Xi'an Incident and the Second United Front

Date

12–26 December 1936

Category

Politics & governance

Region

East Asia (China)

Era

Modern

Significance

From 12 to 26 December 1936, generals Zhang Xueliang and Yang Hucheng detained Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek at Xi'an, demanding that he halt the civil war against the Chinese Communists and instead unite the nation against Japanese aggression.

With Communist envoy Zhou Enlai taking part in the negotiations, Chiang gave his assent to ending the anti-Communist campaign and was released on 25 December. The crisis produced the Second United Front, an uneasy alliance between the Nationalists (Kuomintang) and the Chinese Communist Party against Japan. The agreement halted the Nationalists' encirclement campaigns, gave the weakened Communists a vital reprieve to rebuild, and consolidated Chiang's position as the symbol of national resistance. By redirecting China's military energies toward Japan, the Xi'an Incident helped set the stage for full-scale war the following year and shaped the balance of forces that would determine China's post-war future.

Empires active in 12–26 December 1936

• Soviet Union
  1922 CE – 1991 CE
• Empire of Japan
  1868 CE – 1947 CE
• French Colonial Empire (Second)
  1830 CE – 1962 CE
• British Empire
  1583 CE – 1997 CE
• Spanish Empire
  1492 CE – 1976 CE
• Portuguese Empire
  1415 CE – 1999 CE

Related politics & governance events

• Stalin's Great Purge (Great Terror)
  1936–1938
• The Munich Agreement Cedes the Sudetenland
  1938
• Hitler's appointment and Nazi consolidation of power
  30 January 1933 – August 1934
• Founding of the United Nations
  26 June 1945 (in force 24 October 1945)
• Treaty of Versailles and the founding of the League of Nations
  28 June 1919 (in force 10 January 1920)
• Russian Revolutions of 1917
  March & November 1917 (February & October Revolutions, O.S.)

Further reading

Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan

The wider story

Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan

Herbert P. Bix

Pulitzer-winning life of the emperor and his empire.

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