Second United Front

Also called: Eighth Route Army, Anti-Japanese National United Front

When the war with Japan broke out, the Nationalists and Communists joined hands again in September 1937 to form an anti-Japanese national united front; the Red Army was reorganized as the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army of the National Revolutionary Army.

The two parties, which had been negotiating since the Xi’an Incident, quickly reached agreement once the Marco Polo Bridge Incident started full-scale war. In August the Red Army became the Eighth Route Army of the National Revolutionary Army, and in October the southern guerrillas became the New Fourth Army; on 22 September the Nationalists published the Communists’ declaration on cooperation, and the next day Chiang Kai-shek issued a statement accepting it. The Communists dissolved their Soviet government and turned it into the Shaan-Gan-Ning Border Region government.

The Eighth Route Army fought guerrilla campaigns in north China, such as the Battle of Pingxingguan (1937) and the Hundred Regiments Offensive (1940), expanding anti-Japanese base areas in the countryside. But rivalry between the parties continued, and after Nationalist troops attacked the New Fourth Army in the Wannan (South Anhui) Incident of January 1941 the alliance survived in name only. During the war the Communists vastly expanded their membership and army, building the strength to confront the Nationalists in the post-war civil war.