A report on Chiang Kai-shek, Chongqing and World War II

The League of Nations assembly, held in Geneva, Switzerland, 1930

Adolf Hitler at a German Nazi political rally in Nuremberg, August 1933

Sun Yat-sen and Chiang at the 1924 opening ceremonies for the Soviet-funded Whampoa Military Academy

A sunset view of Jiefangbei CBD and Hongya Cave, taken in 2017

Benito Mussolini inspecting troops during the Italo-Ethiopian War, 1935

Map including Chongqing (labeled as 重慶 CH'UNG-CH'ING (CHUNGKING)) (AMS, 1954)

The bombing of Guernica in 1937, during the Spanish Civil War, sparked fears abroad in Europe that the next war would be based on bombing of cities with very high civilian casualties.

Chiang (right) together with Wang Jingwei (left), 1926

Japanese Imperial Army soldiers during the Battle of Shanghai, 1937

Red Army artillery unit during the Battle of Lake Khasan, 1938

Chiang during a visit to an air force base in 1945

In the spring and fall, downtown Chongqing is often enshrouded in fog.

Chamberlain, Daladier, Hitler, Mussolini, and Ciano pictured just before signing the Munich Agreement, 29 September 1938

Chiang and Soong on the cover of Time magazine, 26 October 1931

The Great Hall of the People serves as the venue for major political conferences in Chongqing

German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop (right) and the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, after signing the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, 23 August 1939

Nationalist government of Nanking – nominally ruling over entire China in 1930s

Jiefangbei CBD, Yuzhong Peninsula of Chongqing at night

Soldiers of the German Wehrmacht tearing down the border crossing into Poland, 1 September 1939

After the breakout of the Second Sino-Japanese War, The Young Companion featured Chiang on its cover.

Jiefangbei (People's Liberation Monument), the landmark and center of Chongqing

Soldiers of the Polish Army during the defence of Poland, September 1939

Chiang with Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill in Cairo, Egypt, November 1943

Finnish machine gun nest aimed at Soviet Red Army positions during the Winter War, February 1940

Chiang and his wife Soong Mei-ling sharing a laugh with U.S. Lieutenant General Joseph W. Stilwell, Burma, April 1942

Entrance to the Chongqing Nankai Secondary School

German advance into Belgium and Northern France, 10 May-4 June 1940, swept past the Maginot Line (shown in dark red)

A train of Chongqing Rail Transit Line 2 coming through a residential building at Liziba station.

London seen from St. Paul's Cathedral after the German Blitz, 29 December 1940

Chiang with South Korean President Syngman Rhee in 1949

An aerial tramway across the Yangtse river in Chongqing CBD Photo by Chen Hualin

Soldiers of the British Commonwealth forces from the Australian Army's 9th Division during the Siege of Tobruk; North African Campaign, September 1941

Map of the Chinese Civil War (1946–1950)

Hydrofoil on the Yangtze in the outer reaches of the municipality

German Panzer III of the Afrika Korps advancing across the North African desert, April-May 1941

Chiang with Japanese politician Nobusuke Kishi, in 1957

European theatre of World War II animation map, 1939–1945 – Red: Western Allies and the Soviet Union after 1941; Green: Soviet Union before 1941; Blue: Axis powers

Chiang presiding over the 1966 Double Ten celebrations

View of Chaotianmen Bridge across the Yangtze River in Chongqing

German soldiers during the invasion of the Soviet Union by the Axis powers, 1941

Chiang with U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower in June 1960

Zhongshan Ancient Town, Jiangjin, Chongqing

Soviet civilians leaving destroyed houses after a German bombardment during the Battle of Leningrad, 10 December 1942

The National Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall is a famous monument, landmark, and tourist attraction in Taipei, Taiwan.

Japanese soldiers entering Hong Kong, 8 December 1941

The USS Arizona (BB-39) was a total loss in the Japanese surprise air attack on the American Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor, Sunday 7 December 1941.

