IN CHINA

Hokitika Guardian, 18 November 1929, Page 8

IN CHINA

(FROM SIR. PEROIVAL PHILLIS.)

SHANGHAI, October 3

Affnii*s in China are still moving steadily towards an upheaval of the familiar kind, which is likely to disrupt the so-called Central (National] Government at Nanking and again split the country into areas ruled by military dictators for their own ends. Opposition to Chiang Kai-shek, the President of the National Government has been growing in the six provinces which comprise the real Nationalist Government, centered about the Yangtse River, as well as in other parts ol South China. The military leaders who have never professed more than a nominal allegiance to Nanking, see an opportunity to put Peking on the map again as at least one “capital” of China. There have been three appempts rcecnty to asassinate Chiang Kai-shek, and violent manifestoes lmvc been circulated against him. These have been met by many arrests and some executions.

DECOTED AND LOCKED UP

Local leaders previously among his strongest supporters, but now suspect, have 'been decoyed to Nanking on the pretext of a conference on local matters, only to find themselves under lock and key.

Nanking watches 1 with undisguised anxiety the movement of the two army grooms in the South. The more formidable group is the notorious “Ironsides Division,” the only real Communist army in China—in which the officers and men are paid alike—commanded by General Cluing Pah-kwai, now in the region ol tile upper Yangtse, round Ishang. These troops were responsible for the outrages at Nanking in the spring of 192-7.

The nominal ally of this group is the army in the Kwangsi Province, which has been consistently hostile to the Central Government.

Meanwhile the old military leaders in the North,- Feng Yu-shiang, the former “Christian” general and ally of Moscow, who holds three NorthWestern provinces, and Yet Hsi-shan, Wiio rules Shaushi, are in close relations with the real ruler of Manchuria, kite young M.a'rksal Gluing Hsuehliang, for the purpose of throwing off their nominal alleganre to Nanking. THE FAMILY CABINET. The refusal of the National Government to settle the disupte with Russia over the seizure of ...e Chinese Eastern Railway has led to conversations at Mukden (Manchuria) during the past week between agents of the three chiefs as to the advisamJity of trying to arrange independent negotiations with the Bolsheviks, a step tor which Moscow has been patiently waiting.

There is, too, keen resentment; i.. the real sphere of Southern influence against Chiang Kai-shek’s “Family Cabinet,” also called the “Sun Yatsen Dynasty.” (T ne late Dr. Sun Yatsen was the first Provisional President of the Chinese Republic.) Airs Sun Yat-sen’s sister is Chiang Kai-sliek’s wife; her brother Mr T. V. Soong, is Finance Minister, and Sun Fo, the son of Sun Yat-sen by his first wife, is Minister of Railways.

These are some of the elements of

ie situation—more tangled and perplexing than any in recent years. Only one tiling is certain—Russia is not playing a waiting game without a motive.