The New Fourth Army Incident
The pending negotiation between the Kuomintang and the CCP was not cancelled by the Battle of One Hundred Regiments; it was resumed in September. Precisely what happened between the two parties and within the CCP during late August and early September cannot be known at present. Hence, this account must be mostly conjectural. There seems little doubt that the author of the CCP's June proposal was Mao: he wanted to compel the Kuomintang to formally concede north Kiangsu to the CCP. In this he was opposed, I infer, by a coalition of the Internationalists and some generals; fearing
[148] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 385.
[149] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 57.
[150] PLA during resistance , p. 117. P'eng Te-huai stated that 90,000 were lost from 1940 to 1941 partly because of the Japanese counter-offensive, in Amerasia Papers , p. 710.
[151] Chung-Kung chung-yang kuan-yü chün-shih hsing-tung shih-chih [The CCP Central Committee's directive concerning military movements], Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 190–191.
Chungking's surrender, they advocated the offensive campaign and authored the CCP's August proposal. As far as Mao's opponents were concerned, the offer to abandon central China was to be made in good faith. But Mao might have compromised the opposition's demands by turning them into a means for simply keeping the Chungking negotiation open. The CCP offered to withdraw from central China—a large concession—so as not to provoke the central government; but as a trade-off it asked for five northern provinces and authorization for a larger force level. It presumed to act as though the Kuomintang's "final decision" was negotiable. The CCP used such a delaying tactic between the Sian Incident and the Lukouchiao Incident to prevent the government from integrating the Red Army into its forces. The Battle of One Hundred Regiments—commenced on the date on which compliance with the government was due—had the effect of distracting Chunking until the international situation changed, thereby forcing it to abandon the order.
If the CCP was willing to discuss withdrawal from central China in late August and early September, it had reverted to its stand of July 7 by the middle of September. Some time prior to the eighteenth, according to my reckoning, Chou En-lai delivered another proposal. The available version of the three-point proposal seems to be a summary and is very cryptic.[152] According to Chu Te's later revelation, Chou En-lai petitioned the central government that "it graciously grant its permission to all units on the south and north sides of the Yangtze to remain in their original areas for resistance . . . " until the war was over![153]
At the time T. V. Soong, soon to be the Foreign Minister, was in Washington as Chiang Kai-shek's emissary. His mission was to secure American loans and material assistance. The political implications of such aid at this juncture were fully appreciated by all concerned—not least of all by Tokyo.[154] As will be shown below, the CCP, too, was aware of the loan negotiation in Washington. It is probable that the CCP's reversion to the hard line in mid-September was based on Chungking's jubilant reaction to the initial American approval for the loan.[155]
[152] Ibid. , p. 223; K'ang-chan yen-lun-chi , p. 21.
[153] Ibid. , pp. 28–29. Chu Te's letter is dated November 9, 1940.
[154] U. S. Department of State, Foreign Relations of the United States, Diplomatic Papers, 1940 , Vol. IV: The Far East (Washington: U. S. Government Printing Office, 1955), p. 649.
[155] The earliest sign of approval for Export–Import Bank credit to China came on September 13. See Ibid. , p. 668. Another loan came in November. On Soong's negotiations, see Stilwell and the American Experience in China , pp. 214–215.
Toward the end of September, the CCP's outlook on both the domestic and international situations had undergone perceptible change. It was unmistakably encouraged by the reaction of the United States to the formation of the Tripartite Alliance. On September 28—the day after the alliance was announced—the Central Committee postulated three possibilities for the war. The first was American intervention in the war to bring it to a conclusion.[156] The second was the possibility that "the national bourgeoisie and certain factions of the intermediate groups" might come to the fore in Chungking to "ease the high pressure policy . . . to the advantage of the Communist Party, the resistance against Japan, and the preservation of the Kuomintang." Sun Fo, Feng Yü-hsiang, Li Chi-shen, Yü Yu-jen, Ch'en Chia-keng, Ch'en Kuang-fu, Huang Yen-p'ei, Chang Nai-ch'i and others were named as "our relatively good allies."[157] The CCP's hope in this case was to draw on the influence of these leaders to revive the pro-Soviet, pro-resistance spirit which had animated China during the first stage of the war. The third possibility was the fall of Chungking and the union of the die-hards with the Wang Ching-wei faction into a "Pétain regime."[158] If the Kuomintang were to enter a negotiated settlement of the war, according to this view, it would become the common enemy of the CCP and the United States. This is one of the earliest intimations of the Communists' hope to use anticipated American intervention to displace the Kuomintang.
