The area was a battlefield in the First Sino-Japanese War and he joined the Honghuzi irregular cavalry forces of the Manchurian warlord Zhang Zuolin at an early age.

In the final years of the Qing dynasty, Zhang Zuolin was appointed Viceroy of Three Northeast Provinces with his base at Fengtian, and with the Xinhai Revolution managed to obtain recognition of his forces as part of the new Republic of China military.

Zhang called a conference in his office on 27 September 1931 to organize an "Emergency Committee of the Special District", with the goal of achieving the secession of Manchuria from China.

[3] As Prime Minister of Manchukuo, Zhang preferred to take a passive figurehead role, allowing the Japanese advisors seconded from the Kwantung Army to handle all aspects of day-to-day administration while he spent his days copying Buddhist sutras.

That same year a false report was published in Time Magazine that Zhang had poisoned his family and killed his Japanese advisor and other members of the Manchukuo government before committing suicide.