Editing Kuomintang (section)

=== Under Chiang Kai-shek in Mainland China  ===
When Sun Yat-sen died in 1925, the political leadership of the KMT fell to [[Wang Jingwei]] ("[[Reorganization Group]]") and [[Hu Hanmin]] ("[[Western Hills Group]]"), respectively the left-wing and right-wing leaders of the party. However, the real power was in the hands of Chiang Kai-shek, who was in near complete control of the military as the superintendent of the [[Whampoa Military Academy]]. With their military superiority, the KMT confirmed their rule on Canton, the provincial capital of [[Guangdong]]. The Guangxi warlords pledged loyalty to the KMT. The KMT now became a rival government in opposition to the [[Warlord era|warlord]] [[Beiyang government]] based in [[Beijing]].<ref name="Nationalist China">{{cite web|url=http://www.wsu.edu/~dee/MODCHINA/NATIONAL.HTM|title=Nationalist China|publisher=Washington State University|date=6 June 1996|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060906095406/http://www.wsu.edu/~dee/MODCHINA/NATIONAL.HTM|archive-date=6 September 2006}}</ref>

Chiang assumed leadership of the KMT on 6 July 1926. Unlike Sun Yat-sen, whom he admired greatly and who forged all his political, economic, and revolutionary ideas primarily from what he had learned in Hawaii and indirectly through [[British Hong Kong|Hong Kong]] and [[Empire of Japan|Japan]] under the [[Meiji Restoration]], Chiang knew relatively little about the West. He also studied in Japan, but he was firmly rooted in his ancient [[Han Chinese]] identity and was steeped in [[Chinese culture]]. As his life progressed, he became increasingly attached to ancient Chinese culture and traditions. His few trips to the West confirmed his pro-ancient Chinese outlook and he studied the ancient [[Chinese classics]] and ancient Chinese history assiduously.<ref name="Nationalist China"/> In 1923, after the formation of the [[First United Front]], Sun Yat-sen sent Chiang to spend three months in Moscow studying the political and military system of the Soviet Union. Although Chiang did not follow the Soviet Communist doctrine, he, like the Communist Party, sought to destroy [[warlordism]] and foreign [[Western imperialism in Asia|imperialism in China]], and upon his return established the [[Whampoa Military Academy]] near Guangzhou, following the Soviet Model.<ref name="China in the 20th Century">{{cite web |last1=Bowblis |first1=J |title=China in the 20th Century |url=https://departments.kings.edu/history/20c/china.html#Chiang |website=Kings College History |publisher=King's College History Department |access-date=31 October 2020 |archive-date=5 November 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201105231856/https://departments.kings.edu/history/20c/china.html#Chiang |url-status=live }}</ref>

Chiang was also particularly committed to Sun's idea of "political tutelage". Sun believed that the only hope for a unified and better China lay in a military conquest, followed by a period of political tutelage that would culminate in the transition to democracy. Using this ideology, Chiang built himself into the dictator of the Republic of China, both in the [[Chinese mainland]] and after the [[Government of the Republic of China|national government]] relocated to [[Taiwan]].<ref name="Nationalist China"/>

Following the death of Sun Yat-sen, Chiang Kai-shek emerged as the KMT leader and launched the [[Northern Expedition (1926–1927)|Northern Expedition]] to defeat the [[Warlord era (China)|northern warlords]] and unite China under the party. With its power confirmed in the southeast, the [[Nationalist Government]] appointed Chiang Kai-shek commander-in-chief of the [[National Revolutionary Army]] (NRA), and the [[Northern Expedition]] to suppress the warlords began. Chiang had to defeat three separate warlords and two independent armies. Chiang, with Soviet supplies, conquered the southern half of China in nine months.

A split erupted between the Chinese Communist Party and the KMT, which threatened the Northern Expedition. Wang Jing Wei, who led the KMT leftist allies, took the city of [[Wuhan]] in January 1927. With the support of the Soviet agent [[Mikhail Borodin]], Wang declared the National Government as having moved to Wuhan. Having taken Nanjing in March, Chiang halted his campaign and prepared a violent break with Wang and his communist allies. Chiang's expulsion of the CCP and their Soviet advisers, marked by the [[Shanghai massacre]] on 12 April, led to the beginning of the [[Chinese Civil War]]. Wang finally surrendered his power to Chiang. Once this split had been healed, Chiang resumed his Northern Expedition and managed to take Shanghai.<ref name="Nationalist China"/>

