Second Encirclement Campaign against Jiangxi Soviet

Second Encirclement Campaign
Part of the Chinese Civil War
Location of Jiangxi
Date April 1 - May 31, 1931 Location Jiangxi province Result Red Army victory
Belligerents
Republic of China	Chinese Red Army
Commanders and leaders
He Yingqin Chiang Kai-shek	Zhu De Mao Zedong
Strength
200,000	30,000+
Casualties and losses
30,000	?

The Second Encirclement Campaign (Chinese: 第二次围剿) against Jiangxi Soviet was a series of battles launched by the Chinese Nationalist Government in the hope of encircling and destroying the Jiangxi Soviet after the previous campaign had failed. The Red Army repelled the encirclement by launching their Second Counter-Encirclement Campaign (Chinese: 中央苏区第二次反围剿), also called by the communists as the Second Counter-Encirclement Campaign at Central Revolutionary Base (Chinese: 中央革命根据地第二次反围剿), in which the local Chinese Red Army successfully defended the Jiangxi Soviet against the Nationalist attacks from April 1, 1931, to May 31, 1931.

TIME magazine reported that on Jan. 26, 1931, Chinag Kai-shek ordered an offensive launched on January 19 by the 18th army division, when the Red Army managed to encircle it, they gave up their weapons along with the defection of the entire division to the Communist side. 100,000 were reported killed by the Communists. The communists demanded that 2 Million Mexican dollars be paid for the release of the divisional Commander Chang Chi-tsan, Chiang responded with a renewed 4 division offensive.

After the defeat of the first encirclement campaign, the nationalists quickly regrouped and prepared for the second encirclement campaign against the Jiangxi Soviet. In February 1931, Chiang Kai-shek named He Yingqing the acting commander-in-chief and deployed nineteen divisions totaling over 200,000 troops for the second encirclement. The nationalists completed their planned deployment by late March 1931.

In contrast, the communists were slow to develop their own strategies because of internal power struggles. Wang Ming’s protégé Xiang Ying had reached the Jiangxi Soviet after the third planetary session of the sixth national conference of the Communist Party of China, and on January 15, 1931, the communist Jiangxi Soviet (Communist) Central Bureau for political administration and the Central Military Commission were formed. Xiang Ying became the head of both organizations, as party secretary of the bureau and chairman of the commission.

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