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During the mainland period, the country was known in English as "China" or the "Republic of China". Internally, Zhongguo (Chinese: 中國; lit. 'middle country'), Zhonghua or Jung-hwa (Chinese: 中華; lit. 'middle and beautiful'), or Minguo (Chinese: 民國; lit. 'people's country') were used as short forms of the official country name Zhonghua Minguo (Chinese: 中華民國; lit. 'Chinese people's state') in Chinese.^[3][4][5] Both "Beiyang government" (from 1912 to 1928), and "Nationalist government" (from 1928 to 1949) used the name "Republic of China" as their official name.^[6] The People's Republic of China (PRC), which rules mainland China today, considers ROC as a country that ceased to exist since 1949; thus, the history of ROC before 1949 is often referred to as Republican Era (simplified Chinese: 民国时期; traditional Chinese: 民國時期) of China.^{[7][8][9][10]} The ROC, now based in Taiwan, today considers itself a continuation of the country, thus referring to the period of its mainland governance as the Mainland Period (traditional Chinese: 大陸時期; simplified Chinese: 大陆时期) of the Republic of China in Taiwan.^[11]

Significance of the name

The country's official Chinese name Chunghwa Minkuo, stemmed from the party manifesto of Tongmenghui in 1905, which says the four goals of the Chinese revolution was "to expel the Manchu rulers, to revive Chunghwa, to establish a Republic, and to distribute land equally among the people. (Chinese: 驅除韃虜, 恢復中華, 創立民國, 平均地權; pinyin: Qūchú dálǔ, huīfù Zhōnghuá, chuànglì mínguó, píngjūn dì quán)." The convener of Tongmenghui and Chinese revolutionary leader Sun Yat-sen proposed the name Chunghwa Minkuo as the assumed name of the new country when the revolution succeeded. After the Xinhai revolution overthrew the Qing dynasty in 1911–12, Sun further explained the meaning of the country's Chinese name in detail in 1916:

On 20 October 1923, Sun again stressed that Chunghwa Minkuo means a state "of the people".^[12]

Relevance in Taiwan politics

The Taiwanese politician Mei Feng criticised the official English name of the state, "Republic of China," which fails to translate the Chinese character "Min" (Chinese: 民; pinyin: people) according to Sun Yat-sen's original interpretations, and stated the name should instead be translated as "the People's Republic of China." That would be the same as the current official name of mainland China under communist rule.^[13] To avoid confusion, the ROC government in Taiwan began to put "Taiwan" next to its official name in 2005.^[14]

Overview

A republic was formally established on 1 January 1912 following the Xinhai Revolution, which itself began with the Wuchang uprising on 10 October 1911, successfully overthrowing the Qing dynasty and ending over two thousand years of imperial rule in China.^[15] From its founding until 1949, the republic was based on mainland China. Central authority waxed and waned in response to warlordism (1915–1928), a Japanese invasion (1937–1945), and a full-scale civil war (1927–1949), with central authority strongest during the Nanjing Decade (1927–1937), when most of China came under the control of the authoritarian, one-party military dictatorship of the Kuomintang (KMT).^[16]

In 1945, at the end of World War II, the Empire of Japan surrendered control of Taiwan and its island groups to the Allies; and Taiwan was placed under the Republic of China's administrative control. The communist takeover of mainland China in 1949, after the Chinese Civil War, left the ruling Kuomintang with control over only Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen, Matsu, and other minor islands. With the loss of the mainland, the ROC government retreated to Taiwan and the KMT declared Taipei the provisional capital.^[17] Meanwhile, the CCP took over all of mainland China^[18][19] and founded the People's Republic of China (PRC) in Beijing.

Founding and initial Beiyang rule (1912–1916)

Background

In the late Qing dynasty, the ruling dynasty of China, was suffered the instability from both internal rebellion and foreign imperialism, and social unrests.^[20] The Boxer Rebellion led the Eight-Nation Alliance force to launch a war of aggression against China, forcing the Qing government to sign the Xinchou Treaty. Some Chinese enlightened individuals and oversea students established some revolutionary organisations.^[21] In 1908, the Qing Government annunciate Principles of the Imperial Constitution and announced that constitutionality will be implemented in ten years to deal with calls for reform. The result, however, was a huge disappointment for the constitutionalists, and leading the revolution became popular.^[22][23]

The Chinese Tongmenghui (United League), an underground movement founded by Sun Yat-sen, began to take action by launching the Huanghuagang uprising at Canton in 27 April 1911, but was suppressed by the Qing Army. On 17 June, the Sichuan Railway Protection Comrades Association was founded and launched the Railway Protection Movement led by constitutionalists.

