Wu's Coup de Corde

When one honorable Chinese statesman guarantees the safety of another, then if the latter is straightway executed, it is comme il faut for the embarrassed guarantor to commit suicide, and soon. Embarrassed in the Chinese capital of Nanking, last week, was elder statesman Wu Tze-hui. People kept telling him that a man whose life he had guaranteed, Gen- eral Li Chai-sum, the governor of Canton, had been executed--and there were newspapers to prove it. "Fate leaves me no alternative!" cried grizzled Guarantor Wu. "For my worthless neck the cord!" Presently there were Chinese "Extras!" on the street with news that Wu had committed honorable suicide; and then before long there were "Extra Extras!" screeching that General Li had never been executed at all; but everything came out all right, because almost at once "Extra Extra Extras!" were out with the news that Li had been cut down before he was quite hanged.* In other words, the revolutionary situation in Nanking, last week, was so chaotic that scarcely anyone knew where they were at. One evening it was creditably reported that the General Staff had mutinied and deposed President Chiang Kaishek; but the very next morning China's bantamweight President--who as Marshal Chiang conquered all China--marched forth against the rebels as chief of the General Staff. He left behind him in jail the governor of Canton, who had earlier been reported executed. He denounced him, General Li, as "a traitor to the sacred cause of Nationalism!" Seemingly Li of Canton was in league with the rebels, a clique of military leaders with their base of operations in what are called the Wuhan cities (see below). The incautious Li had come to Nanking (guaranteed as to his life by Wu) in order to attend the third annual Nationalist Party Congress. The Congress adjourned last week after passing resolutions unqualifiedly condemning the Wuhan clique, directing that Li be kept in jail, and entrusting the fullest military authority to President Chiang. Since the wily president had unquestionably "packed" the congress, its actions surprised no one. In Canton yet another military clique, composed of colleagues of General Li, swore vengeance on account of his execution or imprisonment--without knowing which had occurred--moved to join the Wuhan revolt. As Marshal Chiang and his army bore southward upon the rebel areas, the Cantonese colleagues of General Li forgot their indignation and made a neat right-about, in the famed manner of Chinese generals, loudly proclaiming allegiance to President Chiang.

* "Certain degenerate courtiers of dissolute Louis XV claimed to derive exquisite sensations from a partial hanging of this type, which they called Le Coup de Corde. Many experienced hangmen maintain, and so does Novelist James Joyce, that the sensations of a man at the moment he is hanged are by no means always unpleasant, to judge from spasmodic reactions often observed.