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Negotiating at an uneven table

National pride, sovereignty and the Sino-Soviet dispute over Dalian

In the mid-1960s, during a private chat with Beijing’s deputy mayor Wu Han, Mao staunchly defended his arch-rival Chiang Kai-shek against criticism by recognising that Chiang’s insistence on the indivisibility of China against foreign encroachments had contributed to China’s national integrity. It was quite exceptional for Mao to speak out in support of Chiang. This only lends weight to Guy Alitto’s observation that even ‘the most fervent of the reputable vilifiers’ against Chiang have to recognise Chiang as one of the foremost promoters of China’s political independence and territorial integrity.¹

As Chiang’s brother-in-law Song Ziwen (T.V. Soong) confided to Stalin during their treaty negotiations in 1945, the GMD itself had created the all-pervasive nationalist climate in China. The Chinese people had been imbued with the idea of territorial integrity since the time of GMD’s founding father Sun Yat-sen, which made it extremely difficult for leaders like Song to abandon the moral high ground in international negotiations.² GMD leaders had been relentless, riding a tiger of their own creation since the 1920s: simultaneously exploiting mass nationalism, turning it into an anti-imperialist groundswell against foreign interests while forging ties with foreign powers to fulfil a ‘nation-state-building impulse’.³ History seems to endorse this view. Following Japan’s invasion of Manchuria and the creation of the Manchukuo puppet state in 1932, Chiang’s regime had pursued peace with the Japanese via a series of treaties unfavourable to China.⁴ Chiang’s method of prioritising the counterinsurgency against their domestic Communist enemy over fighting Japan’s aggression was like introducing a Trojan horse into his regime. His overall policy regarding Japan was vehemently criticised, both domestically and internationally, for being weak.⁵ In 1936, Chiang was kidnapped at Xi’an by two of his own generals, who forced him to acknowledge national sentiment and terminate the anti-Communist campaign, in support of an anti-Japanese united front with the CCP. Although Chiang’s negotiators had held talks with the Chinese Communists for an anti-Japanese alliance before the mutiny, the Xi’an Incident prompted changes in the GMD’s wartime foreign and domestic policy alignments, paving the way for total war against Japan from 1937 to 1945.⁶

The GMD’s policy during the post-war Sino-Soviet negotiations over Manchuria deserves attention here. In August 1945, during the closing days of World War II, the GMD signed a friendship treaty with the Soviet Union, under the framework of an Anglo-American–Soviet secret deal, at Yalta. In a bid to secure post-war reclamation of the territory, the Nationalists yielded to Soviet demands to concede Outer Mongolia and some vital Chinese interests in Manchuria. Despite the treaty, GMD leaders proceeded to clash with the Soviets in the immediate aftermath of the Allied victory over Japan. The origins of the dispute lay in the re-establishment of Chinese sovereignty over Manchuria, in particular over the Nationalists’ plan to land troops at the strategic seaport of Dalian. Disagreement over Dalian, as well as the extent and manner of Sino-Soviet economic cooperation in Manchuria, soon developed into a stalemate between China and the Soviet Union. This eventually resulted in the GMD losing the race against the CCP to recover Manchuria.

The dispute over Dalian has been viewed from a ‘US–GMD versus Soviet–CCP’ dichotomy: Chiang’s insistence on sending his armies to Dalian was deliberately aimed at pleasing the Americans, who wished to break the Soviet stranglehold on the port.⁷ Arne Westad, who believes that Chiang clashed with the Soviets over Dalian for American support, also argues that the GMD leader’s deal with Stalin was an act of political expediency and that Chiang was too shrewd a politician to be taken in by either the Americans or the Soviets without weaving in his own foreign policy. In dealing with the Soviets during the treaty negotiations in July and August 1945, Chiang was aware that Washington would favour its own interests: China had to decide its own foreign policy even if Chiang had been reporting to Washington on progress at the negotiating table.⁸ Chiang’s skill in dealing with the Great Powers (i.e. the US and USSR) has been widely recognised, and some even argue that Chiang was motivated solely by rational–strategic interests regarding policy choices.⁹

So how did a perspicacious leader like Chiang allow a disagreement (one that emerged only after the signing of the treaty) to throw GMD–Soviet relations off course, ultimately scuttling his bid for a favourable post-war arrangement over Manchuria? This chapter tracks the policies and decisions of the GMD leaders and the negotiating behaviour of the GMD interlocutors. It argues that it was national pride and sovereignty, rather than the interplay of Great Power politics per se, that foiled Chiang’s plans for reclaiming north-east China.

The Sino-Soviet Treaty

China acquired Great Power status under US auspices during the Allied summits in 1943.¹⁰ However, when the United States sought Soviet entry into the Pacific War, China was excluded from the Yalta Conference in February 1945, where the United States, Britain and USSR secretly agreed that the Soviet Union would enter the war against Japan. In return, the Soviets received tacit approval from the Americans and British to, among other interests in the North Pacific, gain control over Manchurian railways and major ports and a nominally independent Outer Mongolia. The agreement was made without Chiang’s knowledge, but Chiang, who was supreme allied commander in China, would be compelled to go along with it.¹¹

Chiang felt that the best available foreign policy option for China under the circumstances was to maintain the policy of non-involvement in the face of Soviet–US rivalry. Chiang hoped that this policy would buy him two to three years to unify China before the Soviets turned to support the CCP.¹² Accordingly, in late June 1945, Chiang sent a delegation led by premier-cum-foreign minister Song Ziwen to Moscow to negotiate a friendship treaty with the Soviet Union. The negotiations dragged on into August. On 8 August, the USSR declared war on Japan and launched the Red Army’s invasion of Manchuria.¹³ A massive Soviet force invaded Manchuria and rapidly overran China’s north-east. They succeeded in forcing the Japanese troops to capitulate, thus bringing the Pacific War to a swift end on 15 August, precipitating Japan’s unconditional surrender.¹⁴ The following paragraphs will prove that Chiang had been hoping for this war even before World War II.

