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The next flag not only looks awesome but was wielded by warlords by the name of the Fengtian Clique. I assumed the Fengtian Clique were a lot like today’s G-Unit but it turns out they were even more gangster. The Fengtian Army had 100 aircraft, including bombers and fighter planes – pretty decent for a warlord in the 1920s – and at least one tank. Not only did they have suicide units but they were called “dare to die” units. Like all gangsters the Fengtian Clique met a bad end. Leader Zhang Zhuolin and son Xueliang did not get to live out their lives in prison making spaghetti sauce and slicing garlic with razors. After Zhuolin was assassinated by his Japanese sponsors in 1928, Xueliang, womanizer and opium addict, kicked his habit and threw in with Chiang Kai-shek. After some secret conferences, kidnappings, and other shenanigans Chiang got Xueliang hooked on opium again and imprisoned him. Xueliang was only released in 1990 which makes quite likely the longest held political prisoner in history.

This super retro design is the Jiangxi Soviet Flag, the flag of the Jiangxi-Fujian Soviet Republic or, more succinctly, the China Soviet Republic. On November 7, 1931, the anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution and with the support of the Soviets, a new country was founded in the center of China. Led by a charismatic Head of State and Prime Minister, they started their own banks, and started printing their own money. The man serving as both Head of State and as Prime Minister of the Soviet Republic of China was a young man from Hunan whose wife had recently been executed – Mao Zedong. The characters, from right to left, read Communist Party of China. The second flag is a much lamer flag from the China Soviet Republic.

This glowing golden crown motif on the flag below is ironic considering it represents the October 10, 1911 Wuchang uprising that sparked the Xinhai Revolution that put the final nail in the coffin of the Qing Dynasty and ended monarchal rule in China. Wuchang was a Russian concession city in Hubei that manufactured bombs for the New Army – an army founded in 1895 by Empress Dowager Ci Xi, trained with western methods and equipped, at first, with German arms.

You could see the logo below as an explosion since that’s what happened – a bomb blew up in the process of manufacture and the authorities came to investigate. It was a typical John LeCarre airport bookstore thriller kind of situation – names were discovered on lists they weren’t supposed to be on and, facing certain and imminent execution, these names staged a coup. The local officials ran for their lives and the New Army were beaten out of Wuchang in a day. I assume the flag was made during the following six weeks as the revolutionaries made their way to other provinces by telegraph and in person and convinced 15 more to secede.

Next up we’ve got the first flag of the Republic of China, also known as "Five Races Under One Union”. From 1921 to 1928 this flag flew brightly over the eastern parts of Northern China and was raised at the founding of the ROC. Following the philosophy of Sun Yat-sen, the five great races, from top to bottom, are the Han Chinese, the Manchus, the Mongols, the Huis and Uyghurs share the blue stripe, and the Tibetans are represented by the black. Today the Uyghur flag cannot legally be flown in China and the Tibetan flag is also outlawed. There is no legal injunction against flying the current ROC flag, probably because no one on the mainland is foolish enough to even try it.

Finally we have the flag of the Ma Clique, or Ma Family Army, a trio of warlord all named… Ma, who ruled the Gansu, Qinghai, and Ningxia provinces for almost 40 years preceding the founding of the People’s Republic. Ma Bufang, Ma Hongkui, and Ma Hongbin led a group of Hui Chinese – a Muslim Chinese ethnicity – and were assisted by important but not as powerful Mas, Ma Qi, Ma Lin, and Ma Zhongying.

The Three Mas of the Northwest (Bufang, Hongkui, and Hongbin) took control of the provinces during the Warlord Era and held onto it through a series of strategic alliances with the Guominjun and KMT. They battled the Red Army during the Long March and during the Second Sino-Japanese War fought against the Chinese.

After the Communists beat the KMT, the Three Ma Musketeers disbanded. Ma Hongbin rapidly became a communist and eventually the vice-governor of Gansu. Ma Hongkui stayed loyal to the KMT and fled to Taiwan. When he failed to ward off Communist troops in his defense area he fell out of favor with the KMT and took off for Los Angeles.

Ma Bufang escaped to Chongqing and then Hong Kong. Chiang Kai-shek urged him to return to his former command in the Northwest and fight the PLA but he gathered his closes relatives and subordinates and all 200 of them took flight to Saudi Arabia to make a pilgrimage to Mecca.

A lot has happened in the last 100 years in China and it’s fascinating to see the changes reflected and narrated by rectangles of cloth. Men went into battle behind these flags. There was bloodshed and drastic shifts in the countries ruling ideology and leaders came and went, proposed and enacted reforms that transformed China from an inward looking nation to an economic giant tearing into a new century that it will most likely dominate at a ferocious clip with the rest of the world following in its draft. The dreams, the hopes, the sometimes disastrous results, the unbelievable transformation, are all woven into these flags.
 

Related Links
The Fabric of History – A Century of Chinese Flags and the Stories Behind Them (Part 1)
Instant Expert: Important People in Chinese History
Instant Expert: A Quick Guide to China's Dynasties

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