waijiaobu, August 8, 1939, AMFA-1, 172–1/0051–1; Waijiaobu to Chinese Embassy in London, August 15, 1939, ibid.; Waijiaobu to MTAC, August 28, 1939, ibid. 87 Memorandum by Department of European Affairs, Waijiaobu, dated September 22, 1942, AMFA-1, 172–1/0051–2; Note from British Embassy in China to Waijiaobu, April 21, 1943, ibid.; Waijiaobu to Chinese Consulate-General at Calcutta, May 31, 1943, ibid. 88 Chinese Consulate-General at Calcutta to Waijiaobu, November 11, 1943, AMFA-1, 172–1/0051–2; Waijiaobu to Ministry of Finance, November 23, 1943, ibid.


158 Notes 89 British Embassy in Angora to Government of India, June 6, 1939, OIOC, L/P&S/12/355; Chinese Consulate-General in Calcutta to Waijiaobu, September 2, 1942, AMFA-1, 172–1/0047. 90 British Mission in Kabul to Foreign Office, January 25, 1940, OIOC, L/P&S/12/355; KMT Central Organization Department to Waijiaobu, December 7, 1942, AMFA-1, 172–1/0047. 91 Waijiaobu to KMT Central Organization Department, October 22, 1941, AMFA-2, 321/87; Chinese Consulate-General at Calcutta to Waijiaobu, October 29, 1942, AMFA-1, 172–1/0047; Chiang Kai-shek to Waijiaobu, December 10, 1942, ibid.; Bao Junjian (Chinese Consul-General at Calcutta) to Waijiaobu, March 31, 1943, ibid. 92 Report from KMT Central Committee to Executive Yuan, enclosed in Executive Yuan to MTAC, January 17, 1941, in ZMDZH, vol. 5:, no. 2, Politics (4), pp. 851–2. On the issue of Kazakh migration in Republican China, see also L. Benson and I. Svanger, China’s Last Nomads: The History and Culture of China’s Kazaks (New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1998). 93 Chinese Consulate-General at Calcutta to Waijiaobu, May 12, 1943, AMFA-1, 172–1/0047; KMT Overseas Affairs Department to Waijiaobu, July 9, 1943, ibid.; Xinjiang Provincial Government to Waijiaobu, July 17, 1943, ibid. 94 Memorandum entitled “Chinese Moslems,” enclosed in British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, April 9, 1942, FO 436/17087 F3512/113/10; Notes from Waijiaobu to Ministry of Military Ordinance, Ministry of Home Affairs, and KMT Central Organization Department, dated August 11, 1943, AMFA-1, 172–1/0047. 95 See: Li Tiezheng to Waijiaobu, July 7, 1943, AMFA-1, 172–1/0103; Li’s telegrams to Chongqing concerning route issues and his meeting with British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden, February 2 and 4, April 1 and October 18, 1943, ibid. 96 Ministry of Economic Affairs to Waijiaobu, November 13, 1943, AMFA-1, 172–1/1368. 97 Li Tiezheng to Waijiaobu, November 20, 1943 and October 4, 1944, AMFA-1, 172–1/1368; Waijiaobu to Ministry of Economic Affairs, November 6, 1944, ibid. 98 Military Affairs Commission to SNDC, Top Secret, April 29, 1943, ASNDC, 003/2358; SNDC to Executive Yuan, August 9, 1945, ibid., 003/3206; Memorandum by Waijiaobu, May 25, 1944, AMFA-1, 172–1/0103. 99 See: British Military Attaché in China to War Office and Government of India, March 11, 15 and 16, 1943, OIOC, L/P&S/12/806; Government of India to British Military Attaché in China, March 16, 1943, ibid. 100 Note from the Moslem Youth Monthly (Lanzhou) to Waijiaobu, June 6, 1942, AMFA-2, 321/87; Executive Yuan to Waijiaobu, January 8, 1943, ibid. 101 Waijiaobu to the Chinese Legations in Iran and Turkey, February 19, 1943, AMFA- 1, 172–1/1366; Memorandum by Department of Western Asiatic Affairs, Waijiaobu, April 1944, AMFA-1, 172–1/1360; Li Tiezheng to Waijiaobu, April 7, 1944, ibid. 102 Li Tiezheng to Waijiaobu, November 5, 1943, AMFA-1, 172–1/1366; Li to Waijiaobu, June 12, 1944, ibid., 172–1/1371. 103 Prince Abdulilah (le Régent of Iraq) to Chiang Kai-shek, May 7, 1945, AMFA-1, 172–1/1360; Da Gong Bao (Chongqing), August 24, 1945, p. 2. 104 Zhongyang Ribao (Chongqing), April 13, 1945, p. 3; Memorandum by Department of Western Asiatic Affairs, Waijiaobu, dated June 29, 1944, AMFA-1, 172–1/1360; Li Tiezheng to Waijiaobu, November 1, 1944, ibid.; Waijiaobu to Executive Yuan, November 14, 1944, ibid.; Chinese Legation in Egypt to Waijiaobu, March 23, 1945, ibid. 6 Reconfiguring ethnic frontier territoriality 1 Xiaoyuan Liu, A Partnership for Disorder: China, the United States, and their Policies for the Postwar Disposition of the Japanese Empire, 1941–1945 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 55–80.


Notes 159 2 Chiang Kai-shek, China’s Destiny (New York: Roy Publishers, 1947), pp. 9–11. 3 Chiang Kai-shek’s Diary, entries for September 13, 30 and October 6, 1942, CKSD, Box 42 4 Leibold, Reconfiguring Chinese Nationalism, pp. 44–7. 5 On the Western powers’ negative reactions toward Chiang’s book, see, for example, US Chargé in China (Atcheson) to State Department, May 31, 1943, FRUS, 1943: China, pp. 245–8; Foreign Office Minute Paper Entitled “China’s Destiny,” written by A.D. Blackburn, dated 15 February 1944, FO 436/16680 F807/310/10. 6 Forbes, Warlords And Muslims In Chinese Central Asia, pp. 169–72. See also D. Wang, Under the Soviet Shadow: The Yining Incident (Hong Kong: Chinese University Press, 1999). 7 Zeng Xiaolu, “Wu Zhongxin Tongzhi Xinjiang Jingguo (The Course of Wu Zhongxin’s Governance in Xinjiang),” Xinjiang Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji, vol. 1 (1979), pp. 93–5; Qinghai Provincial Government, ed., Qinghai San Ma, pp. 267–74. 8 Diao Baoshi, ed., Minguo Wu Liqing Xiansheng Zhongxin Nianpu, p. 168. In January 1946, a new commissioner’s office was set up in Yarkand in southern Xinjiang for “administrative convenience,” and many were convinced that Xinjiang might genuinely be divided into two administrative regions. See “Monthly Report for January 1946,” enclosed in British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, February 7, 1946, FO 436/17172 F2919/25/10. 9 See: “Draft Plan for Constructing the Northwest in the Next Decade and the Budget for the Fiscal Year 1943,” Central Planning Bureau, confidential, November 1, 1942, T.V. Soong Papers, Box 25; MI6 Political Report, dated June 28, 1943, WO 208/408. 10 Xing Suzhi, Xueyu Qiufa Ji: Yige Hanren Lama de Koushushi (Pursuing Dharma in the Land of Snow: An Oral History of a Han Chinese Lama) (Beijing: Sanlian chubanshe, 2003), p. 233. 11 Lin, Tibet and Nationalist China’s Frontier, pp. 151–6. 12 The relationship between Pandatsang Rapga and other Tibetan leaders in the Nationalist era can be found in M. Goldstein, D. Sherap, and W. Siebenschuh A Tibetan Revolutionary: The Political Life and Times of Bapa Phuntso Wangye (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004). 13 Rapga to Wu Zhongxin, enclosed in Wu to Chiang Kai-shek, October 22, 1943, ANG, 200000000A, 419/1979–419/1996; Document entitled “Concise Agreement of Tibet Improvement Party, Kalimpong,” (n.d.), OIOC, L/P&S/12/4211. 14 Memorandum by Military Affairs Commission, October 28, 1943, ANG, 200000000A, 419/1997–419/2005; Chiang Kai-shek’s Instructions to Wu Zhongxin and General Dai Li (Deputy Director of the Bureau of Investigation and Statistics), Top Secret, November 2, 1943, ibid., 419/2006–419/2008. 15 MTAC Memorandum Concerning Postwar Mongolian Banners and Tibet, August 27, 1944, enclosed in Chiang Kai-shek to T.V. Soong, February 28, 1945, AMFA-1, 172–1/0001; Note by the Military Affairs Commission concerning MTAC’s Memorandum, August 1944, ibid. 16 “Record of a Conversation between Dr. K.C. Wu (Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs), and Mr. B. Gage (First Secretary to the British Embassy in China),” June 10, 1944, enclosed in Seymour to Foreign Office, June 28, 1944, FO 436/16680 F3308/127/10. 17 Memorandum Entitled “Present Status of Mongolia,” December 9, 1942, Stanley Hornbeck Papers, Box 300. 18 Foreign Office Minute Paper Entitled “Chinese Policy Regarding Outer Mongolia,” dated April 23, 1942, FO 371/31702 F3099/3099/10; Letter from F. Jones of the Foreign Office Far Eastern Section to Philip Broad (Foreign Research and Press Service, Royal Institute of International Affairs), dated June 1, 1942, ibid. 19 MTAC Memorandum, enclosed in Wu Zhongxin to Chiang Kai-shek, August 1939, TD/YB, vol. 64, no. 42538.


