After occupying three provinces in northeast
China, Japanese army indulged in a series of provocations to give itself an excuse
to penetrate deeper into North China. Under such a dangerous situation, people throughout
China demanded that National Government stop civil war and switch to resisting Japan
army. But Chiang Kai-shek stubbornly persisted in his policy of eliminating the
CPC first before standing against Japanese.
In 1936, Chiang went to Xi'an to press two generals, Zhang Xueliang and Yang Hucheng,
to pursue the operations against the Communists more vigorously. Zhang Xueliang,
who had lost his home base of the Northeast, insisted on fighting Japan and pleaded
tearfully with Chiang to stop Civil War for the sake of saving the nation. Not moved,
Chiang blamed Zhang bitterly. When all attempts of persuasion turned out to be in
vain, Zhang and Yang decided to force Chiang to resist Japanese.
On December 9th, to celebrate the anniversary of December 9th Movement, more than
10 thousand students in Xi'an held a demonstration and walked to Chiang's residence
to demand that he halt Civil War and turn his guns on Japanese. Bursting with anger,
Chiang ordered Zhang Xueliang to stop students with force and to open fire if necessary.
Zhang sympathized with students. He went to them, persuaded them to retreat and
promised to answer their request with facts within one week. On the very evening,
Zhang Xueliang expressed to Chiang again, and pleaded for the decision to fight
Japan and save the nation. He was once again rejected.
In the night of December 12, the two generals Zhang Xueliang and Yang Hucheng launched
a coup and arrested Chiang in Huaqing Pool, near Lintong. They then invited the
CPC to send Zhou Enlai to Xi'an to discuss a solution to the problem. With efforts
from all sides, Chiang Kai-shek finally agreed to stop Civil War and cooperate with
the CPC to resist Japanese invaders. Thus, Xi'an Incident was settled peacefully.
This laid the foundation for the second KMT-CPC cooperation and marked the end of
the ten-year Civil War.
Reference data
"Heros of All Time"
After the peaceful settlement of Xi'an Incident, Zhang Xueliang accompanied Chiang
Kai-shek to Nanjing to show his loyalty, yet was put under house arrest by Chiang
and lost his freedom. Yang Hucheng was murdered later. Zhang died in Hawaii in 2001
at the age of 101. These two generals, who had made a great contribution to the
resistance against Japan when the nation was in great danger, were praised by Zhou
Enlai as "Heros of All Time".
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