[[File:Countermand concession.jpg|thumb|The [[National Revolutionary Army]] soldiers marched into the British concessions in [[Hankou]] during the [[Northern Expedition]]]]
During the [[Nanking incident of 1927|Nanjing incident]] in March 1927, the NRA stormed the consulates of the United States, the United Kingdom and [[Empire of Japan|Imperial Japan]], looted foreign properties and almost assassinated the Japanese consul. An American, two British, one French, an Italian and a Japanese were killed.<ref>{{cite news|title=Foreign News: NANKING|magazine=Time|date=4 April 1927 |url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,722979,00.html|access-date=11 April 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110426030922/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,722979,00.html|archive-date=26 April 2011|url-status=dead}}</ref> These looters also stormed and seized millions of dollars' worth of British concessions in [[Hankou]], refusing to hand them back to the UK government.<ref>{{cite news|title=China: Japan & France |magazine=Time|date=11 April 1927|url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,730304,00.html|access-date=11 April 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110426030508/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,730304,00.html|archive-date=26 April 2011|url-status=dead}}</ref> Both Nationalists and Communist soldiers within the army participated in the rioting and looting of foreign residents in Nanjing.<ref name="beede">{{cite book|last=Beede|first=R. Benjamin|title=The War of 1898, and U.S. interventions, 1898–1934: an encyclopedia|year=1994|publisher=Taylor & Francis Publishing|isbn=0-8240-5624-8|page=[https://archive.org/details/americanrevoluti0000unse_o8w2/page/355 355]|url=https://archive.org/details/americanrevoluti0000unse_o8w2/page/355}}</ref>

NRA took Beijing in 1928. The city was the internationally recognized capital, even when it was previously controlled by warlords. This event allowed the KMT to receive widespread diplomatic recognition in the same year. The capital was moved from Beijing to Nanjing, the original capital of the [[Ming dynasty]], and thus a symbolic purge of the final Qing elements. This period of KMT rule in China between 1927 and 1937 was relatively stable and prosperous and is still known as the [[Nanjing decade]].

After the [[Northern Expedition]] in 1928, the [[Nationalist government]] under the KMT declared that China had been exploited for decades under the [[Unequal treaty|unequal treaties]] signed between the foreign powers and the Qing dynasty. The KMT government demanded that the foreign powers renegotiate the treaties on equal terms.<ref>{{cite news|title=CHINA: Nationalist Notes|magazine=Time|date=25 June 1928|url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,786420,00.html|access-date=11 April 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110426030536/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,786420,00.html|archive-date=26 April 2011|url-status=dead}}</ref>

Before the Northern Expedition, the KMT began as a heterogeneous group advocating American-inspired federalism and provincial autonomy. However, the KMT under Chiang's leadership aimed at establishing a centralized [[one-party state]] with one ideology. This was even more evident following Sun's elevation into a cult figure after his death. The control by one single party began the period of "political tutelage", whereby the party was to lead the government while instructing the people on how to participate in a democratic system. The topic of reorganizing the army, brought up at a military conference in 1929, sparked the [[Central Plains War]]. The cliques, some of them former warlords, demanded to retain their army and political power within their own territories. Although Chiang finally won the war, the conflicts among the cliques would have a devastating effect on the survival of the KMT. Muslim Generals in [[Gansu]] waged war against the [[Guominjun]] in favor of the KMT during the [[Muslim conflict in Gansu (1927–1930)|conflict in Gansu in 1927–1930]].<ref>{{cite book|author=Andrew D. W. Forbes|title=Warlords and Muslims in Chinese Central Asia: a political history of Republican Sinkiang 1911–1949|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IAs9AAAAIAAJ|access-date=28 June 2010|year=1986|publisher=CUP Archive|location=Cambridge, England|isbn=978-0-521-25514-1|page=108|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140704173905/http://books.google.com/books?id=IAs9AAAAIAAJ|archive-date=4 July 2014|url-status=live}}</ref>

[[File:kmtarmy.JPG|thumb|upright|[[National Revolutionary Army|Nationalist soldiers]] during the [[Second Sino-Japanese War]]]]
In 1931, Japanese aggression resumed with the [[Mukden Incident]] and occupation of Manchuria, and the CCP founded the [[Chinese Soviet Republic]] (CSR) in [[Jiangxi]] while secretly recruiting within the KMT government and military. Chiang was alarmed by the expansion of communist influence; he wanted to suppress internal conflicts before confronting foreign aggression. The KMT were aided by German military advisors. The CSR was destroyed in 1934 after a series of KMT offensives. The communists abandoned bases in southeast China for Shaanxi in a military retreat called the [[Long March]]; less than 10% of the communist army survived. A new base, the [[Shaan-Gan-Ning Border Region]], was created with Soviet aid.

