Flaming Dragons-A Warlord China Alternate History

Loving the photos so far :)


Indeed. They really add something to the timeline.

Thanks, my other TL Not By a Mine didn't have them, but since I set this one more further along I thought it would be good to use them. Inspiration of using photos comes from No Spanish Civil War and Chiang-Kai Shek goes to Germany, thye just add an extra level to a TL that words sometimes can't do
 
Ok I'm going to provide maps as well, to show the changes of territory as things progress, but I'm not so great with maps, if there's anyone following the TL and is interested in making them then let me know

May 1926
editedasiamap.png


Light yellow-Japan
Dark yellow-Fengtian
Light red-Shanxi
Dark blue-Guominjun
Grey- Zhili (Sun Chuanfang)
Purple-Zhili (Wu Peifu)
Light blue-Kuomintang
Brown-Yunnan
Green-Xibei San Ma
 

Hendryk

Banned
This TL continues to be very interesting. The outcome of the battle between the Nationalists and the warlords is quite plausible; in OTL too, the warlords were a fractious bunch whose coalitions of convenience broke down in the face of sustained losses. And Zhang Zuolin's death spares the Nationalists from having to storm Manchuria by military means, which would have been difficult, since the place can be easily defended from attacks from the south-east and Zhang's army was a respectable one by the standards of the time.
 
I find your treatment of Zhang Zuolin, The Mukden Tiger. unlikely.

Zhang Zuolin, Supported the Nationalists, intervening several time in the twenties against Warlord attempts to take Peking.
Zhang Zuolin's Troops were well Disciplined, well Lead, and well Supplied by his Japanese Allies.
 
I find your treatment of Zhang Zuolin, The Mukden Tiger. unlikely.

Zhang Zuolin, Supported the Nationalists, intervening several time in the twenties against Warlord attempts to take Peking.
Zhang Zuolin's Troops were well Disciplined, well Lead, and well Supplied by his Japanese Allies.


Well Zhang was leading the forces against the KMT during the Northern Expediiton in OTL and fled north after losing Beijing and was assassinated by the Japanese a short time later.
His army could have done better in my TL, but I killed him off during the battle which pretty much leaves it maimed and the other warlords see the writing on the wall and decide to cooperate with the new order
 
Another map, please note, the warlrod regiosn remain but they recognise the authority of the Kuomintang government

May 1927
May1927-AftertheNorthernExpedition.png
 
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Very interesting TL, just a little detail, in:

[FONT=&quot]3. Clash Of Arms[/FONT] Snip

you made a [5] annotation, without its explaining ...

Except this, and recognizing my lack of knowledge of warlod´s china (and China in general ) I found this this way:


GREAT! :D
 
Very interesting TL, just a little detail, in:



you made a [5] annotation, without its explaining ...

Except this, and recognizing my lack of knowledge of warlod´s china (and China in general ) I found this this way:


GREAT! :D

Ah thank you for spotting that, reference has now been added in, It was simply some background info that i neglected to do write the note for. Glad your liking it.
 

Hendryk

Banned
I find your treatment of Zhang Zuolin, The Mukden Tiger. unlikely.

Zhang Zuolin, Supported the Nationalists, intervening several time in the twenties against Warlord attempts to take Peking.
Zhang Zuolin's Troops were well Disciplined, well Lead, and well Supplied by his Japanese Allies.
True, but he only allied with them insofar as they were useful to keep the other warlords focused on their southern borders. He very much wanted to keep Manchuria for himself, if he couldn't get all of China, which is why the Japanese propped him up--the minute he was no longer useful to them, they got rid of him.

Which makes one all the more curious to see if the Nationalists will be able to get a secure hold on Manchuria before the Japanese make their move, assuming they do in TTL (perhaps they'll change their plans). In OTL Jiang's regime barely had time to claim sovereignty over Manchuria when it was annexed by Japan.
 
5. Consolidation

Taken from “The Many Headed Dragon: Warlords in China”
By Rodger Stevens
© 1970, Bluewood Books
Philadelphia, USA

The end of the first part of the Northern Expedition brought the Kuomintang into the spotlight in China and their support surged. There were still some warlords in the north that retained power and even after Huaibei they managed to maintain their independence, despite the international recognition that the Wuhan based Kuomintang government received after January 1927. Ironically these warlords that remained after the Northern Expedition had only been minor leaders previously and while many of them were connected with the new government and recognised its rule, they still ruled their provinces with a great deal of independence, such as Long Yun, Sheng Shicai , Ma Hongkui, Feng Yuxiang and Yan Xishan [1].

