War Lord Battles

"Name all the Gods, and in their name I tell you France must help me--must!" Thus, at Peking, to a French correspondent, thundered last week the great barbaric War Lord of Manchuria, Chang Tso-lin. Thumping a table top with the hilt of his sword, Chang continued: "The advance of the Chinese Nationalists northward from Shanghai against me (TIME, March 28 et seq.) is of international importance. If Bolshevism triumphs in China, it will triumph throughout the world. The Great Powers must help me to push the Nationalists back, South of the Yangtze River. Then I will treat with their military leader, Chiang Kaishek, on a brotherly basis. With him I have no quarrel, for I hear that in his heart he too wants to get rid of the Bolsheviks. Only two Chinese parties would then face each other across the Yangtze, and it should not be hard to establish a great laborious country, peaceful and blessed by the Gods."

Yellow Magic. To back up these warlike words, Chang Tso-lin was hastening last week the advance southward of an army commanded by his son, Marshal Chang Hsueh-liang. As his troop trains rumbled into the province of Honan, little papers by thousands were found strewn along the tracks. When Chang's soldiers read them, they discovered with terror that a mighty brotherhood of magicians, the Red Lances, had imprinted the papers with curses. "Whoso enters Honan to fight her defenders," read the curse, "shall suffer the withdrawal of the protection of his ancestors. Beware!"

Before a threat so awful, despatches told, the entire army halted. Frantically young Chang Hsueh-liang telegraphed his father, Chang Tso-lin, to send still more potent magicians from Peking to break the curse. Soon, by special train, these gentry arrived. They advised that each soldier should break the curse against himself individually by tying a small "magic rag" to his rifle and wetting it with "enemy blood."

Since the magicians had brought plenty of "magic rags," from Peking, the grateful soldiers had only to perform the simple task of drawing each a little "enemy blood" in which to dip the rags. Emboldened, valorous, they advanced a considerable distance into Honan.

Battles. Most important of the Chinese engagements, last week, were two serious clashes near Yangchow. Northern troops commanded by Sun Chuan-fang, recent ly driven from Shanghai (TIME, March 7), turned back upon the, Southern Nationalists who had been pursuing them, dealt two heavy blows, and recaptured "Yangchow. Though the number of troops involved was not great, this was the first action in which the Nationalists have suffered a definite defeat since they left Canton on their great campaign which has resulted in the capture of all China South of the Yangtze.

Reds Raided. Emboldened by this Northern success, War Lord Chang Tso-lin, at Peking, ordered his soldiers to enter the grounds of the Soviet Embassy, and to seize all documents and persons in the various subsidiary offices and outbuildings, sparing only the Embassy itself.

This act was, of course, in flagrant violation of diplomatic usage. Chang, however, knew that it would be condoned if not approved by non-Reds throughout the world. He was right. Immediately thereafter the Municipal Council of Occidentals who administer the international city at Shanghai employed "White Russian" mercenary soldiers to picket the Soviet Consulate and search all who left or entered. This, too, was in contravention of international usage., but in most non-Red countries was condoned if not approved. It was expected that translations of the documents seized from the Reds at Peking and Shanghai would amply justify the seizure in the eyes of those who seized them and perhaps before non-Red public opinion generally.