2P - The Sino-Japanese war: the Xi'an incident and the Second United Front | AQA A-Level History

The war against Japan brought the GMD and CCP into cooperation without ending their rivalry. Learn why the Second United Front emerged, how each side fought and governed during the war, and why the conflict changed their relative positions by 1945.

Xi'an and the Second United Front

The Xi'an Incident revealed the growing conflict between Jiang's anti-Communist priorities and demands for resistance to Japan. In December 1936 Zhang Xueliang and Yang Hucheng detained Jiang at Xi'an. Zhang's northeastern forces had lost their home region to Japan, while being required to fight Communists in northwest China. The captors wanted a change of policy towards national resistance. The incident therefore grew from pressures within the Nationalist military coalition, not simply from a Communist order.

Negotiations involving Zhou Enlai and others helped secure Jiang's release. The CCP accepted a settlement rather than seeking Jiang's execution, since renewed conflict among Chinese forces would obstruct resistance and could endanger Communist survival. Jiang's release made rapprochement possible, but did not itself create a completely integrated alliance or a signed nationwide war programme overnight.

The Marco Polo Bridge Incident near Beijing on 7 July 1937 escalated into full-scale war. By September the GMD and CCP had publicly established the Second United Front against Japan. Communist forces were nominally incorporated into the Nationalist military system as the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army. The CCP moderated parts of its social programme to attract a broader anti-Japanese coalition.

United front

An alliance of organisations with different long-term aims for a shared immediate objective. The Second United Front coordinated resistance to Japan while the GMD and CCP retained separate political interests and much practical autonomy.

The timing matters. Japanese expansion supplied the external threat; dissatisfaction inside Jiang's coalition produced the Xi'an crisis; full-scale invasion made cooperation more urgent. None alone explains every step. The alliance changed immediate priorities while leaving the question of who would govern China unresolved.

Fighting a common enemy

Nationalist forces bore the main burden of large conventional battles against the Japanese army. Fighting at Shanghai in 1937 cost Jiang valuable troops, while the fall of Nanjing was followed by Japanese atrocities against soldiers and civilians. The GMD government eventually established its wartime capital at Chongqing in the southwest. Retreat preserved a continuing Chinese government and prevented Japan from translating military advances into complete Chinese surrender.

The war disrupted coastal trade, tax revenues and industrial production. Some factories and skilled personnel were moved inland, helping sustain resistance and change the geographical distribution of industry. The survival of government in the interior was a significant achievement, but it depended on increasingly difficult financial and military mobilisation. Allied assistance, especially after Japan's attack on the United States in December 1941, gave Jiang an important international role. Assistance did not remove domestic problems or mean that all resources reached troops effectively.

Communist forces operated largely from rural bases in north China and behind Japanese lines. Guerrilla attacks, local militias and political organisation challenged occupation and helped expand CCP influence. The Hundred Regiments Offensive in 1940 demonstrates that Communist resistance was not confined to avoiding battle: it attacked Japanese communications and positions on a substantial scale. Severe Japanese countermeasures also exposed rural populations and Communist bases to destruction.

The different military roles should not be turned into a simple contrast between one side fighting and the other doing nothing. Conventional battles tied down Japanese forces but could inflict heavy losses on Nationalists. Guerrilla operations exploited areas where central authority was weak and made political growth possible, but incurred real risks and suffering. Both military action and the ability to preserve an organisation mattered to the balance after the war.

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2P - The Sino-Japanese war: the Xi'an incident and the Second United Front

Xi'an and the Second United Front

Fighting a common enemy

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