Chinese propaganda poster proclaiming "Long Live the President"

US President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British PM Winston Churchill seated at the Casablanca Conference, January 1943

The Hongya Cave (Hongya-dong) traditional Bayu-style stilted houses at Jiefangbei CBD

Map of Japanese military advances through mid-1942

Chiang Kai-shek and Winston Churchill heads, with Nationalist China flag and Union Jack

The steep path up to the front gate of Fishing Town

US Marines during the Guadalcanal Campaign, in the Pacific theatre, 1942

Statue of Chiang Kai-shek in Yangmingshan National Park, Taiwan

Ciqikou ancient road in Shapingba District

Red Army soldiers on the counterattack during the Battle of Stalingrad, February 1943

Typical Chongqing hot pot served with minced shrimp, tripes, pork aorta, goose intestine, and kidney slices.

American 8th Air Force Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bombing raid on the Focke-Wulf factory in Germany, 9 October 1943

Chiang Kai-shek with the Muslim General Ma Fushou

Chongqing Xiao mian with peas and spicy bean paste

U.S. Navy SBD-5 scout plane flying patrol over USS Washington (BB-56) and USS Lexington (CV-16) during the Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaign, 1943

Chiang Kai-shek as Knight of the Royal Order of the Seraphim

Red Army troops in a counter-offensive on German positions at the Battle of Kursk, July 1943

Mao Fumei (毛福梅, 1882–1939), who died in the Second Sino-Japanese War during a bombardment, is the mother of his son and successor Chiang Ching-kuo

Ruins of the Benedictine monastery, during the Battle of Monte Cassino, Italian Campaign, May 1944

Yao Yecheng (姚冶誠, 1889–1972), who came to Taiwan and died in Taipei

American troops approaching Omaha Beach during the invasion of Normandy on D-Day, 6 June 1944

Chen Jieru (陳潔如, "Jennie", 1906–1971), who lived in Shanghai, but moved to Hong Kong later and died there

German SS soldiers from the Dirlewanger Brigade, tasked with suppressing the Warsaw Uprising against Nazi occupation, August 1944

Soong Mei-ling (宋美齡, 1898–2003), who moved to the United States after Chiang Kai-shek's death, is arguably his most famous wife even though they had no children together

General Douglas MacArthur returns to the Philippines during the Battle of Leyte, 20 October 1944

Jiangbeizui CBD from above, taken in 2018

Yalta Conference held in February 1945, with Winston Churchill, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Joseph Stalin

Chaotianmen Bridge connects Jiangbei District with Nan'an District of Chongqing, taken in 2018

Ruins of the Reichstag in Berlin, 3 June 1945.

Jiefangbei ({{zh|c=解放碑|l=People's Liberation Monument|labels=no}}) is a World War II victory monument

Atomic bombing of Nagasaki on 9 August 1945.

Raffles City Chongqing, sitting in the confluence of Yangtze and Jialing River

Ruins of Warsaw in 1945, after the deliberate destruction of the city by the occupying German forces

Defendants at the Nuremberg trials, where the Allied forces prosecuted prominent members of the political, military, judicial and economic leadership of Nazi Germany for crimes against humanity

Post-war border changes in Central Europe and creation of the Communist Eastern Bloc

David Ben-Gurion proclaiming the Israeli Declaration of Independence at the Independence Hall, 14 May 1948

Bodies of Chinese civilians killed by the Imperial Japanese Army during the Nanking Massacre in December 1937

Schutzstaffel (SS) female camp guards removing prisoners' bodies from lorries and carrying them to a mass grave, inside the German Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, 1945

Prisoner identity photograph taken by the German SS of a Polish Catholic girl who died in Auschwitz. Approximately 230,000 children were held prisoner and used in forced labour and Nazi medical experiments.

Polish civilians wearing blindfolds photographed just before their execution by German soldiers in Palmiry forest, 1940

Soviet partisans hanged by the German army. The Russian Academy of Sciences reported in 1995 civilian victims in the Soviet Union at German hands totalled 13.7 million dead, twenty percent of the 68 million persons in the occupied Soviet Union.

