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Concept
Zhang Zuolin
Summary
Zhang Zuolin (March 19, 1875 June 4, 1928) was a warlord who ruled Manchuria from 1916 to 1928. He led the Fengtian clique, one of the most important factions during China's Warlord Era. During the last year of his life, he briefly installed himself as President of the Republic of China.
Backed by Japan, Zhang successfully influenced politics in the Republic of China during the early 1920s. In the fall of 1924, during the Second Zhili–Fengtian War, he invaded and gained control of Beijing, including the internationally recognized government, in April 1926. His appointment as grand marshal of the Republic of China in June 1927 represented the height of his success, but was quickly followed by defeat: the economy of Manchuria, the basis of his power, was overtaxed by his adventurism and collapsed in the winter of 1927; and he was defeated by the National Revolutionary Army of the Kuomintang under Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek in May 1928. Leaving Beijing in early June to return to Manchuria, he was killed by a bomb planted by infuriated Kwantung Army officers on June 4, 1928; his brief reign presaged the end of Chinese warlordism by December.
Zhang was born in 1875 in Haicheng, a county in southern Fengtian province (modern Liaoning) in northeastern China, to poor parents. He received little formal education, and the only non-military trade that he learned in his lifetime was a small amount of veterinary science. His grandfather had come to the northeast after fleeing a famine in Zhili (modern Hebei) in 1821. As a child, Zhang was known by the nickname "Pimple." He spent his early youth hunting, fishing and brawling. He hunted hares in the Manchurian countryside to help feed his family. In appearance he was thin and short.
Zhang asserted that he was a Han Chinese Bannerman.
When he became old enough to work, he got a job at a stable in an inn, where he became familiar with many bandit gangs operating in Manchuria at the time. As early as 1896 (aged 21) Zhang himself was a member of a well-known bandit gang.
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