1911 Revolution and the overthrown of monarchy

The Gongjinhui, with the Literary Society, launched the Wuchang Uprising against the Qing government on 10 October 1911, leading to the establishment of the Military Government of the Republic of China, which is now celebrated annually as the ROC's national day, also known as "Double Ten Day". Subsequently, 15 provinces in China successively declared independence from the Qing government, forming the nationwide 1911 Revolution.^[24] The Hubei Army Governor's Office was established on the follow day in Wuchang, Hubei,^[25] and on 17 November, a joint meeting of provincial governor's offices recognised the Hubei Military Government as the Central Military Government of the Republic of China. The first constitutional law of the Republic of China, the Organisational Outline of the Provisional Government of the Republic of China, was passed on 3 November. The revolutionaries organised the Central Provisional Government, while they negotiated the Qing Prime Minister, Yuan Shikai, who agreed to would be elected as the president of the provisional government if he forced the Qing emperor to abdicate. Sun, who had been actively promoting revolution from his bases in exile, was returned to China and on 29 December, he was elected interim president by the Nanjing assembly in Jiangning Mansion, Jiangsu,^[26] which consisted of representatives from seventeen provinces. Jebtsundamba Khutuktu established the Bogd Khanate of Mongolia, and declared Outer Mongolia independence from the Qing rule on the same day. The Lhasa turmoil broke out in Tibet, and Qing officials and garrisons were expelled, the 13th Dalai Lama, who had been exiled in British Raj for many years, later returned to Lhasa and regained power in Tibet.

Establishment and Yuan's dictatorship

On 1 January 1912, the Provisional Government was formally established in Nanjing, Sun Yat-sen was officially inaugurated and pledged "to overthrow the despotic government led by the Manchu, consolidate the Republic of China and plan for the welfare of the people",^[27] Sun Yat-sen also proposed the "Five Offers" on behalf of the Provisional Government on 18 January.^[28] Sun's new government lacked military strength. As a compromise, he negotiated with Yuan Shikai the commander of the Beiyang Army, promising Yuan the presidency of the republic if he were to remove the Qing emperor by force. Yuan agreed to the deal.^[29] On 12 February 1912, regent Empress Dowager Longyu signed the abdication decree on behalf of the Xuantong Emperor, ending several millennia of Chinese monarchical rule.^[30] Yuan was elected provisional president of the ROC in on 15 February 1912, as Sun Yat-sen kept his promise, he resigned to senate two days earlier.^[20][31] The senate passed the Provisional Constitution of the Republic of China on 8 March, and he sworn in two days later.^[32] In the first parliamentary election at the end of the year, the Kuomintang, led by Song Jiaoren, won a majority of seats both in the Senate and the House of Representatives, by fashioning his party's program to appeal to the gentry, landowners, and merchants.^[33]

Song Jiaoren, who was about to become Prime Minister, was assassinated on 20 March 1913, at the behest of Yuan Shikai, leaving him and other Beiyang warlords held the power.^[34] He ruled by military power and ignored the republican institutions established by his predecessor, threatening to execute Senate members who disagreed with his decisions. Sun Yat-sen directed several southern provinces to launch a second revolution against him, but failed due to the assassination pf Song and massive loan that resulted in the loss of power and humiliation of the country.^[35] Yuan was elected as the first president of the republic on 6 October 1914, Congress passed the Tiantan Constitution and adopted a cabinet system to restrict his power. He soon postponed the ruling Kuomintang party for participating in the second revolution, banned "secret organizations" (which implicitly included the KMT), and ordered the dissolution of Congress.^[33][36] In 1914, Yuan ordered the National Assembly to amend the Provisional Constitution of the Republic of China and change the cabinet system to a presidential system, He also announced the country's name would be changed to the Empire of China in December 1915.^[33] Cai E and Tang Jiyao, generals of the Yunnan province, soon declared independence and organised the National Protector Army to overthrown Yuan. In 1916, Yuan Shikai renounced the imperial system and sought re-election as president, but was rejected by the National Guard Army. Yuan died of illness on 6 June.^[37][38]

