Chang Tso-lin 張作霖 T. Yü-t'ing 雨亭 Chang Tso-lin (1873-June 1928), known as the Old Marshal, military leader who consolidated control of the Northeast. He began as the leader of a local army in Fengtien and rose to rule Manchuria as a virtually autonomous state from 1919 to his death. After 1924, Chang extended his control to Peking and he served as a barrier to the unification of China by the revolutionary forces. He was succeeded as ruler of Manchuria by his son Chang Hsueh-liang 張學良 (q.v.). A family biography prepared shortly after Chang Tso-lin's death in 1928 provides some information about his early years. According to that source, he was born in Haich'eng, Fengtien. He was the fourth child in the family. The oldest son died in infancy, the second son was executed as a bandit, and the third child was a girl. His father, Chang Yu-ts'ai, died about 1882, and his mother later married the village veterinarian. Of peasant origin and without education, the young Chang Tso-lin appeared to have limited prospects.

He began his military career before he was 20. He enlisted in the unit known as the I-chun, commanded by Sung Ch'ing (ECCP, II, 68688) and fought in the Sino-Japanese war of 1894-95. After the war he returned to Fengtien province to organize an armed group to protect his native district. Through his capacities for leadership, Chang built a substantial and well-organized military force of his own. In training local militia in Fengtien, he was closely associate with Chang Ching-hui, who later became premier of the Japanese-sponsored government of Manchoukuo, and with Chang Tso-hsiang, who later became governor of Kirin province. Because Chang Tso-lin was not in the official military system of imperial China, he is often referred to as having been a bandit. During the Russo-Japanese war of 1904-5, Chang Tso-lin and his troops became irregular allies of the Japanese and engaged in harassing attacks against the Russians. Chang emerged from that conflict with substantial military power and with increased prestige in southern Manchuria. After the war he came to an agreement with Chao Erh-sun (q.v.), who was then military governor of Fengtien, and his unit was organized into a regiment. Although his fortunes were not immediately advanced, Chang had found a useful political patron. Chao Erh-sun soon afterwards went to Peking to take up a metropolitan post, but he returned to Mukden as governor general of all Manchuria in April 1911. On the eve of the 1911 revolution, the territorial guard forces comprised a total of 40 battalions, divided into five routes, and Chang Tso-lin commanded the Forward Route, with garrison station at Taonanfu. When the Wuchang revolt broke out, Chao Erh-sun transferred the Rear Route guard force from the Liaoyuan-Tungliao sector to Mukden. Chang Tso-lin, sensing a political opportunity, on his own initiative moved his guard troops to the Mukden sector. Chao Erh-sun accepted this action, and soon afterwards he gave Chang concurrent command of the Central Route guard force stationed in the Mukden-Tiehling sector. When Lan T'ien-yü and his 2nd Mixed Brigade threatened revolt, Chang put down the incipient rebellion, and thus made a major contribution to the maintenance of order in the Northeast.

After the establishment of the new republican government and the accession to power of Yuan Shih-k'ai in 1912, the Manchurian provinces came under the nominal control of Peking. The Mukden garrison forces were reorganized into two divisions, the 27th and the 28th. In September 1912 Chang Tso-lin, now a lieutenant general, took command of the 27th Division; Feng Te-lin, who had commanded the Left Route garrison force, received command of the 28th Division.

In November 1912 Chao Erh-sun was succeeded in Fengtien by Chang Hsi-luan, who had known both Chang Tso-lin and Feng Te-lin for years. Chang Hsi-luan effectively commanded their respect and obedience. When Yuan Shih-k'ai launched his scheme to become emperor at Peking in 1915, Chang Tso-lin and Feng Te-lin initially supported that move. Yuan, however, appointed his trusted lieutenant Tuan Chih-kuei to be military commander of the Northeast and civil governor of Fengtien. Tuan's father, Tuan Yu-heng, had acted as guarantor for Chang Tso-lin when Chang had made his arrangements with the Ch'ing authorities several years earlier. The new appointment of Tuan Chih-kuei, however, was a clear challenge to Chang Tso-lin's political ambitions in Manchuria; on Tuan's recommendation, Yuan Shih-k'ai ordered Chang and his 27th Division to Hunan.

