---
title: 不澈底的重建 (An Incomplete Reconstruction), Beiyang Huabao no. 116
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/beiyang-huabao-incomplete-reconstruction-1927/
description: A cartoon of a city wall flying the Nationalist (Kuomintang) sun flag, being rebuilt by labourers from a pile of bricks stamped with the labels…
section: Collection
---

[Collection](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/)

[![不澈底的重建 (An Incomplete Reconstruction), Beiyang Huabao no. 116](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/beiyang-huabao-incomplete-reconstruction-1927.png)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/beiyang-huabao-incomplete-reconstruction-1927.png)

# 不澈底的重建 (An Incomplete Reconstruction), Beiyang Huabao no. 116

A cartoon of a city wall flying the Nationalist (Kuomintang) sun flag, being rebuilt by labourers from a pile of bricks stamped with the labels 'warlords', 'old bureaucrats' and 'old politicians'. The title calls the rebuilding 'incomplete'. The Nationalists' own epithets for their enemies are stamped onto the building material, and the label does the arguing in place of any evidence.

- **Date:** August 27, 1927
- **Period:** [Interwar](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#era=interwar)
- **Made by:** Beiyang Huabao (Beiyang Pictorial News), Tianjin illustrated paper; cartoon credited to Xinru (心如)
- **Region:** [East Asia](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#region=east-asia)
- **Country:** [China](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#country=china)
- **Medium:** [Cartoon](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#medium=cartoon)
- **Issuer type:** [Media](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#actor=media)
- **Regime:** [Beiyang Government](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#regime=beiyang-government)
- **Leader:** [Zhang Zuolin](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#leader=zhang-zuolin)
- **Audience:** [Domestic public](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#audience=domestic-public)
- **Purpose:** [Persuade or win support](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#purpose=persuade-support)
- **Themes:** [Elections and party politics](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=elections-party-politics), [War and the military](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=war-military)
- **Event:** [Northern Expedition](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#event=northern-expedition)
- **Techniques:** [Name-calling](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/name-calling/)
- **Source:** Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- **Source:** [Wikimedia Commons (from Beiyang Huabao, as reproduced in Kwong Chi Man, 2017)](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Beiyang_huabao_poster.png), retrieved September 29, 2026
- **Rights:** Public domain (published 1927, before 1931; Commons page cites PD-China, term expired) Xinru (心如), Beiyang Huabao no. 116, 27 August 1927, Tianjin; via Kwong Chi Man, War and Geopolitics in Interwar Manchuria (Brill, 2017), p. 128, and Wikimedia Commons.

## Text on the object

Original (Chinese (traditional characters)) · read from the image, not independently checked

```
[Title, vertical, read right to left:] 不澈底的 / 重建

[Labels stamped on the bricks:] 軍閥 / 舊官僚 / 老政客

[Caption line, right to left, between triangle marks:] 黨軍致敗之道

[Artist credit, right to left:] 心如作

[English line under the drawing, added by the reproducer, not on the original:] "It is why the Nationalists failed."
```

English translation (machine translation by Claude, not verified by a fluent reader)

```
[Title] An incomplete reconstruction. [Brick labels] Warlords / old bureaucrats / old politicians. [Caption] The way the Party Army came to defeat. [Credit] Drawn by Xinru. (The English line is already English.)
```

Read from a 500 px reproduction. The first character of 舊官僚 is small and is a best reading; 黨軍 (literally 'party army') is the Nationalist National Revolutionary Army. The small emblem near the title and the writing on the wall gate are not legible.

[← "Jungles Today, Gold Mines Tomorrow" (Empire Marketing Board, 1926)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/jungles-today-gold-mines-tomorrow-1926/) [Locarno? Wählt deutschnational! (Locarno? Vote German National!) →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/dnvp-locarno-waehlt-deutschnational-1928/)

## Using the same techniques

- [Passional Christi und Antichristi: the emperor kisses the pope's foot (leaf 'Antichristus')](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/passional-christi-antichristi-emperor-kisses-pope-1521/) (1521 · Name-calling, Card stacking)
- [Ondersoeckt de Geesten, ofse van den Duyvel syn, of niet (the De Witt brothers as devils)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/ondersoeckt-de-geesten-de-witt-devils-1672/) (1672 · Scapegoating, Name-calling)
- [The Highlanders Medley, or The Duke Triumphant (A Loyal Song)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/highlanders-medley-duke-triumphant-1746/) (1746 · Name-calling, Transfer)
- [The Bloody Massacre perpetrated in King Street Boston on March 5th 1770 by a party of the 29th Regt.](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/revere-bloody-massacre-king-street-1770/) (Mar 1770 · Name-calling, Card stacking)
- [Marche du Dom Quichotte moderne pour la deffence du Moulin des Abus (March of the Modern Don Quixote in Defence of the Mill of Abuses)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/dom-quichotte-moulin-des-abus-1791/) (1791 · Name-calling, Transfer)
- [Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sans-culottes-bread-of-liberty-gillray-1793/) (Jan 12, 1793 · Fear appeal, Name-calling)
- [Exit Liberté a la Francois! or Buonaparte closing the Farce of Egalité, at St. Cloud (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/exit-liberte-buonaparte-gillray-1799/) (Nov 21, 1799 · Name-calling)
- [Van Moscouw tot Elba moest ik wyken (From Moscow to Elba I had to give way), Napoleon caricature by Wijnand Esser](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/van-moscouw-tot-elba-napoleon-esser-1814/) (1814 · Name-calling)