The Kuomintang allowed these warlords to keep their rule of provinces, as the Northern Expedition had exhausted the Kuomintang armies and they needed time to recover and establish their rule. This meant focussing on governing rather than fighting warlords that were willing to accept the new order. In addition some of the former warlords who had joined the NRA still tired to retain a form of independence, in terms of keeping control of their armies, but the new leadership was happy to accept this provided that those armies continued to fight for them, especially considering the new problems that would soon come to pass with the CCP.


5-1.jpg

Several of the Kuomintang allied warlords, from left to right, Long Yun, Ma Hongkui, Feng Yuxiang


6 February 1928
Wuhan, Republic of China

Chen Duxiu and Zhou Enlai were addressing their comrades in a large meeting hall. The Chinese Communist Party had for a long time been allies and many of them members of the Kuomintang and they both expected that to continue despite the recent problems many of their members had faced with the military and the right-wing of the party. Though neither of them had met with Wang in the last week, which was troubling, he usually held joint meetings for the entire party and was constantly giving them assurances that the CCP were important members of the new government.

Zhou stepped out of the main room after he was finished speaking to go and relieve himself, he had had some huangjiu [2] to drink earlier and it had seemed to go right through him. As he was doing so, he heard Chen speaking from the hall. Then he heard the doors open and Chen stopped. He heard some loud voices after that and several shouts of outrage. He finished what he was doing, but waited before going back inside. He put his head against the wall to see if he could hear better. Just as he did so, the sound of gunfire cracked through the wall and he withdrew his head in horror. He didn’t what had happened, but whatever it was, wasn’t good. He fled out the side door and ran as fast as he could to check the other party building in the city.


Taken from “Sun Yat-Sen’s Heirs”, By Liao Yanshi, © 1988, Lotus Flower Publishing-Guangzhou, Republic of China

The goodwill that had existed between the KMT and CCP was quick to disintegrate in 1928. Despite Sun Yat-sen’s wish that all Chinese revolutionaries cooperated together there was a substantial amount of distrust from the KMT rightwing. This had been increased in the wake of Chiang Kai-Shek’s assassination and during the Northern Expedition. Chinese communists had instigated uprisings during the Northern Expedition in several cities as well as several peasant revolts, which brought some alarm to many of the KMT leaders as well as their new warlord allies.
However Wang Jingwei had been close to the communists for quite some time and showed every sign of continuing the cooperation with them, despite what his later actions and attitude towards communists would reveal.

Wang had included them in his new Wuhan based government and met with their top leaders, Chen Duxiu, Li Dazhao and Xiang Zhongfa. In the north and east, anti-communist actions were already being taken by several KMT and warlord province rulers, in Beiping [3], Shanghai, Nanjing and Hangzhou armed gangs sanctioned by the city rulers would go out and disrupt CCP and labour union meetings in an effort to keep them from organising.


5-2.jpg

Warlord soldiers having just raided a communist HQ

This situation could not continue forever, the communists were reaching a point of striking back while the right-wing KMT had practically declared war. On 18 January Wang had a meeting with several key KMT leaders as well as generals, Li Zongren and Li Jishen. During the meeting Wang was presented with evidence that the Comintern had plans to use the CCP to replace the left-wing KMT and take over the party. (This was in fact true, Stalin had given Mikhail Borodin secret orders to this effect but told him not to implement them until the time was right, they were leaked and eventually ended up in the hands of one of Chen Guofu's agents, who presented them to Wang)
Wang agreed with the other leaders that it was time to end the alliance with the communists before the Comintern ordered them to take over the party.
Wang stopped meeting with the communists and started planning the actions required to remove them, a dangerous move since it could have tipped them off to his intentions, but they remained unaware right up until the February Purge began.


