Study Of Nationalist Party’s Reflection After Retreat To Taiwan

The Nationalist Party retreated to Taiwan in1949and reflection on this failure inhistory is worth thinking and studying and is of great research value. Before the retreat ofthe Nationalist Party to Taiwan, Chiang Kai-shek has reviewed the causes for thecontinuous failures of Nationalist Party in battles with Communist Party. More reviewswere even made after the retreat and Chiang Kai-shek also wrote a book Soviet Russia inChina to systematically conclude their lessons from the failure. Taiwan scholars andforeign scholars began to make academic research on this event in the early1950s.Although the mainland scholars started later in such research than the Taiwan scholarsand foreign scholars, certain achievements have also been achieved.As for previous researches in the historical circle, they mainly focus on the causes ofthe failure of the Nationalist Party viewed from the research content and topic and oftenstand on the position and angle of the Mainland China. However, studies of reflection ofthe Nationalist Party are few. When the Nationalist Party’s reflection on the failure wasreferred to, it was often summarized as “away from the point”, but comprehensive anddeep studies are rarely seen. Based on its research value and the current research status,this paper takes the reflection of the Nationalist Party after retreat to Taiwan (hereinafterreferred to as “reflection of the Nationalist Party”) as the topic, makes in-depth study ofthe reflection of the Nationalist Party with the reflection of Chiang Kai-shek as the mainpoint, studies the real causes for its failure from its own understanding, and summarizessignificant historical enlightenment from its loss of the ruling party position. This paperis divided into three parts:The first part mainly studies the reflection of the Nationalist Party and the relevantmeasures it had adopted after retreat to Taiwan. This part firstly analyzes the reflection ofChiang Kai-shek on failure from military, politics, economy, diplomacy and party policy,then the reflections of Taiwan scholars on its failure, and the reflections of some defeatedgenerals of the Nationalist Party. Secondly, it expounds corresponding measures thatNationalist Party has taken after they retreated to Taiwan, including its “transformation”,the proposition and implementation of “mass line”, financial and economic measures andthe reconstruction of Taiwan-US relation. The second part mainly analyzes the characteristics and problems of the NationalistParty’s reflection. Their reflection emphasizes more on military but less on politics, moreon tactic but less on strategy, more on external causes but less on internal causes andmore on absolving responsibilities but less on shouldering responsibilities. Manyproblems exist on their reflection, mainly reflected in the substitution of the leader’spersonal reflection to the whole Party’s reflection, chaotic logic of the reflection and thelack of fundamental reasons of its failure in reflection.The third part introduces the significance and enlightenment brought by the study ofNationalist Party’s reflection. This study can enrich the researches on the reflection ofNationalist Party, deepen the theoretical study of the ruling party, and can enrich theresearch on the modern history of China and the history of Chinese parties. Study ofNationalist Party’s reflection also has a certain practical significance: it helps correctsome wrong understandings on the civil war between Nationalist Party and CommunistParty, provides theoretical support for red tourism, and can expand the exhibitioncontents in the Memorial of the Liao-shen Campaign, etc. The study of NationalistParty’s reflection also brings us a revelation: only with the correct reflection and thecourage to bear historical responsibilities, can errors be corrected and ruling abilityimproved; the ruling party must firmly grasp the historical rule and keep up with thetrend of the history to stand in an impregnable position.