B-29 Superfortress strategic bombers on the Boeing assembly line in Wichita, Kansas, 1944

A V-2 rocket launched from a fixed site in Peenemünde, 21 June 1943

Nuclear Gadget being raised to the top of the detonation "shot tower", at Alamogordo Bombing Range; Trinity nuclear test, New Mexico, July 1945

For eight years, he led the war of resistance against a vastly superior enemy, mostly from the wartime capital Chongqing.

- Chiang Kai-shek

When the Second World War ended, the Civil War with the communists (by then led by Mao Zedong) resumed.

- Chiang Kai-shek

During and after the Second Sino-Japanese War, from Nov 1937 to May 1946, it was Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek's provisional capital.

- Chongqing

Chongqing was acclaimed to be the "City of Heroes" due to the indomitable spirits of its people as well as their contributions and sacrifices during the War of Resistance-World War II.

- Chongqing

Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek deployed his best army to defend Shanghai, but after three months of fighting, Shanghai fell.

- World War II

Japanese military victories did not bring about the collapse of Chinese resistance that Japan had hoped to achieve; instead, the Chinese government relocated inland to Chongqing and continued the war.

- World War II

3 related topics with Alpha

(clockwise from top left)Imperial Japanese Navy landing force in military gas masks in the Battle of Shanghai

Japanese Type 92 heavy machine gunners during Operation Ichi-Go

Victims of the Nanjing Massacre on the shore of the Qinhuai River

Chinese machine gun nest in the Battle of Wuhan

Japanese aircraft during the bombing of Chongqing

Chinese Expeditionary Force marching in India

Second Sino-Japanese War

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Military conflict that was primarily waged between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan.

Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, Allied Commander-in-Chief in the China theatre from 1942 to 1945

Japanese troops entering Shenyang during the Mukden Incident

A baby sits in the remains of a Shanghai train station on 'Bloody Saturday', 1937

Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek announced the Kuomintang policy of resistance against Japan at Lushan on 10 July 1937, three days after the Marco Polo Bridge Incident.

Japanese landing near Shanghai, November 1937

Japanese troops in the ruins of Shanghai

Soviet embassy in Nanjing is being burned down by arson on 1 January 1938.

A Chinese POW about to be beheaded by a Japanese officer with a shin gunto

National Revolutionary Army soldiers during the 1938 Yellow River flood

Map showing the extent of Japanese occupation in 1941 (in red)

Theaters (military operational regions) of the Chinese National Revolutionary Army from late 1938 to early 1940

Wang Jingwei and officers of the Collaborationist Chinese Army

Chinese soldiers in house-to-house fighting in the Battle of Taierzhuang, March–April 1938

National Revolutionary Army soldiers march to the front in 1939.

Eighth Route Army Commander Zhu De with a KMT "Blue Sky, White Sun" emblem cap

115th Division of the Eighth Route Army Lieutenant General (NRA rank) Lin Biao in NRA uniform

War declaration against Japan by the Chongqing Nationalist Government on 9 December 1941

Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek and his wife Madame Chiang with Lieutenant General Joseph Stilwell in 1942, Burma

A United States poster from the United China Relief organization advocating aid to China.

Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Winston Churchill met at the Cairo Conference in 1943 during World War II.

I-16 with Chinese insignia. The I-16 was the main fighter plane used by the Chinese Air Force and Soviet volunteers.

Flying Tigers Commander Claire Lee Chennault

A "blood chit" issued to American Volunteer Group pilots requesting all Chinese to offer rescue and protection

Free Thai, American and Chinese military officers in China during the war

The India–China airlift delivered approximately 650,000 tons of materiel to China at a cost of 1,659 men and 594 aircraft.

French colonial troops retreating to the Chinese border after the Japanese coup d'état in March 1945

WWII victory parade at Chongqing on 3 September 1945

Japanese troops surrendering to the Chinese

The Chinese return to Liuzhou in July 1945.

China War of Resistance Against Japan Memorial Museum on the site where the Marco Polo Bridge Incident took place

The Taiwan Strait and the island of Taiwan

Casualties of a mass panic during a June 1941 Japanese bombing of Chongqing. More than 5,000 civilians died during the first two days of air raids in 1939.

