The Bloody White Baron (21 page)

Asked later how he could claim to be ‘sent by God for the salvation of Mongolia' he replied, ‘I wrote it because it sounded good.'
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But Ungern at least half-believed in the legends himself. He was particularly taken with one that spoke of how ‘Ivan from the North would come to save Mongolia'. Prophecies could be unclear on the details, but they pointed the way nevertheless. Mongolia longed for a foreign saviour, and from there the restoration of the world could begin.

SIX

Ragged Crusade

The sudden departure of Ungern's forces from Dauria sparked rumours from Paris to Tokyo. This mobile, piratical force could strike anywhere, at any time. In Moscow, some of the Soviet newspapers reported that Ungern's forces had been engaged and destroyed, but the Bolshevik leadership knew better and displayed great nervousness as to where he might attack next. The Soviet-run
Far East Review
commentated, ‘If it were announced tomorrow that Ungern was in sight of Irkutsk or at the gates of Peking, we could merely confess our ignorance about where he was, and admit that anything is possible with this devil of a man.'
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The Mongolian rumour mill was better informed. Lacking grapevines, the Mongolians say that news spreads through the countryside like ‘a crack in the ice'. Especially in the summer, life was constantly mobile; trading, visiting, courting were all done on horseback. If your mount was tired or sick, it was perfectly usual to leave it with the family you were staying with and ask to borrow one of theirs in ‘much the same way as a European will turn to a passer-by for a match'. It was a distant echo of the old Mongolian postal system, and Mongolians could travel hundreds of miles in a few days as a result.

News travelled with them. In less than a couple of weeks, virtually all the country knew about the entry of the White forces, and most people were eager for their arrival. Upon crossing the border Ungern was supposed to have made three promises - ‘We will place the Bogd upon the throne, and restore the autonomous government,' ‘We will
free the Mongols from the Chinese,' and ‘We will build Greater Mongolia.'

Mention Mongolia to most Chinese and the inevitable response is, ‘Ah, you know that Mongolia used to be part of China.' A little more drink, and more imperial ambitions begin to emerge; now the Russians are gone, China should take back Mongolia - well, after the persistent canker of Taiwan is dealt with, at least. The Mongolians look on their immensely richer and stronger neighbour nervously. One Mongolian might be worth eight Chinese,
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but there are five hundred Chinese for every Mongolian. They only have to look at Inner Mongolia, where ethnic Mongols, once the majority, now make up less than 5 per cent of the population, to see their likely fate if swallowed by the new Chinese imperium: reduced to a colourful sideshow in dancing displays staged to demonstrate the wonderful diversity of China while their children study Mandarin in school.

The origin of these tensions lies in the years between Mongolian independence and Ungern's invasion. When Ungern visited Mongolia in 1913 it was a sovereign state, albeit one under heavy Russian pressure, newly free of its Chinese overlords and anticipating an independent future. By 1920 it was yet again occupied by Chinese forces. After the collapse of the Qing dynasty in 1911 China had fragmented into a cracked mess of feuding warlords. At first, something of a centralised government remained in Peking, under the leadership of General Yuan Shikai, and was able to conduct diplomatic relationships with other states. China still had considerable territorial ambitions, and the reclamation of Mongolia was an important foreign policy aim.

The weakness of the Chinese government, and the counterbalancing influence of Russia, made this impossible. The Mongolians were even able to win a minor conflict, more a series of skirmishes than an actual war, when they sent troops to support Inner Mongolia's attempt to also break away from China in 1912. Instead, China tried to claim at least symbolic suzerainty over Mongolia at the bargaining table. A tripartite conference was held in 1914 between Russia, China and Mongolia. It dragged on for months, and only the Russians emerged satisfied. The Mongolians, who had been hoping for an acknowledgement of their
full independence, and even harboured ambitions of taking back Inner Mongolia, found themselves forced to accept the dubious status of an ‘autonomous' region of China. The Bogd Khan was made to abandon the title ‘king', thought inappropriate to the new Chinese republic, and to assume the less exalted status of
povelitel
, ‘ruler'. On the other hand, the Chinese agreed not to station large numbers of troops in Mongolia, or settle Chinese there. Mongolia's status was now deeply ambivalent; in theory the country remained part of China, but in practice China had no way of enforcing its authority.

The Bogd Khan was left de facto ruler of Mongolia. His government was not a shining example of civic responsibility. A Western-style government was formed, with two houses of parliament, a prime minister, and a cabinet, but it was a cargo-cult semblance, imitative in form but not in content. Real power lay with the ecclesiastical court and the monasteries. Prominent secular politicians were frequently assassinated, and the business of government conducted in all-night binges at the Bogd's palace.

A couple of the more competent members of the government were assassinated. Others qualified themselves to serve on the Bogd's cabinet by accompanying him in his legendary drinking sessions. The theocrats and aristocrats in the government were primarily interested in enriching themselves, and both their foreign and domestic policies were wasteful, aimless and costly. Taxation, a perennial source of complaint under Manchu rule, was increased under the new government, and entire regions were impoverished. Five million silver taels, a huge amount of money, was borrowed from Chinese banking houses, and to have even a chance of paying the interest the government had to squeeze ordinary Mongolians dry.

