Wang Ching-wei
Wang Ching-wei
(wäng jĭng-wā), 1883–1944, Chinese revolutionary and political leader. A supporter of Sun Yat-senSun Yat-sen, Mandarin Sun Wen, 1866–1925, Chinese revolutionary. He was born near Guangzhou into a farm-owning family. He attended (1879–82) an Anglican boys school in Honolulu, where he came under Western influence, particularly that of Christianity.
..... Click the link for more information. , Wang was sentenced (1910) to life imprisonment for attempting to assassinate the regent of China. Freed in 1912, he studied in France until 1917, when he became personal assistant to Sun. Upon Sun's death (1925) Wang became chairman of the national government, though he remained in conflict with Chiang Kai-shekChiang Kai-shek
, 1887–1975, Chinese Nationalist leader. He was also called Chiang Chung-cheng.
After completing military training with the Japanese Army, he returned to China in 1911 and took part in the revolution against the Manchus (see Ch'ing).
..... Click the link for more information. , who led the military and the right-wing of the KuomintangKuomintang
[Chin.,=national people's party] (KMT), Chinese and Taiwanese political party. Sung Chiao-jen organized the party in 1912, under the nominal leadership of Sun Yat-sen, to succeed the Revolutionary Alliance.
..... Click the link for more information. . In uneasy truce, he served as premier (1932–35) and deputy leader of the Kuomintang (1938). Wang broke with Chiang in 1938, advocating peace with Japan and continued struggle against the Communists. From 1940 to his death he was premier of the Japanese puppet government at Nanjing.
Bibliography
See study by G. E. Bunker (1972).
Wang Ching-Wei
Wang Chao-ming. Born circa 1884; died Nov. 10, 1944. Chinese political figure. Member of the Kuomintang.
Wang Ching-wei participated in the bourgeois Hsinhai Revolution of 1911. In 1925 and 1926 he was chairman of the Kuangchou Kuomintang government. From April through August 1927 he was chairman of the Central Executive Committee of the Kuomintang as well as chairman of the Kuomintang government in Wuhan. In July 1927 he led a counterrevolutionary coup in Wuhan. From 1932 to 1935, Wang Ching-wei was minister of foreign affairs in the Nanking Kuomintang government, and he was the leader of the pro-Japanese faction in the Kuomintang. In December 1938 he fled from the city of Chungking (the provisional capital of China) and openly went over to the side of the Japanese invaders. A traitor to his native land, Wang Ching-wei was head of the puppet government created by the Japanese imperialists in Nanking from 1940 to 1944. He died in Japan.