The Soviet invasion of Manchuria forced the GMD negotiators to seek an early agreement before Manchuria was completely overrun by the Red Army. The prospect of not reaching a deal with the Soviets was politically unacceptable for the Nationalists, although the Soviets also were equally insistent that the treaty be signed quickly.¹⁵ Exploiting Soviet leverage to the fullest, Stalin and his foreign minister Molotov were able to persuade Song and his associates of the deal’s value, thereby softening the GMD’s bargaining stance. Stalin adeptly set the stage, making Song haggle intensely for every concession he made. This gave Chinese negotiators the impression that some Soviet concessions were more valuable than they actually were. For instance, Song accepted Stalin’s support for a Chinese civil administration in Dalian as a major Soviet concession.¹⁶

During the Moscow talks, Stalin also made several verbal promises, such as maintaining a no-arms-supply policy to the CCP and banning cross-border firearm sales to the Muslim rebels in Xinjiang.¹⁷ Notably, however, the final text of the treaty did not contain any of these assurances. Some treaty clauses were too vague to signify a clear and unambiguous agreement. Jay Taylor argues that the ambiguous wording of the Soviet pledge to support the Nationalist government posed a particular problem for treaty implementation.¹⁸ However, recent studies of international political agreements have found that ambiguous treaties are not uncommon; this is because negotiators often need to determine a settlement through a maze of conflicting interests between the disputing parties. In ratifying an ambiguous agreement, political leaders need the courage to achieve a mutually acceptable interpretation of the agreement in the implementation stage, rather than blaming ambiguous wording in treaty clauses for implementation failures.¹⁹ Chiang might not have had the foresight of modern negotiation analysts, but he was pleased with the outcome. He knew that the most important concession he had made—the independence of Outer Mongolia—conflicted ideologically with the GMD’s reunification goal.²⁰ However, as he confided to his foreign-minister-in-waiting, Wang Shijie, the disagreement over Mongolia ‘was not worth the misgivings’.²¹

First, the former northern region of China had been under Soviet control since the 1920s and had proclaimed separate statehood as the Mongolian People’s Republic (MPR) in 1924. The ties between the two nations were further strengthened in 1936 when Moscow and Ulan Bator signed a ten-year mutual assistance pact, paving the way for the MPR’s complete Sovietisation.²² Second, before World War II, Chiang had recognised that Soviet control of the MPR was not entirely against China’s national interests as it offered a counterbalance to Japanese aggression. He believed that Moscow’s hegemony over the MPR’s affairs would ultimately lead it to wage war with Japan. For Chiang, a Soviet–Japanese war could open a window of opportunity from which he might benefit; additionally, it would be a disaster for China if the Soviet Union and Japan delayed war against each other. Chiang held to his judgement throughout World War II, even though he might not have thought that war between Japan and the USSR would finally break out in August 1945.²³ Hence, during the 1945 Moscow negotiations, although Chiang was sensitive to popular nationalist sentiment over Outer Mongolia, he was willing to recognise its independence.²⁴

In the Nationalists’ political calculations, the worst-case scenario was a Soviet occupation of Manchuria without any prior agreement. The GMD leaders thought that a formal treaty with the Soviets would legally restrain the USSR from normalising relations with the CCP, keeping the GMD’s programs of quelling the Communists and Manchuria’s recovery on course.²⁵ The GMD leadership’s strategy during the Moscow talks was ‘to pursue the possible, rather than the preferred’.²⁶

Nevertheless, the GMD’s leaders had no desire to be linked to the calumny of forfeiting China’s sovereign rights in a humiliating treaty.²⁷ In the midst of the negotiations, Song desperately sought another leader with whom to share the blame. Chiang turned to Wang Shijie, head of the Central Propaganda Department, coaxing him to replace his lead negotiator Song as foreign minister and sending him to join Song at the final stage of the Moscow talks. Chiang cloaked his moves in the façade of a cabinet reshuffle designed to place Wang in the front line.²⁸ Wang was thus dragooned into representing the GMD to sign a treaty with unfavourable terms dictated by Stalin and accepted by Song and Chiang. The Nationalists calculated that the treaty could lead to post-war cooperation with the Soviets, if it did not attract overwhelming domestic criticism and if the Soviets reciprocated Chiang’s sweeping concessions. Wang noted that if Chinese public opinion turned against the USSR over the treaty, the Sino-Soviet relationship could be thrown off course and the GMD would be forced to accept a one-sided deal.²⁹ In contrast, Song seemed to believe in the adage that the real negotiations would only begin once the treaty was signed. During the final stage of the Moscow talks, Song used the prophetic phrase ‘a life sentence’, hinting to his fellow delegate Xiong Shihui (widely tipped as Chiang’s favourite to be the new chief executive of Manchuria working with the Soviets on treaty implementation) about the difficulties ahead regarding negotiations with the Soviets.³⁰

The negotiations were completed on 14 August 1945 when both sides signed the China, Soviet Union Treaty of Friendship and Alliance (hereafter the Sino-Soviet Treaty). As Chiang had authorised Song to concede to Soviet demands,³¹ the treaty was constructed within the framework of Yalta and formulated very much on Soviet terms.³² Stalin thus emerged victorious by securing GMD recognition of Outer Mongolia’s independence and the primacy of Soviet interests in Manchuria. These interests included control of Lüshun as a naval base, opening Dalian as a commercial free port, and joint Sino-Soviet ownership and operation of the Chinese Changchun Railway. In contrast, the GMD received nothing tangible in return, essentially obtaining a Soviet pledge of support and respect for China’s full sovereignty over Manchuria.³³

