ms throughout
             the country. Lacking internal authority, it did not carry much weight
             in its foreign relations. As it struggled awkwardly, there arose two
             more radical political forces, the relatively powerful Kuomintang of
             Sun Yat-sen and Chiang Kai-shek, and the younger and weaker
             Communist Party of China (CPC ). With indispensable support from the
             CPC and the Third International, the Kuomintang achieved sufficient
             success so it felt justified in proclaiming a new government,
             controlled by itself, for the whole of China. For a time the
             Kuomintang made a valiant effort to tackle China's numerous and
             colossal problems, including those that had ruined its predecessor :
             poor communications and the wide distribution of arms. It also took a
             strongly anti-Western course in its foreign relations, with some
             success. It is impossible to say whether the Kuomintang's regime would
             ultimately have proven viable and successful if it had not been ruined
             by an external enemy, as the Republic had been by its internal
             opponents. The more the Japanese exerted preemptive pressures on
             China, the more the people tended to look on the Kuomintang as
             the only force that prevent china from being dominated by Japan.
             During the Sino-Japanese war of 1937, the Kuomintang immediately
             suffered major military defeats and lost control of eastern China. It
             was only saved from total hopelessness or defeat by Japan's suicidal
             decision to attack the United States and invasion of Southeastern
             Asia. But military rescue from Japan brought no significant
             improvement in the Kuomintang's domestic performance in the political
             ...