Chang was saved from transfer by "popular protest," doubtless organized by Chang himself. When opposition to Yuan's monarchical scheme developed in Yunnan in December 1916, Chang let it be rumored that Manchuria was going to declare its independence and issued plans for the establishment of a so-called people's peace preservation society. Chang was challenging the authority of Tuan Chih-kuei, and Yuan Shih-k'ai, if he desired to keep Fengtien from rebelling, would have to give Chang Tso-lin a responsible post. Tuan Chih-kuei resigned and left Mukden. Chang was made tutuh [military governor] of Fengtien.

After the death of Yuan Shih-k'ai, Chang Tso-lin moved to consolidate his personal control of southern Manchuria. He became tuchün (the new title for military governor) and civil governor of Fengtien, retaining control of the 27th Division. Trouble arose when T'ang Yu-lin, commanding the 53rd Brigade of the 27th Division, endeavored to organize a movement against Chang's authority. Chang Tso-lin heard of T'ang's scheme, and T'ang fled with a small force to Hsinmin. Chang sent Chang Tso-hsiang after him with a cavalry force, but T'ang was saved from immediate retribution by the intervention of Chang Hai-p'eng, the commander of the 55th Brigade of Feng Te-lin's 28th Division.

Chang Tso-lin chose not to pursue the affair. Feng Te-lin, however, tried to exploit the situation. He made contact with Wu Chün-sheng, the commander of the 2nd Cavalry Brigade, with the aim of overthrowing Chang Tso-lin. When he heard of this plot, Chang Tso-lin made a number of command shifts and dispatched the 56th Brigade of the 28th Division on a bandit-suppression mission in Liaosi. At the end of May 1917 Chang deployed the 27th and 29th divisions against Feng Te-lin and announced that he was changing the commands. Feng, seeking a way out of his predicament, reached an agreement with Chang Hsün (q.v.) and left the area in haste to participate in Chang Hsin's restoration attempt of July. Thus, Chang Tsolin came to control the 28th Division.

In 1917 Chang succeeded in having one of his own supporters named military governor of Heilungkiang province by Tuan Ch'i-jui (q.v.) who then was premier at Peking. Early in 1918 Chang lent Fengtien military support to Tuan Ch'i-jui and his lieutenant Hsu Shu-cheng (q.v.) to exert pressure on Feng Kuo-chang (q.v.) in north China. When Tuan Ch'i-jui again became premier at Peking, he repaid Chang Tso-lin by naming him in September 1918 to the post of inspector general of the Three Eastern Provinces. In that year Chang added seven mixed brigades to his domain's military forces. When Meng En-yuan, the Kirin military governor, resisted his authority, Chang forced him out of office in mid-1919 and had one of his supporters, Pao Kuei-ch'ing, appointed to the Kirin post. Chang's personal control of the Northeast was complete. During the final decade of Chang Tso-lin's life, his domain in Manchuria was, for all practical purposes, an autonomous state. Although his political and military ventures in north China during those years were inconclusive, nevertheless, with the support of Japan, he was at all times in control of the provinces lying to the northeast of the Great Wall.

From 1917 until 1920 Chang Tso-lin had cooperated closely with Tuan Ch'i-jui, to their mutual benefit. Late in 1919, however, Hsu Shu-cheng began to build up a personal empire in the Mongolian borderlands, disregarding Chang Tso-lin's view that the area fell within the Northeastern sphere of influence. The alliance with Chang was broken as a result of these actions. Tuan Ch'i-jui, however, continued to support Hsu Shu-cheng. Chang Tso-lin joined forces with the Chihli generals led by Ts'ao K'un (q.v.), and the combined Chihli and Fengtien forces administered a swift series of defeats to Tuan Ch'i-jui's forces. On 13 July Chang announced that he was sending forces inside the Great Wall. The Chihli forces defeated Tuan and his Anfu forces in a battle near Paoting on 18 July, and Tuan resigned his post the following day. The victors, however, were unable to agree on the composition of a new government, and in mid-August of 1920 the Fengtien forces withdrew to Manchuria. They took with them the heavy equipment captured from Tuan Ch'i-jui's armies, an action that sowed additional seeds of dissension between the Chihli generals and Chang Tso-lin.

