Talk:Northern Expedition

NRA victory or Nationalist Government victory?

The infobox currently states that this was an NRA victory, but usually don't we say the government/country instead of the army? Alexysun (talk) 01:54, 11 May 2024 (UTC)

What I'm saying is so shouldn't it be Nationalist Government victory or is there a nuance? Alexysun (talk) 01:55, 11 May 2024 (UTC)

@Alexysun: This is a valid question. As I think about it "Nationalist government victory" might actually be better, as many of the warlords (on the winning side) submitted to and even became part of the government, but did not properly join the NRA (though they were assigned official NRA designations). @RGloucester: you did the most to improve the article, what do you think? Applodion (talk) 09:15, 11 May 2024 (UTC)

@Applodion Thank you. Let's see what Gloucester says. Alexysun (talk) 18:44, 11 May 2024 (UTC)

@Alexysun and Applodion: Apologies for the long delay in my response. I agree with the both of you and have remedied the infobox accordingly. RGloucester — ☎ 09:08, 12 September 2025 (UTC)

"Chinese Nationalist Revolution" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Chinese Nationalist Revolution has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2025 March 19 § Chinese Nationalist Revolution until a consensus is reached. - CHAMPION ^{(talk) (contributions) (logs)} 23:07, 19 March 2025 (UTC)

Infobox

Northern Expedition
Part of the aftermath of the Fourth Revolution and the Warlord Era
Clockwise from top-left: Chiang inspecting soldiers of the National Revolutionary Army; NRA troops marching north; an NRA artillery unit in combat; civilians showing support for the NRA; peasants volunteering to join the expedition; NRA soldiers preparing to launch an attack.
Date 9 July 1926 – 29 December 1928 (2 years and 173 days) Location China Result Nationalist victory Nationalist government replaces the Beiyang government Nanjing–Wuhan split occurs Chinese Civil War begins
Belligerents
Republic of China (Beiyang) National Pacification Army Fengtian clique Zhili clique Japan	Republic of China (Nationalist) United Front (until April 1927) Kuomintang Chinese Communist Party (until April 1927) Guominjun Guangxi clique Shanxi clique Other warlord armies Soviet Union Communist International
Commanders and leaders
Zhang Zuolin X Zhang Xueliang Zhang Zongchang Yang Yuting Wu Peifu Sun Chuanfang Chu Yupu	Chiang Kai-shek Feng Yuxiang Li Zongren Bai Chongxi He Yingqin Yan Xishan Zhang Fakui Li Jishen Tan Yankai Cheng Qian Deng Yanda Zhou Enlai Ye Ting Mikhail Borodin Vasily Blyukher
Strength
c. 700,000–1,000,000 (1926) c. 190,000–250,000 (Dec. 1928)	c. 100,000 (July 1926) c. 264,000 (Dec. 1926) c. 700,000 (spring 1927) c. 1,000,000 (1928)
366,000-953,000 deaths (including non-combatants) estimated

@Applodion, I apologize for the uninformed changes I made. I still wish to help improve the infobox, so I have taken what you mentioned in the edit message and made this one. Please do let me know what you think and if it is suitable.

References

Wasting time is still my passion (talk) 20:09, 30 March 2026 (UTC)

I'm puzzled why you decide to change the commanders' flags? Furthermore, why do you remove "Allied warlord armies" from the infobox? In addition, the warlords were part of the United Front. In general, I currently do not see how exactly your proposal improves the existing infobox version. Applodion (talk) 19:52, 31 March 2026 (UTC)

My decision to change the commander flags was to clarify the separation between those part of the KMT and those part of the CCP, although I suppose the NRA was the KMT's military wing and thus this detail is trivial to include. I have edited my proposed infobox with the NRA flags.

I felt that it would be better to list each warload clique individually instead of in parenthesis. Even though it may not directly state "Allied warlord armies", the inclusion of "clique" in the name will provide a similar meaning. The "jun" in Guominjun is "army".

As for the warlords being part of the United Front, I am actually curious why this is the case. The sources I have seen describe the front explicility as a KMT-CCP alliance and does not mention the warlords. However, I trust that you are more familiar than me on the topic, so I just ask if there is a source that I can do some reading on for this topic. Wasting time is still my passion (talk) 06:24, 1 April 2026 (UTC)

There were simply too many warlord cliques to list them all, and for the readers it is clearer to collect them in a group to understand their relation to the overall Nationalist war effort. The warlords' position in the United Front was complex; some southern warlords were original members due to having formally joined the KMT before the Northern Expedition (despite remaining independent), others joined the NRA as the Northern Expedition took place and thereby joined the United Front in a more indirect way. Regardless, they were part of the alliance, as they were part of the wider KMT and NRA umbrella. Applodion (talk) 08:12, 2 April 2026 (UTC)