160 Notes 20 Memorandum Entitled “Restoration of our Country’s Territorial Integrity,” June 7, 1943, Victor Hoo (Hu Shize) Papers, Hoover Institution Archives, Stanford University, Box 3; MTAC Memorandum Concerning Postwar Mongolian Banners and Tibet, August 27, 1944, AMFA-1, 172–1/0001; Memorandum from Luo Liangjian (Head of MTAC) to Chiang Kai-shek, May 26, 1945, ANG, 200000000A, 412/1738–412/1749. 21 The Nationalists were unsuccessful throughout the war with regards to Outer Mongolian issues. Although a series of honorific titles and official positions were showered upon the Dilowa during his stay in Chongqing, this Mongolian dignitary showed no intention to serve as an intermediary between the Nationalists and Outer Mongols. After the war, when Outer Mongolia was granted de jure independence, the Dilowa resigned from his posts and spent rest of his life in the United States. See P. Hyer and S. Jagchid, A Mongolian Living Buddha: Biography of the Kanjurwa Khutughtu (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1983), p. ix; Jagchid, The Last Mongol Prince, pp. 19, 272. 22 MTAC Memorandum, enclosed in Wu Zhongxin to Chiang Kai-shek, August 1939, TD/YB, no. 42538; Waijiaobu conference minute concerning frontier policy designing, March 11, 1940, AMFA-1, 172–1/0996. 23 “A General Plan for Restoring Chinese Sovereignty over Xinjiang,” submitted by General He Yingqin to Chiang Kai-shek, July 13, 1942, in ZZSC, 3 (2), pp. 439–40. 24 Waijiaobu Conference Minute Concerning Frontier Policy Designing, March 11, 1940, AMFA-1, 172–1/0996. 25 Liu, Frontier Passages, pp. 144–5; Huang Shijian and Zhang Sicheng, “Guanyu Yimeng Shibian (On the Yekejuu League Incident),” in Institute of the CCP Party History of Inner Mongolia, ed., Neimenggu Jindaishi Luncong (Collected Essays on Modern Inner Mongolian History), vol. 1 (Hohhot: Neimenggu Daxue chubanshe, 1982), pp. 268–72; Zou Huanyu and Zhang Zhongche, “Yi Meng San-Er-Liu Shibian Shimo (The Whole Story of the Yekejuu Incident on March 26, 1943),” in Neimenggu Wenshi Ziliao, vol. 27 (1987), pp. 143–51. 26 Chiang Kai-shek to Suiyuan Provincial Government, October 1943, TW, vol. 6, no. 32033658; General Zhu Shaoliang to Chiang, October 27, 1943, ibid., no. 32017583; Chiang’s Instruction to Fu Zuoyi, October 30, 1943, ibid., no. 32033677. 27 See, for example, Resolutions by People’s Political Council regarding Mongolian and Tibetan affairs, September 5, 1944, in ZZSC, 3 (2), p. 1351. 28 Minute Paper by Military Affairs Commission Concerning Restoring Inner Mongolian Banners, August 1944, AMFA-1, 172–1/0001; Memorandum by Waijiaobu, June 13, 1945, ibid.; Minute Paper by Waijiaobu Concerning Restoring Inner Mongolian Banners, June 13, 1945, ibid. 29 Liu, A Partnership for Disorder, pp. 237–47; W. Cohen, The Cambridge History of American Foreign Relations: Volume IV, America in the Age of Soviet Power, 1945–1991 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), pp. 3–20. 30 Chiang Kai-shek Diary, entry for June 15, 1945, CKSD, Box 44. 31 See, for example, J. Garver, Chinese–Soviet Relations 1937–1945: The Diplomacy of Chinese Nationalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988), pp. 209–30; Liu, A Partnership for Disorder, chapter 11. 32 For a comprehensive study on Soviet Russia’s foreign policy toward postwar China, see A. Ulam, Expansion and Coexistence: Soviet Foreign Policy, 1917–73, Second Edition (New York: Praeger, 1974), pp. 456–95. 33 Wang Shijie, Wang Shijie Riji (The Diary of Dr. Wang Shijie) (Taipei: Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica, 1990), vol. 5, pp. 130–2. 34 Chiang Kai-shek Diary, entry for August 20, 1945, CKSD, Box 44. 35 Memorandum by SNDC Concerning the Recognition of the Outer Mongolian Independence, Top Secret, October 2, 1945, ASNDC, 003/3368; Wang Chonghui to Chiang Kai-shek, October 18, 1945, GW/BW, vol. 40, p. 369; Memorandum by Waijiaobu, July 11, 1947, AMFA-2, 112/1–2.


Notes 161 36 British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, February 16, 1946, FO 436/17172 F2588/25/10; Waijiaobu Internal Memorandum, November 14, 1946, AMFA-1, 172–1/1344. See also J. Burke, “China’s Losing Game in Mongolia,” in Far Eastern Survey, vol. 17, no. 13 (1948), pp. 156–7. 37 Issues relating to Outer Mongolia’s independence in 1945–6 particularly generated a striking impact on the situation in Inner Mongolia. For an excellent research into this topic, see C. Atwood, “Sino-Soviet Diplomacy and the Second Partition of Mongolia, 1945–1946,” in S. Kotkin and B. Elleman, eds., Mongolian in the Twentieth Century: Landlocked Cosmopolitan (London: M.E. Sharpe, 1999), pp. 137–61. 38 See: Chiang Kai-shek Diary, entry for August 25, 1945, CKSD, Box 44; SNDC to Executive Yuan, September 29, 1945, Xingzheng Yuan Dang’an (Archives of the Executive Yuan), Academia Historica (Taipei), 300000000A, 40/875–40/881; Note from Waijiaobu to Executive Yuan, October 11, 1945, ibid., 40/882–40/884; “Russian Intervention in Sinkiang and Mongolia,” Extract from Reference India Command Fortnightly, Intelligence Summary no. 14, enclosed in British Consul in Urumqi to Foreign Office, April 16, 1946, WO 208/268. 39 Note from Ministry of National Defense to Waijiaobu, December 3, 1946, AMFA-2, 120/2; Waijiaobu Memorandum, July 5, 1947, AMFA-2, 112/1–2. 40 Copy of English Text of Chiang Kai-shek’s Speech, published by Central News Agency, enclosed in British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, August 26, 1945, FO 371/46212 F5766/186/10; Seymour to Foreign Office, September 17, 1945, FO 371/46213 F6996/186/10. 41 Chiang’s Diary, entry for August 25, 1945, CKSD, Box 44. 42 To reduce its political implication when visiting China, the Tibetan mission was dispatched with the pretext of “congratulating the Allied Nations on winning the war.” See British Mission in Lhasa to Government of India, April 2, 1946, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4226. 43 Note from Tibetan Foreign Affairs Bureau to British Mission in Lhasa, April 12, 1946, FO 371/53616 F6625/71/10; Communiqué by Tibetan Mission to Nationalist Government, November 20, 1946, ANG, 20000000A, 419/0412–419/0426. 44 Chiang Kai-shek Diary, entry for November 4, 1946, CKSD, Box 45; Draft Proposal Submitted Jointly by Dai Chuanxiang, Wu Zhongxin, Zhang Qun, Liu Wenhui and Wu Dingchang to Chiang Kai-shek, December 26, 1946, ANG, 20000000A, 419/0459– 419/0465. 45 British Consulate at Urumqi to British Embassy in Chongqing, February 5, 1945, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2405. See also Benson, The Ili Rebellion, pp. 42–66; Millward, Eurasian Crossroads, pp. 215–24. 46 British Consulate at Urumqi to British Embassy in Nanking, August 3, 1946, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2405; W.G. Graham (British Consul at Urumqi) to British Embassy in Nanking, September 24, 1946, L/P&S/12/2402; Memorandum by Executive Yuan to Waijiaobu, Top Secret, October 17, 1946, AMFA-2, 197/1. 47 Letter from Masud Sabrī, Mohammed Amin Bughra, and Isa Yusuf Alptekin to Chiang Kai-shek, October 6, 1945, AMFA-2, 197/1. 48 Minute of Meeting Concerning Implementing a High-Degree Autonomy in Xinjiang Province, October 16, 1945, AMFA-2, 197/1; Memorandum entitled “Current Situation in Xinjiang and the Policy of Governing Xinjiang,” prepared by the Investigation and Statistics Bureau, enclosed in Executive Yuan to Waijiaobu, June 14, 1946, ibid. 49 Note from Executive Yuan to Waijiaobu, July 12, 1948, AMFA-1, 172–1/1340. 50 Memorandum by KMT Central Committee entitled “The Inner Mongolian Question and its Countermeasures,” March 1946, AKMT, 561/3; British Embassy in China to Foreign Office concerning the situation in Inner Mongolia, 28 February 1946, FO 436/17172 F4122/757/10. 51 British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, February 26, 1946, FO 371/53674 F4123/401/G10; Memorandum by KMT Central Executive Committee, March 1946, AKMT, 561/3.


