Chiang Kai-Shek was a great military mind of his time. So how come Chiang Kai-Shek can be considered solely responsible for the failure of the KMT to maintain control of China? He manage to practically exterminate the communist during the long march, However later when he should have been rallying the support of the Chinese Peasant and working to improve China's economic conditions he chose to rather continue to chase down the few communists surviving. When China was being invaded by a foreign power, Japan, He did what no other politician would do he ignored the threat and waited for western powers to respond and kick the Japanese out. When World War II broke out he stockpiled the weapons given to him by the USA to use against the communist afterwards. On top of all that, The Nationalist regime wa saturated with corrupted officials. The result of all this was the communist were able to appeal to the frustrated (major understatement) Chinese peasants by using guerilla tactics against the Japanese Kwantung army, and preaching Land reform. The failure of the KMT to maintain control of China after a relatively successful military campaign against the communists can be attributed solely to the poor political skills of Chiang Kai-Shek as seen through his ineffectualness to control corruption within the party, his lack of response to Japanese invasion, his neglection to appeal to peasant majority of China, and his inability to focus on a single ideology, .
The rise of the Kuomintang party in China was a long and arduous journey which began mainly in 1912 with the overthrow of the Manchu Dynasty. At the Times Chian was ruled by warlords who held parts of China's territory as tiny provinces. When the Manchus were overthrown it was assumed that Sun Yat sen, the founder of the KMT and his three principle , nationalism, democracy and peoplrs livelihood, would take control of China and rule.