The recovery of Manchuria thus became the key component of the GMD’s post-war strategy. Internationally, the GMD needed to prove it was capable of protecting China’s sovereign rights.³⁴ Domestically, the GMD was facing a strong challenge from the CCP to recover Manchuria. As will be discussed further in the following chapters, the GMD and the CCP had formed an uncomfortable wartime alliance in 1937. While conducting the war against Japan together, these two armed forces clashed under the banner of a ‘United Front’, with heightened tensions between the two parties towards the end of World War II. The CCP started a race against the GMD for the recovery of Manchuria immediately after the Soviet incursion in August 1945. This was done by deploying a substantial number of troops to the north-east. Chiang urgently needed to control Manchuria to stop the CCP from collaborating with the Soviets and extending its base into the north-east. Manchuria had become the destination of Chiang’s nationalist revolution.³⁵

Dispute over Dalian

The most direct way for the GMD to reclaim Manchuria was to negotiate with the Soviets to take the entire region from the Red Army. A new GMD organisation, the North-East Headquarters (NEHQ) of the Military Affairs Commission, was established by the end of August 1945 for this purpose.³⁶ The NEHQ’s key positions were drawn from influential figures in the GMD government: Xiong Shihui, Zhang Jia’ao and Chiang Ching-kuo.

Xiong was appointed director of the NEHQ and concurrently chairman of its Political Affairs Commission, making him the GMD’s top bureaucrat and later chief negotiator with the Soviets in Manchuria. Xiong was Chiang’s long-time military and political associate and was in charge of post-war reconstruction. Xiong’s experience in international negotiations came largely from his appointment in 1942 as chief of a Chinese military mission to the United States—a GMD lobby group sent to Washington to obtain American aid.³⁷ During his tenure in the United States, Xiong expressed indignation over what he perceived as his American counterparts’ discriminatory attitude towards the Chinese.³⁸ At times, Xiong found it difficult to manage the conflicting demands of defending national pride and depersonalising petty issues in order to establish good working relationships with the Americans. As an example, in September 1942, when Xiong visited American politician Wendell Willkie in New York, he stormed out of the latter’s office even before the meeting started because he believed that Willkie had failed to practise proper etiquette. This later proved to be nothing other than a simple misunderstanding.³⁹ As mentioned, Xiong had been part of the GMD delegation in Moscow for the Sino-Soviet treaty negotiations, although he had not participated in the actual negotiations and was received coldly by Soviet officials.⁴⁰ Later, in a more combustible context, Xiong’s testiness with his international counterparts caused friction at the negotiating table.

Zhang Jia’ao, a leading banker and economist, was appointed chairman of NEHQ’s Economic Affairs Commission. Zhang had a successful record of representing the GMD government in negotiating with foreign interests during the 1930s. However, given that Zhang had only held junior-level ministerial positions in Chiang’s cabinet—and his brother Zhang Junmai (Carsun Zhang) was the co-founder of China’s political third force (the China Democratic League)—he was certainly not one of Chiang’s cronies. Rather, Zhang was someone over whom Chiang tried to exert some control, due to Zhang’s influential position in China’s finance and banking sector and his connections to Chiang’s political foes.⁴¹ The post of special envoy for foreign affairs of the NEHQ was reserved for Chiang’s eldest son, Chiang Ching-kuo, who had studied and worked in the Soviet Union.⁴² As Chiang Kai-shek’s top adviser on Soviet policy, Chiang Ching-kuo played a role in persuading his father to negotiate the Soviets into cooperation.⁴³

Despite the urgency of recovering Manchuria, Chiang Kai-shek’s government now wasted precious time on other matters, including re-demarcating the Manchurian provinces and NEHQ staffing. Hence, key NEHQ officials were not ready for Manchuria until mid-October.⁴⁴ In contrast, in September Moscow informed Chongqing that it had appointed Marshal Rodion Yakovlevich Malinovsky, a Soviet Army commander during the invasion of Manchuria, as its delegate plenipotentiary to negotiate with the GMD over the Red Army’s withdrawal. The Soviets also proposed a time frame, 10–15 October, and a place, Changchun (the old capital of Manchukuo). The Nationalists reacted by appointing Xiong as their representative in Manchuria.⁴⁵ Preliminary negotiations between the GMD officials and the Soviet ambassador, Appolon Alexandrovich Petrov, began in late September in Chongqing. Attempting to manipulate the boundaries and agenda during this pre-negotiation stage, both parties made unilateral moves without consulting each other. On 26 September, Petrov informed Zhang Jia’ao that the Red Army’s headquarters in Manchuria had begun issuing its own army scrip. Next, the Soviets endeavoured to ensure GMD acknowledgement of Soviet control of the Chinese Changchun Railway. From the GMD’s perspective, Petrov’s move indicated the Soviets would not countenance the return of Manchuria to China unless their own interests were satisfied.⁴⁶

Although details were noticeably absent in the terms of the Sino-Soviet Treaty, the Nationalists were committed to putting the Soviets on notice regarding China’s intention to land its armies in the most effective location and reclaim China’s sovereignty over Manchuria. Clearly, a successful and glorious takeover would satisfy China’s national pride. Without persuading the Soviets into countenancing bilateral solutions to the issues, Chongqing bluntly informed Moscow (via a memorandum on 1 October) that the Chinese government had decided the GMD armies, with US aid, would disembark in Dalian. The memorandum did not acknowledge that the Soviets, as one of the signatory parties of the GMD–Soviet pact, had an equal right to provide their own interpretation of the treaty. Neither did it show any intention to develop a positive treaty partnership with Moscow. In other words, the GMD adopted a hard-line approach that was not conducive to post-treaty cooperation.⁴⁷

Manchuria’s international port Dalian was the GMD’s preferred debarkation site. The port’s railways connected it to the rest of the north-east, and the harbour was capable of accommodating US deep-draft cargo ships, particularly the Liberty ships (around 10,000 tonnes). Notably, the GMD government did not have a modern transport capacity and had to rely on the United States.⁴⁸ The Americans were using Liberty ships and tank landing ships (LST) to assist GMD troop movement.⁴⁹ However, Chinese navigation specialists had already noted in 1943 that the Liberties were too large to enter most Chinese ports.⁵⁰ While Dalian was unmistakably the best choice for the Nationalists, the city and its seaport, located at the tip of the Liaodong Peninsula, had been occupied by Soviet troops since late August.⁵¹ This meant that the GMD had to reach an understanding with the Soviets before it could send its troops in. Despite this, Chongqing chose to act unilaterally, inviting Moscow’s immediate rebuff.

