When Zhang Xueliang talked about the Xi’an Incident in his later years, he said this sentence: My business is to be 36 years old. This sentence also expresses the young commander’s helplessness and unwillingness. When I was a child, when I read this section of history, there was always a question that haunted me. Why did Zhang Xueliang have to send Chiang Kai shek back to Nanjing? What would happen if he didn’t deliver? Of course, Zhang Xueliang’s noble moral character and conduct were the reasons why he escorted Chiang Kai shek. The Xi’an military admonition led Chiang Kai shek to accept the idea of “stopping the civil war and uniting the Communist Party to resist Japan”, which led to the second cooperation between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party. Zhang Xueliang’s achievements in Yang Hucheng were indispensable and will be remembered forever in history.
Let’s first listen to Zhang Xueliang himself. In 1990, in an interview with a Japanese television reporter, Zhang Xueliang mentioned the mentality of sending Jiang away after the Xi’an Incident: “I am a soldier and should be responsible for my actions. I went to Nanjing to plead guilty, which includes shooting me
When Zhang Xueliang talked about the Xi’an Incident during his oral history in his later years, he said, “I have a clear conscience. I have no selfish intentions! I did that thing (the Xi’an Incident) without any personal interests in it. I have not mixed things related to my own status and interests, I have not! If I wanted my own status and interests, I would not have the Xi’an Incident.” When Zhang Xueliang launched the Xi’an Incident, he once told Chiang Kai shek that our hearts are pure. He sent Chiang Kai shek the same way, openly and honestly, only for the great cause of the country.
We are talking about the imminent contradictions in various aspects of society at that time. Firstly, Chiang Kai shek signaled to Zhang Xueliang to send him back to Nanjing. Jiang has privately revealed to Zhang that this incident has caused him to lose face, implying whether he can let Jiang down the stairs and save face. And, along with Song Ziwen and Song Meiling, they also promised Zhang that Chiang Kai shek would not retaliate against Zhang and would personally send Zhang back to Xi’an after returning to Nanjing. In his later years, Zhang Xueliang’s oral history also emphasized sending Chiang back to Nanjing. “This incident was a great blow to him (Chiang), so we need to give him face and restore his authority
Secondly, to counter the accusations of demonization by the international community. At that time, Zhang Xueliang and Yang Hucheng launched a military admonition and made a lot of preparations to arrest Chiang, but did not have time to do a good job in the post arrest work. Hu Zongnan and many other military generals jointly telegraphed the whole country: “For those who violate party discipline and national laws, we should request the government to immediately issue a clear order to suppress them, to urge Zhang Xueliang to rein in the cliff, to escort his generals to the south, and to release their troops and bind themselves, and to punish the country
He Yingqin even more gathered the forces of seven divisions and mobilized all the bombers to fight against Xi’an; After the incident, Zhang Yang’s eight point proposal has not yet been published, and rumors have spread throughout the international community. The Japanese newspaper “South Korea Japan News” accused the Xi’an Incident of being manipulated by the Moscow magician behind Zhang Xueliang. The Soviet Union also held a condemning attitude towards the incident, and the Pravda newspaper stated that Zhang Xueliang’s rebellion was purely a new Japanese conspiracy in China. The Xi’an Incident became a conspiracy in Xi’an, and even rumormongers claimed that Zhang Xueliang was a form of banditry. With Zhang Xueliang’s personality, sending Jiang away is also a manifestation of his will and self certification of innocence.
So, what if Zhang Xueliang doesn’t send Chiang Kai shek back to Nanjing? Zhang Xueliang may have guaranteed the safety of the 300000 Northeast Army, but at that time, the Northeast Army had already lost its hometown and resided in the northwest army of Yang Hucheng. Prior to the Xi’an Incident, Chiang Kai shek planned to transfer the Northeast Army to Fujian and the Northwest Army to Anhui, making Zhang and Yang the bare commanders. It’s only a matter of time before each one can break through. After the Xi’an Incident, Yang Hucheng was first dismissed and left in office, and later forced to go abroad for “investigation”. He repeatedly sent telegrams to Jiang requesting to return to China to resist Japan, but was refused. After being imprisoned for 12 years, he was killed in 1949.
The Zhang family is in danger of survival. Zhang Lushi, Zhang Xueliang’s nephew, recalled: “My father told me that it was the elder uncle who saved the whole family at his own expense. At that time, the military statistics department had mastered the information about all the relatives of the Zhang family, and Dai Li, the director of the military statistics department, was a cold-blooded murderer who would not let the Zhang family go easily. Soong May-ling promised to ensure the safety of the Zhang family as long as the elder uncle agreed to send Chiang Kai shek back to Nanjing together.”