In early October, Ch'en I's unit had fought and won a decisive battle at Huangch'iao in north Kiangsu with Han Te-ch'in's troops commanded by Li Shou-wei. Following the previously established procedure, the New Fourth Army sent several telegrams of regret to Chungking explaining the action as self-defense against the provocation of traitors.[159] Publicly assuming a low posture, the CCP was nevertheless taking a calculated risk. By November 1, it was issuing directives to its organizations to get ready for a sudden attack by the Kuomintang.[160]
On October 19, Ho Ying-ch'in and Pai Ch'ung-hsi telegraphed Chu Te, P'eng Te-huai, and Yeh T'ing. It was a public message, the first
[156] Chung-Kung chung-yang kuan-yü shih-chü tsung-ch'ü-hsiang ti shih-chih [The CCP Central Committee's directive concerning the general trend of the situation], Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 78.
[157] Ibid.
[158] Ibid. , p. 79.
[159] Johnson, Peasant Nationalism , p. 135. See Chu Te's telegram to Chiang Kaishek in K'ang-chan yen-lun-chi , pp. 39–41.
[160] Chung-Kung chung-yang tui chi-yao kung-tso ti shih-chih [The CCP Central Committee's directive for secret work], Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 148–149. Destruction of documents was ordered.
one of its kind in the Kuomintang—CCP negotiations. It stated that " . . . since the deputy director [of the Military Commission] Chou [En-lai] went back, there has been as yet no clear indication to strictly observe the order. [On the contrary, you] also proposed the three-point measure to adjust the guerrilla districts and guerrilla forces and caused the Center a great deal of additional difficulty in the disposition [of the matter]."[161] The message put the blame for the north Kiangsu incident on the Communist side and demanded once again that the Communist forces move across the Yellow River into north China. The government compromised with the CCP's dilatoriness by extending the deadline for transfer until the end of November. Having dealt with the CCP in an authoritative fashion by issuing an order on July 20, Chungking was not going to budge. But as long as its order was kept secret, the CCP would stall it. It was probably for this reason that Chungking made its new order public. In so doing, it put its authority and prestige at stake.
In Shen-Kan-Ning, the blockading was tightened in October. The so-called "second anti-Communist high tide" is traced back to this reinforcement.[162] By then the international situation had visibly improved for China. Far from being intimidated into neutrality by the coalescence of Japan with Germany, the United States decided to oppose the fascist encirclement. In Asia, this took the form of putting its muscle behind the principle of Open Door for the first time, and of coming to the aid of Britain to obstruct Japan's move into Southeast Asia. Britain reversed itself and, on October 8, notified Tokyo that the Burma Road would be reopened on the eighteenth.[163] The Kiri Operation had been discarded by the China Expeditionary Forces on September 28, when it was concluded that China was "not sincere in her desire for peace."[164]
But Konoe (in his second cabinet) persisted in a search for a way out of the expanding conflict. Formal recognition of the Wang Ching-wei regime was slated at the end of November, which was the deadline for peace talks. The new foreign minister Matsuoka Yosuke[*] took charge. He asked Germany to increase its pressure on Chungking while seeking a new direct contact with it.[165]
Ch'ien Yung-ming, the general manager of the Communications Bank and an important member of the so-called Kiangsu–Chekiang financial clique, acted as a go-between. On November 12, a messenger of unknown identity arrived in Hong Kong bearing a letter from
[161] Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 218.
