Ma Bufang
Ma Bufang was a prominent Chinese Muslim Ma clique warlord in China during the Republican era, ruling the province of Qinghai. His rank was lieutenant-general.
Life
Ma Bufang and his older brother Ma Buqing were born in Monigou Township in what is today Linxia County, west of Linxia City. Their father Ma Qi formed the Ninghai Army in Qinghai in 1915, and received civilian and military posts from the Beiyang Government in Beijing confirming his military and civilian authority there.His older brother Ma Buqing received a classical Chinese education, while Ma Bufang received education in Islam. Ma Qi originally had Ma Bufang study to become an imam while his older brother Ma Buqing was educated in the military. Ma Bufang studied until he was nineteen and then pursued a military career like his brother. Ma Bufang controlled the Great Dongguan Mosque. Ma was a graduate of the Officers' Training Corps of Qinghai.
Ma Bufang sided with Feng Yuxiang's Guominjun until the Central Plains War, when he switched to the winning side of Chiang Kai-shek. Ma Qi died in 1931 and his power was assumed by his brother Ma Lin, who was appointed governor of Qinghai.
Ascension to Governorship
General Ma Lin held the position of civil Governor, while Ma Bufang was military Governor. They feuded with, and disliked each other. Ma Bufang was not admired by people as much as his uncle Ma Lin, whom the people adored.In 1936, under the order of Chiang Kai-shek, and with the help of Ma Zhongying's remnant force in Gansu, and Ma Hongkui's and Ma Hongbin's force from Ningxia, Ma Bufang and his brother Ma Buqing played an important role in annihilating Zhang Guotao's 21,800 strong force that crossed the Yellow River in an attempt to expand the Communist base. In 1937, Ma Bufang rose with the help of the Kuomintang and forced his uncle Ma Lin to concede his position. At that point Ma Bufang became governor of Qinghai, with military and civilian powers, and remained in that position until the Communist victory in 1949. During Ma Bufang's rise to power, he along with Ma Buqing and cousins Ma Hongkui and Ma Hongbin, were instrumental in helping another cousin, Ma Zhongying, to prevail in Gansu. They did not want Ma Zhongying to compete with them on their own turf, so they encouraged and supported Ma Zhongying in developing his own power base in other regions such as Gansu and Xinjiang. Ma Bufang defeated Ma Zhongying in a battle in Gansu, and drove him into Xinjiang.
In 1936, Ma Bufang was appointed commander of the newly organized 2nd army.
Because Ma Bufang did not want the 14th Dalai Lama to succeed his predecessor, he stationed his men in such a way that the Dalai Lama was effectively under house arrest, saying this was needed for "protection", and refusing to permit him to leave for Tibet. He did all he could to delay the movement of the Dalai Lama from Qinghai to Tibet by demanding 100,000 Chinese silver dollars.
Even though his uncle Ma Lin was officially governor of Qinghai, Ma Bufang held de facto military power in the province and foreigners acknowledged this. While his uncle Ma Lin was governor of Qinghai, Ma Bufang was pacification commissioner of Gansu. In 1936, during Autumn, Ma Bufang made his move to expel his uncle from power and to replace him. Ma Bufang made Ma Lin's position untenable and unbearable until he resigned from power by making the Hajj to Mecca. Ma Lin's next position was to be part of the National Government Committee. In an interview Ma Lin was described as having: "high admiration and unwavering loyalty to Chiang Kai-shek".
The Qing dynasty had granted his family a yellow standard which had his family name "Ma" on it. Ma Bufang continued to use this standard in battle and, as of 1936, he had 30,000 Muslim cavalrymen in his army.
War against Tibet and Ngoloks
Ma Bufang had a conflicted relationship with the Tibetan population of Qinghai. Some Tibetan Buddhists served in his army while others were crushed and killed by it.In 1932, Ma Bufang's Muslim troops, and the Han Chinese general Liu Wenhui, defeated the 13th Dalai Lama's Tibetan armies when Tibet tried to invade Qinghai province. Ma Bufang overran the Tibetan armies and recaptured several counties in Xikang province. Shiqu, Dengke, and other counties were seized from the Tibetans who were pushed back to the other side of the Jinsha River. Ma and Liu warned Tibetan officials not to cross the Jinsha River again. A truce was signed ending the fighting.
The reputation of the Muslim forces of Ma Bufang was boosted by the war and victory against the Tibetan army. The stature of Ma Biao rose over his role in the war and later in 1937 his battles against the Japanese propelled him to fame nationwide in China. The control of China over the border area of Kham and Yushu with Tibet was guarded by the Qinghai army. Chinese Muslim run schools used their victory in the war against Tibet to show how they defended the integrity of China's territory as it was put in danger since the Japanese invasion.
The Kuomintang Republic of China government supported Ma Bufang when he launched seven extermination expeditions into Golog, eliminating thousands of Ngolok tribesmen. Some Tibetans counted the number of times he attacked, remembering the seventh attack which made life impossible for them. Ma was highly anti-communist, and he and his army wiped out many Ngolok tribal Tibetans in the northeast and eastern Qinghai, and also destroyed Tibetan Buddhist Temples.
Ma Bufang established the Kunlun Middle School and used it to recruit Tibetan students, who were subjected to harsh military life. The school became an important source of Tibetan translators as Ma expanded his military domain over land inhabited by Tibetans. As Ma Bufang defeated more Tibetans, he also drafted them into his army.
