The Secret War for China

In 1927, Chiang Kai-shek - the head of China's military academy and leader of the Kuomintang (KMT) - began the `northern expeditions' to bring China's northern territories back under the control of the state. It was during this period that the KMT purged communist activities, fractured the army and sparked the Chinese Civil War - which would rage for over twenty years. The communists, led by General Mao Tse-Tsung, were for much of the period forced underground and concentrated in the Chinese countryside. As the author argues, this resulted in China's war featuring unusually high levels of espionage and sabotage, and increased the military importance of information gathering. Based on newly declassified material, Panagiotis Dimitrakis charts the double-crossings, secret meetings and bloody assassinations which would come to define China's future. Uniquely, The Secret War for China gives equal weighting to the role of foreign actors: the role of British intelligence in unmasking Communist International (Comintern) agents in China, for example, and the allies' attempts to turn nationalist China against the Japanese. The Secret War for China also documents the clandestine confrontation between Mao and Chiang and the secret negotiations between Chiang and the Axis Powers, whose forces he employed against the CCP once the Second World War was over. In his turn, Mao employed nationalist forces who had defected - during the last three years of the civil war about 105 out of 869 KMT generals defected to the CCP. This book is an urgent and necessary guide to the intricacies of the Chinese Civil War, a war which decisively shaped the modern Asian world.

Panagiotis Dimitrakis holds a doctorate in War Studies from King's College London, UK, and is an expert on intelligence and military history.

Abbreviations Acknowledgements Introduction: Suspect Everyone 1. Spies Unleashed 2. Failed Campaigns 3. Shadowing the Comintern 4. Lawrence of Manchuria 5. The Unparalleled Intelligence Failure 6. Rogue Spymasters 7. Learning the Ropes of Espionage 8.  The 'C' 9. The Secret Strategy 10. A mole in Mao's office 11. Murderous Intrigues 12. The Antagonists 13. The Kremlin's Spies 14. Our Man in Yenan 15. Into Manchuria 16. An American General 17. The Japanese Friends 18. The Russian Operatives 19. Uranium 20. Spying on the Cousin 21. The One-Eyed Lieutenant-General 22. Secret Sources 23. Guy Burgess the Spy 24. Spies' Warnings 25. Stalin fears 26. HMS Amethyst Aftermath: 'Your Future is Very Dark'