[162] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 45.
[163] Nihon gaiko[*] nempyo[*] , II, 141.
[164] Boyle, p. 293.
[165] Taiheiyo[*] senso[*] e no michi , IV, 238.
Chiang Kai-shek written by Chang Ch'ün. Chiang offered to enter into a peace negotiation on two major conditions. One was Japan's agreement to the principle of total withdrawal. The other was withholding of recognition from Wang Ching-wei's faction. A four-minister conference in Tokyo accepted the two conditions on November 22. A Japanese reply to that effect reached Hong Kong on November 24, but Chungking's messenger had already left. On the twenty-eighth, the Konoe cabinet decided that it would sign the Basic Treaty with Wang Ching-wei's regime on the thirtieth. On November 29, Chungking notified Tokyo that it was appointing Hsü Shih-ying, the former Chinese ambassador to Japan, as the chairman of the Chinese delegation to the peace negotiation. But this did not reverse Tokyo's final decision to go for a protracted war.[166] On no other occasion during the war did Chungking and Tokyo come so close to agreeing to basic conditions for peace. But how serious the Kuomintang was in these peace discussions remains moot to this day.[167]
On November 7—the day after Roosevelt was re-elected to his third term—the CCP's Central Committee ordered stepped-up propaganda efforts to create a public opinion opposed to "split" and "capitulation." It instructed:
Do not revile X [Chiang Kai-shek?], do not revile the Kuomintang, do not revile the central army and the Whampoa faction, do not revile the tsap'ai armies . . . do not revile Britain, the United States, and the pro-British pro-American faction. . . . All efforts must be concentrated on reviling the pro-Japanese faction, the plotters and the provocateurs.[168]
The directive named Ho Ying-ch'in as the leader of the "pro-Japanese faction." It also ordered struggles to nullify the German mediation in Chungking.[169]
On November 9, Chu Te, P'eng Te-huai, Yeh T'ing, and Hsiang Ying jointly sent a reply to the October 19 message of Ho Ying-ch'in and Pai Ch'ung-hsi. Its humble style was in contrast to its substance. The CCP stood by its September proposal: the New Fourth Army was to remain in north Kiangsu until Japan was defeated. Then Chu Te's letter went on:
[166] Ibid. , p. 243.
[167] Those who took part in the Kiri Operation speculated that Chungking was trying to split Japan and Wang Ching-wei.
[168] Chung-Kung chung-yang kuan-yü fan-tui t'ou-hsiang fen-lieh wan-chiu shih-chü wei-chi ti shih-chih [The CCP Central Committee's directive concerning opposition to capitulation and split and saving the dangerous situation], Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 224.
[169] Ibid. , pp. 223, 225.
As for the regular units south of the Yangtze, [Chu] Te and others are just now undertaking the painful task of persuading them to obey the order and to move for the good of the whole. We beg the Center to postpone the deadline so as to facilitate our efforts to make thorough explanations to them, and to avoid sudden preciptation of other incidents, which would in turn add to the infinite transgresssions of [Chu] Te and others.[170]
This message was the basis for the CCP's later assertion that it had promised to move its troops in southern Anhwei northward.[171]
In December, the Central Committee issued a directive concerning the political situation. It indicated the Party leadership's judgment that the crisis in Chungking had passed:
Following the signing of the Japan–Wang Ching-wei treaty, the United States' loan, Soviet assistance, and the development of our Party's anti-capitulation struggle, the capitulation crisis of this occasion has already come to a halt. Though there are possibilities that this sort of crisis may happen again in the future, nevertheless at the moment the situation is still for resistance.[172]
By stalling the Kuomintang by means of negotiations and a costly offensive, the CCP had succeeded in weathering perhaps the worst crisis in the war. Whatever friction and military clash might occur from this point on would not affect the united front. The only question that remained, Yenan seemed to assume, was whether such a clash would be viewed by the public—domestic as well as international—as a repression of patriots by the government or a revolt by traitors. The directive therefore instructed the Party to sway the public opinion in favor of the CCP.[173]
The taunting reply from Chu Te and others was more than the Kuomintang could tolerate. On December 8, Ho Ying-ch'in and Pai Ch'ung-hsi again dispatched a very lengthy telegraphic message to the Communist military leaders. Written in dignified literary style, it seethed wth indignation.[174] This was quite understandable but pointless—unless the government was willing to enforce its orders. On the following day, Chiang Kai-shek personally ordered that all units of the Eighth Route Army south of the Yellow River move across to the north bank by December 30, and that all units of the New Fourth
[170] K'ang-chan yen-lun-chi , p. 29.
