National Pacification Army
The National Pacification Army, also known as the Anguojun or Ankuochun, was a warlord coalition led by Fengtian clique General Zhang Zuolin, and was the military arm of the Beiyang government of the Republic of China during its existence.
The army was formed in November 1926 after the Fengtian victory in the Anti-Fengtian War, the NPA was tasked with countering the advance of the Kuomintang -aligned National Revolutionary Army of Chiang Kai-shek, who had launched the Northern Expedition in June 1926. In addition to its Fengtian Army core, the NPA also included Zhili clique generals, such as Sun Chuanfang. The NPA suffered a series of serious military defeats inflicted by Chiang and his warlord allies, including Feng Yuxiang, Li Zongren and Yan Xishan. On the southern front, the NPA was pushed back from Jiangsu and Henan after fierce fighting against the Guominjun and the NRA. On the western front, they fought Shanxi forces under Yan Xishan. Following these setbacks, a conference of NPA leaders in June 1927 established a military government and proclaimed Zhang Zuolin as Generalissimo, whereupon all military and civilian power was placed in his hands.
Despite having achieved a few victories in mid-1927 in Jiangsu and extensive victories in Shanxi, the NPA could not defeat the Kuomintang forces and soon retreated north and east of Tianjin. Following Zhang Zuolin's assassination by the Japanese Kwantung Army in the Huanggutun Incident on 4 June 1928, he was succeeded by his son, Zhang Xueliang, who disbanded the National Pacification Army and swore allegiance to the Kuomintang government in Nanjing.
Background
fragmented into various warlord factions as part of the tumultuous Warlord Era during the 1910s which started from the Xinhai Revolution. Many provinces became autonomous under their ruling generals. Following the National Protection War against Beiyang Army general-turned-emperor Yuan Shikai, China became balkanized into a collection of regional power networks, the feud between different factions intensified, and warlordism was born.The Fengtian clique had been formed under Zhang Zuolin, who was the local hegemon in Manchuria. Zhang's Fengtian Army was the backbone of his influence and allowed him to make mutually-beneficial alliances with local elites. In response to the growing dominance of China by the Anhui clique, an opposing warlord group consisting of the Fengtian and Wu Peifu-led Zhili cliques banded together. This coalition expelled the Anhui clique from Beijing in the Zhili–Anhui War, pushing them southwards and allowing the Fengtian and Zhili cliques to jointly control the capital. However, this order fell, with the Zhili and Fengtian cliques going to war in the First Zhili–Fengtian War. Zhili won, pushing Fengtian back to Manchuria.
In 1924, Zhili-aligned Jiangsu governor Qi Xieyuan declared war on Fengtian-allied Zhejiang governor Lu Yongxiang, sparking a new conflict between the Fengtian and Zhili cliques, called the Second Zhili–Fengtian War. The decisive moment of the conflict came on 30 October 1924, when warlord Feng Yuxiang broke from the Zhili clique, declared the establishment of the independent Guominjun, and aligned with the Fengtian in his Beijing Coup. This led to an overwhelming Fengtian victory, the removal of the Zhili clique from the capital and Cao Kun from the presidency of the Republic of China, and placed Zhang Zuolin in control of the Beiyang government.
Fengtian thus took control of Zhili and Shandong provinces, with the Zhili clique routed southwards, where warlord Sun Chuanfang established control of the provinces of Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Anhui, Fujian, and Jiangxi. The army he created he named the Allied Army of the Five Provinces. The fragile peace following the Second Zhili–Fengtian War did not last long, as Feng Yuxiang and Zhang Zuolin quickly turned against each other. Both had been seeking an alliance with the Zhili clique, but Wu Peifu, in an attempt at revenge, sided with Zhang in the Anti-Fengtian War. In October 1925, Sun Chuanfang began the invasion of Jiangsu, and Feng began his invasion of Shandong, which was now under the control of Fengtian general Zhang Zongchang. In November 1925, general Guo Songling turned against Zhang Zuolin, siding with Feng. In January 1926, Zhang launched an offensive, ordering his troops in Fengtian and Shandong provinces to invade Beijing and Tianjin.
By mid-1926, Zhang and his Fengtian clique held the dominant stake in the Beiyang government. At around the same time, in June 1926, the rival Kuomintang government, based in the southern city of Guangzhou, launched the Northern Expedition. This posed a serious threat to the northern cliques, and countering the Kuomintang advance would be the raison d'être of the National Pacification Army. Zhang was also pressured by a destabilization of the government in Beijing as well as Japanese and Soviet influence. With Zhang having pushed Feng away from Beijing, beyond the Nankou Pass, and with the collapse of Wu Peifu's army in the wake of the NRA advance in Hunan and Hubei provinces in late 1926, the Fengtian clique cemented its position both as leader of the Beiyang government and as the main military clique in northern China.
