Chinese Civil War Compare and Contrast

What finally undermined the Nationalist government was not war or politics but economics. The military and political success of the Communists under Mao Zedong certainly played a vital part in determining their takeover in 1949, but it is arguable that the single most powerful reason for the failure of the GMD government was inflation…By 1949 China’s monetary system had collapsed, the government was discredited, and the people of Nationalist China were demoralized. Even had the Nationalists not been defeated in the civil war and driven from the mainland it is difficult to see how Jiang Jieshi and the GMD could have continued to hold power in China.

The most important near cause of the downfall of the Nationalists was the eight-year Japanese war, which completely exhausted the government militarily, financially, and spiritually. Had there been no Japanese war, the situation in China would have been very different… Many of the disastrous repercussions of the war … continued to plague the Nationalists during their struggle with the Communists. The price the Nationalists paid to win the Japanese war was also the first installment toward its eventual downfall.