THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MANCHURIAN ATLAS: COMPETITIVE GEOPOLITICS, PLANNED INDUSTRIALIZATION, AND THE RISE OF HEAVY INDUSTRIAL STATE IN NORTHEAST CHINA, 1918-1954 A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE DIVISION OF THE SOCIAL SCIENCES IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY BY HAI ZHAO CHICAGO, ILLINOIS DECEMBER 2015 For My Parents, Zhao Huisheng and Li Hong ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS It has been an odyssey for me. The University of Chicago has become both a source of my intellectual curiosity and a ladder I had to overcome. Fortunately, I have always enjoyed great help and support throughout the challenging journey. I cannot express enough thanks to my academic advisors—Professor Bruce Cumings, Professor Prasenjit Duara, and Professor Guy Alitto—for their dedicated teaching, inspiring guidance and continued encouragement. I have also benefited immensely, during various stages of my dissertation, from the discussions with and comments from Professor Salim Yaqub, Professor James Hevia, Professor Kenneth Pomeranz, and Professor Jacob Eyferth. Professor Dali Yang of Political Sciences and Professor Dingxin Zhao of Sociology provided valuable insights and critiques after my presentation at the East Asia Workshop. My sincere thanks also goes to Professor Shen Zhihua at the East China Normal University who initiated my historical inquiry. I am deeply indebted to my friends and colleagues without whom it would not have been possible to complete this work: Stephen Halsey, Paul Mariani, Grace Chae, Suzy Wang, Scott Relyea, Limin Teh, Nianshen Song, Covell Meyskens, Ling Zhang, Taeju Kim, Chengpang Lee, Guo Quan Seng, Geng Tian, Yang Zhang, and Noriko Yamaguchi. I am grateful to Professor Yiching Wu of the University of Toronto for sharing his struggle and triumph with me. My heartfelt thanks go to Sonja Rusnak, David Goodwine, and Joanne Berens for their professional work and countless help over the years. Finally, no words can express my gratitude to my parents and my loving wife Qiu Ling. Their unwavering trust and support was the shining beacon of hope that led me out of the treacherous waters. iii ABSTRACT The different paths of economic development between Manchuria and the China proper in modern times has long been noticed and attributed to the distinctive Japanese colonialism and imperialism. Contrary to the literatures that examine Manchuria through national historical perspectives, this thesis proposes a Manchuria-centered regional economic point of view that cuts through Chinese warlord, Japanese imperialist, Nationalist, and Communist political regimes between 1918 and 1954, and reconnects these fragmented periods back into a continuous pattern of political economy, conceptualized as the heavy industrial state. Four major characteristics of the heavy industrial state in Manchuria are described and analyzed in a chronological order with the existing and recently unveiled historical records. First, the Manchurian state consistently spends a considerable portion of revenue on increasing industrial output by building, consolidating and expanding modern fiscal and monetary power. It prioritizes heavy industrialization under shifting geopolitical pressures through empowered central planning agencies and in the form of annual or five-year plans. In addition, the state enterprise system and its government managing apparatus are the main developmental actors to carry out the economic plans conceived and financed by the state. And finally, the heavy industrial state derives its core technological and managerial assistances and acquires the advanced machinery mostly through exclusive political-military alliances with preferential terms. As a fertile soil for experimenting European anti-liberal capitalism ethos, military, political, economic and technological elites of East Asia, though implacable foes against each other in many respects, explored a resembling prototype of the future developmental and socialist state in Manchuria. However, they also built a special state-economy/society relationship into the semi- iv periphery state that exudes the chronic problem of addressing national autonomy at the expense of profitability, despite its merits in claiming miraculous economic results in Asia. This cradle and training camp of Manchurian Atlas becomes a focal point once again when China is poised for deepening the reform of its economic system and widening its integration into the global capitalist system in the 21st century. v TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS…………………………………………………………….………...iii ABSTRACT….………………………………………………………………………….…….....iv LIST OF TABLES………………………………………………………………….…………..viii INTRODUCTION……………………………………………………………………….