[171] See Mao Tse-tung in Selected Works , III, 146.
[172] Chung-Kung chung-yang kuan-yü shih-chü cheng-ts'e ti shih-chih [The CCP Central Committee's directive concerning the situation and policy], Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 227.
[173] Ibid. , pp. 227–228. The arguments to be used were that the Communists had already agreed to evacuate the south bank of Yangtze, that the troops in central China only wanted to defend their homes, etc.
[174] Chung-Kung wen-t'i chung-yao wen-hsien , pp. 15–24.
Army south of the Yangtze River move to the north side by December 31 and cross the Yellow River northward by January 31, 1941.[175] Ho's letter as well as Chiang's order were meant to be an ultimatum, though this was the second time the deadline had been put off.
On January 4, what was said to be the headquarters unit of the New Fourth Army, with 9,000 men, was surrounded by the Kuomintang forces of the Third War Zone commanded by Ku Chu-t'ung, at Maolin near Chinghsien in southern Anhwei—south of the Yangtze. The bulk of the unit perished in ten days of bitter fighting. Yeh T'ing, the commander, was taken prisoner while Hsiang Ying, the vice commander, and Yüan Kuo-p'ing, the director of the political department, were reported to have been killed. On January 17, the Chungking government disbanded the New Fourth Army for breach of discipline. There were many mysterious aspects to the incident. Internally the CCP has placed the blame on Hsiang Ying's alleged defiance of the Party's order since the Sixth Plenum to move east and north into areas behind the Japanese line. As late as May, 1940, however, Mao was directing him personally to expand into Kiangsu and Chekiang Provinces.[176] At the time of this incident, Hsiang Ying's unit was moving southward.
Commenting publicly on the government's order of January 17 disbanding the New Fourth Army, Mao said, " . . . those who issued this counter-revolutionary order . . . must have determined upon a complete split and out-and-out capitulation."[177] It is quite possible that the CCP, surprised by the sternness of Chungking's action after all the postponements, prepared for a civil war. In the end, however, the CCP's directive of December was vindicated: the New Fourth Army Incident remained basically "local" in character. In fact, it was an anti-climax. The incident took place on the south side of the Yangtze, from which the CCP had been withdrawing the bulk of its forces of its own accord since 1939. It promised to vacate the area in November, though it would not have kept the promise unless forced. A military clash might have taken on a more serious character had it been undertaken by the Kwangsi forces in north Kiangsu. Attacking the Communist forces on the south bank of Yangtze instead, the government's action had the effect of saving its face after having issued an order which it was unwilling to enforce.
Did the Kuomintang intend to attack the New Fourth Army in north Kiangsu and north Anhwei? Since late 1939, the Kwangsi forces
[175] Soviet Russia in China , p. 95.
[176] Selected Works , II, 431–432.
[177] Ibid. , p. 454. This was issued on January 22.
of the Fifth War Zone—having semi-central army status—had been amassed on the west side of the Tientsin–Pukow railway with obvious intentions of attacking the New Fourth Army in the area. Several skirmishes took place. According to a Japanese source, T'ang En-po was ordered to marshal the 31st Group Army, the Second Cavalry Army, and the Third Group Army to engage in Communist suppression in Honan and eastern Anhwei in late January. But this force happened to be obstructed by Japanese operations in the area and withdrew.[178] It appears in the last analysis that the Kuomintang could not bring its superior central forces to bear on the Communist forces without first coming to terms with Japan.
