Xi’an Incident

Also called: Sian Incident

On 12 December 1936 Chiang Kai-shek was detained in Xi’an by his own commanders, Zhang Xueliang and Yang Hucheng, who pressed him to stop fighting the Communists and turn against Japan. Mediation by the Communist Zhou Enlai won Chiang’s release, paving the way for the Second United Front.

Having lost Manchuria, Zhang Xueliang’s Northeastern Army had moved to Shaanxi and been thrown against the Communists, but among soldiers longing to recover their homeland the cry that “Chinese should not fight Chinese” grew loud. Anti-Japanese national salvation movements, such as the student protests of 9 December 1935 in Beiping, were also gathering strength. Zhang secretly contacted the Communists and urged Chiang to stop the campaign, but was rebuffed.

When Chiang came to spur the campaign on and stayed at Huaqing Pool in Lintong, Zhang and Yang Hucheng of the Northwestern Army seized him before dawn on 12 December and demanded an end to the civil war and united resistance to Japan. Zhou Enlai for the Communists and Chiang’s wife Soong Mei-ling, among others, negotiated, and Chiang, having in effect agreed to halt the civil war, was released on the 25th. Zhang voluntarily accompanied him to Nanjing, was court-martialled, and spent more than fifty years under house arrest.

The Xi’an Incident halted the Nationalist campaign against the Communists, and when war with Japan broke out the following year the Second United Front was formed.