Moscow insisted that Dalian was a commercial port according to the Sino-Soviet Treaty and should not be used for military purposes. The Soviets wasted no time in clarifying their stance: on 6 October, Moscow expressed its objection to the proposed GMD troop landing to Chiang’s government.⁵² The GMD leaders held a round of internal conferences in late September but failed to find an acceptable bargaining range on key issues for the upcoming negotiations on Manchuria.⁵³

When Xiong Shihui and his cohort arrived in Changchun on 12 October 1945, they discovered that the entire city was living under a strong Soviet military presence.⁵⁴ The GMD takeover personnel immediately received reports from local informants about the Soviets’ planned removal of crucial industrial equipment in the region. The officials, perceiving these plans as Soviet infringements of China’s sovereignty, felt insulted and humiliated. Not surprisingly, the diaries and memoirs of the GMD delegation emphasised their experience of injustice.⁵⁵

On the evening of 12 October, the NEHQ trio, Xiong, Chiang Ching-kuo and Zhang Jia’ao, prepared a three-point agenda for their first formal negotiation with Marshal Malinovsky, scheduled for the following day. The agenda demonstrates a strong commitment to continue the GMD’s strategy in the Sino-Soviet Treaty, emphasising the pursuit of a negotiated settlement rather than Chiang Kai-shek’s preferred solution. The agenda included requesting Soviet cooperation to return regional transportation to normal, reopen airfields to the GMD and supply military aircraft and army uniforms to the NEHQ. The sensitive issue of the GMD’s proposed troop entry to Dalian was deliberately bypassed.⁵⁶

The agenda presented a position of moderation to the Soviets, but as it did not concede any ground, the GMD negotiators could still begin haggling for China’s primary interests at the time of their choosing. The agenda represented a negotiation style that purposely delayed the presentation of opening positions while gaining time to learn more about the rival’s real position: the ‘flanking manoeuvre’ of a weaker party.⁵⁷ By seeking Soviet donations-in-kind for transport and clothing for its takeover personnel, the GMD also showed deference to the Soviet Union—a tactical move to alleviate Soviet sensitivities over the ongoing US–GMD alliance. In other words, this was a gesture from the Nationalists to the Soviets that the GMD would pursue its interests in a way that respected the Great Power status of the USSR. The implication of such a deferential gesture was that the GMD accepted its asymmetrical relations with the Soviet Union.⁵⁸

However, the situation began to unravel when Xiong called on Malinovsky at the Soviet Army headquarters on 13 October for a courtesy visit before the scheduled start of the negotiations—a development that completely altered the GMD’s approach. Malinovsky did meet with Xiong at his headquarters compound, but the Soviet marshal did not pay Xiong a courtesy ‘return visit’ as traditional Chinese etiquette required. Instead, Malinovsky told Xiong simply to return in about two hours time with his delegation for the first plenary meeting of the two parties. Xiong felt that Malinovsky had failed to properly acknowledge his status as the senior Chinese bureaucrat in Manchuria and was clearly offended. In his memoir some twenty years later, Xiong recalled with bitterness that the Soviet marshal was boorish and arrogant.⁵⁹

Perceived injustice is a breeding ground for conflict. The feeling of not being treated with due respect had a great influence on Xiong’s subsequent negotiation strategy.⁶⁰ In his first official meeting soon after with Malinovsky, one that Chiang Ching-kuo and Zhang also attended, Xiong made two crucial statements that were incompatible with the original agenda that Chiang Ching-kuo and Zhang had agreed upon. First, Xiong enquired about the schedule for the Soviet forces’ evacuation and, in violation of the spirit of the original agenda, he informed the Soviets of the GMD’s intention to land its troops not just in Dalian but also at other Manchurian ports. He also requested Soviet support for the GMD troop disembarkations.⁶¹

If Xiong’s intention was to demonstrate China’s uncompromising stance over Manchuria, he could consider his approach a success, as he received a tough response from Malinovsky. The Soviet marshal told Xiong that any dispute over Dalian should be settled between the two governments, intentionally skirting the issue. Malinovsky also rejected Xiong’s request for Soviet assistance to transport troops. Nevertheless, he indicated that if the GMD armies intended to disembark at Yingkou and Huludao, this was negotiable.⁶²

The port of Yingkou provided maritime access to the Manchurian Plain, with the regional industrial and business centre Shenyang within striking distance. Huludao was a domestic deep-water seaport situated on a cape extending into the Liaodong Gulf just outside the strategic Manchurian town of Jinzhou, located in the land transport corridor connecting Manchuria and China proper. Malinovsky nonetheless declared that he had no knowledge about the harbour conditions in these two places.⁶³ At that point, the two parties did not resolve the dispute over Dalian immediately by negotiating for possible transitional arrangements. The meeting ended in a stalemate, and Xiong left empty-handed. Xiong recorded his ‘revised’ meeting agenda in his diary entry for Saturday 13 October 1945, but he did not state whether it was supported by Chiang Ching-kuo and Zhang Jia’ao before the meeting.⁶⁴ In a report to his father, Chiang Ching-kuo clearly revealed his concern over the negotiation stalemate.⁶⁵ Zhang, on the other hand, was sceptical about Xiong’s decision to raise the Dalian issue at the start of negotiations.⁶⁶

