China–Germany relations (1912–1949)

The

The German Empire was, like the other major European powers, initially reluctant to grant recognition to the newly established Republic of China. It eventually did extend recognition in October 1913, after the inauguration of Yuan Shikai as the Republic's first president.^[1] During the First World War, China fought on the side of the Allies in an attempt to reconquer Qingdao, which had been colonized by Germany in 1898. China's entry into the war was a result of agreements between President Yuan Shikai and the United Kingdom.

Weimar Republic and China

Sino-Weimar Republic relations

China	Germany

Under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, the German Army had been restricted to 100,000 men, and its military-industrial production was greatly reduced. To circumvent the treaty's restrictions, German industrial firms formed partnerships with nations such as the Soviet Union and Argentina to produce weapons and sell them legally.^{[citation needed]} After the death of Yuan Shikai, the Republic of China had descended into a civil war between various warlords. German arms producers began looking to re-establish commercial links with China to tap into its vast market for weapons and military assistance.^[2]

The

Nazi Germany and China

China–Nazi Germany relations

China	Germany

Economic and military cooperation

In 1933, the Nazi Party came to power in Germany. The Nazis sought to increase cooperation with the Nationalists in order to gain access to Chinese raw materials.^[9][11] Foreign Minister Konstantin von Neurath very much believed in maintaining Germany's good relations with China and mistrusted the Empire of Japan.^[3][4] The 1931 Japanese invasion of Manchuria had shown the Chinese leadership the need for military and industrial modernization and they wanted German investment.^[12] Moreover, the rapid rise of Nazi Germany's military strength led some Chinese elites to explore fascist ideas.^[13] In May 1933, Hans von Seeckt arrived in Shanghai to oversee German economic and military involvement in China. He submitted the Denkschrift für Marschall Chiang Kai-shek memorandum outlining his programme for industrialising and militarising China. He called for a small, mobile, and well-equipped force to replace the massive but under-trained army. In addition, he advocated for the army to be the "foundation of ruling power" and for military power to rest in qualitative superiority derived from qualified officers.^[14] Von Seeckt suggested that the first step toward achieving this framework was the uniform training and consolidation of the Chinese military under Chiang's command and that the entire military system must be subordinated into a centralised hierarchy. Toward that goal, von Seeckt proposed the formation of a "training brigade" to replace the German eliteheer, which would train other units, with its officer corps selected from strict military placements.^[15]

In January 1934, the Handelsgesellschaft für industrielle Produkte, or Hapro, was created to unify all German industrial interests in China.^[16] The most important industrial project from the Sino-German cooperation was the 1936 Three-Year Plan, which was administered by the Chinese government's National Resources Commission and the Hapro corporation. It had several basic components, such as the monopolisation of all operations of tungsten and antimony, the construction of the central steel and machine works in Hubei, Hunan, and Sichuan, and the development of power plants and chemical factories. Cost overruns for the projects were partly assuaged by the fact that the price of tungsten had more than doubled between 1932 and 1936.^[17] Germany also extended a 100-million Reichsmark line of credit to the Kuomintang. The Three-Year Plan introduced a class of technocrats to run the state-owned projects.^{[clarification needed]}

The Chinese military was an important customer for German arms manufacturers and heavy industry. Chinese exports to Germany, including deliveries of tin and tungsten, were also seen as vital.^[18] At its height, Germany accounted for 17% of China's foreign trade and China was the largest trade partner for German businesses in Asia.^[19][20]

Germany sent military advisers such as

As the 1930s progressed, "the Nazi government began leaning noticeably closer to Japan" while "the advisors (and many members of the German army) continued to push for a stronger Sino-German relationship".[25] Although Neurath and the German Foreign Office continued to favor a pro-China foreign policy, "Ambassador-Plenipotentiary at Large" Joachim von Ribbentrop—who was in charge of an unofficial, alternative foreign ministry sponsored by Hitler—strongly preferred an alliance with Japan.^[26] For their part, the Japanese political and military establishments were, by 1934, less than certain about the usefulness of the new Hitler government in Germany, which Tokyo assumed would attempt to maintain a peaceful relationship with the Soviet Union and avoid any open alignment with Moscow's enemies. The distrust that Japan felt was partially caused by the close relationship between Germany and China, which, in turn, was perceived as an ally of the Soviet Union against Japan.^[27] So Japanese Ambassador Kintomo Mushanokōji and military attaché Hiroshi Ōshima often worked closely with Ribbentrop to undermine German-Chinese economic and diplomatic relations.^[20][3]

One of the major questions was whether Germany would recognize the Japanese puppet state in Manchukuo, installed after the 1931 Japanese invasion of Manchuria. A recognition of Manchukuo, as suggested by German ambassador in Tokyo Herbert von Dirksen beginning in early 1934, would have clearly signaled support for Japanese expansionism. But fearing that the Chinese and Soviets would perceive such a move as an attempted encirclement, recognition of Manchukuo was initially opposed by Neurath and the Foreign Office.^[28] In response to his initial request to recognize Manchukuo, Ambassador Dirksen was instructed to avoid "any close relations with Japan which might lay [Germany] open to being suspected of wishing to render assistance against Russia". This level of caution was also attributable to the Germans' impression that war between Japan and the USSR could be on the horizon. They assumed that the Soviet Union would receive the aid of the western democracies if it were to break out, and the German Foreign Office sought, at all costs, to avoid entanglement in such a conflict.^[29]

