Fifth Encirclement Campaign against Jiangxi Soviet The Fifth Encirclement Campaign against Jiangxi Soviet was a series of battles fought during the Chinese Civil War from September 25 , 1933 to October 1934 between Chiang Kai - shek ' s Kuomintang ( nationalist ) and the Chinese communists . During this campaign , the Kuomintang successfully overran the communist Chinese Soviet Republic and forced the communists on the run , an event later known as the Long March . Chiang Kai - shek and the Kuomintang called this campaign the Fifth Encirclement Campaign ( ) at the time , while the Chinese communists call it the Fifth Counter Encirclement Campaign at the Central Soviet ( ) , also known as the Fifth Counter - Encirclement Campaign at the Central Revolutionary Base ( ) or Fifth Extermination Campaign . Prelude . After the failure of the 4th encirclement campaign in the spring of 1933 , Chiang Kai - shek immediately mobilized troops for the next campaign . Nationalist troops eventually totalled more than one million , most of them being the forces of regional warlords ; of which the largest percentage were men from the Guangdong warlord Chen Jitang ' s army of more than 300 , 000 ( or 30 % of the total nationalist force ) . Chen Jitang ' s troops were mobilized to blockade the southern border of the Jiangxi Soviet . However , most of the warlords were somewhat half - hearted towards the campaign , due to a mixture of only wanting to keep their own power and having already seen four previous campaigns fail . In the end , the majority of warlord troops only participated as block - troops and occupiers of captured communist regions . Chiang Kai - shek ' s own Kuomintang troops carried out the majority of the fighting . Chiang Kai - shek was commander - in - chief of the Nationalist forces and set up his headquarters in Nanchang . In addition to mobilizing many warlords ' troops , Chiang also adopted his German advisers ' ( Hans von Seeckt and Alexander von Falkenhausen ) strategy , which involved the systematic encirclement of the Jiangxi Soviet region with fortified blockhouse s . This method proved to be very effective . In an effort to break the blockade , the Red Army — under the orders of a three - man committee consisting of Bo Gu , Zhou Enlai and Li De ( Otto Braun ) — besieged the forts many times , but suffered heavy casualties with little success . The Jiangxi Soviet shrunk significantly due to the Chinese Red Army ' s disastrous loss of manpower and material throughout the year , and by the end only a handful of towns and cities remained in Communist hands . First Phase . The campaign officially began on September 25 , 1933 when the first Kuomintang assault on Communist positions was launched . Three days later the Communists lost Lichuan ( 黎川 ) . Although their force managed to stop the Nationalist advance on the southwest of Lichuan ( 黎川 ) , further operations ended in failure : when the 24th division of the Chinese Red Army attempted to take Xiaoshi ( 硝石 ) on October 9 , 1933 , not only did the city remain firmly in Nationalist hands , but the communists were forced to withdraw over the next few days while suffering heavy casualties . Witnessing this success , Chiang Kai - shek issued a new order on October 17 , 1933 , requiring troops to follow the principle of tactical defense , strategic offense in order to perfect his German advisers ' blockhouse strategy . In contrast , the Communist leadership refused to adjust their tactics and stubbornly continued futile attacks on Kuomintang blockhouses . Between September 25 , 1933 and mid - November 1933 , the Chinese Red Army failed to achieve any major victories and suffered serious losses , not only in battle but from defection and disease . Second phase . On December 11 , 1933 , a total of eight columns of Kuomintang troops ventured out of their fortifications and began a second offensive . The Communist leadership decided to face the numerically and technically superior Nationalist army in open battle . As a result , Communist forces suffered badly . By the end of January 1934 , warlord forces began to participate , and men from the Fujian warlord armies struck from the east in coordination with Nationalists in the north and south . Third phase . On April 10 , 1934 , eleven divisions of the National Revolutionary Army began their attack on Guangchang ( 广昌 ) , and the communists decided to concentrate a total of nine divisions in its defence . Due to overwhelming Nationalist superiority , Communist strongholds at Ganzhu ( 甘竹 ) 、 Great Luo Mountain ( 大罗山 ) and Yanfuzhang ( 延福嶂 ) fell . At dawn of April 19 , 1934 , the Communists launched a counterattack against the Nationalist force at the Great Luo Mountain , only to be driven off . On April 27 , 1934 , the Nationalists launched their final assault on Guangchang , succeeding in taking it by the evening and inflicting over 5 , 500 casualties on its Communist defenders . Remnants of the shattered Communist defense fled to the south and west under the cover of darkness . Final phase . The three - man committee of the communist leadership divided their force into six different groups in early July 1934 . On August 5 , 1934 , nine Nationalist divisions ventured out of their forts , taking areas north of Yiqian ( 驿前 ) and adjacent regions . By the late September 1934 , the Chinese Soviet Republic was left with only Ruijin , Huichang , Xingguo , Ningdu , Shicheng , Ninghua and Changting . It was at this point that Zhou Enlai ' s spy network within Chiang Kai - shek ' s headquarter in Nanchang passed intelligence to the Communists revealing that Chiang was massing for a final push . The decision was made to abandon the Jiangxi Salient , resulting in the beginning of the Long March . As a result of the Communist failure to defeat the Fifth Encirclement , the largest Communist base in China was lost . Conclusion . Communist failures were mainly due to the policies of the Communist leadership :