Negotiating at an uneven table

Moscow was alarmed. On 15 October, the Soviet government sent a communiqué to Chongqing, reiterating its opposition to any GMD troops entering Dalian.⁶⁷ When Chiang Kai-shek received Moscow’s stern message, he also obtained a scathing report from Changchun about Soviet encroachment in China’s national interests and sovereign rights in Manchuria.⁶⁸ In a handwritten directive to Xiong and Zhang on 16 October, Chiang Kai-shek apparently realised that his preferred settlement of the Dalian issue was almost unattainable and that a change of plan was necessary. He told Xiong and Zhang that he had already made arrangements to prioritise sending armies overland, and he expected that these army units would reach Shenyang before 20 November. Diplomatically, however, Chiang refused to seek a bilateral solution to the dispute with the Soviets. He insisted that the military sea transport destined for Manchuria would be executed as planned and that his troops would disembark at Dalian.⁶⁹

Simultaneously, reports about the Soviets disarming the Japanese puppet forces and transferring Japanese weapons to the pro-CCP elements continued to flow to Xiong.⁷⁰ At their second formal meeting with the Soviets on 17 October, Xiong and his team still pushed for Soviet military support for two GMD armies to enter Dalian and advance into the Manchurian hinterland after landing.⁷¹ In addition, Xiong notified the Soviets of the GMD’s intention to send another two armies overland into Manchuria and requested that the Soviet forces restore the Manchurian railway sector southbound to Shenyang.⁷²

Malinovsky did not respond directly to Xiong’s untiring appeals to send troops to Dalian. Rather, he replied adroitly that the Soviet forces would begin a phased withdrawal from Manchuria from mid-November (to be completed in early December). However, he simultaneously ruled out the possibility of a joint GMD–Soviet forces rendezvous. In a proclamation to which Malinovsky adhered as stipulated, he informed his Chinese counterpart that the GMD forces would take over the defence only after Soviet troops had withdrawn. This effectively disregarded the Soviets’ responsibility to assist the GMD forces entering Manchuria.⁷³

Xiong and his team seemed to realise, at that particular juncture, that they were negotiating at an uneven table, and the Soviets remained unperturbed by their attempts to make an issue of Dalian. Existing records show that Xiong now tried to shift the focus of the troop-landing dispute by declaring that the GMD forces would seek alternative disembarkation points. Malinovsky was keen to show his GMD counterparts that the Soviets were manipulating the terms. The Soviet marshal told Xiong he was inclined to accept GMD troop entry to these ports, but the Red Army would not be able to offer assistance.⁷⁴ In an attempt to persuade the Nationalists to send their troops by an overland route to Shenyang via Chengde, the provincial capital of Rehe Province, Malinovsky pledged to restore the main railway. He stressed that non-GMD Chinese forces would not be allowed to remain in the line of communication.⁷⁵ In doing so, Malinovsky kept secret the deal he had made with the CCP just a few weeks previously. As part of this deal, the Red Army had promised to let the CCP take control of Chengde.⁷⁶

It should be noted here that certain items raised in Malinovsky’s response, such as supporting GMD troop transport via overland routes, were compatible with the GMD’s initial proposal. The problem for the two parties was that they failed to explore more common ground. At the end of the meeting on the troop-landing issue, Xiong completed a full circle, from pressing for Dalian to accepting alternative ports again. In making his final statement, Xiong argued that the Chinese government had decided to dispatch armies to Manchuria via sea to Dalian because of its superior harbour. Xiong dropped his last bombshell before the end of the meeting by telling the Soviets to take full responsibility for maintaining local security before their withdrawal—a tart reminder that the Soviet forces was not trying hard enough to suppress the CCP combatants. Dong Yanping, Xiong’s deputy chief of staff, who also attended the negotiations, recalled that Xiong’s final statement was designed to clarify the duties of the two parties: a pre-emptive measure against possible Soviet interference in regional politics.⁷⁷

In Chongqing, Chiang Kai-shek decided to intervene after learning that his demands had not been met. On 18 October, Chiang summoned Petrov to a meeting. Chiang recommended, for Stalin’s urgent consideration, that the GMD armies be allowed to land at Dalian.⁷⁸ Following the example set by Chiang Kai-shek, Xiong went to see Malinovsky on 19 October and expressed his government’s staunch position on sending troops to Dalian.⁷⁹ Malinovsky snubbed Xiong by advising him to return to Chongqing to acquaint his government with Soviet opinion, so that the negotiations would run smoothly.⁸⁰ Xiong flew back to Chongqing to report to Chiang on 21 October.⁸¹

While Malinovsky used his sarcasm to pressure Xiong at the expense of their working relationship, his vice chief of staff Pavlovsky went one step further. As agreed by both parties on 17 October, Pavlovsky would confer with Dong on military affairs.⁸² Starting 20 October, the pair held meetings for two days, during which the disagreement over Dalian once again sparked a barrage of unfriendly exchanges. For instance, Pavlovsky connected the Dalian issue with the Soviets’ prime concern, its naval base at Lüshun. He pronounced that Dalian was within a restricted zone of the Soviet naval base and therefore Chinese officials would not be allowed to enter. The Soviet also rejected Dong’s request for winter gear for the GMD armies. Given that, in an asymmetric bilateral relationship, the stronger party has more incentive to show graciousness in a climate of friendship rather than hostility, Pavlovsky’s show of toughness indicated that the Soviets intended to sanction the GMD over their differences. In turn, Dong restated China’s right to land its armies in Dalian and take over its civil administration. Dong’s perseverance over Dalian certainly was in line with Chiang Kai-shek’s policy, but this approach substantially limited the latitude for GMD negotiators to compromise. When Pavlovsky reiterated the Soviet position that they would allow GMD troops to enter Manchuria via alternative ports, Dong was noncommittal.⁸³

