Unit+II+Module+3+Chinese+Dynasties+1911+and+Beyond

1911 and Beyond = __The Republic Period (team gangsta)__ = //**In the twentieth century**// China was transformed from a weakened imperial state into a global superpower. After the fall of the Qing dynasty, Yuan Shikaiwas made president of a parliamentary system, but he immediately began acting as a dictator, and even announced plans to take the title of emperor, and had began to guickly go against the democratic ideals of the revolution. His sudden death in 1916 was followed by a decade of rule by regional warlords. Eventually Jiang Jieshi (Chiang Kai-shek) and the Nationalist Party (Kuomintang or Guomindang) established a working government with Nanjing as the capital. Although they had cooperated with the [|Communist]Party, in the late 1920s the Nationalists turned on the Communists, forcing their retreat into rural areas. During the early 1930s, the Nationalist government promoted modernization and attempted to build a national infrastructure. However, first the worldwide depression of the 1930s and then war with Japan presented considerable obstacles to modernization and successful governance. During World War II, the Japanese army invaded Manchuria and from there worked their way south, often brutalizing civilians along the way. In the face of a common enemy, the Nationalists and the Communists once again joined forces. This cooperation only lasted until the end of the war, and then China was plunged into civil war. Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, Communists made their case to rural peasants. With popular support and Mao's tactical intelligence, the Communists defeated the Nationalists and established the People's Republic of China in 1949. During the 1950s, the government undertook land reform and industrialization, with Soviet help, as they worked to modernize the economy. In 1957 Mao decided to speed up this process, and declared the Great Leap Forward. He assured that China could surpass Britain in industrial production within fifteen years, and moved people into vast agricultural communes to pursue this goal. Lofty expectations led to vast overestimates of industrial and agricultural production, and the consequence was widespread famine. The early 1960s saw a return to more moderate economic policies, but by the middle of the decade Mao began to worry that the revolution was stagnating. He launched the Cultural Revolution, which took earlier propaganda campaigns to a whole new level. Everyone was encouraged to report on the "rightist" or capitalist tendencies of their friends, family and neighbors, and the youth in particular were encouraged to experience revolution first-hand by working to expose Party enemies. The worst of the Cultural Revolution was over by early 1970s, but it did not officially end until Mao Zedong's death in 1976. Deng Xiaoping then led the country with a focus on economic development while maintaining the political status quo. This development, coupled with greater openness to the rest of the world, led an intellectual blossoming in the 1980s. New ideas were discussed, and new art was created. However, when these new ideas led to demands for increased political freedom, the government reacted with military force in the Tiananmen Square incident of 1989. The following decade saw rapid economic development, but only limited challenges to the authoritarian rule of the government.

Timeline of China in the 20th Century

For more detailed chronologies, see //Columbia Chronologies of Asian History and Culture// (Columbia, 2000).
 * 1913-1916 || Presidency of Yuan Shikai ||
 * 1934 || Jiang Jieshi (Chiang Kai-shek) announces New Life Movement ||
 * 1934-5 || Long March of Chinese Communist Party ||
 * 1937-1945 || KMT and CCP form united front against Japan ||
 * 1949 || People's Republic of China founded; Nationalist government flees to Taiwan ||
 * 1953-7 || First Five-Year Plan modeled on Soviet economic planning ||
 * 1956-1957 || Hundred Flowers Movement followed by Anti-Rightist campaign ||
 * 1958-61 || Great Leap Forward ||
 * 1966 || Beginning of Cultural Revolution ||
 * 1972 || Nixon visits China ||
 * 1976 || Death of Mao Zedong ||
 * 1989 || Tiananmen Square incident ||
 * 1997 || Deng Xiaoping dies ||
 * 1997 || Hong Kong returned to China ||

Two Important Figures That Were Alive During The Time:
He was born on December 26th, 1893 and died on September 9th, 1976. He was a Han Chinese revolutionary, political theorist and communist leader. Moa was one of fifty members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in 1921. He has his own brand of communist policies which are called Maoism. He was extremely smart & he was a great leader. In the 20th century's he was one of the most important movers and reformers. His goal was to have a strong agricultural nation. He wanted to reconect with the United States as one of his last major acts. -He doesn't brush his teeth. Mao's portrait is still on Tiananmen and on all Renminbi bills. -He was inspired by the Russian Revolution. -He had four wives which occupied powerful positions in the Politburo after the Tenth Party Congress of 1973. (//Wives =// Jiang Qing, Wang Hongwen, Yao Wenyuan and Zhange Chungqiao). -He had suffered from effort and Parkinson's Disease.
 * Mao Zedong:**
 * Some interesting fun facts are:**


 * “A revolution is not a dinner party, or writing an essay, or painting a picture, or doing embroidery; it cannot be so refined, so leisurely and gentle, so temperate, kind, courteous, restrained and magnanimous. A revolution is an insurrection, an act of violence by which one class overthrows another.” ||
 * [[image:http://thinkexist.com/i/sq/as4.gif width="11" height="9" align="middle"]] [|Mao Zedong quote] ||



He was born on October 31, 1887 and died on April 5, 1975. He was Sun Yat Sen's close ally. He was the leader of Guomingdang (nationalist army). He was well educated and beloved in America. He wanted a strong industrial nation, and joined the army who's goal was to unify China. Chiang had defeated the communist army, and had eventually established a government in Nanjing. There continued to be hardships, but through it all Chiang still maganed to be a great leader. -He grew up in the province of Zhejiang. -His father was a merchant. -he died in at the age of 87 from a major heart attack and pneumonia.
 * Chiang Kaishek:**
 * Some interesting fun facts are:**

"Prayer is more than meditation. In meditation the source of strength is one's self. When one prays he goes to a source of strength greater than his own."