Anti-Comintern Pact

In mid-1935, in an effort to square the circle between seeking a rapprochement with Japan and Germany's traditional alliance with China, Ribbentrop and Ōshima devised the idea of an anticommunist alliance as a way to bind China, Japan, and Germany together.^[30] Wang Jingwei was in favor of joining the pact, but Chiang Kai-shek was careful not to offend the Soviet Union, which was China's only potential partner in case of a Japanese attack.^[31]: 237 Chiang knew that the Japanese regarded Chinese adhesion to the proposed pact as a way of subordinating China to Japan. As the Chinese hesitated, Foreign Minister Neurath and War Minister Werner von Blomberg persuaded Hitler to shelve the proposed treaty to avoid damaging Germany's good relations with China.^[30] But Ribbentrop disagreed and argued that Germany and Japan should sign the pact regardless.^[30] A revival of interest in both Tokyo and Berlin led to the signing of the Anti-Comintern Pact on 25 November 1936, without Chinese participation, although China did receive an invitation to join.^[32] After serious consideration, the Chiang administration refused.^[33] They were unwilling to align with Japan without a retreat of Japanese forces from China. Such a retreat was rejected by Japan, which meant that China was unwilling to offend the Soviet Union, the only major power that would be able to effectively aid them in the case of a war against Japan.^[34] The Anti-Comintern Pact marked the beginning of Germany's shift away from China and towards Japan.^[35]

Chinese Finance Minister

Despite German reassurances, the outbreak of the

Germany continued to side with Japan, and in 1940 signed the Tripartite Pact with Japan and Italy.^[46][47] In July 1941, Germany officially recognised Wang Jingwei's puppet government in Nanjing after negotiations by its Foreign Minister Chu Minyi.^[48] Nationalist China did not declare war on Germany, Italy, or even Japan until after the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941.^[49][50] In retaliation, the Gestapo launched mass arrests and full-scale persecution of Chinese Germans.^[51][52]

See also

• China–Germany relations
• Foreign relations of the Axis powers
• History of foreign relations of China
• Persecution of Chinese people in Nazi Germany

References

Citations

Bibliography

• Craig, Gordon A.; Gilbert, Felix, eds. (1953). "The German Foreign Office from Neurath to Ribbentrop". The Diplomats: 1919-39. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. pp. 406–436.
• Weinberg, Gerhard (1980). The Foreign Policy of Hitler's Germany: Starting World War II 1937–39. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
  ISBN 0-226-88511-9
  .
• Bloch, Michael (1992). Ribbentrop. New York: Crown Publishing.
• Taylor, Jay (2009). The Generalissimo.
  ISBN 9780674033382
  .
• Chen, Yin-Ching. "Civil Law Development: China and Taiwan" (PDF). Stanford Journal of East Asian Affairs. Spring 2002, Volume 2. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2006-05-24.
• China Year Book, 1929–1930 (1930). North China Daily News & Herald.
• Chu Tzu-shuang. (1943) Kuomintang Industrial Policy Chungking.
• Ellis, Howard S (1929). French and German Investments in China. Honolulu.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
• Fass, Josef (1968). "Sun Yat-sen and Germany in 1921-1924". Archiv Orientální. 36. Praha: 135–148.
  ProQuest 1304093042
  .
• Fischer, Martin (1962). Vierzig Jahre deutsche Chinapolitik. Hamburg.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
• Griffith, Ike (1999). Germans and Chinese. Cal University Press.
• ISBN 0-8047-1209-3
  .
• Liu, Frederick Fu (1956). A Military History of Modern China, 1924–1949. Princeton University Press.
• Sun Yat-sen (1953). The International Development of China. Taipei: China Cultural Service.
• Wheeler-Bennet, J., ed. (1939). Documents on International Affairs. Vol. 2. London.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
• US War Department Strategic Service Unit (1946), German Intelligence Activities In China During World War II (Declassified and Approved for Release By The Central Intelligence Agency, Nazi War Crimes Disclosure Act)
• ISBN 0-226-88509-7
  .
• Ferris, John; Mawdsley, Evan, eds. (2015). Fighting the War. The Cambridge History of the Second World War. Vol. 1. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  ISBN 9781107038929
  .
• ISBN 978-0-547-84056-7. Archived
  from the original on 12 October 2022. Retrieved 27 January 2020.
• Boyd, Carl (1977). "The Role of Hiroshi Ōshima in the Preparation of the Anti-Comintern Pact". Journal of Asian History. 11 (1): 49–71.
  JSTOR 41930226
  .
• Stratman, George John (1970). Germany's diplomatic relations with Japan 1933–1941. Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers. Vol. 2450. University of Montana.
• Lambert, Margaret; et al., eds. (1973). 14. Juni bis 31. Oktober 1934. Akten zur deutschen auswärtigen Politik 1918–1945. Vol. C-3. Vandenhoeck + Ruprecht.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Sino-German cooperation.

• Letter from Chiang Kai-shek to Adolf Hitler