On January 20 the Revolutionary Military Commission of the Central Committee published an order making appointments to the New Fourth Army, which had been "abolished" by the central government. Ch'en I and Chang Yün-i were appointed commander and vice commander respectively; Liu Shao-ch'i and Teng Tzu-hui were political commissar and director of the political department; and Lai Ch'uan-chu was the chief of staff.[179] Simultaneously, the CCP demanded that the government meet twelve demands, including punishment for Ho Ying-ch'in, Ku Chu-t'ung, and Shangkuan Yünhsiang as culprits for the incident.[180] The fiction that the Communist forces were a part of the National Revolutionary Army was formally done away with, and Yenan began to claim the trappings of an independent state. On February 18, the Central Committee went ahead on its own initiative to reorganize the New Fourth Army—now under Mao's complete control—into seven divisions. The seven Communist delegates to the National Political Council vowed to boycott the Council until the government met its "Twelve Item Demands."[181] By March, Mao felt that the "second anti-Communist high tide" was ending.[182]
The new united front was consolidated. The CCP had had to test its strength slowly since the Sixth Plenum. The cornerstone of the new united front was the Kuomintang's resistance in a protracted war of stalemate. Within this basic framework the Kuomintang recognized the right of the CCP to carry out revolutionary expansion. With the taking of north Kiangsu, the CCP's basic requirement for its revolutionary goal was met. Only at this point did Mao's thesis in the
[178] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 390. Beside the Japanese, the Russians restrained Chungking, according to Ho Kan-chih: "The aid of the Soviet Union to China and her attitude constituted another factor that the die-hards had to ponder carefully," p. 368.
[179] Selected Works , II, 451.
[180] Ibid. , pp. 455–456.
[181] Mao Tse-tung-chi , VII, 284.
[182] Selected Works , II, 459.
Wayaopao Resolution—since abandoned—come to take on apparent validity. Whether the Kuomintang was actually compelled by the Communists to stay in the war did not matter. It had demonstrated by its deed that Communist preparation for the forthcoming civil war would be tolerated.[*]
On May 8, Mao lectured his internal opponents in reviewing the New Fourth Army Incident, saying,
As long as the contradiction between China and Japan remains acute, even if the entire big landlord class and big bourgeoisie turn traitor and surrender, they can never bring about another 1927 situation. . . . The first anti-Communist onslaught was appraised as another May 21st Incident by some comrades, and the second onslaught as a repetition of the April 12th and the May 21st Incidents, but objective facts have proved these appraisals wrong. The mistake of these comrades lies in forgetting that the national contradiction is the primary one.[183]
Mao professed to defend the united front against its detractors. This was the end of the Internationalists. The Rectification Campaign that followed ratified this fact.[184]
[*] The Kuomintang lumps together the negotiations in 1939 and 1940 and calls it the first negotiation. There were five of them altogether during the war: March, 1942; May, 1944; November, 1944; and January, 1945. By the fifth round, the CCP demanded sixteen divisions in five armies and a coalition government. Soviet Russia in China , pp. 107–108, 115–117, 122–123. As the Communists grew in strength, the negotiations came to resemble diplomatic bargains between independent states.
[183] "Conclusions on the Repulse of the Second Anti-Communist Onslaught," Ibid. , p. 464. The April 12th and the May 21st Incidents refer to the Kuomintang's coup in 1927.
[184] In the November, 1940, issue of The Communist , Wang Ming published a lengthy article elaborating on "comrade Mao Tse-tung's" united front tactics. It is my guess that this was his self-criticism. I can only guess because the version I have seen was mutilated in several places. "Lun Ma-Lieh chu-i chüeh-ting ts'e-lüeh ti chi-ke chi-pen yüan-tse" [On several basic principles concerning tactics based on Marxism-Leninism], Kung-ch'an-tang-jen , No. 12.