as the civil war began the union navy used a

The civil war resumed as soon as it became apparent that the Japanese defeat was imminent, and the communists gained the upper hand in the second phase of the war from 1945 to 1949. Exacerbating the divisions within China further was that a puppet government, sponsored by Japan and nominally led by Wang Jingwei, was set up to nominally govern the parts of China under Japanese occupation.

From 1937 to 1945, hostilities were mostly put on hold as the Second United Front fought the Japanese invasion of China with eventual help from the Allies of World War II, but even then co-operation between the KMT and CCP was minimal and armed clashes between them were common. The war is generally divided into two phases with an interlude: from August 1927 to 1937, the KMT–CCP Alliance collapsed during the Northern Expedition, and the Nationalists controlled most of China.

The Chinese Civil War was fought between the Kuomintang-led government of the Republic of China and forces of the Chinese Communist Party, with armed conflict continuing intermittently from 1 August 1927 until 7 December 1949, and ending with Communist control of mainland China.

As the civil war began the union navy used a