Second World War as The War of Resistance Against Japan

1
Second World War as The War of Resistance Against
Japan

• Wartime Politics in China
• 1937 - 1945

2
The Eruption of the Sino-Japanese War

• The aftermath of the Xian incident (Dec. 1936)
  the 2nd GMD-CCP united front,
• The hard and unresolved bargaining on two issues
  the CCPs control over its military and
  territories,
• The July 7 incident (Beijing) the August 13
  incident (Shanghai)
• International reactions western inertia and
  Soviet aid, the German mediation,
• The rape of Nanjing (Dec. 1937),
• The Fall of Canton and Wuhan(Oct. 1938), the end
  of the first stage of war and the beginning of a
  protracted war of attrition,

3
The Initial GMD-CCP Cooperation

• The initial nationalist sentiment and Moscows
  attitude leading to two famous battles in Taier
  Village (GMD) and Pingxing Path (CCP), the
  initial euphoria,
• The CCPs policy modification 25 rent reduction
  replaced land confiscation the three-third
  makeup of local govt encouraging industrial
  investment and the opium trade
• Historiography on the reasons for the CCP wartime
  success Seldens The Yanan Way, Johnsons
  Peasant Nationalism,
• Do they have a point? Or the question should be
  Why did the GMD fail?

4
The Failure of the GMD

• The weak party to the Japanese,
• The loss of industrial / financial base in
  Eastern China,
• The lack of international aid,
• The corruption inefficiency,
• The division within
• Wang Jingweis defection,
• The division in the military (central v. local),
  the troops low morale,
• John Services wartime report from Chongqing The
  Lost Chance in China?

5
The Success of the CCP

• The origins of Maos strategy of dispersed
  guerrilla warfare in the remote rural villages
• Maos changing attitude on the Hundred Regiment
  Campaign
• The kill-time strategy to preserve build
  rural bases behind the enemy line for the future
• Jiangs reaction the New 4th Army Incident in
  1940, a civil war within the national war against
  Japan.

6
Mao, Stalin, and the US in WWII

• Was there a lost chance for a genuine
  CCP-Washington cooperation? Why?
• What is the role of ideology in foreign policy
  process?
• If the CCP foreign policy had two sides of class
  struggle and united front, which side was the
  decisive one? Why?