………..1 CHAPTER 1 CONSTRUCTING A NEW NORTHEAST, 1918-1931……………………………….………..30 1.1 Modernizing State Finance in Manchuria………………………………………........35 1.2 Founding a Modern Industrial State……………………………………………........48 1.3 Trisecting the Manchurian Railway System………………………………….……...69 CHAPTER 2 PLANNED HEAVY INDUSTRIALIZATION IN MANCHUKUO, 1931-1945……………… 85 2.1 Building a Modern Monetary and Fiscal System………………..………..................87 2.2 Evolution of Economic Planning Agencies and the Making of Manchurian Industrial Development Plans………………….…………………….……….….....103 2.3 From SMR to MHID: Restructuring the Special Corporation System for Rapid Industrialization……………………………………………………….……..133 CHAPTER 3 POSTWAR STRUGGLE OVER MANCHURIAN HEAVY INDUSTRIES, 1945-1948.........153 3.1 Soviet Destruction of Manchurian Industries……………………………..………..157 vi 3.2 Failed Sino-Soviet Economic Cooperation Negotiations……..…………………....171 3.3 Development of Nationalist Planning Agencies and Heavy Industries...…………..183 3.4 Nationalist Plans for Postwar Reconstruction and the NRC Heavy Industrial System…..……………………….…………………………………..…..195 CHAPTER 4: RESURGENCE OF HEAVY INDUSTRIAL STATE IN COMMUNIST MANCHURIA, 1946- 1954……......................................................................................................................................213 4.1 Reformation of Economic Leadership and State Financial System.........………......215 4.2 Evolution of the Communist Heavy Industrial State: From DMI and BIM to NMI …………………………………………………….....233 4.3 Industrial Reconstruction and Reinstallation of Economic Planning……………....258 4.4 Soviet-Manchurian Trades and Soviet Assistance to Heavy Industrialization……..275 EPILOGUE……………………………………………………………………………………..308 BIBLIOGRAPHY………………………………………………………………………………312 vii LIST OF TABLES 1. Major Railways in Manchuria between 1910 and 1930………………………………………75 2. Manchukuo National Budget General and Special Accounting, 1932-1942………….………92 3. Manchukuo Public Debt Balance, 1932-1945……………………………………….………..93 4. Circulation of Bank Notes in Manchuria by the End of 1929……………………….………..94 5. Accounts of the Central Bank of Manchuria……………………………………….…………98 6. Lending By Major Banks in Manchuria, 1936-1941……………………………….…………99 7. Japan’s Trade Surplus with and Investments in Manchuria, 1933-1944………………….…101 8. Target Plan for the Manchuria Development Five-Year Plan………………………..………117 9. MFYP Production Targets and Required Capital Investments for the Mining and Industrial Sector…………………………………..……………...…...……....……………..120 10. Planned and Actualized Investment For the MFYP…………………..……………..…..…124 11. Real Results of Key Industrial Products in the MFYP…………………………..………....125 12. Return of Key Advocates of the MFYP from Manchuria to Japan…………………..…….127 13. Second MFYP Mining and Industry Production Targets……………………………..…....130 14. Major Holdings of the Manchuria Heavy Industrial Development Corporation, 1940….…145 viii 15. MHID Government Subsidy and Profit, 1938-1944…..……………………………………148 16. Proportion of the Total Value of Production by Industries, 1929-1940….………………...151 17. Comparison Between the Pauley Report and the Northeast Industrial Association (NIA) Report...…….…………………...…………………………………………………………..166 18. Overview of the Heavy Industrial Development Five-Year Plan, 1936……….…………...189 19. Annual Government Appropriations for to National Resource Commission (NRC) and NRC Payout to the Government………………...………………………...……….……………..192 20. Reorganization of Japanese-Manchukuo Enterprises into 19 NRC Enterprises……………201 21. NRC Requests of Japanese Industrial Reparations……………………………..…………..203 22. Heavy Industrial Products from Manchuria and the NRC System in Comparison to National Total……………...………………...………..……………………………...…….208 23. Sources of Communist State Revenue in Manchuria, 1948-1949…………………….....…221 24. State Revenue and Expenditure of the Northeast People’s Government, 1949-1952…...…230 25. Historical Comparison of Major Industrial Products……………………………………….232 26. State-owned Enterprises Industrial Output, 1946-1948………………...…………………..242 27. Major Heavy Industrial Assets Taken Over by the Northeast Ministry of Industry (NMI), November 1948…………………...………...........................................................................246 ix 28. Anshan and Benxi Company Production and Reconstruction Summary, 1949……………250 29. Fengman Generator Set Installation Chart………………………………………...………..253 30. Equipment and Capacity of the Nonferrous Industry, 1949……………………...………...256 31. Northeast Ministry of Industry Plan for Investment and Construction, 1949………………263 32. Major State Industry Output and Plan Completion Rate, 1949…………...…………...…...265 33. Comparative Rates of Depreciation in Manchukuo and the Communist Northeast………..267 34. Added Production Capacity in 1950 Compare a Year Before……...………………………272 35.