FOOTNOTES:
[1] For an excellent definition of Free China, see Quigley, Harold S., "Free China," cited, p. 133-35. The most readable geography of China is Cressey, George B., China's Geographic Foundations, New York, 1934.
[2] For further development of this problem, see below, p. [185]. The present author considered this question in relation to the Chinese political heritage, in Government in Republican China, cited, p. 2-12, 69-74, 188-89. Professor George Taylor, in The Struggle for North China, cited, relates this problem to the broad issues of world discussion, in a most acute analysis of "The Problem of China," p. 8-16, and gives a clear answer to the questions thus posed, p. 197-201.
[3] Tsang, O. B., A Supplement to a Complete Chinese-English Dictionary, Shanghai, 1937, p. 267. The older, standard dictionaries do not include the term. Lieutenant H. S. Aldrich, in his Hua Yu Hsü Chih: Practical Chinese, Peiping, 1934, gives Sui-ching Ssŭ-ling as Pacification Commissioner (Vol. II, p. 74).
[4] An apt, grisly story is reported in the semi-official English-language journal of the Nanking regime. The "Peace Movement" is, of course, the Japanophile movement of Mr. Wang Ch'ing-wei. This is the way it was given in The People's Tribune, Vol. XXIX, Nos. 7-10 (October-November 1940), p. 305:
"In response to President Wang Ch'ing-Wei's peace appeal to the nation, Mr. Tan Shih-Chang, member of the Chungking Air Force, flew to Hankow by his own plane on June 10 to join the Peace Movement. Upon his arrival in Nanking, Mr. Tan was warmly received by the re-organized National Government. Later, he was sent to Macao on an important mission, but upon his arrival there, he was instantly killed by desperadoes in the employ of the Chungking regime.
"It is learned that the plane he left in Hankow has now been repaired by the Japanese Air Force and brought to the Capital. Following its arrival, the plane was immediately handed over to the Military Commission by the Japanese military authorities."
(This would need further corroboration before it could definitely be accepted.)
[5] In an interview with the author, Chungking, July 31, 1940; the interview was unfortunately terminated by the raid alarm. It might be noted at this point that proposals for the reinstitution of strong provincial executives have been postponed from year to year since 1932. See The China Year Book 1939, cited, p. 217 n.
[6] Fêng Yü-hsiang, Wo-ti Shêng-huo (My Life), Kweilin, 1940, p. 22.
[7] As reported by Paul M. W. Linebarger in his Conversations with Sun Yat-sen [as yet unpublished; in the author's possession]. Book II, Chapter V.
[8] The author has sought to trace the political and military aspects of this cycle in Government in Republican China, cited. There are numerous works on the subject from the economists' point of view. Outstanding are the books by John Lossing Buck, R. H. Tawney, J. B. Condliffe, Karl Wittfogel, Ch'en Han-seng, and the articles by Norman Hanwell (chiefly in Asia, Amerasia, and The Far Eastern Survey).
[9] Below, p. 324, and p. 388.
[10] A detailed chart will be found in Appendix III (C), at p. [388].
[11] See above, p. [13]. The last term is literally Executive Area (or District) of North Shan (Shensi). In the text, Frontier Area is used throughout as the simplest English equivalent.
[12] Chin Chi-yin, 'Pien-ch'ü' ti Ming-ch'êng' (The Name "Frontier Area"), in So-wei "Pien-ch'ü," cited above, p. 3-6.
[13] Ts'ui Yün-ch'ang, Shan-pei Lun Kuo-hua (A Brief Sketch of Northern Shensi), Kweilin, 1939, p. 4-5. This author concludes that Communist rule worsened the economic status of the area. "Then there occurred the campaigns for 'the extermination of landlordism' and for 'division of the lands.' The result of such proletarian disturbances was an astonishing decrease of population, caused by massacre and emigration, and the devastation of much land." (p. 6.)