Developments in Outer Mongolia occupied the attention of both Chang Tso-lin and the Japanese. In the spring of 1921, after the abortive intervention of Baron von Ungern-Sternberg and his White Russian forces, a provisional people's government of Mongolia was established at Urga (Ulan Bator) in March. In May, units of the Russian Red Army also entered Outer Mongolia. Although the new authorities in Outer Mongolia had declared their independence of the republican government of China, Chang Tso-lin was appointed high commissioner for the Mongolian borderlands and was charged with the task of maintaining Chinese influence there. As a result of that appointment, his authority was extended into Inner Mongolia, to the south of the Gobi. Chang's men were appointed to high positions in the three special districts of Jehol, Chahar, and Suiyuan. But the combined Russian Red Army and Mongol forces on 6 June 1921 occupied Urga (Ulan Bator), and on 10 July the provisional people's government became the people's revolutionary government of Mongolia. The Soviet Union supported the new regime and signed a treaty of friendship with it on 5 November. Chang, who had received a large sum of money to finance his military expedition against Outer Mongolia, reputedly pocketed the money. He turned again to north China politics.

In December 1921, Chang Tso-lin succeeded in installing his chosen instrument, Liang Shih-i (q.v.), as premier at Peking. Chang's challenging position in north China, where he was again aligned with Tuan Ch'i-jui, alarmed his nominal allies, especially the Chihli faction. Ts'ao K'un and Wu P'ei-fu were not prepared to cede north China to Fengtien control, and Wu P'ei-fu was able to force Liang Shih-i to abandon his post in January 1922. Chang Tso-lin's attempts to buttress Liang's position proved futile. The first Chihli-Fengtien war began in April 1922, when Chang Tso-lin started to move his troops inside the Great Wall. In a public telegram of 19 April he announced that his move was designed to unify his "rear shield." Ts'ao K'un, in a telegram of 22 April, opposed the proposition that unity should be achieved through military force. Other north China militarists, including Feng Yü-hsiang (q.v.), supported Ts'ao's position. Chang announced on 1 May 1922 that henceforth all Manchurian affairs would be handled independently by the Northeastern authorities at Mukden and that Manchuria was aligning itselfwith the "Southwestern authorities," that is, Kwangsi and Kwangtung. Thus, he temporarily allied himself with the loose grouping that included Sun Yat-sen.

In the battle that was joined on 3 May at Ch'anghsintien, near Peking, the Fengtien forces were defeated. Chang Tso-lin then pulled his troops back into Manchuria, leaving Wu P'ei-fu dominant in north China. Hsu Shihch'ang, who then held the presidency at Peking, had stripped Chang Tso-lin of his posts on 1 May. But the conflict was inconclusive in view of Chang's remaining military strength, some 100,000 troops, and his special position with respect to the Japanese in Manchuria. He then proclaimed himself commander in chief for peace preservation in the Three Eastern Provinces and began to ready his forces for another bid for power in north China.

Early in 1923 Sun Yat-sen sent Wang Ching-wei to talk with Chang Tso-lin and with Lu Yung-hsiang, the military governor of Chekiang and a supporter of Tuan Ch'i-jui, about a so-called triple alliance, based on the political program of the Kuomintang. Chang and Lu, however, qualified their acceptance by insisting that Wu P'ei-fu be overthrown and that China be unified before they would enter into such an alliance. The position of Chang Tso-lin's regime at Mukden complicated the foreign relations of the Peking government during this period. Chang's government performed all the functions of a sovereign state, including the making of treaties with foreign governments. This ambiguous situation was evident in connection with the problem of the Chinese Eastern Railway. On 31 May 1924 the Peking government signed an agreement with the Soviet Union defining the Status of that railroad and the rights of the two parties in its operation. To make the agreement effective, it was necessary to obtain Chang Tsolin's acceptance of its terms, since the rail line ran through his Manchurian territory. The Peking government sent an emissary to Mukden to attempt to obtain his acquiescence, but that mission failed. However, Chang's position on the Chinese Eastern Railway issue was awkward, since he could not count on Japanese support in the contravention of a treaty properly concluded by the Chinese government at Peking. At the same time, since he was preparing for a new war against Wu P'ei-fu, he could not afford to aggravate relations with Moscow.