162 Notes 52 “Special Report on the Current Situation in Northeast and Inner Mongolia,” April 9, 1946, AMFA-2, 317/18; “Russian Intervention in Sinkiang [Xinjiang] and Mongolia,” Intelligence Summary no. 14, enclosed in British Consulate at Urumqi to Foreign Office, April 16, 1946, WO 208/268; Leighton Stuart (US Ambassador to China) to State Department, August 9, 1946, in FRUS, 1946, vol. IX, pp. 1491–3. See also Liu, Reins of Liberation, pp. 151–94. 53 Proposal Concerning the Restoration of Leagues and Banners in Inner Mongolia, submitted by MTAC and Ministry of Home Affairs to Chiang Kai-shek, March 25, 1946, ASNDC, 004/144.1; Luo Liangjian (Head of MTAC) to Chiang Kai-shek, September 25, 1946, GW/BW, vol. 40, pp. 396–7. 54 Proposal submitted by MTAC and Ministry of Home Affairs to Chiang Kai-shek, March 25, 1946, ASNDC, 004/144.1; Proposal submitted by KMT Central Executive Committee to SNDC, August 28, 1946, ibid., 004/144.2. 55 Military Affairs Commission to Waijiaobu, March 19, 1946, AMFA-2, 317/18; Ministry of Military Ordinance to Wang Chonghui (Secretary-General of SNDC), March 30 and April 5, 1946, ASNDC 004/144.1. 56 Fu Zuoyi (Governor of Suiyuan Province) to Chiang Kai-shek, March 29, 1946, ANG, 20000000A, 386/1451–386/1452; Wu Huanzhang (Governor of Xing’an Province) to Chiang, March 30, 1946, ASNDC, 004/144.1; Joint Petition from Members of the Political Councils in Chahar, Suiyuan and Qinghai to Nationalist Government, April 17, 1946, ibid. 57 Memorandum by Nationalist General Staff to Chiang Kai-shek, enclosed in Chiang to SNDC, July 22, 1946, ASNDC, 004/144.1. 58 See: “Resolutions Concerning the Takeover of the Japanese-Occupied Areas,” SNDC, August 11, 1945, and “Methods for Executive Yuan to Take Over the Japanese-Occupied Areas,” August 1945, in ZZSC, 7 (4), pp. 9–18. 59 See: Chiang Kai-shek to SNDC Concerning the Restoration of the Northeast, August 29, 1945; “Guidelines for Restoring the Northeastern Provinces,” prepared by KMT Central Standing Committee, August 31, 1945; SNDC to Nationalist Government Concerning Demarcating the Northeast, September 9, 1945; and “The Demarcation of the Nine New Provinces in the Northeast,” issued by Chinese Ministry of Information, June 1947, in ZZSC, vol. 7, no. 1, pp. 30–1, 47–69. 60 Shi Yangcheng, “Lun Suoxiao Shengqu yu Tiaozheng Shengxianqu (On Minimizing Provincial Territories and Adjusting Provinces, Counties and Districts),” in Dongfang Zazhi (Eastern Miscellany) (Hong Kong), vol. 42, no. 14 (July 15, 1946), pp. 9–13; Wang Chengzu, “Dongbei zhi Xingzheng Quhua (The Administrative Demarcation of the Northeast),” in Bianzheng Gonglun, 6: 2 (June 1947), pp. 16–18. 61 Li Zongren to Chiang Kai-shek, December 10, 1945, ANG, 20000000A, 386/1329; Xiong Shihui to Chiang, August 24, 1946, ibid., 386/1335–386/1337; Chiang’s Instructions to Xiong, T.V. Soong, and Bai Chongxi (Minister of National Defense), October 9, 1946, ibid., 386/1338–386/1339. 62 Petition by Rehe Provincial Government to Executive Yuan, April 14, 1947, ANG, 20000000A, 386/1347–386/1351; Prince Da (Head of Josoto League) to Chiang Kai-shek, June 7, 1947, ibid., 386/1373–386/1375; Petition by Rehe Native-place Society in Peking to Chiang, July 28, 1947, ibid., 386/1387–386/1389. On the Nationalist government’s administrative endeavors in postwar Inner Mongolia and Manchuria, see also Liu, Reins of Liberation, pp. 195–234. 63 Minute of Conversation between British Military Attaché in China and General Cheng (Director of Intelligence in the Chinese Ministry of National Defense), December 9, 1946, FO 436/17402 F18247/384/10; Report from Nationalist Joint Office in Northeast China to Waijiaobu, Top Secret, April 9, 1946, AMFA-2, 317/18. 64 Chiang Kai-shek to Li Zongren, March 30, 1946, GW/BW, vol. 40, p. 385; Note from Yu Jishi (Director of Bureau of Military Affairs, Nationalist Government) to Chiang, June 21, 1946, ibid., p. 421.


Notes 163 65 Report submitted by Ma Hetian (MTAC Special Commissioner in Chahar), enclosed in Executive Yuan to Waijiaobu, July 4, 1947, AMFA-2, 317/18; M.I.5 Intelligence Report entitled “China: Inner Mongolia People’s Republic,” January 9, 1948, WO 208/4719. On Inner Mongolian Autonomous Movements after World War II, see also Hao, ed., Neimenggu Jindai Jianshi, pp. 212–69. 66 SNDC to Chiang Kai-shek, November 11, 1946, ASNDC, 004/144.2; Chiang’s Instruction to SNDC, November 19, 1946, ibid. 67 Intelligence Report no. 6661, “China: Increase of Communist Influence in Ninghsia [Ningxia]–Suiyuan Area,” October 19, 1948, WO 208/4719; British War Office Memorandum entitled “Status of Inner Mongolia,” July 5, 1949, WO 208/4582. 68 “Report Submitted to the General Staff on China’s Frontier Constructions,” December 13, 1946, in Shih-sou Collections, Enclosed Documents, pp. 127–8. 69 Chiang Kai-shek Diary, entries for November 21, December 6, 7, and 20, 1946, CKSD, Box 45. 70 Report from R.G. Etherington-Smith (British Consul-General at Kashgar) to Government of India, November 21, 1946, OIOC, L/P&S/12/2402; Chen and Chen, Minguo Xinjiang Shi, pp. 415–6. 71 See Shen Xiaoyun, “Guomin Zhengfu Xibei Kaifa Shiqi Chengshihua Jianshe Buzou Shulun (A Commentary on the Urbanization and Construction Measures taken by the Nationalist Government during the Northwestern Development Era),” in Minguo Dang’an (Republican Archives) 2007 (1), p. 79. 72 Confidential Memorandum submitted to Chiang Kai-shek entitled “Dealing with Xinjiang and Northwestern issues,” March 30, 1946, GW/BW, vol. 39, pp. 119–21. 73 Chiang Kai-shek Diary, entry for May 10, 1947, CKSD, Box 46. 74 Memorandum on the Proposed Joint Development of the Petroleum Industry in Kansu [Gansu] and Chinghai [Qinghai] Provinces, enclosed in Weng Wenhao (Head of National Resources Commission) to T.V. Soong, December 4, 1945, T.V. Soong Papers, Box 63. 75 “Guidelines for Constructing Northwest China for the First Stage,” drafted by Ministry of National Defense, October 1946, enclosed in Waijiaobu Memorandum, November 8, 1946, AMFA-1, 172–1/1344; Ministry of National Defense to Waijiaobu Concerning the Dispatch of Military Commissioners to Alashaa and Ejine Banners, November 3, 1946, AMFA-2, 317/23. 76 MTAC to Waijiaobu, June 17, 1947, AMFA-2, 317/21; Memorandum by Waijiaobu, June 27, 1947, ibid.; Report by MTAC Commissioner’s Office in Chahar, enclosed in MTAC to Waijiaobu, July 18, 1947, ibid.; Foreign Office Memorandum entitled “Report of Mongolian Penetration of Chinese territory,” June 16, 1947, FO 371/66443 N7070/4303/38. 77 During the talks in Moscow, the Nationalists insisted upon the demarcation of the Sino-MPR boundary as a prerequisite for ratification of the Sino-Soviet treaty, but the Soviets resolutely refused. In the end Chiang Kai-shek reluctantly agreed to sign the treaty without specifically defining the location of the national boundary between China and the MPR. See: Chiang Kai-shek’s Instructions to T.V. Soong and Wang Shijie, August 13, 1945, in ZZSC, 3 (2), p. 649; Minute of the First National Boundary Conference, December 31, 1945, enclosed in Ministry of Military Ordinance to Waijiaobu, February 13, 1946, AMFA-2, 112/91. 78 Minutes of the Third, Fourth, and Fifth National Boundary Conferences, dated January 17, 24 and February 7, 1946, enclosed in Ministry of Military Ordinance to Waijiaobu, February 13, 1946, AMFA-2, 112/91. 79 Minute of the Sixth National Boundary Conference, February 14, 1946, enclosed in Ministry of Military Ordinance to Waijiaobu, March 19, 1946, AMFA-2, 112/91; Ralph Stevenson (British Ambassador to China) to Foreign Office, June 10, 1947,

