Who is Chiang Kai-shek?

Chiang Kai-Shek was an important figure in the history of China. Knowledge of his history will help an understanding of modern China and its politics.

Chiang Kai-shek (1887-1975) was a political and military leader of the Republic of China. He was the second leader of the Nationalist Party in China and the Kuomintang, after the death of the founder, Sun Yat-sen, in 1925. During the civil war in 1945, his troops were defeated by the Chinese Communists and the Nationalist government was forced to retreat to Taiwan, where it continued its struggle against the Communist party. Chiang died while ruling as President of the Republic of China and Director-General of the Kuomintang.

Chiang Kai-shek's birthplace was Xihou, a town in the Zhejiang Province. His father, Chiang Zhaocong, and mother, Wang Caiyu, were upper class salt merchants. Deciding to pursue a military career, the young Chiang entered the Baoding Military Academy in 1906, then the Rikugun Shikan Gakko school in Japan in 1907. He was in the Imperial Japanese Army from 1909 to 1911.

Chiang returned to China in 1911 to join the struggle to overthrow the Qing Dynasty and form a Chinese republic. He led a regiment for the revolutionary forces, and when the revolution succeeded, Chiang became one of the founding members of the Kuomintang.

Chiang soon gained the trust of Sun Yat-sen, the founder of the party, and rose in power. When Sun Yat-sen died in 1925, Chiang won the power contest that followed, and became Commander-in-Chief of the National Revolutionary Army in 1925. Then in 1926, he launched a military campaign called the Northern Expedition, to unify China under the Kuomintang. He was successful in gaining control over the country, although some warlords were still autonomous in their own areas.

The next step was to rebuild China following the three steps laid out by Sun Yat-sen: military rule, political tutelage, and constitutional rule. The eventual goal was democratic, constitutional rule, although consolidation of the nation had to take place first. With the first step (military rule) completed through the Kuomintang takeover, Chiang set out to implement the second step, political tutelage.

In the decade from 1928 to 1937, Chiang's government worked to modernize the legal and penal systems, stabilize prices, reform the banking system, build infrastructures, and institute other reforms.

Following the war with Japan and World War II, Chiang's government was losing popular support and power, while the grassroots Communist movement was gradually taking over city after city. On December 10, 1949, Communist troops laid siege to Chengdu, the last Nationalist-occupied city in China. Chiang Kai-shek and his family were evacuated by aircraft to Taiwan the same day, where Chiang lived out his life as President of the Republic of China. He died in 1975 from renal failure aggravated with advanced cardiac malfunction at the age of 87.

Reference: BBC Biography