Ma Bufang attacked and demolished a Tibetan Buddhist monastery in Rebgong in 1939, one of the oldest in Amdo. Ma Bufang sent his army to destroy and loot the Tsanggar Monastery in 1941; his forces expelled the monks. It was not until the Communists took power that the Monastery could be rebuilt; the monks returned in 1953. Many of the monasteries attacked by Ma Bufang were associated with the Ngoloks.
Tibetan tribals in southern Qinghai revolted due to taxation between 1939 and 1941, but they were crushed by "suppression campaigns" and massacred by Ma Bufang which caused a major influx of Tibetan refugees into Tibet from Qinghai.
A former Tibetan Khampa soldier named Aten, who battled Ma Bufang's forces, provided an account of a battle. He described the Chinese Muslims as "fierce". After he and his troops were ambushed by 2,000 of Ma Bufang's Chinese Muslim cavalry, he was left with bullet wounds and he "had no illusions as to the fate of most of our group", most of whom were wiped out. Aten also asserted that "the Tibetan province of Amdo", was "occupied" by Ma Bufang.
Second Sino-Japanese War
Ma Bufang called for peace and tolerance between ethnicities.The soldiers in Ma Bufang's cavalry forces belonged to a wide range of ethnicities. Hui, Mongols, Tibetans, and Han Chinese all served in Ma Bufang's cavalry. Ma Bufang's ethnic tolerance in theory ensured that recruits could escape ethnic divergence in his armies.
In 1937 and 1938, the Japanese attempted to approach Ma Bufang and were ignored.
Ma Bufang's soldiers were designated as the 82nd Army during the war against Japan.
In 1937, when the Japanese attack at the Battle of Beiping–Tianjin began the Chinese government was notified by Muslim General Ma Bufang of the Ma clique that he was prepared to bring the fight to the Japanese in a telegram message. Immediately after the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, he arranged for a cavalry division, under Muslim General Ma Biao, to be sent east to battle the Japanese. Ma Buqing and Ma Bufang discussed the battle plans against the Japanese over the telephone with Chiang Kai-shek. The top crack elite cavalry of Ma Bufang was sent against Japan. Ethnic Turkic Salar Muslims made up the majority of the first cavalry division which Ma Bufang sent.
Because of fierce resistance by Ma Hongkui and Ma Bufang's Muslim cavalry, the Japanese were never able to reach and capture Lanzhou during the war.
Ma Bufang also obstructed Japanese agents trying to contact the Tibetans and was called an "adversary" by a Japanese agent.
Ma became governor of Qinghai when he expelled his uncle Ma Lin from power in 1938. He commanded a group army. He was appointed because of his anti-Japanese inclinations.
Under orders from the Kuomintang government of Chiang Kaishek, Ma Bufang repaired Yushu Batang Airport to prevent Tibetan separatists from seeking independence. Chiang also ordered Ma Bufang to put his Muslim soldiers on alert for an invasion of Tibet in 1942. Ma Bufang complied, and moved several thousand troops to the border with Tibet. Chiang also threatened the Tibetans with bombing if they did not comply. Ma Bufang attacked the Tibetan Buddhist Tsang monastery in 1941. He also constantly attacked the Labrang Monastery.
Ma Bufang's army battled extensively in bloody battles against the Japanese in Henan province. Ma Bufang sent his army, under the command of his relative General Ma Biao, to fight the Japanese in Henan. The Qinghai Chinese, Salar, Chinese Muslim, Dongxiang, and Tibetan troops Ma Bufang sent fought to the death against the Imperial Japanese Army, or committed suicide refusing to be taken prisoner, when cornered by the enemy. When they defeated the Japanese, the Muslim troops slaughtered all of them except for a few prisoners sent back to Qinghai to prove that they had been victorious. In September 1940, when the Japanese launched an offensive against the Muslim Qinghai troops, the Muslims ambushed them and killed so many of them that they were forced to retreat. The Japanese could not even pick up their dead; instead, they cut an arm from their corpses for cremation to send back to Japan. The Japanese did not attempt to make a similar offensive again. Ma Biao was the eldest son of Ma Haiqing, who was the sixth younger brother of Ma Haiyan, Ma Bufang's grandfather.
During the war against Japan, Ma Bufang commanded the 82nd Army.
Xining was subjected to aerial bombardment by Japanese warplanes in 1941 during the Second-Sino Japanese War. The bombing spurred all ethnicities in Qinghai, including the local Qinghai Mongols and Qinghai Tibetans, against the Japanese. The Salar Muslim General Han Youwen directed the defense of the city of Xining during air raids by Japanese planes. Han survived an aerial bombardment by Japanese planes in Xining while he was being directed via telephone from Ma Bufang, who hid in an air raid shelter in a military barracks. The bombing resulted in human flesh splattering a Blue Sky with a White Sun flag and Han being buried in rubble. Han Youwen was dragged out of the rubble while bleeding and he managed to grab a machine gun while he was limping and fired back at the Japanese warplanes and cursed the Japanese as dogs in his native Salar language.
Ma Bukang and Ma Bufang were having a discussion on Ma Biao when Japanese warplanes bombed Xining.
In 1942, Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, head of the Chinese government, toured Northwestern China in Xinjiang, Gansu, Ningxia, Shaanxi, and Qinghai, where he met both Ma Buqing and Ma Bufang. It was reported around this time that Ma had 50,000 elite soldiers in his army.
Ma Bufang supported the Chinese nationalist imam Hu Songshan.