Page:Earl Browder - Civil War in Nationalist China (1927).pdf/7



In 1926 and 1927, China, whose very name had been for ages a synonym for changeless stability, underwent the most kaleidoscopic transformations in her political life. These changes were at the same time the heralds of far-reaching social and economic revolution, of such a fundamental nature that the mere intimation of them in connection with the revolution in China sufficed to cause the Western ruling classes to shiver with horror and apprehension.

It was my good fortune to spend several months in China during the most critical days of 1927, under such circumstances as to bring me into contact with the leaders of all sections of the nationalist movement of China. In both local and national developments, there were times when the International Workers Delegation, of which I was a member, became one of the determining factors in events. It has been my aim in writing this pamphlet, to condense the most important or most typical of these experiences, into a brief and readable narrative which will make the current history of the Chinese revolution more easily comprehensible to American readers.

Throughout the pamphlet I have taken for granted that the reader has a general knowledge of China, and of the Chinese revolution up to 1926, in the main aspects a reported currently in the capitalist newspapers and magazines. It is assumed that the reader knows of the fall of the Manchu Dynasty (1911) the resignation of the Dr. Sun Yat-sen in favor of Yuan Shih-kai as President of the Chinese Republic; the attempt of Yuan Shih-kai to make himself Emperor and establish a new dynasty, with the resulting revolt of the South, and the death of Yuan Shih-kai (1914); the division of China which followed the death of Yuan, among the various most powerful Generals of the monster Army created by Yuan by means of the loans from Britain; and the chronic civil war between rival militarist rulers which has torn China to pieces since 1914.

In 1926, the Chinese Nationalist Party, which up till