China

Yuan’s attempts to become emperor

In the wake of the humiliation of these forced concessions, Yuan launched a movement to revive the monarchy, with some modernized features, and to place himself on the throne. The Japanese government began to “advise” against this move in October and induced its allies to join in opposing Yuan’s plan. Additional opposition came from the leaders of the Nationalist and Progressive parties. In December, Chen Qimei (Ch’en Ch’i-mei) and Hu Hanmin (Hu Han-min), two followers of Sun Yat-sen (who was actively scheming against Yuan from his exile in Japan), began a movement against the monarchy. More significant was a military revolt in Yunnan, led by Gen. Cai E (Ts’ai O; a disciple of Liang Qichao) and by the governor of Yunnan, Tang Jiyao (T’ang Chi-yao). Joined by Li Liejun (Li Lieh-chün) and other revolutionary generals, they established the National Protection Army (Huguojun) and demanded that Yuan cancel his plan. When he would not, the Yunnan army in early January 1916 invaded Sichuan and subsequently Hunan and Guangdong, hoping to bring the southwestern and southern provinces into rebellion and to then induce the lower Yangtze provinces to join them. The Japanese government covertly provided funds and munitions to Sun and the Yunnan leaders. One by one, military leaders in Guizhou, Guangxi, and parts of Guangdong declared the independence of their provinces or districts. By March the rebellion had assumed serious dimensions, and public opinion was running strongly against Yuan.

A third source of opposition came from Yuan’s direct subordinates, Generals Duan Qirui (Tuan Ch’i-jui) and Feng Guozhang (Feng Kuo-chang), whose powers Yuan had attempted to curtail. When he called on them for help, they both withheld support. On March 22—with the tide of battle running against his forces in the southwest, Japanese hostility increasingly open, public opposition in full cry, and his closest subordinates advising peace—Yuan announced the abolition of the new empire. His opponents, however, demanded that he give up the presidency as well. The revolt continued to spread, with more military leaders declaring the independence of their provinces. The issue became that of succession should Yuan retire. The president, however, became gravely ill and died on June 6.

Yuan’s four years in power had serious consequences for China. The country’s foreign debt was much enlarged, and a precedent had been established of borrowing for political purposes. Yuan’s defiance of constitutional procedures and his dissolution of parliament also set precedents that were later repeated. Many were disillusioned with the republican experiment; China was a republic in name, but arbitrary rule based on military power was the political reality. The country was becoming fractured into competing military satrapies—the beginning of warlordism.

Gen. Li Yuanhong (Li Yüan-hung), the vice president, succeeded to the presidency, and Duan Qirui continued as premier, a position he had accepted in April. A man of great ability and ambition, Duan was supported by many generals of the former Beiyang Army, a powerful force based in northern China that developed originally under Yuan’s leadership. Duan quickly began to gather power into his own hands. Parliament reconvened on August 1; it confirmed Duan as premier but elected Gen. Feng Guozhang, the leader of another emerging faction of the Beiyang Army, as vice president. The presidential transition and restoration of parliament had by no means answered the underlying question of where the governing power lay.