Warlord Era (1916–1927)

Yuan's changes to government caused many provinces to declare independence and become warlord states. Increasingly unpopular and deserted by his supporters, Yuan abdicated in 1916 and died of natural causes shortly thereafter.^[37][38] The central government lacked the strength to govern various provinces, China subsequently experienced a period of warlord seperatism. The main forces of the Beiyang Government, including Zhang Zuolin of the Fengtian clique, Duan Qirui of the Anhui clique, and Cao Kun of the Zhili clique, fought for control of the government many times.^[39][40] Other warlords included Yan Xishan's Shanxi clique, Feng Yuxiang's Northwest Army, Tang Jiyao's Yunnan clique, and Lu Rongting's old Guangxi clique. Sun, having been forced into exile, returned to Guangdong in 1917 with the help of warlords, and cooperated with the Cantonese warlords to establish a separate military government of the Republic of China, which was the rival government to the Beiyang Government in Peking, in Panyu county, having re-established the KMT in October 1919.

Meanwhile, the Beiyang government struggled to hold onto power, and an open and wide-ranging debate evolved regarding how China should confront the West. In 1919, a student protest against the government's weak response to the Treaty of Versailles,^[41] considered unfair by Chinese intellectuals, led to the May Fourth movement, whose demonstrations were against the danger of spreading Western influence replacing Chinese culture.^[41] It was in this intellectual climate that the influence of Marxism spread and became popular, leading to the founding of the CCP in 1921.^[42]

After Sun's death in March 1925, Chiang Kai-shek became the leader of the Kuomintang. In 1926, Chiang led the Northern Expedition with the intention of defeating the Beiyang warlords and unifying the country. Chiang received the help of the Soviet Union and the CCP. However, he soon dismissed his Soviet advisers, being convinced that they wanted to get rid of the KMT and take control.^[43] Chiang decided to purge the Communists, killing thousands of them. At the same time, other violent conflicts were taking place in China: in the South, where the CCP had superior numbers, Nationalist supporters were being massacred. Such events eventually led to the Chinese Civil War between the Nationalists and Communists.

Nationalist rule (1927–1931)

Nanjing decade

Chiang Kai-shek pushed the CCP into the interior and established a government, with Nanjing as its capital, in 1927.^[44] By 1928, Chiang's army overthrew the Beiyang government and unified the entire nation, at least nominally, beginning the so-called Nanjing decade.^[45]

Sun Yat-sen envisioned three phases for the KMT rebuilding of China – military rule and violent reunification; political tutelage; and finally a constitutional democracy.^[46] In 1930, after seizing power and reunifying China by force, the "tutelage" phase started with the promulgation of a provisional constitution.^[47] In an attempt to distant themselves from the Soviets, the Nationalist Government sought assistance from Germany. Chiang Kai-chek was influenced by European fascist movements, and launched the Blue shirts and the New Life Movement in conscious imitation of them.^[48][49] Several major government institutions were founded during this period, including the Academia Sinica and the Central Bank of China. In 1932, China sent its first team to the Olympic Games. Campaigns were mounted and laws passed to promote the rights of women. In the 1931 Civil Code, women were given equal inheritance rights, banned forced marriage and gave women the right to control their own money and initiate divorce.^[50]No nationally unified women's movement could organise until China was unified under the Kuomintang Government in Nanjing in 1928; women's suffrage was finally included in the new Constitution of 1936, although the constitution was not implemented until 1947.^[51] Addressing social problems, especially in remote villages, was aided by improved communications. The Rural Reconstruction Movement was one of many that took advantage of the new freedom to raise social consciousness.^{[citation needed]} The Nationalist government published a draft constitution on 5 May 1936.^[52]

Local uprising and reforms

Continual wars plagued the government. Those in the western border regions included the Kumul Rebellion, the Sino-Tibetan War, and the Soviet Invasion of Xinjiang. Large areas of China proper remained under the semi-autonomous rule of local warlords such as Feng Yuxiang and Yan Xishan, provincial military leaders, or warlord coalitions.^[45] Nationalist rule was strongest in the eastern regions around the capital Nanjing. The Central Plains War in 1930, the Japanese aggression in 1931, and the Red Army's Long March in 1934 led to more power for the central government, but there continued to be foot-dragging and even outright defiance, as in the Fujian Rebellion of 1933–34.^{[citation needed]}