In a letter to his father, Chiang Ching-kuo noted that this tactic of insisting on landing at Dalian was not helping to solve the dispute. Nevertheless, the attraction of applying such a tactic, as he also discovered, was that it would help the GMD maintain what they believed was a solemn and just stand.⁸⁴

While his negotiators struggled to find a balance between national pride and resolving the dispute over Dalian with their Soviet counterparts, Chiang Kai-shek was about to make China’s sovereignty a much bigger issue. He summoned Petrov again on 23 October. During this meeting, the Soviet ambassador conveyed Stalin’s personal message to Chiang Kai-shek: it would contravene the treaty if GMD troops entered Dalian. Chiang Kai-shek responded, without tactful circumlocutions, that Dalian was Chinese territory and that it would be a true violation of the treaty if his armies could not use it as a port of entry.⁸⁵ By analysing the dispute from the perspective of sovereign rights, in his position as China’s paramount leader, Chiang’s statement virtually turned the Dalian issue into a fundamental and irreconcilable dispute between China and the Soviet Union. As Raymond Cohen cogently argues, issues concerning territorial sovereignty are extremely sensitive in political negotiations. Negotiators must manage these issues skilfully, as they risk derailing the entire process.⁸⁶ Chiang was indeed aware of the great risk he was taking, as he appeared more conciliatory immediately after his harsh statement. He told Petrov that he wanted to disengage from their disagreement on the treaty and its legality. He further recommended that Stalin consider their personal relationship and the spirit of the Sino-Soviet alliance, and allow the GMD armies to use Dalian as their port of entry to Manchuria.⁸⁷

To Chiang Kai-shek’s disappointment, he did not have much to cling to in terms of personal ties with Stalin, as distrust between the two leaders ran high towards the end of World War II. Chiang Kai-shek’s relationship with Stalin had been good when the Soviet Union augmented its aid to China, helping to resist Japan in 1938, but since then their relationship had spiralled downwards. Chiang’s distrust of the Soviet Union grew after the latter signed the Treaty of Non-Aggression with Germany in 1939. Stalin too had begun to think about pressuring Chiang in support of the CCP after the Soviets’ decisive victory against the Germans in 1943. Mistrust between the two became apparent when both Stalin and Chiang would agree to attend the Allied summit meetings only if the other party was excluded.⁸⁸

Not surprisingly, the Soviets reacted to Chiang Kai-shek’s strong statement more rapidly than to his personal plea to Stalin. On 24 October, the Soviet forces in Manchuria raided the GMD party branch headquarters in Changchun and arrested the branch staff officers for violation of the propaganda code (although the detained personnel were released the following day after receiving a stern warning to end all anti-Soviet activities).⁸⁹ Watching his government’s relationship with the Soviets suffer yet another serious setback, Chiang Kai-shek instructed his Foreign Ministry officials on 25 October to notify Petrov that the GMD armies would land at Huludao and Yingkou until the Dalian issue was settled.⁹⁰ To control the damage, Chiang Kai-shek advised Xiong to restrain the activities of their hardliners in Changchun.⁹¹ Having shifted their support to the CCP, the Soviets were in no mood to be conciliatory and continued to wield their power to blunt Chiang’s moves to recover Manchuria. On 27 October 1945, a CCP-controlled municipal government was established in Dalian under the aegis of Soviet forces.⁹²

Landing attempts

Thus, after almost two weeks of heated exchanges with the Soviets, Chiang Kai-shek was forced to relinquish the plan to use Dalian. He instead staked his hopes on Huludao and Yingkou, in the vain hope that his troops could disembark at either of these alternative ports. But the change of plan did not automatically put the GMD–Soviet negotiations on an even keel. On 24 October 1945, a contingent of the US Navy’s Seventh Fleet started transporting the GMD Thirteenth Army (hereafter 13A) from Hong Kong to provisional debarkation ports in Manchuria, but the American commanders in charge of troop movement did not know exactly where they were supposed to land.⁹³

Operating under such uncertainty, the US Navy conducted reconnaissance missions for possible landing sites along the Manchurian coastline, including at Lüshun–Dalian: some US naval crew disembarked at Dalian,⁹⁴ and another small boat with the US flag prominently displayed approached the port of Huludao, where it was fired upon by suspected pro-CCP troops on the shore.⁹⁵ The Soviets protested through Malinovsky to Xiong in Changchun on 29 October against American military activities in the Lüshun–Dalian zone. The Soviets quickly issued a disclaimer that they were unable to ensure a safe disembarkation of the GMD armies at Huludao.⁹⁶ Thus, Yingkou seemed to be the last entry point in Manchuria available for the GMD, given that the port facilities in Andong (China’s northernmost port, which borders North Korea on the Yellow Sea) were substandard, according to the Soviets.⁹⁷ Despite its geographical advantage, Yingkou was a small river port and could not accommodate large-capacity troop carriers.