164 Notes

80


81

82

83

84 85

86

87 88 89

90

91 92 93

FO 405/17601 F8774/76/10; Memorandum entitled “Relations between Burma and China,” by Foreign Office Research Department, May 31, 1948, FO 405/17912 F7962/359/79. Investigative Report by General Zhao Xiguang (Head of Political Department of Generalissimo’s Field Headquarters in the Northwest), enclosed in Executive Yuan to Waijiaobu, February 13, 1947, AMFA-2, 317/39. Note from Nationalist Government to Waijiaobu on the Beitashan Incident, June 10, 1947, AMFA-2, 112/82–1; Report from Headquarters of Xinjiang Garrison Forces to Nationalist Government, June 10, 1947, ibid.; “China: Monthly Summary for June 1947,” enclosed in British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, July 1, 1947, FO 405/17601 F9454/28/10. Foreign Office Minute Paper entitled “The Mongolian–Sinkiang Frontier Incident,” June 17, 1947, FO 371/66443 N7114/4303/38; Intelligence Report by Bureau of Military Affairs of Nationalist Government, June 1947, AMFA-2, 112/82–1; Memorandum by Nationalist Government, enclosed in Chiang Kai-shek to Waijiaobu, June 24, 1947, ibid., 112/82–6. See: Da Gong Bao (Impartial Daily), June 19, 1947, p. 2; Correspondences between Waijiaobu and General Zhang Zhizhong, dated June 23, 28, July 13 and August 9, 1947, AMFA-2, 112/82–2; Waijiaobu to Chinese Embassy in Moscow, July 8, 10 and 11, 1947, ibid.; Chiang Kai-shek Diary, entry for June 14, 1947, CKSD, Box 46. Reports from British Embassy in Moscow to Foreign Office, dated February 27 and April 6, 1948, FO 371/69631 F3506/2538/10; British Embassy in China to Foreign Office, March 16, 1948, FO 371/69631 F4690/2538/10. Yin Kenhuo (Chinese Consul in Alma Ata) to Waijiaobu, June 14 and July 11, 1945, AMFA-2, 110/16; Memorandum by Waijiaobu to Ministry of National Defense Concerning the Political Situation in Xinjiang, September 8, 1947, AMFA-1, 172–1/1434. Memorandum by Department of Western Asiatic Affairs, Waijiaobu, October 4, 1947, AMFA-1, 172–1/1117; Note from Government of India to Chinese Embassy in India, November 26, 1947, enclosed in Chinese Embassy to Waijiaobu, November 29, 1947, ibid. Special Intelligence Report no. 96 entitled “Organization of the Torgut Mongols of Sinkiang,” dated March 19, 1947, WO 208/4718. Report written by O.C. Ellis (Clerical officer at British Consulate Urumqi), November 15, 1950, FO 371/92207 FC1016/1. Report from Chinese Consulate-General at Calcutta to Waijiaobu, January 14, 1948, AMFA-1, 172–1/1488. On the return of the exiled Kazakhs to Xinjiang during the postwar period, see also He Xueyi and Zha Kan, eds., Xinjiang Hasakezu Qianxi shi (A History of Migration of the Kazakhs in Xinjiang) (Urumqi: Xinjiang Daxue chubanshe, 1993), pp. 122–35. Chinese Muslim Association to Waijiaobu, July 20, 1948, AMFA-1, 172–1/1346; Note from Waijiaobu to Chinese Muslim Association, August 17, 1948, ibid.; Waijiaobu’s Instruction to Chinese Legation in Afghanistan, November 18, 1948, ibid. See also D. Bodde, “China’s Muslim Minority,” in Far Eastern Survey, vol. 15, no. 18 (1946), pp. 281–4. Chinese Consulate-General at Calcutta to Waijiaobu, May 12, 1948, AMFA-1, 172–1/1488; Waijiaobu to Liu Zerong (Waijiaobu Special Commissioner in Xinjiang), August 17, 1948, AMFA-1, 172–1/1346. Nationalist Northwestern Headquarters to Waijiaobu concerning Kazakhs in Xinjiang, January 10, 1949, AMFA-1, 172–1/1346. Memorandum by Department of Western Asiatic Affairs, Waijiaobu, February 27, 1947, AMFA-2, 119/4–1. On China’s relations with the Muslims in Kashmir after World War II, see also G. Patterson, “Recent Chinese Policies in Tibet and towards the Himalayan Border States,” in China Quarterly, no. 12 (1962), pp. 191–202.


Notes 165 94 Waijiaobu to Xinjiang Provincial Government, March 8, 1947, AMFA-2, 119/4–1; Memorandum by Waijiaobu, March 19, 1947, ibid. 95 Confidential report from General Zhao Xiguang to Waijiaobu and Ministry of National Defense, September 29, 1947, AMFA-2, 119/4–1; Letter from Mir of Hunza to Xinjiang Provincial Government, enclosed in Chinese Embassy in India to Waijiaobu, December 29, 1947, ibid. 96 Memorandum by Waijiaobu, October 4, 1947, AMFA-2, 119/4–1; Chiang Kai- shek’s Confidential Instructions to Wang Shijie, October 2 and 7, 1947, ibid.; Orders given by Nationalist Government to Ministry of National Defense and Waijiaobu concerning Hunza, November 5, 1947, ibid.; Proposal Concerning Hunza’s Status Submitted by Waijiaobu to Chiang, December 4, 1947, ibid. 97 Waijiaobu to Zhao Xiguang, December 18, 1947, AMFA-1, 119/4–1; Waijiaobu to Liu Zerong, December 22, 1947, ibid. 98 India Office Minute Paper, dated December 11, 1947, OIOC, L/P&S/13/1860; British High Commissioner in India to Commonwealth Relations Office, January 22, 1948, OIOC, L/P&S/12/3303; Memoranda by Waijiaobu, January 31 and February 20, 1948, AMFA-2, 119/4–1; News Clips on the Gilgit Revolution, enclosed in Chinese Embassy in India to Waijiaobu, January 17, 1948, ibid., 119/4–2. 99 Chiang Kai-shek was particularly concerned about India’s negative reactions. See Chiang Diary, entry for December 11, 1947, CKSD, Box 46. 100 Zhao Xiguang’s report to Nanking, January 7, 1948, enclosed in Liu Zerong to Nanking, January 12, 1948, AMFA-2, 119/4–2; Office of British Deputy Commissioner (Peshawar) to British High Commissioner in Pakistan, February 2, 1948, OIOC, L/P&S/12/3303. 101 General Zhao Xiguang’s Report, enclosed in General Zhang Zhizhong’s Confidential Dispatch to Waijiaobu, April 1, 1948, AMFA-2, 119/4–2; Waijiaobu Analytical Report, Top Secret, April 8, 1948, ibid. 102 Letter from the Mir of Hunza to General Chau (Zhao), February 15, 1948, enclosed in Liu Zerong to Waijiaobu, May 5, 1948, AMFA-2, 119/4–2; Zhang’s Report to Nanking on the Kashgar Mission to Hunza, August 3, 1948, ibid.; Liu Zerong to Waijiaobu, August 24, 1948, ibid.; Zhao Xiguang’s Report, enclosed in Liu to Nanking, September 1, 1948, ibid. 103 T. Das, “The Kashmir Issue and the United Nations,” in Political Science Quarterly, vol. 65, no. 2 (June 1950), pp. 264–82; C. Dasgupta, War and Diplomacy in Kashmir, 1947–48 (New Delhi: Sage, 2002), pp. 23–49; P.N.K. Bamzai, A History of Kashmir: Political, Social, Cultural (New Delhi: Metropolitan Book Co. Ltd., 1973), pp. 767–70. 104 Note from Chinese Presidential Office to Waijiaobu, September 2, 1948, AMFA-2, 119/4–2; Memorandum by Department of Western Asiatic Affairs, Waijiaobu, September 21, 1948, ibid. 105 In a secret dispatch to Waijiaobu in mid-September 1948, officials from the Ministry of National Defense revealed that, according to an intelligence report from their underground network in Central Asia, the second Kashgar mission did not in fact enter Hunza and meet the Mir of Hunza. Instead, the mission had been unable to cross the border and was eventually forced to return to Kashgar on July 6. Although this piece of information was not confirmed, it would conceivably have greatly reduced the Nanking leadership’s already tenuous trust in Zhao Xiguang and his staff. See Note from G-2 of Ministry of National Defense to Waijiaobu, September 14, 1948, AMFA-2, 119/4–2. Epilogue: the end of the journey 1 Pei Zhouyu, Suiyuan Fangshi di Shengli (The Triumph of the Suiyuan Formula) (Taiyuan: Shansi renmin chubanshe, 1985), pp. 16–19; Song Zhi, Ping Jin Zhanyi di