The Soviet government therefore was able to take advantage of the situation, and a separate Mukden-Soviet treaty was concluded on 20 September 1924. By this agreement, which was signed by Chang and Nikolai Kuznetsov as the Soviet representative, the Russians were granted rights with regard to the Chinese Eastern Railway similar to those covered in the May 1924 treaty that Chang Tso-lin had refused to recognize. This action temporarily restored the special Russian position in northern Manchuria. Another salient aspect of the September 1924 treaty, however, was that in permitting Chang Tso-lin to save face by repudiating the right of the Peking government to conclude an international agreement on a specifically Manchurian question without his consent a dangerous precedent was created. The Mukden agreement recognized Chang Tso-lin's government of the Three Eastern Provinces as a separate and autonomous regime at a time when he was in open rebellion against the central government of China, thus laying the foundations for the proclamation of independence of Manchuokuo in 1932.

War had begun on 1 September 1924 between Chekiang and Kiangsu. Chang promptly announced his support of his Chekiang ally Lu Yung-hsiang and moved forces against Jehol. As he advanced, Wu P'ei-fu moved to reinforce Chengteh, the provincial capital. On 5 September Sun Yat-sen issued a manifesto opposing Ts'ao K'un and Wu P'ei-fu and on 1 8 September announced that his proposed northern expedition aimed to overthrow the warlords and the imperialism on which they relied.

By the beginning of October, Chang Tso-lin was attacking at Shanhaikuan. As Wu P'ei-fu advanced northward with his army to meet the invasion at Shanhaikuan, the situation was disrupted by the defection of Feng Yü-hsiang (q.v.), who was a subordinate of Wu. Feng abandoned his sector of the front at Kupeikow, proceeded rapidly to Peking, staged a coup d'etat, and issued a public call for peace in October. The coup had been worked out in advance with Chang Tso-lin. The forces of Feng Yü-hsiang and those of Fengtien commander Chang Tsung-ch'ang (q.v.), cut off the line of retreat of Wu P'ei-fu's forces deployed along the eastern end of the Great Wall. The war ended in disastrous defeat for the Chihli faction and left the Fengtien group in a stronger position than ever in north China.

The new regime at Peking centered on a coalition of Chang Tso-lin, Feng Yü-hsiang, and Tuan Ch'i-jui. However, the alliance began to disintegrate even as victory was being consolidated. One paramount problem was that of relations with the forces of revolutionary nationalism in south China, where Sun Yat-sen and the Kuomintang were consolidating their position in alliance with the Communists. Chang Tso-lin, who was opposed to the concept of revolutionary change, met with Sun Yat-sen in December 1924, when Sun arrived in north China to confer with the generals holding power there. He discovered that Sun Yat-sen's plans were considerably at variance with those which he and Tuan Ch'i-jui had made. When Sun, by then seriously ill, finally arrived at Peking at the end of December, Feng Yü-hsiang had already retired in disagreement with his former allies, and Chang Tso-lin and Tuan Ch'i-jui were patently opposed to the establishment of a new government in which, as Sun Yat-sen hoped, the Kuomintang would exercise dominant authority. The death of Sun Yat-sen in March 1925 only confused the situation further.

Chang Tso-lin and the Fengtien generals succeeded in pushing southward to the Shanghai area at the beginning of 1925 and also attempted to drive westward along the Lunghai rail line to penetrate Honan province. But Chang had to face continuing opposition during the year from competing leaders with autonomous military forces. Sun Ch'uan-fang (q.v.) in the lower Yangtze provinces defeated the Fengtien forces in October 1925, while Feng Yü-hsiang, Chang Tso-lin's erstwhile ally, posed a threat from Honan. Faced with an unpromising military situation and with a deteriorated position at Peking brought about by the political pressures that he had exerted on Tuan Ch'i-jui, Chang Tso-lin withdrew important elements of his army to the Great Wall and into Manchuria.