When Du Yuming, NEHQ’s newly appointed overall commander of the GMD’s Manchurian forces, met Malinovsky on 28 October, the Soviet marshal behaved differently from the way he had with Xiong. This meeting passed amicably, as Malinovsky was open to Du’s proposal to use Yingkou as a landing site.⁹⁸ Xiong took full advantage of Du’s success. On 31 October, Xiong struck a deal with Pavlovsky, in which it was agreed that the Soviet garrison forces at Yingkou would secure the port until 10 November in support of GMD troop entry.⁹⁹

After an exchange of fire with the CCP forces at Huludao had become menacingly close, the US Navy commanders were on high alert. Despite their image of promoting unqualified support for the GMD regime,¹⁰⁰ the US Navy was careful to pursue Washington’s policy of providing assistance to the GMD without becoming involved in armed conflicts with the CCP.¹⁰¹

On 2 November, Daniel Barbey, commander of the US Seventh Amphibious Force, anchored his flagship some 30 kilometres off the Yingkou waterfront in an attempt to coordinate with the local Soviet forces to disembark the GMD troops. Two days later, a prearranged meeting with Soviet Army officers came to an abrupt end after Barbey, Du and a GMD reconnaissance party were fired upon by unidentified gunmen at Yingkou’s dock area. Barbey soon received reports that the Soviet troops had decamped and that the port had been captured by pro-CCP forces.¹⁰² The landing was therefore abandoned.¹⁰³

Meanwhile in Changchun, during a meeting with his GMD counterparts on 5 November about the Soviets’ early withdrawal from Yingkou before the prior agreed date, Malinovsky delivered a convoluted diplomatic statement. The Soviet marshal stated that his men had pulled out of Yingkou because they were outnumbered by the influx of strong CCP regular combat units into the area. The justification for the Soviet forces’ disengagement was, according to Malinovsky, the principle of non-intervention in China’s internal affairs. The meeting ended in discord after Xiong retaliated by blaming the GMD armies’ failure to land at Dalian and Yingkou on Soviet non-cooperation. After the meeting, key GMD negotiators attributed the diplomatic setback, with near-unanimity, to Soviet antipathy towards US involvement in Manchurian affairs.¹⁰⁴

Eventually, on 7 November the US Seventh Amphibious Force landed the GMD Fifty-Second Army (hereafter 52A) at Qinhuangdao (the nearest deep-water port to Manchuria in China proper) to join the GMD 13A, which had disembarked there earlier.¹⁰⁵ Qinhuangdao was a less desirable port at which to disembark the GMD armies due to the lengthy rail transportation necessary to move troops into Manchuria, and the presence of strong CCP forces along the way. The port was too small for a main troop embarkation point, and the berth was congested.¹⁰⁶

The GMD’s bid to move its troops quickly into Manchuria with the US Navy’s help was thus dashed completely. In reviewing the cascade of events in its sea-transport operations in Manchuria, US officials were punctilious in avoiding a repetition of incidents that would have embroiled the United States in the centre of the conflict between the GMD, the CCP and the Soviet Union.¹⁰⁷ The commander of the US forces in China and chief of staff to Chiang, Albert C. Wedemeyer, sent a memorandum to Chiang on 10 November, concerning the founding of a pro-GMD American Military Advisory Group. In the memorandum, Wedemeyer commented scathingly that the United States would consider severing military aid if the GMD government continued to use American aid to fund its war efforts against the CCP.¹⁰⁸

Trying to ‘flog a dying horse’

When Wang Shijie departed for Moscow for the final round of the Sino-Soviet treaty negotiations in August 1945, his daughter Wang Qiuhua wrote a touching goodbye message on a small sheet of blotting paper that she left inside his diary. She quoted Hamilton Mabie: ‘Don’t be afraid of opposition. Remember, a kite rises against, not with, the wind.’¹⁰⁹ Wang Qiuhua’s choice of encouraging words for her father succinctly concurred with the view that you should refuse to negotiate if your counterpart requests something you cannot support.¹¹⁰ This view, to a certain extent, explains the actions taken by tens of thousands of nationalist-minded Chinese, who were emotionally unprepared to accept the unfavourable treaty that the GMD government signed with the Soviet Union, and expressed their anger in a nationwide anti-Soviet protest in early 1946.¹¹¹

However, it is vital for the weak to have moral courage in reaching agreements with stronger parties on the basis of interests, not positions.¹¹² During the Sino-Soviet treaty negotiations, Chiang Kai-shek and his interlocutors were rationally prepared to abandon pursuit of the preferred and settle for the possible. Walking away from the GMD’s position on China’s sovereign right over Outer Mongolia, the prediction Chiang Kai-shek had made before World War II materialised: a full-scale military confrontation between the USSR and Japan—the 1905 Russo-Japanese War, déjà vu—but the Soviets and Chinese Nationalists were on the winning side this time. Most importantly, Chiang won a Soviet pledge of support for the GMD’s post-war control of Manchuria. Chiang Kai-shek and his negotiators were nonetheless aware that accepting a weak treaty could spark popular as well as internal discontent. In this sense, the GMD’s greatest sacrifice in signing the treaty was not Chinese sovereignty over a breakaway landlocked border region or Russian privileges in Manchuria, but the sidestepping of their emotional and ideological responsibilities to the Chinese people.

Making concessions is a high-stakes game in international treaty negotiations. Concession-making cannot be haphazard. This can put the concession-maker on the spot if the other party is unable to reciprocate proportionally.¹¹³ Chiang Kai-shek and his interlocutors were left exposed by the substantial concessions they had made in the treaty, even as Chiang resorted to shift the blame onto Wang, to protect his brother-in-law Song. The political reality for the Nationalists after the treaty was that if the Soviets did not reciprocate Chiang Kai-shek’s concessions by making good their promise to support the Nationalists’ bid for Manchuria, it would be extremely difficult for the GMD to shed its weak-kneed image.

The GMD leaders were also aware that the real haggling would start after the Sino-Soviet Treaty was signed. In the lead-up to the post-treaty negotiations held in Changchun, GMD officials tried desperately to obtain Soviet support for the GMD’s troop entry into Manchuria, particularly at Dalian. Unfortunately, their attempts failed even before the game began. The GMD’s unilateral moves triggered a treaty interpretation dispute between Moscow and Chongqing. As a result, the GMD negotiators were forced to begin talks in Changchun without a prior agreement with their Soviet counterparts on whether the issues under dispute were negotiable.