166 Notes Mimizhan (The Secret War of the Beijing and Tianjin Battle) (Beijing: Dangdai Zhongguo chubanshe, 2007), esp. chapter 18. 2 Memorandum entitled “Status of Inner Mongolia,” July 5, 1949, WO 208/4582; Intelligence Report entitled “Present Conditions in Suiyuan,” September 20, 1949, ibid. 3 Li Wu, Zhang Wenjin, and Luan Huaxin, “Suiyuan Jiu-yi-jiu Qiyi (The Uprising of Suiyuan Province on September 19, 1949),” in Chang Shun, Jing Yao, Sun Weihou and Cai Huilin, eds., Baiwan Guomindangjun Qiyi Toucheng Jishi (A True Record of the Millions of Nationalist Forces Coming to our Side) (Beijing: Zhongguo wenshi chubanshe, 1991), vol. 1, pp. 457–80. 4 Yuan Wei, ed., Mao Zedong Junshi Huodong Jishi, 1893–1976 (A True Record of Mao Zedong’s Military Activities, 1893–1976) (Beijing: Jiefangjun chubanshe, 1994), pp. 788–90; Qin, ed., Zhongtong Jianggong Dashi Changbian Chugao, vol. 7, part ii, p. 358. 5 Yuan Dejin and Liu Zhenhua, Xibei Jiefangjun Zhanzheng Jishi (A True Record of the War of Liberation in the Northwest) (Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 2003), pp. 610–19; “Suiyuan Peacefully Liberated,” October 9, 1949, WO 208/4582. 6 See Ma Hongkui’s Letter to Wedemeyer, February 26, 1951, Albert C. Wedemeyer Papers, Box 102. 7 J. Gao, “The Call of the Oases: The Peaceful Liberation of Xinjiang, 1949–53,” in Dilemmas of Victory, pp. 188–9. See also Millward, Eurasian Crossroads, pp. 231–4, for the final days of Nationalist rule in Xinjiang. 8 Office of Deputy High Commissioner for UK, Peshawar, to Foreign Office, December 6, 1949, FO 371/75800 F19231/10126/10. See also: Tao Zhiyue, “Daozhi Xinjiang Heping Jiefang di Licheng (Courses Leading to Xinjiang’s Peaceful Liberation),” in Xinjiang Wenshi Ziliao Xuanji, vol. 4 (1979), pp. 1–10; Forbes, Warlords and Muslims in Chinese Central Asia, pp. 215–20. 9 Notable examples of the practice of the Suiyuan Peace in southwest China occurred in both Yunnan and Xikang Provinces. See Report from Zhang Chun (Director of the Pacification Commission in Chongqing) to Chiang Kai-shek, January 6, 1950, in ZZSC, 7 (2), pp. 959–62. 10 MTAC to Waijiaobu, July 22, 1949, AMFA-2, 019/42; Chinese Embassy in India to Waijiaobu, July 23, 1949, ibid.; Chen Xizhang (Acting Chinese Representative to Tibet) to MTAC, July 8, 1949, ACROT, E-20. 11 Jagchid, The Last Mongol Prince, pp. 403–17; Nei Zhenlian, “Alashan qi Qiyi (The Uprising of Alashaa Banner),” in Chang Shun, Jing Yao, Sun Weihou and Cai Huilin (eds.), Baiwan Guomindangjun Qiyi Toucheng Jishi, vol. 1 (1991), pp. 414–18. 12 Liu, Reins of Liberation, pp. 321–8. 13 Yuan and Liu, Xibei Jiefangjun Zhanzheng Jishi, pp. 709–18; Duan-ta-la-teng-dai, “De Wang Chuzou Dingyuanying hou di Yixie Huodong Qingkuang (Some Activity Reports about Prince Demchugdongrob after he Fled from Dingyuanying),” in Alashan Meng Wenshi, vol. 2 (1986), pp. 1–5. 14 British Embassy (Peking) to Foreign Office, November 15, 1950, FO 371/92207 FC1016/1; G. Lias, Kazak Exodus (London: Evans Brothers Ltd., 1956), pp. 154–9, 172–5. 15 Ma Bufang to Chiang Kai-shek, January 18, 1950, TD/XW, vol. 62, no. 54071; Memorandum by British Commonwealth Relations Office to Foreign Office, October 3, 1951, FO 371/92897 FL1823/1. For the unrests in Xinjiang in the first half of the 1950s, see also M. Dillon, Xinjiang – China’s Muslim Far Northwest (London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2004), pp. 52–5; He and Zha, eds., Xinjiang Hasakezu Qianxi shi, pp. 111–14. 16 Yuan and Liu, Xibei Jiefangjun Zhanzheng Jishi, pp. 698–725; New China News Agency-Peking no. 1616, dated February 23, 1951, FO 371/92207 FC1061/2. 17 G-2 of Ministry of National Defense to Chiang Kai-shek, February 21, 1950, TD/XW, vol. 62, no. 54133; Office of the Generalissimo to Legislator Guang Lu, February 26,


Notes 167 1950, ibid., no. 54134; “Record of Interview with General Yolbas Beg, Former Governor of Hami in Sinkiang [Xinjiang], at New Delhi,” dated April 3, 1951, FO 371/92207 FC1016/3. 18 Lin, Tibet and Nationalist China’s Frontier, pp. 199–200. 19 US Embassy in China to State Department, February 26, 1944, USFR, 893.00 Tibet/73, in USDS 1940–1944, reel 7; Government of India to British Political Office in Sikkim, March 4, 1944, OIOC, L/P&S/12/4212; British Mission in Lhasa to British Political Office in Sikkim, March 6, 1944, ibid. 20 Intelligence Report from Lhasa to Chiang Kai-shek, September 15, 1948, GW/BW, vol. 40, pp. 588–90; Chinese Mission in Lhasa to Nationalist Government, October 20, 1948, ANG, 200000000A, 420/0506–420/0507. 21 Lin, Tibet and Nationalist China’s Frontier, p. 201; Lamb, Tibet, China and India, pp. 493–4. For first hand information on the new Panchen Lama and his entourage at Kumbum Monastery in the last days of the Nationalist rule, see also L. Clark, The Marching Wind (London: Hutchinson, 1955), pp. 33–49. 22 Bai Yunti (Head of MTAC) to Chen Xizhang, June 18, 1949, ACROT, E-20; Confidential Scheme Submitted by Office of the Generalissimo to Chiang Kai-shek, July 15, 1949, TD/XW, vol. 62, no. 54076; Memorandum Submitted by Waijiaobu to Executive Yuan, August 3, 1949, AMFA-2, 019/42. 23 KMT Central Extraordinary Committee to Chiang Kai-shek, August 1, 1949, TD/ XW, vol. 62, no. 54108; Memorandum by MTAC, August 1949, AMFA-2, 019/42. 24 Li Zhifu to Chiang Kai-shek, August 8, 1949, TD/XW, vol. 62, no. 54095; Memorandum from Office of the Generalissimo to Chiang, August 12, 1949, ibid., no. 54097; Minute of Conference, Executive Yuan, September 9, 1949, AMFA-2, 019/42; Memorandum Submitted by MTAC to Executive Yuan, September 24, 1949, ibid. 25 Chiang Kai-shek Diary, entry for August 20, 1949, CKSD, Box 47. 26 Ya Hanzhang, Biographies of the Tibetan Spiritual Leaders Panchen Erdenis (Beijing: Foreign Language Press, 1994), pp. 337–8; Jiang Ping, ed., Banchan Erdeni Pingzhuan (A Critical Biography of the Panchen Lama) (Beijing: Zhongguo Zangxue chubanshe, 1998), pp. 119–22. 27 Goldstein, A History of Modern Tibet, 1913–1951, pp. 759–72. See also Chen Jian, “The Chinese Communist ‘Liberation’ of Tibet, 1949–51,” in Dilemmas of Victory, pp. 130–59. 28 Luo Jialun, Luo Jialun Xiansheng Wencun (The Extant Works of Mr. Luo Jialun) (Taipei: KMT Historical Committee, 1976), vol. 2, pp. 872–8. 29 Memorandum by the Generalissimo’s Office, December 30, 1949, TD/XW, vol. 62, no. 54067; Report from Legislators Guang Lu and Abdullah to Chiang Kai-shek, January 6, 1950, ibid., no. 54119. See also Luo, Luo Jialun Xiansheng Wencun, vol. 7, pp. 283–5. 30 On the discussion of anti-Communist momentum in China’s Central Asian borderland in the 1950s, see, for example, Hsiao-ting Lin, “Lengzhan Bianyuan: Erci Dazhanhou Meiguo zai Zhongguo Bianjiang Diqu de Mimi Huodong –1947–1951 (The Cold War on the Periphery: American Underground Activities in China’s Borderlands during the post-World War II Period – 1947–1951),” in Zhongyang Yanjiuyuan Jindaishi Yanjiusuo Jikan (Bulletin of the Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica) (Taipei), no. 53 (September 2006), pp. 103–48. 31 D. McMillen, “Xinjiang and the Production and Construction Corps: A Han Organization in a non-Han Region,” in Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs, no. 6 (1981), pp. 65–9; Dillon, Xinjiang, pp. 35–6. 32 McMillen, “Xinjiang and Wang Enmao: New Directions in Power, Policy and Integration?” in China Quarterly, no. 99 (1984), pp. 569–70. 33 Ren Yifei and Zhou Jinghong, Zhonghua Renmin Gongheguo Minzu Guangxishi Yanjiu (A History of the Relationship between the Nationalities in the People’s Republic of China) (Shenyang: Liaoning minzu chubanshe, 2003), pp. 112–14.


