ABSTRACT
The alliance of the splinter groups in Hong Kong with the Communist Party lifted the names of their leaders from relative obscurity to prominence in the seething rumor markets of present-day China. Alliance with the Hong Kong groups has obvious advantages from the Communists’ point of view. The idea of a coalition government is popular in China. Intellectuals and professional politicians make up almost the entire membership of Chinese democratic groups. In 1940, one group of party dissidents, including General Feng Yu-hsiang and Marshal Li Chi-shen, began to hold regular secret meetings in Chungking to discuss the current political situation. The National Salvation Society is even less of a political party, if possible, than most of the other Hong Kong groups. It came into existence before the Sino-Japanese War when about 300 intellectuals issued a patriotic appeal for resistance against Japan.
