Gen, Chiang Kai-shek promptly and energetically took advantage of his remarkable military victory and, concentrating his efforts. on the province of Szechuen, started a fundamental military and political reorganization of this province which went hand in hand with far-reaching measures for economic reconstruc tion, He thus initiated what we might term the frst period of rela~ tions between Central Government and Szechuen in most recent times.
Tt will be remembered that conditions in Szechuen before the bexinning of this first period were in each and every respect typical for the remoter provinces of China where ttle or no influence of the Central Government, conducting tts Administration along modern ines, was exerted: warlords were In com= mand of the province, with their private armies fighting each other: the population suffered of sponging pillaging soldiers: taxes were arbitrarily "levied whenever and wherever there. was suffelent power to enforce their collection: trans-Vorlation was unsafe: both an estab-Vshed judicial code anda stable and universal currency system were Those were some characteristic features of the old Szechuen when Gen, Chiang first established the in= fluence of the Central Government the province. He personally rected reconstruction during the rst months and created that change of conditions which characterized the situation in Szechuen during the last two years up to the recent conferences which represent another landmark.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.