168 Notes 34 Hou Zhimin, “Zouxiang Xinsheng–Ma Bufang Canbu Toucheng Jishi (Heading toward Regeneration: A True Record of the Surrender of Ma Bufang’s Remaining Forces),” in Chang Shun, Jing Yao, Sun Weihou and Cai Huilin, eds., Baiwan Guomindangjun Qiyi Toucheng Jishi, vol. 1 (1991), pp. 537–41. 35 Chen Jian, “The Chinese Communist ‘Liberation’ of Tibet, 1949–51,” in Dilemmas of Victory, pp. 130–59. 36 See J. Millward and N. Tursun, “Political History and Strategies of Control, 1884–1978,” in S.F. Starr, ed., Xinjiang: China’s Muslim Borderland (New York: M.E. Sharpe, 2004), pp. 87–8. 37 R. Taylor, Foreign and Domestic Consequences of the KMT Intervention in Burma (Ithaca: Department of Asian Studies, Cornell University, 1973), pp. 30–4. 38 See, for example, MTAC, ed., Meng Zang Cankao Ziliao (Reference Materials on Mongolia and Tibet), mimeographed copy, April 1953, part ii, pp. 1–2. See also the discussion in Prologue. 39 Yuan and Liu, Xibei Jiefangjun Zhanzheng Jishi, pp. 722–4. It is noteworthy that in September 1954, when the PLA bombed the Nationalist-held Kinmen off the Fujian coast, Mao Zedong stated that the Nationalists’ covert cooperation with ethnic guerrilla forces in West China was one of the reasons for the Communist attack on this offshore island. 40 A. Lamb (Peking) to Foreign Office, February 18, 1953, FO 371/92202 FC1013/16. See also Qin, ed., Zongtong Jianggong Dashi Changbian Chugao, vol. 12, pp. 79, 119. 41 See Minute Submitted by Zhang Lisheng and Zheng Jiemin to Chiang Kai-shek, April 30, 1958, in Shao Minghuang and Xue Huayuan, eds., Jiang Zhongzheng Zongcai Piqian Dang’an Mulu (A Compilation of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek’s Directives and Comments) (Taipei: KMT Historical Committee and Department of History, National Cheng-chi University, 2005), p. 337.


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Index

Page numbers in bold indicate figures not included in the text page range. air bases 94 Ajia Hutuktu 62 Alashaa Banner 20, 64–5, 102, 106, 115, 121 Alliance of the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Movement 102 Alliance Society (Tongmenghui) see Tongmenghui Alptekin, Isa Yusuf 90, 109 Altai region 87, 94, 109 anti-Communism campaigns 115–16 Apresov, Garegin 57 assimilationism xxix, 2, 7, 59 autonomous movements 102 autonomy: Inner Mongolian 24, 43, 101–3; minority groups xxix; non-Han ethnic minorities 100–1; Outer Mongolia 13; and Sun Yat-sen 13; Tibet 100 Baghdad legation 92 Bai Chongxi 18, 21 Bai Yunti (Serengdongrob) 13 Bailingmiao 48 Baitak Bogdo incident 116 Baitak Bogdo (Beitashan) region 107–8 Bat-khaalag (Bailingmiao) 43 Bator, Osman 116 border security: postwar 94, 105–8 borderlands: southwest 3–5 boundaries: drawing xxiv–xxv; the Pamirs 85 Britain: air service 82; and China 84–5; gold bars affair 88–90; lend-lease goods 82, 91; and Outer Mongolia 96; route schemes 82–3; and Sheng Shicai 87, 88–90; and Tibet 10, 69, 96; treaty 93 British Consulate General: Kashgar 89 British Indian citizens 58

Brown, Jeremy xxii Bughra, Muhammad Amīn 90 Cairo Summit 93 Central Political Academy: KMT 31 Chen Changjie 97–8 Chen Cheng 54 Chen Jionming 11 Chen Jitang 52 Chen Lifu 57 Chen Zhong 40, 41 Chiang Kai-shek: and MPR 15; Cairo Summit 93; civil war 22; and ethnic minority groups xxi; frontier issues 24; and Hu Hanmin 34; and Huang Shaohong 44–7; Inner Mongolia 18, 104–5; inspection tours: (1942) 94; (Gansu Corridor) 76–7; Labrang Tibetans 61–2; and Liu Wenhui 60; Manchuria 103–4; Military Affairs Commission 35; and military means 3; and Mukden Incident 34–5; and national security 35–6; at Ningxia 79; Northern Expedition 14–15; and Outer Mongolia 3, 98–100; and the Pamirs 85; southwestern provinces 48–53; and Soviets 11–13; and Sun Dianying 39–40; and Tibet 4; and War of Resistance 54–7, 60; and warlords 17, 19; and Xikang 60–1; at Xining 78; and Xinjiang 75; and Yekejuu incident 97–8 China’s Destiny 93, 94 Chinese Communists xxii, xxvi, 12, 50, 97–8, 104–5, 109–10, 113–14, 116, 118–19 Chinese ethnopolitics: scholarly discourse xxviii Chinese Expeditionary Force 81


Index 187 Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang, KMT) see KMT Chinese Republic: ethnopolitics xxiv Chinese Revolution (1911) xxiii–xxiv Chinggis Khan: mausoleum 56 Cho-Yon relationships 67–70 civil wars: (1930) 21, 22, 23; (1947) 108; (1949) 113 clandestine activities 25–6 Communist Reds 50 see also Chinese Communists conference (1930): KMT 21 Consolatory Commission 51–2 consular posts 108 Crossley, Pamela 1 customs: Kashmir 84; Xinjiang 83 Dai Chuanxian (also Dai Jitao) 3, 4–5, 24, 46 Dalai Lamas: (fifth) 68; (fourteenth) 70–2, 96; (thirteenth) 4, 21, 27–8, 50, 68, 69 Darijayaga, Prince (Da Wang) 64, 65, 115 delegations: to Middle East 91–2 démarche: Suiyuan 113, 114 Demchugdongrob, Prince (De Wang) 24, 33, 48, 55, 66, 115 Dilowa Hutuktu 70, 97 Dong Qiwu 113, 114 Dorzhiev, Agvan 68 Duan Qirui 7 “dying-out” theory 10 East Turkestan Republic (ETR) see ETR Eastern Mongolian People’s Autonomous Government 102 Eastman, Lloyd 54 economic crisis 50 educational resources: and ethnic minorities 31–3 Eighth Regiment 57, 75 Ejine Banner 45, 64, 65, 67, 102, 106, 117, 121 Esherick, Joseph W. xxix ethnic borderlands 4 ethnic frontier perception 24 ethnic leaders: institutional links with 26–31 ethnic minorities: and educational resources 31–3; elites xxi, xxii, 33, 67; soldiers 66 ethnic resistance 115–16 ethnopolitical policies: during Japanese war 58–66 ethnopolitical training 36