Feng Yü-hsiang then joined with Sun Ch'uan-fang and Wu P'ei-fu ; and they formed an army to drive the Fengtien forces from north China. In a move to break up that combination, Chang Tso-lin sent an envoy to Feng Yü-hsiang to review the situation. Feng went through the motions of forsaking his new alliance in favor of a reconciliation with Chang Tso-lin, but Feng had actually won over a Fengtien general, Kuo Sung-ling (q.v.), to betray his chief. In November 1925 Kuo Sung-ling issued a telegram demanding the retirement of Chang Tso-lin in favor of his son, Chang Hsueh-liang (q.v.). Kuo's move, designed to divert attention to Manchuria while Feng Yü-hsiang's Kuominchün attacked in north China, apparently had Soviet sympathy, if not actual support. But it failed because the Japanese at once intervened in the Mukden area. Kuo Sung-ling soon was captured and was executed in December 1925.

The Soviet Union and Japan were concerned with developments in Manchuria because of their competition for influence in that critical area. The fact that Chang Tso-lin, with indirect assistance from Japanese officials, emerged victorious from the Kuo Sung-ling incident did little to stabilize the situation. In January 1926 Chang Tso-lin gave vent to his anti-Russian feelings again. In a blunt effort to demolish Soviet railroad interests in Manchuria, the Northeast authorities on 21 January 1926 arbitrarily arrested A. N. Ivanov, the general manager of the Chinese Eastern Railway, three Soviet directors of the railroad, and other Soviet citizens. On the following day Moscow replied with an equally blunt ultimatum fixing a three-day time limit for the release of the Russian prisoners and for the restoration of normal traffic on the line. The threat of Soviet military action forced Chang Tso-lin to back down, and on 24 January an agreement was signed at Mukden calling for the restoration of the status quo ante on the railroad.

In the sphere of domestic politics, Chang Tso-lin had joined forces in January 1926 with Wu P'ei-fu, a natural alliance since both men were anxious for revenge against Feng Yü-hsiang. Feng himself, judiciously estimating the potential military strength that could be marshaled against him, resigned his posts and departed on a visit to Moscow. His Kuominchün forces were defeated in north China and driven back into Inner Mongolia. Later in the year, the Nationalists, based at Canton, had launched their Northern Expedition in July 1926 and then drove rapidly through Hunan toward the Yangtze. The Fengtien forces had reached an agreement with Sun Ch'uan-fang in the lower Yangtze region, and in December 1 926 the northern generals formally united for joint defense against the revolutionary armies surging up from the south. After a meeting at Tientsin, the northern generals on 1 December 1926 announced the formation of the Ankuochün [national pacification army]. Chang Tso-lin was its commander in chief, with Sun Ch'uan-fang, Chang Tsung-ch'ang, and Yen Hsi-shan as deputy commanders. Wu P'ei-fu, who had remained distrustful of Chang Tso-lin, was associated with the coalition, but was not part of its command.

By the spring of 1927, the position of Chang Tso-lin in north China was under heavy attack. The revolutionary armies commanded by T'ang Sheng-chih and Chang Fa-k'uei (qq.v.) were pressing hard on the Fengtien positions in Honan; while Feng Yü-hsiang, now professing Nationalist sympathies, threatened the flank of Chang's forces. On 28 May, Chang Tso-lin ordered all Fengtien forces committed on the southern front to withdraw to Chihli (Hopei) and Shantung. On 5 June, Yen Hsi-shan declared himself on the side of the Nationalists and advised Chang Tso-lin to do the same. Chang replied on 18 June 1927 by publicly assuming the title of Ta-yuan-shuai, a rank that had previously been held by Yuan Shih-k'ai and Sun Yat-sen. Chang indicated that he intended to remain in the northern capital. Actually, Chang Tso-lin's hold on Peking during his last, short-lived period of supremacy there meant the virtual end of the already shadowy authority of the central government of China represented by Peking.

Chang Tso-lin's final period of ascendancy at Peking also had an aggravating effect on Sino- Soviet relations, which were considerably strained by Chiang Kai-shek's anti-Communist coup in the spring of 1927. Chang Tso-lin had nurtured a consistent distrust of the Russians, both White and Red, since the time of the Russo-Japanese war. In no way chastened by the results of the abortive 1926 move against the Chinese Eastern Railway in Manchuria, he began a series of resolute blows against Soviet interests and representatives in north China. On 28 February Chang Tsung-ch'ang (q.v.) detained the Russian vessel Pamyat Lenina, which was on its way to Hankow. It is probable that the intelligence documents he obtained led to Chang Tso-lin's raid on the Soviet embassy at Peking. On 6 April, Chang Tso-lin ordered a force of the Peking municipal police and his own men to raid the premises of the Soviet embassy inside the Legation Quarter. The raiding party seized truckloads of documents, in both Russian and Chinese, relating to Soviet espionage and the Communist effort in China. It also seized Li Ta-chao (q.v.) and other Chinese Communists who had taken refuge in the compound three months earlier.