[14] See the works cited above, p. [20], n. 16. It is possible to find a contradictory interpretation in Chinese sources for almost every point cited by Western visitors as meritorious. Since the Nationalists are not interested in promoting the international reputation of the Frontier Area, and at the same time are unable to launch any counter-propaganda (for fear of alienating Leftist sentiment in the West, because it would give the Japanese a propaganda advantage, and would disturb the appearance of the United Front), very little criticism—sound or otherwise—of the Chinese Communist area has appeared in the West. Even in a case such as the issuance of paper money, universally regarded as a clever move by the Communists and guerrillas, Chinese writers have charged that the issuance is fiat currency imposed by Communist force (e.g., Wang Ssü-ch'êng, Ju-tz'ŭ Pien-ch'ü [So this is the Frontier Area!] Chungking, 1938, p. 38 ff.) Within China, Communism is just as open to interpretation as the Soviets are in the Western world. Western data now available seems to cover only one side of the case, which is doubtless well-founded; but there must be another. There always is.
[15] Since the author has neither extensive acquaintance with Chinese Communists, nor has visited Yenan, he offers these conclusions more tentatively than he would others, concerning the Kuomintang.
[16] Professor George Taylor's The Struggle for North China presents a full and clear picture of the Border Region and the Peiping regime in startlingly apposite juxtaposition. He concludes by pointing out the significant paradox that the Japanese established a reactionary regime designed to keep China agrarian, backward, and exploitable, but that they had not managed to extend their affiliate beyond the cities. The country, which they had hoped to capture, escaped them through the political resurgence of the Border Region. P. C. Nyi, article cited above, p. [16], n. 10, presents an outline of the regime which supplements the first-hand materials Professor Taylor appends to his work. Major E. F. Carlson's works, which describe this, are Twin Stars of China and The Chinese Army, both cited above; the latter, a valuable contribution to the Inquiry Series of the Institute of Pacific Relations, includes Wang Yu-chuan, "The Organization of a Typical Guerrilla Area in South Shantung" (p. 84-130), a brilliant survey which reveals, sometimes unwittingly, the values and dangers of a Communist-Nationalist-popular union. Mr. Hanson's work is "Humane Endeavour," cited above; as a personal account, it is the most engrossing of the group.
[17] P. C. Nyi, article cited in The Chinese Year Book 1938-39, p. 255. Reading between the lines will illustrate much of the Chungking attitude.
[18] On the New Fourth Army, see Epstein, I., The People's War, cited above, p. 260 ff. Agnes Smedley, the well-known pro-Communist writer, has lived among the New Fourth recently. Another foreign visitor has been Jack Belton, of the Shanghai Evening Post. Publicity for the New Fourth Army, reduced to an absolute minimum by Chungking, is handled by an independent agency, the New China Information Committee (not to be confused with the semi-official China Information Committee) in Hong Kong. The China Defense League, in which the moving spirit is Mme. Sun Yat-sen, also in Hong Kong, acts as an agency for receiving gifts, etc., for the Army.
Chapter V
THE KUOMINTANG
The Kuomintang, a Chinese political party, was formed by federation of old anti-Manchu secret societies, and has become the vehicle for the will of its Leader, Sun Yat-sen: constitutionally and legally it is the superior of the Chinese National Government; administratively, one of the three chief organs of policy execution for the regime; politically, the only legal political party in Free China. It has had undisputed primacy, but not monopoly, in domestic Chinese politics for fourteen years. Despite revolutionary purposes, and idealistic obligations, the Kuomintang is responsible for the welfare of the government which it created. Its interest is therefore superior to and identical with the government's; the party of a one-party state has no business criticizing the government, since the party at all times possesses the means of correction or change.
By its constitution and organization the Party is democratic. In practice it has been a loose oligarchy, similar to the machinery whereby American presidential candidates are nominated. In composition it is by its own statement a cross section of China, composed of persons who qualify as a political elite by their zeal in seeking and obtaining entrance to the Party. Administratively, the Kuomintang possesses a group of Ministries (pu), closely similar to the governmental ministries, and executing quasi-governmental policy, plus an additional group of separate or affiliated organizations having common purposes. In power politics, the Kuomintang claims supremacy in all unoccupied China and legitimate power over the occupied areas; in practice it yields frequently to the demands of dissidents. In function, its highest purpose—bequeathed by Sun Yat-sen—is to destroy its own monopoly of power when the time for democracy shall come; like medicine, it is committed to the eradication of the reason for its own existence.