Japanese war crime against a Chinese POW

Japanese Special Naval Landing Forces with gas masks and rubber gloves during a chemical attack near Chapei in the Battle of Shanghai

Chinese suicide bomber putting on an explosive vest made out of Model 24 hand grenades to use in an attack on Japanese tanks at the Battle of Taierzhuang

The war made up the Chinese theater of the wider Pacific Theater of the Second World War.

After failing to stop the Japanese in the Battle of Wuhan, the Chinese central government was relocated to Chongqing (Chungking) in the Chinese interior.

Later in the same year, Zhang decided to declare his allegiance to the Nationalist government in Nanjing under Chiang Kai-shek, and consequently, China was nominally reunified under one government.

Republic of China (1912–1949)

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Commonly recognised as the official designation of China from 1912 to 1949, when it was a country in East Asia based in Mainland China, prior to the relocation of its central government to Taiwan as a result of the Chinese Civil War.

Land controlled by the Republic of China (1946) shown in dark green; land claimed but uncontrolled shown in light green.

Sun Yat-sen, the founding father of the Republic of China.

Yuan Shikai (left) and Sun Yat-sen (right) with flags representing the early republic

Major Chinese warlord coalitions during the "Nanjing Decade".

China had been at war with Japan since 1931.

Chinese Nationalist Army soldiers during the 1938 Yellow River flood

The Nationalists' retreat to Taipei: after the Nationalists lost Nanjing (Nanking) they next moved to Guangzhou (Canton), then to Chongqing (Chungking), Chengdu (Chengtu) and Xichang (Sichang) before arriving in Taipei.

Nationalist government of Nanking – nominally ruling over entire China during 1930s

Boat traffic and development along Suzhou Creek, Shanghai, 1920

General Chiang Kai-shek, who became the Chairman of the Kuomintang after Sun's death and subsequent power struggle in 1925, began the Northern Expedition in 1926 to overthrow the Beiyang government.

The war lasted until the surrender of Japan at the end of World War II in 1945; China then regained control of the island of Taiwan and the Pescadores.

Three years later, in 1949, nearing the end of the civil war, the CCP established the People's Republic of China in Beijing, with the KMT-led ROC moving its capital several times from Nanjing to Guangzhou, followed by Chongqing, then Chengdu and lastly, Taipei.

Panlongcheng, located in the southernmost area of the Erligang culture

Wuhan

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Capital of Hubei Province in the People's Republic of China.

Foreign concessions along the Hankow Bund c. 1900.

Wuchang Uprising Memorial, the original site of revolutionary government in 1911

A map of Wuhan painted by the Japanese in 1930, with Hankou being the most prosperous sector

Chiang Kai-Shek inspecting Chinese soldiers in Wuhan as Japanese forces approach the city

People's Liberation Army troops at Zhongshan Avenue, Hankou on May 16, 1949

In his poem "Swimming" (1956), engraved on the 1954 Flood Memorial in Wuhan, Mao Zedong envisions "walls of stone" to be erected upstream.

Huazhong University of Science and Technology

Map including the Wuhan area (AMS, 1953)

The main gate of Wuhan Municipal Party Committee

A night sight near a modern shopping mall in Hongshan District

A tram in University Science Park Station

Bianzhong of Marquis Yi of Zeng, made in 433 BC, now on display at the Hubei Provincial Museum in Wuhan

The old library (center), dorm (below), and schools of literature and law (left and right) of Wuhan University

The Institute for Advanced Studies at Wuhan University

Doupi on the left and Re-gan mian on the right

Li Na, a former professional tennis player and two-time Grand Slam champion, serving at Wimbledon 2008, 1st round against Anastasia Rodionova

The city later served as the wartime capital of China for ten months in 1937 during the WWII.

The split was partially motivated by the purge of the Communists within the party, which marked the end of the First United Front, and Chiang Kai-shek briefly stepped down as the commander of the National Revolutionary Army.

In 1936, when natural disaster struck Central China with widespread flooding affecting Hebei, Hunan, Jiangxi, Wuhan and Chongqing caused by the Yangtze and Huai Rivers bursting their banks, Ong Seok Kim, as Chairman of the Sitiawan Fundraising and Disaster Relief Committee, raised money and materials in support of the victims.