The regime did begin to reconcile itself with China, perhaps out of the Bogd Khan's natural inclination to hedge his political bets. The careful diplomacy of the new Chinese commissioner, Chen Lu, admired by all sides for his charm and intelligence, undoubtedly helped, as did the relative unpopularity of the Russian representative. Chinese traders had started drifting back into Urga in 1914, and their domination of Mongolian trade was, if anything, stronger than ever. Much of the reconciliation was accomplished through the use of symbolic politics which deliberately echoed the tributary status of Manchu times: gifts of horses and camels, the investiture of the Mongolian leaders with
Chinese decorations, regular audiences between Chen and the Bogd Khan. The Chinese even agreed to modify some diplomatic ceremonies for the Bogd, since his bulk made bowing and kneeling difficult.

Chinese opportunity came with the Russian revolution. Chinese troops began to infiltrate the region, initially on the pretext of being consular guards. They played on Mongolian fears of post-revolutionary chaos in Russia, using at different times the threat of both Red and White invasion as an excuse to move soldiers into the country. Ordinary Mongolians began to feel threatened by the number of Chinese troops in Urga, especially as they became increasingly arrogant. The revolution also caused a financial crisis. The Russians had always exercised a degree of oversight over Mongolian financial affairs; with their agents gone, there was now almost nobody in Urga with the slightest idea how to manage an economy. The post-revolution collapse of the rouble, now the base currency of Mongolia, further wrecked trade; prices soared, activity in the Urga markets collapsed and the Chinese merchants began calling in debts. Freedom from China suddenly seemed much less attractive.

In truth, the financial situation in China was hardly more stable, nor the government less corrupt. Nevertheless, the Mongolian nobles began pushing for a full reconciliation with China, the prospect of financial security overcoming patriotic feeling. Getting rid of theocratic rule appealed to the nobles; while they were mostly devout Buddhists, they had no great love for the Bogd's court or for the burdens that maintaining the monasteries placed on their finances and manpower.

During August and September 1919 Chen Yi, the new Chinese commissioner, successfully negotiated with the nobility for the abolition of autonomy. Sixty-three conditions were agreed, and sent to Peking on 1 October. They were reasonably accommodating of Mongolian demands, symbolically and politically tactful, and, much to the horror of the ecclesiastical court, removed them from power and instituted the Mongolian nobles as the effective leaders of the region, with Chinese administrative aid. The Bogd's court did everything it could to frustrate them, but to no avail.

Everything seemed to be going smoothly, but the ambitions of one man were to put a much more decisive end to Mongolian autonomy. Xu
Shuzheng, generally known as Xiao Xu, ‘Little Xu', was a major member of the Anfu clique, a group of largely pro-Japanese Chinese leaders. In his late thirties, he was the main aide of Duan Qirui, a key player in Chinese politics and the head of the War Participation Office, a body initially founded to train and manage the Chinese contribution to the war in Europe. The Peking government had been supplying the British and French with enormous amounts of coolie labour - nearly three hundred thousand men in total - to build the trenches on the Western Front. They had also been planning an expeditionary force of trained soldiers in order to curry favour with the post-war Allies. The leaders of the War Participation Office were more concerned, however, with producing a well-trained and well-equipped army for themselves. Their funding came mostly from the Japanese, who wanted to build up military forces sympathetic to them in the north of China, similar to the Manchurian militias they had used in 1904.

When the European war ended, Duan Qirui and Xu Shuzheng were left in an embarrassing situation. Without the excuse of the war, they had no cover for the raising of their forces, and their political opponents were threatening to fold their men into the main bulk of the Chinese army. They dealt with this through the simple expedient of renaming themselves the Bureau of Frontier Defence. This required making at least some token effort to defend the frontier, but fortunately this fitted in well with Xu's ambitions. The end of the war had also meant the end of the funding from Japan, and Xu badly needed a new source of income. He had seen how Zhang Zuolin, a warlord known as the King of the North-East, had built up a regional power base in Manchuria, and Xu was ambitious to become the King of the North-West. Mongolia was a potential source of both men and money. He also seems to have been genuinely concerned with national unity, and eager to bring Mongolia back into the Chinese fold - but only on his terms. The new treaty agreed by Chen Yi threatened his plans, and he had to act fast.

On 23 October, 1919 Xu left for Mongolia, taking with him a substantial number of troops. Together with the forces sent previously, during the invasion scares, this placed over two thousand Chinese soldiers in the country. His unit was supposed to be motorised, having purchased over a hundred vehicles in Peking, but most of the vehicles gave out somewhere on the long hard route from China to Mongolia. Horses and camels proved more reliable.

When Xu arrived he initially attempted to persuade the Mongolian parliament to relinquish autonomy voluntarily. When this failed he resorted to less subtle methods, posting soldiers outside the prime minister's offices and threatening to deport the Bogd Khan to Peking. The Mongolians caved in, and the country became, in theory, a part of China again. The old Mongolian army was disbanded and its weapons turned over to the Chinese.

If Xu had exercised even the slightest amount of tact towards Mongolian feeling, he might well have gained considerable public support. Instead he behaved with arrogance and crudity. After the humiliations of the ‘unequal treaties' that had been forced upon them by the Western powers, the Chinese nationalists were keen to regain face by reasserting traditional Chinese dominance in the region. On 20 February, 1920, the Chinese New Year, Xu forced the Bogd and other prominent Mongolians to repeat the traditional gesture of submission; kowtowing before the Chinese emperor or his image. Unfortunately there was no longer a Chinese emperor, so a portrait of the new Chinese President, Xu Shicheng was substituted.
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At this farcical imperial-republican ceremony, Xu stood by the side of the picture. It was clear that the true point of the exercise was the acknowledgement of his lordship of Mongolia, not the suzerainty of a distant and fading government in Peking.