It must be remembered that many people in Nanking thought she was Being to her death when she insisted on fying to Sian, She was not blind to the possibilities for she took the precaution to hand a revolver to Mr, Donald, who accompanied hei and to make him promise to shoot her without hesitation should she be Seized by the troops on landing. Thi fears were groundless for the situ: tion was as Madame Chiang Kai-shek, and not a8 some people in Nanking, had originally regarded it. In other Generel "Chang Hsueh-liang very tired, very embarrassed and somewhat ashamed" and General Yang Hucchen "very. nervous and just as obviously very relieved at calm attitude." She assumed that they were gentlemen and they behaved accordingly. The scene at the reunion of husband and wife is told with a quiet sense of drama. General Chiang Kai-shek had not been told of her arrival for she wanted him spared undue anxiety: wits G2TBR lad atta Tae amped ofthe throw from: Bane it machine guns, 1° alk shallon. My" husband "wast" bed, Sulfering' from @-wrenched back. "Hie Looked "wan and the crampies snd "butea by the Packs he clambered over. when sealing about ote for hie resentment inst those Fespon=
"swards for valour "Kelly Wali, "Shanghai. '$8.00.
The improvement in the morale of the Chinese regular army brought about by General Chiang Kal-shek's vigorous reforms and by. the success he. has achieved in unifying the country makes this an exceptionally. timely contribution to the study of current Chinese affairs. Captain Kotenev, as a former soldier himself and as 8 man Who has talon special pains to understand the institutions of the country of his present resience, merits attention as he develops the theme of Chinese militarism, The word is really Inappropriate, because rllitarism, although it has been a reourge in China, especially during the period immediately sallowing the revolution, is not compatible with Chinese ideals. As the author points out in his introduction, Confucius de-fled war og a legitimate instrument of politics, and Mencius went even. further when he declared that men who were successful in marshalling troops were great criminals. A country following philosophy of that sort would not be inclined to elevate the military art to the plane discernible elsewhere. Yet although war at its best ly regarded by Chinese tradition og a punitive measure, an exjecution on a much greater scale, the virtue of military heroism" has neither been neglected nor unpractised. It is often. the fashion to belittle the Chinese soldier because of the pathetic incapacity of his. officers in the past, and the stock jokes regarding the' bloodlessness of some of the apparently fierce campaigns fought in China have been responsible for much misleading. thought on the "subject. Captain Kotenev deals quite frankly and fairly with the question when he points out that the Chinese soldier himself displays a readiness to face death, even when, he is, being but poorly pald, worthy of the recor of any army, and cases of individual treachery and wilful desertion ave been almost unknown, except when an entire unit, under direct orders of its commander, changes fig political or party allegiance.
"The book contains an up-to-date account of the regeneration of the Chinese army under General Chiang Kalshek and it pays strong tribute {o the earlier efforts of General Feng Vu-hsiang, who managed to bring his army to an efficiency at that time unknown in China. He also gives an interesting account of that picturesque war-lord Marshal Chang Chung-chang, whose military qualities Captain Koteney evidently thinks have been overlooked by reason of the attention drawn to hig less attractive propensities. The Marshal created in 1926 2 military cadet school for Russians, and Csptain "Kotenev, not unnaturally, iS] gives the Russian detachment which served under that war-lord a tribute to its gallantry and military discipline, Tu bringing out the new spirit in the modern Chinese army, as revealed by the resistance to the Japanese in Shanghai, and in making a close] and severely professional study of the organization of the Red army, Captain Kotenev adds to the value of his work. He points out that the Red soldier, even though grounded in communist principles, is not at heart communist, whatever his commanders may be. "He is, in the first place, professional, soldier, loyal to his chiefs and maintaining the traditions of the Taipings, the Boxers, and the 'sull earller soldiers of Chinese his have been driven into a corner.
In the earlier part of the book the Chinese science of war is discussed, and it is interesting to note how applicable some of the principles of strategy and tactics are to the warfare of to-day; and, true to the philosophical instincts of the Chinese Face, the heroes mostly held in hon-Jour "are not necessarily those who. have achieved ultimate success on the battlefield, but rather those who suffered death in their effort to up~ hold the cause which they considered Fight. So the most famous military writer, Captain Kotenev says, is Sun Tzu, whose career in the field was chequered, but whose 13 articles on the art of war. were praised by the, Breat T¥ao Ts'ao, a famous captain Jot the Han period, as constituting the most profound treatise on war and "The decay of the Chinese army as an institution of national power due to prevailing pacifist tendencies:
religion, philosophy, Iterature and joven the art of war.- The military Jorganization of the country became subordinate (0 civil matters; antieipa-Ing Gilbert, "the major-general became imbued with literary culture' and China was therefore exposed to. the inroads of alien conquerors. Thus. Jcame about the defeats at the hands Jof Western armies and navies in the 19th century, bringing the story right Jdown to the Boxer débicle and the eventual revolution. The narrative leads to the conclusion that if a satisfactory reconciliation can be. made of the modernization of the Chinese army under General Chiang. Kai-shek with the fine principles: handed down by Confucian traditions, it is possible to see in the future a 'China. strong and capable of defending herself, but sumleiently determined to make her defence' an instrument for national reconstruction ra ther than for external aggression,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.