From ‘Bloody Politics: A History of Ideological Violence’, By Brad Miller, © 1989, HGO Publishing-Chicago, USA

The February Purge
Location: Republic of China, various cities
Perpetrators: Kuomintang Government and allied warlords

After the Northern Expedition carried out by the Kuomintang’s National Revolutionary Army had succeeded in ousting the former warlords and unified China, tensions between the left and right soon increased. The Communists had worked hand in hand with the Kuomintang since Sun Yat-Sen had decided that all the revolutionaries need to work together and many of them were party members, but since his death there had been a growing anti-communist faction. This was only exacerbated by the Zhongshan incident and Chiang Kai-Shek’s assassination, which despite contrary claims, was not perpetrated by a communist agent. This claim was likely used as a way to discredit the CCP and curb their increasing power. Wang Jingwei, one of Sun’s successors had newly made his way to the top of the party and was in the precarious position of balancing the various interests and factions, one of the larger factors to weigh in on his decision to turn on the communists was due to many of the prominent NRA generals being very anti-communist and Wang needed their support to maintain his position. The first act of which became the February Purge happened on the 6 February 1928. Several communist leaders were holding a large party meeting in downtown Wuhan when soldiers stormed into the building and started making arrests. Anyone who tried to resist was shot down and in fact the soldiers had orders that made it clear, any small action could be interpreted as ‘resisting’. Among the first few killed was Chen Duxiu, one of the founders of the CCP. In addition Xiong Zhongfa was arrested at the house he was living in and hundreds of other communists were rounded up and taken into custody or in many cases executed on the spot. This was soon repeated in most of the other major cities in China and the CCP was dealt a hefty blow to its influence in the urban areas. Their response came quickly though and organised peasant rebellions broke out in March against KMT rule, led by important communists who had escaped the purge in the cities-Li Dazhao, Li Lisan, Zhou Enlai, Bo Gu, Fang Zhimin, and Mao Zedong. The Chinese Civil War had begun.


5-3.jpg

Rounding up communist prisoners in Wuhan

[1] Just as they did in OTL.

[2] Chinese yellow wine or liquor.

[3] Northern Peace-Beijing was renamed to this after OTL Northern Expedition as well.
 
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Hendryk

Banned
I guess the KMT-CCP split had to come sooner or later. However the fact that the Nationalists have cleared most of the warlords in southern China makes a big difference.
 
6. Party Splinters

March 1928
The Chinese Civil War between the Nationalists and Communists has begun. The February purge has decimated the CCP in the cities and led to the execution of many prominent communist leaders. The communist response was to organise large peasant uprisings against the government. Throughout the countryside in the provinces of Guangdong, Hunan, and Jiangxi large armies of peasants and workers mobilised and staged uprisings. A major battle is taking place in the cities of Fuzhou and Nanchang, the new Chinese Red Army commanded by He Long and Bo Gu has almost taken the city form the few remaining government forces. Meanwhile a much larger NRA force, commanded by Li Jishen is moving south in an attempt to retake the provincial capital.


6 May 1928
Hunan Province
Republic of China (recognised)
Hunan Soviet (proclaimed)

Mao Zedong was one of the last to retreat from the battlefield, as commander of his forces he felt responsible for them and refused to abandon his position until his comrades had escaped as well. Once the Kuomintang army had engaged his forces it was clear who was going to win, the enemy had overwhelmed them with sheer numbers.
Mao turned and spoke to his fellow communist and military commander, Lin Biao.
“We held out as long as we could, but they were too strong for us comrade” he said shaking his head.
“It isn’t over” replied Lin “This fight is just beginning, our army is intact and we can still fight these traitors.” And he gestured his hand at the advancing NRA force.
Mao nodded “You’re right. But from now we have to be smarter in how we fight, engaging the government forces in direct battle cannot work any longer. We have to conserve our forces, attack them when they are weak and lest expected. Spread the party message throughout the countryside until the peasants and workers outnumber the government soldiers and we can beat them back.”
Lin nodded in approval “Guerrilla warfare. Where are we heading for now?”
“Further west” replied Mao “we can avoid the Kuomintang in the mountains and regroup there.”
“Will the others be able to join us?” [1]
“I hope so. Last I heard Nanchang had fallen to Li Jishen and that rabid dog of a general has started slaughtering as many of our comrades as he can get his hands on, He’s forces were scattered. Bo Gu and Zhu De are still fighting but there are far too many for them to defeat. If they can make it here, we can consolidate forces and change our tactics. Ah, good, we had best be going.”
The last of Mao’s soldiers had retreated from the battlefield and Mao and Lin began leading them away on their horses.

