Chiang Kai Shek And Marshall Conciliation

After world II, the Yalta system and the bi-pole structure were developed and Europe was divided into two parts controlled separately by US and Soviet Union. As the two poles back then, US and Soviet Union redrew the postwar political layout of Europe and Asia and established the United Nations which served as the tool to coordinate international disputes and maintain postwar world peace. US became the NO.1power in the world and Soviet Union became NO.2power. US was reluctant to see east European countries under the control of Soviet Union and it wanted to penetrate its power into that area; it also was worried that Soviet Union would expand its power into other areas. The conquest between US and Soviet Union is the theme back then.US changed its policy towards China after the success of the Anti-Japanese War; it transferred its policy from the support of the anti-Japanese united front to the support of Jiang power against the Communist Party. However, the change of the situation in China forced America to encourage both parties to negotiate and avoid civil war while helping Kuomintang to ensure its power in the areas where it expanded its control power. US didn’t want to interfere in China too much; it didn’t want to see that its military and material assistance became the excuse for Chiang Kai shek to initiate civil war; at the same time, he must maintain its benefits in China. So, it must control the situation in China through the military and material assistance of Kuomingtang and it only admitted the national government lead by Chiang Kai shek as the lawful government of China. Hence, US hoped to solve the Chinese peaceful way. On one hand, it strengthened the military strength of the national force to enable it to effectively control China; on the other hand, they hoped to solve the problem of the Communist Party’s troops by integrating the communist party troops into the national army and avoid large scale civil war; they hoped that Kiang Kai shek could relinquish part of power and persuaded the Communist Party to give away their guns and joined the national army so that they could conquer the Communist Party without making a war. The US president sent Marshall to conciliate the contradictions between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party.During the beginning period which lasted from December1945to March1946of Marshall’s conciliation, his attitude was relevantly fair and Chiang Kai shek also took a relevantly cooperative attitude. This resulted in several agreements which peacefully Chinese Problems including the truce agreement, stabilized the situation which was at daggers drawn; China saw the beam of peace. In the second period of the conciliation which lasted from March to July of1946, Chiang Kai shek tended to solve the Communist Party with violence more and more aggressively; he had more and more complaints of Marshall’s conciliation and initiated more and more military attacks. In this period, Marshall’s pressure was very high and he adopted the conciliation policy of promoting peace and encouraging war at the same time. On one hand, he needed to control the situation and exerted pressure on Chiang Kai shek to make the two parties avoid large scale contradictions as much as possible; on the other hand, he had to carry put US’s poly on China which was to support Kiang, Carry large amount of Kiang troops onto the frontier and aid Kiang large amount of munitions and materials. On one hand through military and supplies help, US hoped to the national government to suppress the Communist Party in military, politics and economy and forced the Communist Party to negotiate in order to solve the Chinese problem in a peaceful way. But Kiang insisted on the civil war and he didn’t have any sincerity in making peace; he depended on the civil war and put up many irrational requirements about truce. In this phase, Kiang had made up his mind to initiate large scale military actions and grew more and more whiny about Marshall’s conciliation. Though Marshall kept active conciliation and tried to make Kiang to make a concession by weapon embargo in the attempt to solve Chinese problem peacefully, for the benefit of US, he didn’t and wouldn’t came in the way of US’s help to Kuomintang. And in this phase, US’s military assistance to Kiang had strengthened his military strength and his determination to initiate the civil war; Kiang’s conditions were more and more harsh and Marshall could only compromise to him and make more concession. Marshall kept his negotiation but had received limited effect and his contradiction with Kiang was deeper and deeper. The third phase of the conciliation which lasted from July1946to January1947, large scale civil war between the two parties had occurred and the domestic situation was very harsh; China entered a stage where the two parties were fighting while negotiating and neither of them bore any hope for Marshall’s conciliation and they put their faith into the armed war. Marshall was very worried about the national troops because the large scale civil war would give the Communist Party the chance to expand its limitary strength and Soviet Union might enter into the civil war, which would threat America’s influence in East Asia. Marshall requested the US government to send Stuart to help him with the conciliation; from this we can see that he was still trying for the conciliation. However Kiang had received America’s assistance and was ready for the civil war; then, Marshall’s conciliation had become his barrier and he knew that nobody was on his side except US. In this period, the contradiction between Chiang Kai shek and Marshall went public and Marshall’s conciliation was more and more hard. Although Marshall was still trying, he was unable to do what he hoped to do and it was extremely hard or the conciliation to go on. In the end, the civil war was inevitable and Marshall’s conciliation ended with failure.The policy Marshall observed during the civil war of China was the reflection of America’s policy on China and it was the policy that had drew him deeper and deeper in this swamp. There were many factors that had resulted in the failure of Marshall’s conciliation. The contradictions between America’s policies on China, the contradictions between Chiang Kai shek and Marshall, the bias of America’s noesis of China especially Marshall’s noesis of China and the softening of Marshall’s attitude all worked together to lead to the failure of Marshall’s conciliation and the eventual breakout of the civil war.