KMT secret police persecuted suspected communists and political opponents with [[Terror (politics)|terror]]. In ''The Birth of Communist China'', C.P. Fitzgerald describes China under the rule of the KMT thus: "the Chinese people groaned under a regime Fascist in every quality except efficiency."<ref>C.P. Fitzgerald, ''The Birth of Communist China'', Penguin Books, 1964, pp. 106. ({{ISBN|978-0140206944}})</ref>

In 1936, Chiang was kidnapped by [[Zhang Xueliang]] in the [[Xi'an Incident]] and forced into the [[Second United Front]], an anti-Japanese alliance with the CCP; the [[Second Sino-Japanese War]] started the following year. The alliance brought little coordination and was treated as a temporary cease fire in the civil war. The [[New Fourth Army Incident]] in 1941 ended the alliance.

[[File:19451025 中國戰區臺灣省受降典禮後 臺灣省警備總司令部全體官兵合影.jpg|thumb|upright|The [[retrocession of Taiwan]] in [[Taipei]] on 25 October 1945]]
[[Surrender of Japan|Japan surrendered]] in 1945, and [[Retrocession of Taiwan|Taiwan was returned]] to the Republic of China on 25 October of that year. The brief period of celebration was soon shadowed by the possibility of a civil war between the KMT and CCP. The Soviet Union declared war on Japan just before it surrendered and occupied [[Manchuria]], the north eastern part of China. The Soviet Union denied the KMT army the right to enter the region but allowed the CCP to take control of the Japanese factories and their supplies.

[[File:Bundesarchiv Bild 135-S-13-14-22, Tibetexpedition, Haus mit Glückszeichen.jpg|thumb|upright|left|KMT flag displayed in Lhasa, Tibet in 1938]]
[[File:Kuomintang Party in Xinjiang 1942.jpg|thumb|upright|left|The KMT in [[Ürümqi|Tihwa (Ürümqi)]], Xinjiang in 1942]]
Full-scale civil war between the [[Chinese Communist Party|Communists]] and the [[Nationalist government|Nationalists]] erupted in 1946. The Communist Chinese armies, the [[People's Liberation Army]] (PLA), previously a minor faction, grew rapidly in influence and power due to several errors on the KMT's part. First, the KMT reduced troop levels precipitously after the Japanese surrender, leaving large numbers of able-bodied, trained fighting men who became unemployed and disgruntled with the KMT as prime recruits for the PLA. Second, the KMT government proved thoroughly unable to manage the economy, allowing hyperinflation to result. Among the most despised and ineffective efforts it undertook to contain inflation was the conversion to the gold standard for the national treasury and the [[Chinese gold yuan]] in August 1948, outlawing private ownership of gold, silver and foreign exchange, collecting all such precious metals and foreign exchange from the people and issuing the Gold Standard Scrip in exchange. As most farmland in the north were under CCP's control, the cities governed by the KMT lacked food supply and this added to the hyperinflation. The new scrip became worthless in only ten months and greatly reinforced the nationwide perception of the KMT as a corrupt or at best inept entity. Third, Chiang Kai-shek ordered his forces to defend the urbanized cities. This decision gave CCP a chance to move freely through the countryside. At first, the KMT had the edge with the aid of weapons and ammunition from the United States (US). However, with the country suffering from [[hyperinflation]], widespread corruption and other economic ills, the KMT continued to lose popular support. Some leading officials and military leaders of the KMT hoarded material, armament and military-aid funding provided by the US. This became an issue which proved to be a hindrance of its relationship with [[Federal government of the United States|US government]]. US President [[Harry S. Truman]] wrote that "[[Chiang family|the Chiangs]], [[HH Kung|the Kungs]] and [[Soong sisters|the Soongs]] (were) all thieves", having taken $750&nbsp;million in US aid.<ref>{{cite book|author=Wesley Marvin Bagby|title=The Eagle-Dragon Alliance: America's Relations With China in World War II|year=1992|isbn=978-0-87413-418-6|page=65|publisher=University of Delaware Press }}</ref>

[[File:Cina1948.JPG|thumb|Territories under the control of the Kuomintang/warlords (orange/grey) and communists (yellow) in 1948]]
At the same time, the suspension of American aid and tens of thousands of deserted or decommissioned soldiers being recruited to the PLA cause tipped the balance of power quickly to the CCP side, and the overwhelming popular support for the CCP in most of the country made it all but impossible for the KMT forces to carry out successful assaults against the Communists.

By the end of 1949, the CCP controlled almost all of [[mainland China]], as the KMT [[Retreat of the government of the Republic of China to Taiwan|retreated to Taiwan]] with a significant amount of China's national treasures and 2 million people, including [[Waishengren|military forces and refugees]]. Some party members stayed in the mainland and broke away from the main KMT to found the [[Revolutionary Committee of the Kuomintang]] (also known as the Left Kuomintang), which still currently exists as one of the [[list of political parties in the People's Republic of China|eight minor registered parties]] of the People's Republic of China.