Reformers and critics pushed for democracy and human rights, but the task seemed difficult if not impossible. The nation was at war and divided between Communists and Nationalists. Corruption and lack of direction hindered reforms. Chiang told the State Council: "Our organization becomes worse and worse... many staff members just sit at their desks and gaze into space, others read newspapers and still others sleep."^[53]

Conflict with Japan and World War II (1931–1945)

Outbreak in the East

Few Chinese had any illusions about Japanese desires on China. Hungry for raw materials and pressed by a growing population, Japan initiated the seizure of Manchuria in September 1931 and established the ex-Qing emperor Puyi as head of the puppet state of Manchukuo in 1932. The loss of Manchuria, and its potential for industrial development and war industries, was a blow to the Kuomintang economy.^[54][55] The League of Nations, established at the end of World War I, was unable to act in the face of Japanese defiance.^[56]

The Japanese began to push south of the Great Wall into northern China and the coastal provinces.^[57][58] Chinese fury against Japan was predictable, but anger was also directed against Chiang and the Nanjing government, which at the time was more preoccupied with anti-Communist extermination campaigns than with resisting the Japanese invaders. The importance of "internal unity before external danger" was forcefully brought home in December 1936, when Chiang Kai-shek, in an event now known as the Xi'an Incident, was kidnapped by Zhang Xueliang and forced to ally with the Communists against the Japanese in the Second Kuomintang-CCP United Front.^[59]

Resuming conquest of China

Chinese resistance stiffened after 7 July 1937, when a clash occurred between Chinese and Japanese troops outside Peiping (Later Beijing) near the Marco Polo Bridge.^[54][60][61] This skirmish led to open, although undeclared, warfare between China and Japan. Shanghai fell after a three-month battle during which Japan suffered extensive casualties in both its army and navy. The capital, Nanjing, fell in December 1937,^[62] which was followed by mass murders and rapes known as the Nanjing Massacre. The national capital was briefly at Wuhan, then removed in an epic retreat to Chongqing (Chungking), the seat of government until 1945.^[63] In 1940, the Japanese set up the collaborationist Wang Jingwei regime, with its capital in Nanjing, which proclaimed itself the legitimate "Republic of China" in opposition to Chiang Kai-shek's government, although its claims were significantly hampered due to its being a puppet state controlling limited amounts of territory.

The United Front between the Kuomintang and the CCP had salutary effects for the beleaguered CCP, despite Japan's steady territorial gains in northern China, the coastal regions and the rich Yangtze River Valley in central China. After 1940, conflicts between the Kuomintang and Communists became more frequent in the areas not under Japanese control.^[64] The Communists expanded their influence wherever opportunities presented themselves through mass organizations, administrative reforms and the land- and tax-reform measures favoring the peasants and, the spread of their organizational network, while the Kuomintang attempted to neutralise the spread of Communist influence. Meanwhile, northern China was infiltrated politically by Japanese politicians in Manchukuo using facilities such as the Wei Huang Gong.

World War II

Following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December, China formally declared war on Japan three days later.^[65] After its entry into the Pacific War during World War II, the United States became increasingly involved in Chinese affairs.^[66] As an ally, it embarked in late 1941 on a program of massive military and financial aid to the hard-pressed Nationalist Government. In January 1943, both the United States and the United Kingdom led the way in revising their unequal treaties with China from the past.^[o][67] Within a few months a new agreement was signed between the United States and the Republic of China for the stationing of American troops in China as part of the common war effort against Japan. The United States sought unsuccessfully to reconcile the rival Kuomintang and Communists, to make for a more effective anti-Japanese war effort. In December 1943, the Chinese Exclusion Acts of the 1880s, and subsequent laws, enacted by the United States Congress to restrict Chinese immigration into the United States were repealed. The wartime policy of the United States was meant to help China become a strong ally and a stabilizing force in postwar East Asia. During the war, China was one of the Big Four Allies of the Second World War and later one of the Four Policemen, which was a precursor to China having a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council.^[68]

In August 1945, with American help, Nationalist troops moved to take the Japanese surrender in North China. The Soviet Union—encouraged to invade Manchuria to hasten the end of the war and allowed a Soviet sphere of influence there as agreed to at the Yalta Conference in February 1945—dismantled and removed more than half the industrial equipment left there by the Japanese. Although the Chinese had not been present at Yalta, they had been consulted and had agreed to have the Soviets enter the war, in the belief that the Soviet Union would deal only with the Kuomintang government. However, the Soviet presence in northeast China enabled the Communists to arm themselves with equipment surrendered by the withdrawing Japanese army.

