With the Marco Polo Bridge Incident of the following year, the Sino-Japanese War broke out. The people of Southeast Asia could not overtly speak out against the Japanese, because the colonial governments remained neutral. They nevertheless established the Southeast Asian Chinese Relief Society for Refugees from the Motherland. Tan Kah Kee was selected to be the chairman, and he made fund-raising efforts for the Nationalist government the first priority on his list.
第二年，蘆溝橋事變，中日戰爭爆發，南洋雖在殖民地政府對戰事保持中立的立場下，不能直接標榜「抗日」，但還是成立「南洋華僑籌賑祖國難民總會」，陳嘉庚又被推舉為主席，以募款捐輸政府為第一要務。