Reasons To Leave China

by Michelle Costa, Jack Young, Amanda Waller, and Samantha Blitzer

Great Famine of China

     The Great Famine of China, also known as the Three Terrible Years, spanned 1959 to 1961, and resulted in between fourteen million and twenty-six million excess deaths.  In addition, 21 million and 34 million fewer births occurred during this time period, resulting in a total population slump.  However, the famine was not even discovered by the world outside of China for twenty years, and has been covered up by the Chinese government.^[1]

     The Great Famine was caused partly by Chinese leader Mao Zedong’s project: the Great Leap Forward.  During this time period, General Mao Zedong focused on industrializing China in a communist fashion.  Millions of farmers were either placed in to communes, where production decreased drastically, or sent by the government to work in steel factories. ^[2] This project, however, while meant to modernize China, resulted in crop decreases of at least forty percent each year. ^[3]

     Mostly, however, the Great Famine resulted from unusual weather between 1958 and 1960.  During the Great Famine, China experienced both terrible floods and droughts, including the overflowing of the Yellow River. ^[4] Every province except Xinjiang and Tibet suffered from these weather problems, and the provinces of Sichuan and Anhui suffered worst of all. ^[5] Immediately after and during the Great Famine, emigration out of China and immigration to North America increased.  

Economic Opportunity

          As a result of rebellions, civil disorders, war, floods, and famine, Chinese citizens seeked new economic opportunity, which could be found in America.^[6]  Most Chinese families sent the patriarch of the family to America. There, he would get a job and a foundation to start a new life. As he worked, he would send monthly pays back to his family in China. After the man would settle down in his new life and country, he would then bring his whole family over to the United States.  Overall, Chinese emigrated together from China in "self-help" groups to America, borrowing money together, then repaying their debts in the United States.^[7] Some common jobs taken by Chinese men who needed to raise money for their family included dirty and neglected second hand jobs such as cooks, peddlers, and storkeepers. ^[8]  Although these jobs were not respected and required hard work, the Chinese people traveled to the United States because the nation provided economic opportunity far greater than China.

Japanese Invasion 

          As Japan began to moderized after the turn of the twentith century, the nation developed a need for natural resources and raw materials to be used in the production of goods.  As a result, Japan decided to advance into China, which was rich in these supplies.  Before actually invadeing China in 1937, in order to weaken China, Japan  assassinated various Chinese government officials.  Japan figured that the occupation would take only three months, but had secretly built a massive army of over four million soldiers and two-thousand seven-hundred airplanes.^[9] 

     Japan's next act of violence occurred on July 7, 1937 at the Marco Polo Bridge in Wanping. In order to enter Wanping, Japan claimed to be missing a soldier and wanted to search the city. Once Japan had gained access into Wanping, however, they opened fire. During the same year, Japan captured Shanghai and within the first six months of the invasion, the city of Nanking fell as well.  In the battle that took place at Nanking, ten thousand civilans were killed and an equal number raped.  The Second Sino-Japanese war, as it become known as, lasted from 1937 until Japan's eventually surrender during after the bombing of Nagasaki.  Japan surrendered to China on September 9, 1945.^[10]

     During and after the war, some Chinese citizens tried desperately to escape the country, many fleeing to America.  Even after the war, China was still starving from Chinese distruction of crops and the economy had been destroyed paying for the Chinese army.