Civil War and Retreat to Taiwan (1945–1949)

Post-War and Civil War re-emerged

In 1945, after the end of the war, the Nationalist Government moved back to Nanjing. The Republic of China emerged from the war nominally a great military power but actually a nation economically prostrate and on the verge of all-out civil war. The problems of rehabilitating the formerly Japanese-occupied areas and of reconstructing the nation from the ravages of a protracted war were staggering. The economy deteriorated, sapped by the military demands of foreign war and internal strife, by spiraling inflation, and by Nationalist profiteering, speculation, and hoarding. Starvation came in the wake of the war, and millions were rendered homeless by floods and unsettled conditions in many parts of the country.

On 25 October 1945, following the surrender of Japan, the administration of Taiwan and Penghu Islands were handed over from Japan to China.^[69] After the end of the war, United States Marines were used to hold Peiping and Tientsin against a possible Soviet incursion, and logistic support was given to Kuomintang forces in north and northeast China.^[70] To further this end, on 30 September 1945 the 1st Marine Division, charged with maintaining security in the areas of the Shandong Peninsula and the eastern Hebei, arrived in China.^[71]

In January 1946, through the mediation of the United States, a military truce between the Kuomintang and the Communists was arranged, but battles soon resumed.^[72] Public opinion of the administrative incompetence of the Nationalist government was incited by the Communists during the nationwide student protest against the mishandling of the Shen Chong rape case in early 1947 and during another national protest against monetary reforms later that year.^[73] The United States—realizing that no American efforts short of large-scale armed intervention could stop the coming war—withdrew Gen. George Marshall's American mission.^[74] Thereafter, the Chinese Civil War became more widespread; battles raged not only for territories but also for the allegiance of sections of the population.^[75] The United States aided the Nationalists with massive economic loans and weapons but no combat support.^[76]

Collapse in Mainland and flee to Taiwan

Belatedly, the Republic of China government sought to enlist popular support through internal reforms. However, the effort was in vain, because of rampant government corruption and the accompanying political and economic chaos. By late 1948 the Kuomintang position was bleak.^[77] The demoralised and undisciplined National Revolutionary Army proved to be no match for the Communists' motivated and disciplined People's Liberation Army.^[78] The Communists were well established in the north and northeast.^[79] Although the Kuomintang had an advantage in numbers of men and weapons, controlled a much larger territory and population than their adversaries, and enjoyed considerable international support, they were exhausted by the long war with Japan and in-fighting among various generals. They were also losing the propaganda war to the Communists, with a population weary of Kuomintang corruption and yearning for peace.^[80]

In January 1949, Peiping was taken by the Communists without a fight, and its name changed back to Beijing.^[81][82] Following the capture of Nanjing on 23 April, major cities passed from Kuomintang to Communist control with minimal resistance, through November.^[81][83] In most cases the surrounding countryside and small towns had come under Communist influence long before the cities.^[84] Finally, on 1 October 1949, Communists led by Mao Zedong founded the People's Republic of China.^[85] Chiang Kai-shek declared martial law in May 1949,^[86] whilst a few hundred thousand Nationalist troops and two million refugees, predominantly from the government and business community, fled from mainland China to Taiwan.^[87][88] There remained in China itself only isolated pockets of resistance. The seat of government, after the fall of Nanking, was moved to Kwangchow, before to its wartime capital, Chungking, and lastly on mainland, Chengtu, with some moving to Sichang. On 7 December 1949, Chiang proclaimed Taipei, Taiwan, the temporary capital of the Republic of China, with Chengtu falling to the Communists on 27 December.

During the Chinese Civil War both the Nationalists and Communists carried out mass atrocities, with millions of non-combatants killed by both sides.^[89] Benjamin Valentino has estimated atrocities in the civil war resulted in the death of between 1.8 million and 3.5 million people between 1927 and 1949, including deaths from forced conscription and massacres.^[90]

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