ethnopolitics: early perceptions 1–5 ETR (East Turkestan Republic) 94, 100 expansion: westward xxvi–xxvii Feng Yuxiang 14–15, 17, 19, 21, 22, 39, 97 First Division of the Nationalist Army 39 five-nationality republic model xxiv, 2, 9–10, 19, 27, 36 Forbes, Andrew 94 frontier establishment xxiv Fu Zuoyi 23, 49, 103, 113 Gansu Corridor 76, 77, 79–80, 106, 114 Gao, James Z. 114 garrison forces 105 Germany: blitzkrieg 73 Gilgit region 110–11 gold bars affair 88–90 Goldstein, Melvyn 8 Great Britain see Britain Guangdong Province 52 Guangxi clique 9, 18, 43, 46, 52–3, 104 guerilla forces 65–6, 115–16 Han Chinese: and Manchus xxiv, xxv, 1–2; migration to borderlands xxv, 4 Han Jiaxiang 33 Hu Hanmin 34 Hu Zongnan 38, 45, 114 Huang Musong 41, 49, 50–1, 53 Huang Shaohong 43–7 Huang Xing 4, 7 Huang Zhengji 62 Huang Zhengqing xxi, 61, 62, 117 Hubei Province: revolution 5–6 Hui Muslims 2, 61, 63 Hunza 110–12 immigrants 80 IMPRP (Inner Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party) 13, 102 independence: Outer Mongolia 98–100; Xinjiang 100 India 26 India-Pakistan conflict 111 infrastructure improvement 78–80 Inner Mongolia: anti-Communism campaigns 115; autonomy 43; Chiang Kai-shek 96; and Chinese Communists 104; commission 104–5; cultivation program 97–8; elites 20–2; ethnopolitical policies 63–7; and Japan 48, 55–6; and KMT 13, 16; lamaseries


188 Index Inner Mongolia continued 29, 31; league and banner system 97, 104–5; Mongolian Affairs Conference 21–2; post-World War II 101–3; six new provinces 18–19; and Yan Xishan 19–20; Yekejuu incident 97–8 Inner Mongolian Autonomous Movement 24, 31, 48 Inner Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party (IMPRP) see IMPRP inspection tours: (1942) 94; (Gansu Corridor) 76–7 institutional links: with ethnic leaders 26–31 institutional reforms 24–5, 60–1 intelligence network 25–6, 108 Iran 91 Iraq 92

Koncho Chungnay 28 Kong Qingzong 72 Kublai Khan 67 Kwantung Army 34

Jamyang Hutuktu (fifth) 61 Jamyang Hutuktu (fourth) 61 Janggiya Hutuktu xxii, 28, 29, 31, 49 Japan: invasion (1937–45) xxviii; and invasion threat 35; and Mahmūd Muhītī 87; and Manchuria 7; Mukden Incident 34; and Prince Demchugdongrob 48; and Soviet Russia 73; War of Resistance 54–66 Jebtsundamba Hutuktu 70 Jin Shuren 18, 38, 40 Jin Zaiyie 106 Jānim Khan 116 Joffe, Adolph 11

Labrang 61–2, 67, 118 Labrang Monastery 61, 62, 117, 121 Labrang Tibetans xxi, 61–2, 117 land settlement project 80 Lattimore, Owen xxvii, 49 league and banner system 20, 23, 97, 102–3, 104 “league meeting (huimeng)” 58–9 Lebanon 92 LeDonne, John P. xxvii Leibold, James 94 lend-lease goods 81, 82 Lhamo Dondrup 71–2 Lhawangburugjil, Prince (Ta Wang) 20 Li Fenggang (Mandaltan) 13 Li Tiezheng 91, 92 Li Xiaotian 40, 41 Li Yuanhong 7 Li Zongren 18, 21, 104, 117 Liang Changpei 26 Liu Kuiyi 2 Liu Wenhui 27, 51–2, 60 Liu Wenlong 40 Liu Xiang 50, 54–5 Lobsang Gyentsen 27 Long March 48, 50, 52 Lu Tonglun 75 Luo Wen’gan 41, 42

Kang Youwei 5 Kanjurwa Hutuktu xxii Kashmir 108, 110–12 Kazakhs xxiv, 91, 107–8, 109–10, 115–16 Kesang Tsering 26–7 Kham region 4, 7, 26–7, 52, 60, 95, 118 Khan, Mohammad Jamal 110, 111 Kiakhta talks 8–9 Kirby, William xxix KMT (Kuomintang; Nationalist Party): autonomy for minority groups xxix; and CCP 115; Central Political Academy 31; conference (1930) 21; and ethnic minorities 13, 67, 104; ideology 2; image of 5; Inner Mongol elites 102; leadership struggle 14; military base 12; National Congress 13, 16; and northern frontier 15; party branch offices 37, 62, 66, 78; party headquarters 74, 75; personnel relocation 80; Teiwes on xxix

Ma Bufang xxii, 70–1, 76, 78, 114 Ma Buqing 76, 78 Ma Dunjing 114 Ma family xxi, 37–8, 114 Ma Fuliang 90 Ma Hongbin 79, 114 Ma Hongkui 39–40, 63, 65, 78, 79, 114 Ma Hushan 58, 86, 88, 89 Ma Liang xxii, 122 Ma Lin 39 Ma Muslims 38–43, 61, 70–1, 121 Ma Qi 61 Ma Tungan-Muslim family 23 Ma Yuanxiang xxi, 122 Ma Zhongying 38, 40, 41, 43, 46, 86 McMillen, Donald H. 119 Mahmūd Muhītī 86–7 Manchu emperors 68 Manchukuo regime 102, 103 Manchuria 7, 18, 22, 34, 69, 93, 103–4


Index 189 Manchus xxiv, 2, 5–6 Mao Zedong 50, 113, 122 maps: nationalist China (1930s) xix; western frontiers xx Marco Polo Bridge Incident 54 Matsunaga Anzaemon 7 mausoleum: 0f Chinggis Khan 56 Middle East: outreach to 90–2 migration xxv, 4, 91 Military Affairs Commission 35 military colonization zones 80 military commissioner’s offices 107 military delegations: to Middle East 91–2 military outposts 106 military zone, secret 105–6 Miller, Alexander I. 8–9 Millward, J. xxv Minjur, Prince 109 Mir of Hunza 110, 111 MLAPAC (Mongol Local Autonomy Political Affairs Committee, Menggu Difang Zizhi Zhengwu Weiyuanhui) 43, 48–9 Mongolia 10, 13, 93, 96–8 see also Inner Mongolia; Outer Mongolia Mongolia Autonomous Government 115 Mongolian Affairs Conference (Menggu Huiyi) 21, 22, 23 Mongolian and Tibetan Academy (Meng Zang Xuexiao) 31, 33 Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission (Meng Zang Weiyuanhui; MTAC) see MTAC Mongolian and Tibetan Class 31–2 Mongolian and Tibetan Political Training Corps 32 Mongolian Conference for Autonomy 43 Mongolian Federated Autonomous government 55 Mongolian independence movement xxv Mongolian People’s Republic (MPR) see MPR Mongolian-Soviet military force 11 Mongols: autonomy 24; banner system 23; and Chinese communists 104; early years xxiv, 2–3, 6, 10, 13, 16; and Huang Shaohong 43, 44; independence 99–100, 102; infiltration 29; and Japan 48–9, 69; land reclamation 97–8; new provinces 19–22; and Panchen Lama 30; refugees 97; students 31–2 MPR (Mongolian People’s Republic) 11, 15, 23, 64, 106, 107–8 MTAC (Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs

Commission; Meng Zang Weiyuanhui) 24–6, 59, 96 Mukden Incident 34 Muslim rebellion (1944) 83, 94 Muslims: early years xxiv, 2, 6; ethnic communities 109–10; exiled 91; Gilgit coup 110–11; guerillas 65–6; and Japan 55–6 see also Hui Muslims; Ma Muslims; Tungan Muslims Nanking–Canton split 34–5 National Congress: KMT 13 National Defense Planning Committee 37 national security 35–6 nationalism xxv, xxvi; vs. pragmatism 5–7 “Nationalist government”: in Canton 34 Nationalist Revolutionary Army (NRA) see NRA naval bases 94 Nepal 25–6 “New Policy” (xinzheng) xxiv Ngagchen Hutuktu 69 Ninghai Army 61 Ningxia Province 18, 23, 37, 38, 39, 55–6, 63–4, 76, 77–8, 114 non-Han ethnic minorities 56, 100–1, 109, 115–16 nonaggression pact 56 Noor Beg 86 Norla Hutuktu (seventh) 28, 51, 52 Northern Expedition xxx, 14–15 northern frontier strategy 10–13 northwestern provinces 36–48, 54–8, 77 Northwestern Reclamation Committee 36–7 NRA (Nationalist Revolutionary Army ) 14, 17 nuclear missile site 106 oasis cities 86 oil companies 106 oil exploitation enterprise 106 oil fields 79–80, 91 oil pipelines 82 Outer Mongolia 2–3, 8–9, 10–11, 13, 15–16, 96–7, 98–100, 101 pack routes: Sino-India 81–2 pack-transport firm 81 Palgonchrinle xxi the Pamirs 84, 85, 110 Panchen Lama (ninth) 27–8, 30, 31, 49, 69 Panchen Lama (tenth) 116–18 patron-priest relationships 67–70