6-1.jpg

Communist general Mao Zedong in 1928


Taken from “Our Struggle”, By Deng Xiaoping © 1979, Editorial Atlantida. Buenos Aires, People's Republic of Argentina
Note-This Book is banned in the Republic of China

I wasn’t with Mao and Lin after their first losses, but they talked about it a lot during the Great March. It was then that the first developed the idea of turning the war into a protracted guerrilla struggle rather than large scale revolution. I barely escaped Nanchang with my life, fleeing in disguise as I had in Nanjing. After the failure in Nanchang, we were desperate, the Kuomintang armies were closing in and half of the Second Front Army had been killed or captured. There was little choice, we had to follow Mao to his hideout in the mountains [2]. So we marched west and found ourselves in the mountains soon to join the other forces making their way there. Once we had recovered things didn’t seem so bad, we still had a sizeable army and support among many of the peasants, but the government forces seemed to be everywhere. Then we received word that Zhang Guotao had returned and started his own uprising in Sichuan and Guizhou, and had declared the part of the province he ruled over as the Chinese Soviet State. We bided our time and waited for the right moment to sneak through the gaps between the enemy forces.

6-2.png

The flag of the Chinese Soviet State

6-3.jpg

CCP leaders gathering in Guiyang


Taken from “The Battle For China:1927-1945”, By Eric Warren © 1999, Blackwoods Books, London, UK

The initial seizures of Nanchang and Jiangxi province were relatively easy for the communist forces. There regions did not have large garrisons of NRA soldiers and many in the region had communist sympathies, in fact the party had spent a great deal of time appealing to the peasants and focussed on increasing their numbers. In addition to this many of the best communist military leaders, men who had lead forces in the Northern Expedition, took command of the communist soldiers and proved their worth. But eventually they ran out of time. Wang Jingwei had made his decision to rid himself of them and he stuck by it, indeed he may have had little choice, siding with the communists meant that he could align himself with the right wing of the Kuomintang, which included the ever growing secret police force led by the Chen brothers, the money and connections of several rich families and last, but not least connections to China’s underworld, which brought in a substantial amount of money from the growing opium epidemic [3].

In addition to this Wang badly needed some strong military allies and he choose generals that had given the best performance in the Northern Expedition, Li Zongren, Li Jishen, Bai Chongxi and He Yingqin. These men commanded some of the best and brightest from Whampoa, many of whom would go on to receive German military training and serve as the strong backbone of the NRA in the future. Wang needed these men firmly on his side and they had a large amount antipathy for the communists, so the communists had to go. But despite the quick campaigns to dismantle the communist holdings in the south and the brief uprisings in Shandong and Anhui, they were far from easy to eradicate completely. In fact several independent minded warlord allies, refused to attack them for fear of taking losses, since the only real power they could command came from the size of their armies. This gave the communists a reprieve and they were consolidated in the west, mostly in Sichuan under Zhang Guotao, recently returned from the Soviet Union and now the most senior member of the CCP after the recent purges and executions. But not all of the communists joined Zhang in his Chinese Soviet State, Mao Zedong had decided the war needed to be turned into a guerrilla struggle that would slowly wear away at the nationalists, so he only briefly stopped in Sichuan to resupply and conduct raids on the nearby nationalist armies. Before the end of the year he would have taken his men north on the Great March. The bulk of the communist forces under Zhang would not be easy to break for the nationalists, but the hammer came down in the spring of 1929. Four armies of the NRA were converging on the region with every intention of sealing off any escape and wiping them out completely.

[1] Lin is referring to the other Red Army forces further east. The make-up of these forces are the Second Front Red Army and the Third Front Red Army. The First Front Red Army was based further north, under the command of Li Dazhao and Ye Ting and has been mostly wiped out by the NRA.

[2] The idea of going to Hunan suggested by He Long is taken more seriously TTL since Mao’s army is already there and the Kuomintang already has an extremely large force in Guangdong.

[3] At this point is still fairly limited in China, but Warren is writing with the benefit of hindsight and as per OTL the opium trade will increase significantly via the Green Gang’s connection to the Kuomintang.
 
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Thank you for that update - history seems to be doomed to repeat itself - albeit in different forms.
 
7. Two Red Eggs In The Basket

Taken from “The Battle For China:1927-1945”, By Eric Warren © 1999, Blackwoods Books, London, UK

Despite the fierce resistance put up by the communists in Sichuan they eventually lost out to the inevitable. Li Jishen was in command of the four armies converging on them and he had no intention of allowing them to escape. He made sure that he spread enough troops along the western and northern routes to attempt to stop the communist forces from retreating. However this didn’t stop all of them completely. Enough communists through themselves into the fight at Luzhou that Li was forced to recall some of his units to help him in the battle. This was in fact a strategy that Zhang Guotao had decided on in order to allow a large portion of the communists to escape north, closer to the Soviet Union. Mao Zedong had in fact already taken his forces north near to the mountainous region of Yan’an and Zhang had hoped to join him there. While this strategy did work for a time and allowed many communists to escape the region it was almost for nought. When most of the major battles in Sichuan had finished by 12 January 1929, Li Jishen was already directing troops to pursue the retreating communists. Continued harassment of their force and ambushes by the warlord troops of Ma Hongkui reduced the 100,000 strong force down to about 15,000. By the time Zhang and his remaining men arrived in Yan’an, Mao had already departed further north towards Manchuria, where he would set up his base of resistance which would endure for almost a decade.