The rise of Chinese nationalism, spearheaded by the northward advance of Chiang Kai-shek's armies in 1926-27 was viewed with growing concern by Japan, where the cabinet headed by General Tanaka was in office. The possibility that the Chinese conflict on the mainland might spread through north China and into Manchuria could only have a harmful effect on what influential groups in Japan viewed as their special interests. After becoming premier, Tanaka had requested Chang Tso-lin's Japanese adviser to initiate discussions with Chang concerning the financing and construction of five new rail lines in Manchuria. There were also conversations at Peking in 1927 between Yoshizawa Kenkichi, the Japanese minister to China, and Yang Yut'ing (q.v.), Chang Tso-lin's chief of staff. These moves were designed to impress upon China and the world the intention of Japan to continue to view Manchuria as a special sphere of influence. At the end of May 1927, after their advance into Honan had placed the Nationalists in a position to threaten Shantung, Tokyo had sent Japanese military units into Shantung for the ostensible purpose of protecting Japanese lives and property.

In the summer of 1927, Tokyo urged upon Chang Tso-lin the advisability of withdrawing his armies from north China into Manchuria and of securing his position there with Japanese aid. In mid- 1927, however, Chang estimated that his position in north China might still be saved by the widening split within the Nationalist camp in central China.

The Nationalist armies, once again unified under the leadership of Chiang Kai-shek, began the final stage of their drive on north China in April 1928. At the beginning of May, the Japanese again intervened at Tsinan, capital of Shantung province, in an attempt to divert the Nationalist drive from Japanese interests there. On 18 May 1928, in identical notes addressed to Peking and Nanking, Tanaka clearly outlined a so-called positive Japanese policy. The notes warned that, if disturbances in north China continued, "the Japanese government ... may possibly be constrained to take appropriate and effective steps for the maintenance of peace and order in Manchuria." At the same time, Tokyo warned that Japan would act to prevent "defeated troops or those in pursuit of them" from entering Manchuria. Chang Tso-lin was specifically warned that his units would not be permitted to retire north of the Great Wall unless they left Peking peacefully.

Chang's position at Peking was now undermined beyond repair. He stood as a barrier both to Nationalist plans for the unification of China and to Japanese plans for the future development of East Asia. Chang was resentful of Japanese dictation, but he concluded that he had no realistic alternative but to capitulate and to evacuate Peking. He bade farewell to the diplomatic corps at Peking on 1 June 1928 and left the city for Mukden on 3 June. At half past five on the morning of 4 June, the private railway car in which Chang Tso-lin was traveling was wrecked by a bomb explosion. Chang was severely wounded, and he died a few days later. The explosion took place at the point where his train was passing under the bridge just outside Mukden where tracks of the South Manchurian Railway crossed those of the Peking-Mukden line. The murder was apparently the result of a well-laid plan, since the preparations necessary in laying the wires, detonators, and explosives required several hours. Responsibility was generally attributed to the Japanese. In fact, it was later discovered to have been the responsibility of Colonel Komoto Daisaku, a Japanese staff officer, and his associates, who plotted the killing of Chang Tso-lin as part of a larger plan for the seizure of Manchuria by the Kwantung Army.

With the death of Chang Tso-lin, the Old Marshal, in June 1928, a notable chapter in the history of modern Manchuria ended. His eldest son, Chang Hsueh-liang, the Young Marshal, consolidated power at Mukden, and preserved the family dynasty in Manchuria for another three years (see separate article). Slight of stature and rather delicate in appearance, the Old Marshal had never looked the part of the redoubtable Manchurian warlord. A Western correspondent who interviewed Chang Tso-lin at Mukden in 1922 just before the outbreak of the first Fengtien-Chihli war described him as "a slim little man, with shining brown eyes, a kindly smile, and a gentle manner" and added that, had one met Chang casually, one would have taken him to be "a man who had lived his life in a quiet study poring over the Analects of Confucius." Photographs of Chang give a similar impression. Actually, he was harsh and ferocious when necessary, though he preserved a resolute dignity. He was shrewd without being educated, perceptive without being sensitive. The Chang family had been poverty-stricken peasants; he had made them wealthy and powerful. It was the type of success story always popular in China, and contemporary observers recorded a genuine flush of anti- Japanese sentiment at the news of the killing of the Old Marshal.

