General Yang, a warlord with control of one of China's twelve provinces, plans to overtake them all with his army to corner the markets of silk, rice, and opium. However, his opposition, in the form of Mr. Wu who is leading a rebellion against Yang, knows that Yang is lacking enough loyal men to cement his grip on the whole of China, and those who are with him could desert him for a competing warlord. As such, Wu searches out for O'Hara, a soldier of fortune, to go to
Shanghai to buy weapons from a hard-drinking gunrunner named Brighton who is selling to the first bidder. The money O'Hara is given is kept in a belt and was funded by the peasants trapped under Yang's oppressive rule. In the way of all of this is the Perrie family, made up of Peter and his daughter Judy. Peter is in poor health and is desperate for money so he and his daughter can return to the United States. Judy reluctantly goes along with her father's plan to distract O'Hara while Yang commandeers the train and captures him. Taking the money belt entrusted to O'Hara, he gives it Peter and orders him to deliver it to Brighton in Shanghai so that it will be used to buy guns for Yang's men, and not Wu's. O'Hara is taken prisoner to Yang's boat. After the Perries arrive in Shanghai, Peter betrays Yang by not meeting with Brighton as ordered and uses some of the money to buy steamship tickets for himself and his daughter to leave China. Peter hides the remaining money in the lining of his suitcase while Judy has second thoughts about the trip to America; complicating matters is a man named Leach who, having observed Peter purchasing the steamship tickets and noticing that the monogram on Peter's wallet didn't match the false name he used to buy them, suspects that Peter is using stolen money and tries to get a cut from it. Meanwhile, O'Hara escapes from Yang's boat and gets to the hotel/bar where Brighton is headquartered and where Wu is awaiting him; which, by coincidence, is also where the Perries happen to be staying. While O'Hara grills Judy about the money's whereabouts, Peter, who is hiding unseen and observing from the next room, betrays his presence, and tries to save himself and his hiding place by shooting O'Hara in the hand, but O'Hara gets the upper hand and kills him. Yang and his men then arrive and take Judy, O'Hara, Wu, Brighton, Leach, and the Perries' luggage all captive on Yang's boat, where Yang is determined to find out what happened to the money. Judy is prepared to tell him where the money is to save the lives of O'Hara and Wu, but Yang cruelly orders her to kiss O'Hara goodbye first. When Brighton, kept prisoner below deck, wakens from his drunken stupor, he accidentally finds the money while using a knife to look for any alcohol concealed in the luggage. When he angrily states the currency which dropped on the floor is American and tries to escape the clutches of soldiers guarding him, Yang goes below deck to see the source of the commotion; Brighton stumbles into Yang with the knife, mortally wounding the general, who stumbles back above deck and orders his men to kill the prisoners. Leach, trying to ingratiate himself to Yang to save himself at the expense of the other captives, is the first to be executed. Before the rest of them are killed, O'Hara, trying to save their lives, appeals to Yang's ego and pleads with him to let them live so they can tell the story of the general's 'greatness' and the truth of how he died, lest his subjects and the world falsely believe that he was killed by his own men. Yang, convinced, spares their lives and orders his men to kill each other for the sake of honour before he himself dies. Dawn breaks as Judy and O'Hara embrace. ==Cast==