With little hope left Zhang decided that defeat was inevitable and he allowed his men to go wherever they wished while he went into exile to Soviet-controlled Mongolia. Most of his men scattered into the countryside, and the Kuomintang declared a victory, but many of them would resurge years later in command of communist guerrilla bands which would cause numerous headaches to the government. In addition to this another group of communists had managed to link up with the southern army of Bo Gu and Zhu De. This group included Zhang Wentian who pushed for a move south towards Tibet where they could lie low and continue the struggle as Mao was now doing in the north. For now there remained two large groupings of communists in China, both in fairly secure areas which were difficult for large forces to reach them. Wang Jingwei had every intention of finishing them off, but had been convinced that they were finished as a fighting force and he had other concerns on his mind, like the reorganising of the Kuomintang armies and the first invasions of one of the greatest threats to the Republic.


7-1.jpg

A portrayal of the Nationalist victory over the communists at Luzhou

7-2.jpg

Communist soldiers crossing the Yangtze River to head south to Tibet


Taken from “Our Struggle”, By Deng Xiaoping © 1979, Editorial Atlantida. Buenos Aires, People's Republic of Argentina
Note-This Book is banned in the Republic of China

They were black days in early 1929, more and more of our comrades were being captured every day, but Mao was like a steady rock of morale that kept us going. We headed further north until we reached the wild, untamed lands of Manchuria. The territory may have been under the control of the Young Warlord [1], but his control was limited to the major cities. Holed up in the Xing’an region, Mao set to work rebuilding and retraining us as effective guerrillas. It would prove invaluable, for Manchuria was about to be invaded, giving us an opportunity to train in warfare and also gain many more recruits to our cause. We also received word that Zhang had managed to hold up in the Tibet region and he was clamouring to be the rightful ruler of the CCP. Mao would make him eat those words in the years to come. Zhang had nothing on his brilliant leadership in battle, or his effectiveness at galvanising troops. I was placed in charge of some the new recruits in May of 1929 and the first thing I had to do was give them a proper revolutionary attitude. Many of them had joined up, simply because they didn’t like their warlord overlords, but they knew nothing about the worker’s cause. The first batch was sitting on some rocks awaiting me one morning and I could tell I would have my work cut out for me.


14 July 1929
Sichuan Province
Republic of China

Sweat trickled down Li Jishen’s forehead. The summer sun was scorching him, but he didn’t bother moving towards his tent. He waited and watched as the horseman rode towards his command headquarters. As he got closer, Li could see an official government banner on the horse’s side, it was likely a messenger from Wuhan.
The man pulled his horse up towards Li and his officers, stopped and climbed off.
“General sir, a message from President Wang.” [2]
He handed the envelope to Li who thanked him and bid him goodbye. Li opened it and began reading, his face developed a slight frown.
“General?” asked General Chen Mingshu, his second-in-command “what is it?”
Li sighed and said ‘We’ve being ordered to proceed immediately to Wuhan. The president has called meeting of all generals and subordinates.”
“But we haven’t finished chasing down these communist dogs!”said Chen.
“Yes” agreed Li “but Feng ahs been testing his authority against Wang for some time now and my guess is Wang has finally decided to implement changes to the armed forces that I recommended to him months ago, Feng will be satisfied, but in the long run I suspect it will curb his independent streak and make him a more useful part of the government. There’s not much more the rest of these traitors can do anyway. They’re leaderless, divided and finished. Tell the others to make ready to move out.”

7-3.jpg

General Li Jishen, who destroyed the communist forces in the Sichuan Campaign of 1929.


[1] Zhang Xueliang

[2] After the Northern Expedition, the Nationalist government was reorganised in a similar way as OTL, with the Executive Yuan, thought there are differences. The title of premier does not exist, the Yuan being headed by the president, while there is the administrative role is the Chairman, which shares many of the duties as OTL premier.
 
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