The British note: prelude to the breach

The diehards, after a short lull, renewed their vigorous campaign for the expulsion of the Russians from Britain at the beginning of 1927. Having exhausted the general strike's potential for rousing anti-Soviet sentiments, they now diverted attention to Russia's ‘subversive activities’ in China. By pointing out the Russians' association with the xenophobic movement in China at the end of 1926 they successfully inflamed passions and resuscitated the debate on the future of Anglo-Soviet relations. The diehards failed, however, to force a rupture on this issue as the threat to British interests in China subsided considerably after Chiang Kai-shek's sudden change of heart towards the Russians.

The Chinese communists, influenced by the Russians to a large extent, had been pursuing united front policies with Kuomintang since 1923. Russian involvement was intensified by the collaboration of military advisers in Chiang Kai-shek's northern expedition, which aimed to unify China and curtail the influence of the imperialist powers. The opposition in Russia, however, had long felt doubts about the fragile nature of the alliance. Indeed on 14 April 1927, a month before the Anglo-Soviet rupture, Chiang Kai-shek suddenly turned against his communist allies, massacring many of them in Shanghai and later in Hankow. Since the events in Shanghai in May 1925, the British Government, though concerned at Soviet influence in Kuomintang, had refrained from intervening directly in the civil war, largely because of its inability to establish which side would emerge victorious.