Zhang Zuolin has always been a controversial figure in history, but there is no doubt that Zhang Zuolin himself is patriotic in his political tendencies. Although he was a full-fledged warlord, at least when he was in charge of the northeast, he could perfectly maneuver between the world powers, and he also protected the integrity of the northeast region at that time to some extent. Therefore, in the eyes of the Japanese, Zhang Zuolin was a disobedient leader, so the Japanese military also decided to assassinate Zhang Zuolin, because the Japanese military has always wanted to seize the entire northeast region. Under such ideological leadership, there was the Huanggutun Incident, zhang Zuolin was assassinated by the Japanese on the way back from Beijing to Shenyang, and Zhang Zuolin lost his life.
Zhang Zuolin's death caused an earthquake in the northeast and even in the entire Chinese political arena at that time. The assassination of Zhang Zuolin also exposed the Naked Ambition of the Japanese for the Three Eastern Provinces, but after Zhang Zuolin was assassinated, the Japanese were also very surprised. Because the Japanese have always had a tradition of lower kagami, and the power of the staff officers within the army is too large, they may cross the Japanese military department to provoke war, or launch a series of political events, and some Japanese people suspect that it is the work of Chinese.
In addition, Zhang Zuolin was also the leader of the Beiyang government at that time, although Zhang Zuolin himself was defeated in the war with the Nationalist government, he was still the head of state at that time, so his death also caused the anger of the Chinese people. At this time, the major warlord forces also united, hoping to thoroughly investigate the culprit. In addition, at that time, Japan was not fully prepared for war, so it could only conform to the general trend, and there were also some peaceful factions in Japan advocating a thorough investigation of the truth and punishing the culprits.
According to the investigation, this matter is absolutely inseparable from the Japanese Kwantung Army. Because if Zhang Zuolin returns to the northeast, the threat to the Japanese Kwantung Army is the greatest, once Zhang Zuolin invests all his forces and eyes in the northeast, the Japanese Kwantung Army itself will be greatly threatened. The Japanese diaspora has also expressed panic, which may indeed threaten Japan's interests in the Northeast. Therefore, after the political consideration of the Kwantung Army, it was decided to assassinate Zhang Zuolin without going through the Japanese government, and the mastermind of this assassination should be Kawamoto Daisaku, a senior staff officer of the Japanese Kwantung Army.
After the war, Kawamoto Daisaku also took the initiative to admit that the assassination of Zhang Zuolin at that time was indeed planned by him. Because the Feng army led by Zhang Zuolin was defeated in the battle against the Kuomintang, it was forced to withdraw all its forces from Shanhaiguan. At that time, the number of the Northeast Army gathered in the Fengtian area was as high as 300,000, which also greatly shocked the Japanese. In addition, Zhang Zuolin has always taken a kind of measure to treat Japan as if he were in a hurry, which also caused dissatisfaction among many people in the Kwantung Army, so the senior staff headquarters of the Kwantung Army concluded after studying that only by assassinating Zhang Zuolin could the interests of the Kwantung Army in the northeast region be guaranteed, so finally they formulated a plan to assassinate Zhang Zuolin.
The Huanggutun incident was also one of the many crimes committed by the Japanese in China, but its impact was enormous, because it symbolized Japan's ambition to invade China in an all-round way, and it had been exposed to the bottom. In the later introduction of international history, the Huanggutun incident was also regarded as the starting point of Japan's invasion of China, which was also the prelude to the War of Resistance Against Japan, and the various crimes committed by the Japanese in China should never be forgotten.