Further, chief negotiator Xiong did not establish a good working relationship with his Soviet counterpart Malinovsky. As Cohen has remarked, ‘all negotiations involve a problem-solving element and a relationship element’,¹¹⁴ but it is always advisable to be ‘hard on the problem but easy on the people’ when entering into any negotiating situation.¹¹⁵ The lack of rapport between the Soviets and the Chinese at the Changchun negotiations proved detrimental to the outcome. First, it encouraged univocal and exclusivist rhetoric from both parties in expressing their respective views on principle disagreements. Second, both parties presented tough opening stances at the onset of negotiations. Moreover, the situation encouraged the Soviets to sanction the Nationalists at a time when the GMD–Soviet relationship was at a low point.

Xiong later blamed Malinovsky’s personal style. Indeed, foreign policy under Stalin has been criticised for its crudeness and excessive shrewdness, which worked against overall Soviet foreign policy objectives.¹¹⁶ Nevertheless, Xiong failed to acknowledge that the USSR’s foreign policy process, like that of all superpowers, was awfully messy. While the superpowers are giants in world politics, they usually have troubled lives. For Xiong, negotiating with the Soviets was similar to facing a dilemma: a dilemma cannot be resolved but must be managed. Xiong was the lead negotiator of a weaker party, which means that he had to deal with the situation skilfully, however harrowing this might be.¹¹⁷

There is no winning formula for effective negotiation, and the tough stance that Xiong took by addressing the dispute over Dalian at the start of the Changchun negotiation might not justify criticism in itself. However, as Xiong’s belligerence was instantly mirrored by Malinovsky, Zhang and Chiang Ching-kuo’s more moderate initial position could have been more prudent. Recent studies have demonstrated that when an opposing party does not mirror a moderate opening stance, this is likely to create constraints regarding its response.¹¹⁸

Once the process is underway, upholding negotiation positions does not usually lead to conflict resolution.¹¹⁹ In the face of relentless Soviet rejection, the GMD’s interest in Dalian (attached to its initial negotiating position) dwindled. The Nationalist leaders were interested in sending troops to Dalian for its geographical advantage, superior harbour conditions and easy rail system access. Most significantly, GMD troop entry into Dalian would have produced enough glory to satisfy China’s national pride. None of the above advantages were possible without full Soviet support, however. Ultimately, the GMD’s insistence on sending its forces to Dalian was tantamount to pursuing a hollow position.

Yet Chiang Kai-shek had also called for preparations to move the troops overland as soon as the negotiations reached an impasse in Changchun, clearly demonstrating that he knew the GMD forces had no real chance of entering via the sea. Hence, Chiang’s instructions to his negotiators to uphold their position on territorial integrity regardless of Soviet objections, and his disturbing lectures to Petrov on Chinese sovereign rights, were astonishing examples of refusing to make further concessions before the Soviets reciprocated the major concessions he had made in the Sino-Soviet Treaty. In other words, Chiang Kai-shek needed to reconcile his stance in the current negotiation with the compromises he had made in the past.

Chiang Ching-kuo’s letter to Chiang Kai-shek verifies the claim that the vulnerable often find ‘a false security’ in using perseverance to create an image of greater independence and power, even at the risk of self-defeat.¹²⁰ The problem is that such an approach does not improve the negotiating leverage of the weaker party. In the GMD’s case, its insistence on haggling over Dalian from the high moral ground of sovereignty and territorial integrity invoked a heavy-handed reprisal by the Soviet forces against GMD activities in Changchun and ultimately cleared the way for the Soviets to shift their support to the CCP. Perhaps the GMD’s predicament is best described by Cohen’s description of the relations between American political negotiators and their international counterparts: Chiang Kai-shek’s plan to negotiate with the Soviets for the recovery of Manchuria was scuttled by ‘the twin rocks of pride and sovereignty’.¹²¹

As the Sino-Soviet negotiations spun out of the GMD’s control, it also became more difficult for GMD leaders to manoeuvre at the interstices of Great Power competition. Chiang Kai-shek’s overt reliance on US logistical support for GMD troop deployment to Manchuria was incompatible with the position of non-involvement that he intended to establish in the face of US–Soviet global rivalry. When the United States was alarmed by the ever-escalating situation in Manchuria, fearing it could be embroiled in direct confrontations with the Soviet Union, it resorted to threatening the GMD to adopt a crisis avoidance stance as a condition of continuing to receive US military aid.

Meanwhile, the CCP emerged from the GMD–Soviet dispute over Dalian as a beneficiary. As the GMD armies were prohibited from entering the Lüshun–Dalian zone, the major shipping routes between the Liaodong Gulf and the CCP base areas in the eastern China coastal province of Shandong were laid open to the CCP. The huge influx of CCP combatants from the sea soon proved a major threat to Chiang Kai-shek’s attempt to exert control over Manchuria.

Losing his initiative in the race for territorial recovery in Manchuria against the CCP, Chiang Kai-shek was forced to land his two armies at Qinhuangdao and move them into the north-east via an overland route. Chiang was, however, cautious about the combat risk that his armies would face. Du was instructed on 7 November to secure the land transport corridor between Shanhaiguan at the coastal end of the Great Wall in China proper to the Manchurian city of Jinzho, without pushing his elite forces further to the north.¹²²

Chiang noted that the unfavourable situation had forced him to shift his focus from the north-east to China proper before he could make a final effort to show an optimistic face regarding the problems in Manchuria. As he noted, this would be to ‘make a last try to save the dying horse’.¹²³ Discussing people’s different perceptions of negotiation before and after a crisis, William Zartman laments that people ‘only lock the stable door after the horse has bolted’.¹²⁴ In GMD’s case, the champion race horse in Chiang Kai-shek’s stable lay dying after being mortally injured on the racecourse, but Chiang kept flogging it as long as he saw some movement.