During his lifetime, Chang Tso-lin, through both circumstances and geographical propinquity, was regarded by many as being pro- Japanese. He first rose to power under Japanese supervision and, in return for their active or tacit support of his rule in Manchuria, served Japanese interests by acting as an effective bulwark against the spread of Soviet influence on the mainland of East Asia. After his death, however, many Chinese writers gave him credit for compromising with the Japanese on minor issues in order to resist on larger ones and acknowledged that he was always shrewd and alert in dealing with Japan. Actually, Japanese support of Chang Tso-lin was never a coordinated national policy, and there were frequent differences of opinion among Japanese military and civilian officials over the appropriate course of action to be taken in Manchuria. Chang Tso-lin's inconsistent policies, his opportunism, and his autocratic rule have often been criticized. Yet, his positive accomplishments also deserve attention. Chang did succeed in maintaining a high degree of stability in the Three Eastern Provinces for over a decade during a period when China was confused and divided and when both Japan and Russia had competing political and military interests in that area. Chang Tso-lin's strength in his own domain rested on several factors. Economically, he was supported by the agricultural resources of Manchuria and by the taxes which that region provided. Chang based his military forces on a developed railroad network and on the Mukden arsenal, which he developed with foreign technical advice. Relatively peaceful conditions in Manchuria also permitted him to maintain a regional currency of relative stability. Chang's expeditions into north China constituted a heavy drain on Manchuria's finances and partially nullified the positive effects of his regional rule. But the physical destruction, agricultural and economic paralysis, and human waste characteristic of the warlord period in China were diverted from Manchuria while Chang Tso-lin was in control there.

Chang Tso-lin's actions, contradictory though they often were, did contribute to the movement of twentieth-century China toward political unification. By extending his power into north China and by playing a part in the balance of power in warlord politics there, Chang blurred the distinction between regional and national commitments and made Manchuria an integral part of the framework of Chinese national politics. Thus, he paved the way for the eventual political and economic integration of the Three Eastern Provinces with the rest of China.

In addition to Chang Hsueh-liang, Chang Tso-lin had several other children. Chang Hsueh-ssu (1903-) was graduated from the Hui-wen Middle School in Peking and the Central Military Academy at Nanking. He was deeply affected by the imprisonment of Chang Hsueh-liang after the Sian Incident of December 1936, when he himself had been detained until Chiang Kai-shek's release. Later, however, he resumed active duty in the Fifty-third Army under Wan Fu-lin, one of Chang Hsueh-liang's former commanders, and advanced to the rank of captain. During the Sino-Japanese war, he disagreed with the passive policies of the National Government against the Japanese. He therefore joined the Communist forces and served under Lu Cheng-ts'ao and Nieh Jung-chen. During the later war years, he commanded a sub-district of the Communist Hopei-Jehol-Liaoning military district. After 1945 he returned to his native Manchuria, participated in the campaigns of the civil war there, and appeared at Mukden when the Communists captured that city in October 1948. After 1949 Chang Hsueh-ssu became chairman of the Liaoning provincial government and served as a member of the Northeast regional government council until 1954; for a time he also headed Northeast University at Mukden. He later served as vice president of the Naval Academy in the People's Republic of China and was given the rank of rear admiral in 1956. In 1954 he was a delegate from his native Liaoning to the National People's Congress. Chang Hsueh-ming (1908-) was graduated from the Japanese Infantry Training School in Tokyo. After Chang Hsueh-liang's intervention in north China in 1930, Chang Hsueh-ming became commissioner of public safety at Tientsin. He served with the Nationalist forces in Manchuria in the postwar interlude and presumably surrendered to the Communists when the Nationalists were defeated in that theater. A Chang Hsueh-ming was listed as a member, in the category of "specially invited personalities," of the Third National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference in 1959. Another son, Chang Hsueh-cheng, served in the Secretariat of the United Nations in New York.