History
Establishment (1926)
Following the period of chaos in the aftermath of the Anti-Fengtian War, and the disintegration of Guominjun and Zhili power in Beijing, Zhang Zuolin brought together his Fengtian Army commanders and other, non-affiliated warlords such as Sun Chuanfang and Yan Xishan in November 1926 to discuss the situation. Zhang declared the establishment of the National Pacification Army, a unified military of which he was to be the commander-in-chief. He was officially elected to that post at a conference in December 1926. Sun and Zhang Zhongchang were appointed deputy commanders of the new force, and its headquarters was established in the Pukou–Nanjing area. According to historian Donald Jordan, the name "National Pacification Army" is rooted in "engaging in war to achieve peace", a traditional idea in China's long history of dynastic leaders fighting to reunite the country. At the time of the NPA's establishment, Zhang Zuolin vowed to save China from the "red menace", an attack on the Kuomintang's United Front with the Chinese communists, and their Soviet and Comintern backers. The NPA at this time consisted of 500,000 men.File:張宗昌張作相孫傳芳吴俊陞貢桑諾爾布潘復.jpg|thumb|Anguojun generals, from left to right, Pan Fu, Gungsangnorbu, Wu Junsheng, Sun Chuanfang, Zhang Zuoxiang, and Zhang Zongchang
At the establishment of the NPA in November 1926, Zhang Zuolin had two main allies. The first was Zhang Zongchang, a Fengtian commander and Governor of Shandong province, who commanded the de facto independent Zhili–Shandong Army. This force was a merger of Zhang's "Shandong Army" and the Zhili Army of his lieutenant, Chu Yupu. Although Zhang Zongchang's army was powerful and separate from the Fengtian army itself, Zhang Zongchang still saw himself as subordinate to Zhang Zuolin. His second ally was Sun Chuanfang, a Zhili warlord active in central China. After joining the NPA, Sun's army coordinated its movements with Zhang, and after Sun was driven out of Jiangsu and Zhejiang in early 1927, he was supplied by the Fengtian clique. Even though Sun was totally financially dependent on the Fengtian clique, he was still able to make his own decisions when they would benefit him. Zhili clique general Wu Peifu was considered a part of the NPA, but his power-base was destroyed when the KMT conquered Hubei province in late 1926.
The NPA was essentially a new version of Zhang Zuolin's Eastern Three Provinces Defense Headquarters, with its main difference being that it was located in Beijing, rather than Mukden. Furthermore, the NPA made attempts to gain the allegiance of non-Fengtian-affiliated warlord armies in northern China. Decisions were made by the NPA leaders in conferences at the NPA headquarters in Beijing, with Zhang Zuolin, Zhang Xueliang, Yang Yuting, Yu Guohan, Zhang Zuoxiang, Wu Junsheng, Wang Yongjiang, Sun Chuanfang, and Zhang Zongchang frequently attending. The leadership of the NPA was, in essence, a military council under the leadership of Zhang Zuolin, who had to plan his military activities based on those of his allies and the opinions of subordinates such as Yang Yuting. Even so, when Zhang was strongly convinced about some matter, he had ability to ignore the opinions of his generals.
Setbacks in Henan and Jiangsu (1927)
In early 1927, the forces of the NPA and the National Revolutionary Army were facing off in Henan and Jiangsu. In May 1927, the Japanese, represented by Colonel Doihara Kenji, sent a message to Shanxi warlord Yan Xishan, asking him to establish peace between the NRA and the NPA and "take over northern China". With Japanese support guaranteed, Yan moved to join the KMT. Zhang Zuolin declared himself Generalissimo on the 18th as Fengtian–KMT negotiations deteriorated, forming a new military government. The Guominjun were also involved in the battle in Henan. Its leader, Feng Yuxiang, had joined the Kuomintang in November 1926, and was contesting NPA forces in Henan by December as the commander of the Central Route Army of the Northern Expedition, with 100,000 men fighting in western Henan. The Fengtian clique declared that Zhang Zuolin would be elected president of the Beiyang government once the provinces north of the Yangtze River were secured. This brought Zhang to launch a new offensive in Henan in spring 1927, mirroring a new offensive by the anti-Chiang Kai-shek Wuhan KMT government led by Tang Shengzhi. During May, 100,000 of the Wuhan government's troops were wounded, while Feng's casualties numbered 400. As Yan and Feng swore allegiance to Chiang's newly formed alternative to the Wuhan government, the Nanjing KMT government, the NPA was forced to abandon the two provinces of Henan and Jiangsu, and the broader NPA strategy was abandoned too. Feng continued the drive northwards, pushing against NPA forces in July 1927.File:1927年冯玉祥与蒋介石会面.jpg|thumb|right|Feng Yuxiang and Chiang Kai-Shek in Xuzhou, June 1927
Two other major Chinese battlegrounds in this period were Jiangsu, and Shanxi. With NPA forces expelling the NRA from Xuzhou in August 1927, the NRA and the Guominjun cooperated to defend against NPA offensives led by Sun Chuanfang in a last-ditch attempt to retake his original territories. By August, the front line had moved to southern Jiangsu, with the NRA being pushed to Nanjing, leading Yan Xishan to revert to neutrality. However, in late August, Sun Chuanfang was being pushed back, and he lost 50,000 men throughout September. Jiangsu was where Feng Yuxiang's force was mainly concentrated. Towards the north, Zhang Zuolin was fighting Yan Xishan on a different front. Previously, Yan had been straddling the fence, taking a neutral stance militarily, although favoring the KMT. However, in late August 1927, Zhang attacked Yan's soldiers in Shijiazhuang, who were forced to retreat to Shanxi. This tipped the balance, and Yan began an offensive along the Beijing-Suiyuan Railroad in October, opening up a new front of fighting between the KMT and the Anguojun.