= Two Images that are From the Time Period: =




 * May Fourth Movement:** In Beijing on May 4, 1919 people protested the Chinese government's weak response to the Treaty of Versailles, and the Shangdong problem. (It gave Japan rights to China's Shangdong province.) Japan was China's worst enemy, so this was definately a big problem.

=

 * Long March:** It was an 8,000 mile march, which the communist party walked barefoot 21 miles a day. (They were being chased by the Nationalist army.) Mao Zedong ended up hiding in the mountains. While Japan invaded China, Mao Zedong continuously kept gaining more support for communism.======

Guomingdang and the Chinese Communist Party were partners causing the lost of the Chinese civil war. The war began in April 1927.
 * The Civil War:**
 * Interesting fact:** T he civil war is more commonly known as the //"War of Liberation"//.

Two Important Facts:
-- After all the destruction Japan caused, China found foreign support from the Soviet Union.
 * The War Against Japan: ** On July 7, 1937, the Marco Polo Bridge Incident led the two countries (Japan&China) to war. Japan took Beiping and captured Tianjin. Japan also took Manchuria (renamed Manchuko). This basically lead to the Sino-Japanese war.
 * The Nanjing Massacre: ** It was also known as the //'"Rape of Nanjing".// It happened in December 1937 and ended in January 1938. The Japanese did very cruel things to the Chinese. There was a "3 Alls" Policy ; Burn all, Loot all, & Kill all. That's exactly what the Japanese did.

Why the Republic Period was Important:
The republic begins after the Qing Dynasty in 1912. This was the first modern period after the dynasty cycle ended. The republic of china put an end to over two thousand years of Imperial rule. The Republican Era of China began with the outbreak of revolution on October 10,1911. This period helped China because it helped end the circles of dynasties meaning a good change for China because China was late on everything. While British and the French were imperialising, China was still in dynasties which did not progress very well (because some leaders were not very smart/strong ; were weak).

Press THIS to view the video. We thought this video was quite interesting. It showed the horrors of the Nanjing Massacre (Rape of Nanjing). It also shows how the past/history affects China today.

=** Sun Yat-sen: **= = ﻿ =
 * Sun Yat-****sen** (//Sūn Yìxiān//; 12 November 1866 – 12 March 1925) was a chinese revolutionary and political leader. As the top pioneer of Nationalist China, Sun is frequently referred to as the founding father of Republican China, a view agreed upon by mainland China and Taiwan. Sun played an important role in inspiring the overthrow of Qing Dynasty, which is the last imperial dynasty of China, which began in October 1911. He was the first provisional president when the Republic Of China was founded in 1912 and he later co-founded the //Chinese National People's Party// or otherwise known as Kuomintang, where he served as its first leader. Sun was a uniting figure in post imperial china, and remains special among 20th-century chinese politicians for being widely revered amongst the people from both sides of the Taiwan Strait.

Although Sun is considered one of the greatest leaders of modern China his political life was one of constant struggle and very frequent exile. After the success of the revolution, he quickly fell out of power in the newly founded Republic of China, and led successive revolutionary governments as a challenge to the warlords who controlled much of the nation. Sun did not live to see his party regain its power over the country. His party, which formed a fragile alliance with the communists split after his death. Sun's chief legacy remains in his developing of a political philosophy known as theThree Principles of the People : nationalism, democracy, and the people's livelihood.

= The Long March(October 1934 - October 1935): = ==

=
The **Long March** was a massive military retreat undertaken by the Red Army of the Chinese Communist Party, the forerunner of the People's Liberation Army, to evade the pursuit of the Kuomintang army. There was not one Long March, but a series of marches, as various Communist armies in the south escaped to the north and west. The most popular, is the march from Jiangxi province which began in October 1934. The First Front Army of the Chinese Soviet Republic, led by an inexperienced military commission, was on the brink of complete annihilation by General Chiang Kai-Shek's troops in their stronghold in Jiangxi province. The Communists, under the eventual command of Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai, escaped in a circling retreat to the west and north, which reportedly recorded some 8,000 miles over 370 days.The route passed through some of the most difficult terrain of western China by traveling west, then north, to Shaanxi.=====

=
The Long March began the ascent to power of Mao Zedong whose leadership during the retreat gained him the support of the members of the party. The bitter struggles of the Long March, which was completed by only one-tenth of the force that left Jiangxi, would come to represent an important episode in the history of the Communist Party of China, and would seal the personal prestige of Mao and his supporters as the new leaders of the party in the following decades.=====

=
media type="youtube" key="hvaHrKDwkyM" height="390" width="640" align="center"

=
= Short clip on the long march and how it affected the past,present and future. =