190 Index peace negotiations: north and south 6 Pearl Harbor 66, 73 Peking: Republican parliament 7–9 People’s Liberation Army (PLA) see PLA People’s Republic of China (PRC) see PRC the Pescadores 93 petroleum industry 106 Phagspa 67 PLA (People’s Liberation Army) 114, 115–16, 119 post-Sun Yat-sen era 14–16 pragmatism: vs. nationalism 5–7 PRC (People’s Republic of China): borders xxix, 33 Provisional Government of the Inner Mongolian Republic 102 Puyi, Emperor 69 Qing dynasty xxiv–xxv, 68 Qing expansion xxvi Qing reform programs 3–4 Qinghai 76–7 race (zhongzu) xxv Rapga, Pandatsang 95 Red Hat Sect 51 regime security xxiii, xxvii, 35–6 regime survival xxvii Rehe Province 18, 25, 43, 102, 104 “the Republic of Five Nationalities” (wuzu gonghe) see five-nationality republic model Republican parliament: Peking 7–8 Revive China Society (Xingzhonghui) xxv, 1 Revolutionaries: early Chinese Republic 1–5, 3; ethnic minority policy 5–7 revolutionary ideology xxviii revolutionary movement xxv road construction 81–5, 105 Roosevelt, Franklin D. 98 Russia: expansion xxvii; and Tibet 68–9 see also Soviet Russia Russo-Mongol Agreement 2–3, 8 schools 67 Sechin Jagchid 33 Second Sino-Japanese War: (1937–45) xxviii secret agents 26 Seishiro, Itagaki 63–4 separatist movements 102 Seventh Fleet (US) xxi Shahīdī, Burhan 114–15

Shamsher, Bhim 25, 26 Shanghai: bombardment 34; and War of Resistance 54 Shagdurjab, Prince (Sha Wang) 20–1, 97–8 Shen Zonglian 95 Sheng Shicai 38, 40, 41, 46, 47, 57–8, 74, 80, 86–90, 93 Shirabdorji, Prince (Shi Wang) 49 Shunzhi, Emperor 68 Siberia 10 Sichuan: and Chiang Kai-shek 51, 55, 60; Communist threat 50; economic crisis 50; and Golok region 56; governorship 55; and Huang Musong 50–1; and Kham region 8; and KMT 13; Long March 48; as power base 54–5; unrests 36; wartime headquarters 121 Simla Talks 4, 7–8 Sino-India pack route 81–2 Sino-Russian relations 8, 11 see also Soviet Russia Sino-Soviet collaboration 56–8 Sino-Tibetan relations 67–9, 70–2 see also Tibet Society for United Salvation of National Affairs (Guoshi Gongjihui) 6 Song Jiaoren 7 Soong, T.V. 35, 46, 47 southwestern provinces 36, 48–53 Soviet Central Asia 108 Soviet Russia: and Germany 73–4; and Japan 73; lend-lease goods 82; and Sheng Shicai 47, 88; and Sun Yat-sen 11–13; and War of Resistance 56–8; and Xinjiang 46 see also Russia Stalin, Joseph 98, 114; agreements 56 Stanley Hornbeck 96 state-building programs 78–80 stereotypical views xxviii–xxix students 91 Su Yonghe xxi Suiyuan Peace 113–15 Sun Dianying 39–40, 47 Sun Fo 35 Sun Yat-sen xxv, 1, 4, 7, 9–10, 11–13 Sun–Joffe manifesto 11 Syria 92 Taipei xxi Taiwan xxi, 93 Tangku Truce 43 Tao Mingyue 40, 41 Tao Zhiyue 114, 115, 119 tax revenues: Xinjiang 83


Index 191 Teheran legation 91, 92 Teiwes, Frederick C. xxix territorial expansion xxvii think tanks 37 “Three Eastern Provinces” model 103 Three People’s Principle 27, 36, 92 Tibet: autonomy 100; Chaing Kai-shek on 4; and China 67–9, 70–2, 95–6; and Communists 115; Dai Chuanxian on 4–5; Huang Musong’s mission 50; and Japan 69–70; and Nepal 25–6; and ninth Panchen Lama 27–9; and Qing court 3–4; and Russia 68–9; Simla Talks 4, 7–8 Tibetan Buddhist lamaseries 59 Tibetan Buddhist prelates xxii Tibetan independence movement xxv Tibetans: autonomy 100–1; border clash (1917–18) 10; and Britain 69; and Chinese Communists 118; Cho-Yon relationships 69, 70–2; early years xxiv, 2, 4, 6; and Huang Musong 25–6; and the Qing court 68; Sino-India pack route 81; Suiyuan Peace 115; tenth Panchen Lama 117 Tighe, Justin 19 Tobshinbayar, Prince (Tu Wang) 63 Tongmenghui (Alliance Society) 1, 2 trade routes 83–4, 91 treaties 93 tribute system xxiv Truman administration xxi Tungan Muslims xxi, 23, 37, 61, 63, 86, 117 Tuttle, Gray 27 Twenty-second Army Corps 119 Uighurs xxiv, 100–1, 115–16 Ulan Bator (Urga) see Urga Ulanfu 102 UN (United Nations) 92, 111 underground forces 95 unification 17 United Nations (UN) see UN Urga (Ulan Bator) 2–3, 8, 10–11, 12, 15, 64, 70, 97 USA (United States of America): as ally 73, 74; declaration of war 73; lend-lease goods 82, 91; oil companies 106; oil technicians 79; Seventh Fleet xxi; and Soviet Russia 98; treaty 93 vassals (fanbu) xxiv vocational schools 67

Wagir, Hamga Haji 109 Wang Chonghui 58, 71 Wang Jingwei 1–2, 6, 35 Wang Shijie 99 War of Resistance 54–66 war zones 66 warlordism 17–22 Weng Wenhao 75 Western Enterprises, Inc. xxii western Inner Mongolia 63–6 White Russians 10–11 Wu Huanzhang 103 Wu, K.C. 96 Wu Zhongxin 71–2, 80, 94 Wuhan uprising 5–6 Xikang: and Chiang Kai-shek 48, 60, 100; and Huang Musong 50–1; and Kesang Tsering 26–7; lamaseries 59; and MTAC 25; and Nationalist strategy 121; new province 18; and Norla Hutuktu 51–2; Simla proposals 7 Xinjiang: (1942) 74–5; boundaries 85; and Chiang Kai-shek 56; Communist takeover 119; creation xxiv; customs and tax revenues 83, 84; exiled Muslims 91; garrison forces 105; gold bars story 88–90; industrialization 94–5; insurgency 115–16; and Jin Shuren 18, 38; Kazakh groups 109–10; land reclamation 80; and Mahmūd Muhītī 86–8; military presence 105–6; Muslim rebellion 83, 94; peace agreement 114; political independence 100–1; and Prince Minjur 109; and Sheng Shicai 40–7, 74–5; Soviet control 57–8; and Stalin 114; strategic importance 57–8, 93–4; supply lines 82–3; and Wu Zhongxin 86 Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps 119 Xinjiang-Qinghai Border Region (Xin Qing bianqu) 105–6 Xinjiang Wilderness Reclamation Army (Xinjiang Tunken Jun) 119 Xiong Shihui 104 Xu Xiangqian 50 Xu Yongchang 114 Yalta agreement 98 Yan Xishan 15, 17–18, 19–20, 21, 22, 24–5 Yang Du 6 Yang Hucheng 23, 38


192 Index Yang Yong xxii Yang Zengxin 18, 38 Yekejuu League incident 97–8 Yellow Hat sect 2, 27, 68 Yin Changheng 4 Yolbas Khan 116 Yondonwangchug, Prince (Yun Wang) 49 Younghusband, Francis 69 Yu Lanze (Bayantai) 13 Yuan Shikai xxiv, 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8–9 Yumen oil field 76, 79–80, 105

Zhang Guotao 50 Zhang Peiyuan 40, 41, 42, 43 Zhang Qun 55 Zhang Xueliang 18, 22, 34 Zhang Zuolin 15 Zhanggufeng Hill 73 Zhao Daiwen 25 Zhao Xiguang 110–12, 115, 119 Zhu De 50 Zhu Shaoliang 46, 74–5, 80–1 Zuo Jiren 33

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