Preferred Citation: Kataoka, Tetsuya. Resistance and Revolution in China: The Communists and the Second United Front. Berkeley: University of California Press, [1974] 1974. http://ark.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/ft6v19p16j/
 | Resistance and Revolution in ChinaThe Communists and the Second United FrontTetsuya KataokaUNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESSBerkeley · Los Angeles · Oxford© 1974 The Regents of the University of California |
TO MY PARENTS
Preferred Citation: Kataoka, Tetsuya. Resistance and Revolution in China: The Communists and the Second United Front. Berkeley: University of California Press, [1974] 1974. http://ark.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/ft6v19p16j/
TO MY PARENTS
Preface
As a freshly minted assistant professor on a college campus, I was part of the agonizing American experience of the late 1960s and early 1970s. The great nation seemed to destroy itself over the war in a far-off place. The spectacle shook me especially because, as an immigrant, I was tied to this country only by my love for the ideals of America. As America seemed to lose sight of these ideals, I felt left out on a limb. Then I recalled similar, though much more profound, transformations that visited Japan as a consequence of her involvement in China. As the debate around me ultimately revolved around the Communist revolution there, I decided to do my part, not as an advocate of political action, but as someone who could rise above the politics of Cold War or reaction to it because of his vantage point.
In the sense that my reward in writing this book was in the activity of investigation itself, I have already been amply rewarded by the company of people who have helped me in the task. I must acknowledge my thanks to the following persons and organizations. James P. Harrison of Hunter College and Lowell Dittmer of the State University of New York at Buffalo have read my manuscript and given me helpful comments. My association with Jim Harrison at the Columbia Seminar has been fruitful because he was writing his latest book on the history of the Chinese revolution almost simultaneously. A special thanks is due to Professor Chalmers Johnson who encouraged me in my pursuits while I was a guest of the Center for Chinese Studies at Berkeley. I was also fortunate in having the company of Messrs. John S. Service and C. P. Ch'en. Their advice and assistance was invaluable. Mr. Ch'en Shen-wen of the Bureau of Investigation in Taiwan was good enough to accommodate the jarring presence in his office of a curious foreign
scholar. Mr. Wu Ch'eng-ts'ai of the Institute of International Relations and Mr. Shingyochi[*] Gikei, the then first secretary of the Japanese Embassy, also rendered valuable assistance while I was in Taiwan. In Tokyo I spent most of my time as a guest of the Center for Chinese Studies at Toyobunko[*] . Professor Ichiko Chuzo[*] and his staff have helped me familiarize myself with Japanese materials on the China war. I am particularly grateful to Major General Morimatsu Toshio of the War History Office, Defense Board, for spending many hours with me in discussing his experiences in China and letting me read the manuscript of his Pacification War in North China . The War History Office has been kind enough to give me permission to reproduce maps 1 and 4 from its publications. My indebtedness to Professor Philip Kuhn must be evident to a careful reader; I had to lean heavily on his conceptualization of China's tradition in the rural areas in order to solve an intractable problem which I had encountered in my work.
My association with Professor Tang Tsou of the University of Chicago goes back to the days when I was beginning my study of China there. It is difficult to express my gratitude toward him. I can perhaps suggest a close parallel between my feelings toward him and Lu Hsün's toward "Professor Fujino," whom Lu met while in Sendai, Japan, as a foreign student, and about whom he has written a moving short story. To my American wife I owe a debt of different kind. When the world around me seemed to retreat into "know-nothing" selfishness, she stood by me and encouraged me to bring my self-appointed task to a conclusion. Last, to the Joint Committee on Contemporary China of the Social Science Research Council and the American Council of Learned Societies goes the credit for funding my research in 1968 and 1970. It goes without saying that I am solely responsible for whatever is said in this book.
A few words are in order here to explain why I chose not to offer a bibliography. During the two years I spent abroad in various libraries and archives, I have examined a large number of documents produced by the Chinese Communist Party, army, government, and mass organizations—many more than I have footnoted in direct support of this book. These are raw primary materials left by the Communists in the course of the revolution and war; a good number of them are written in longhand or mimeographed. They are usually brief; most are article-length; and directives seldom run more than a few pages. To be truly meaningful, they have to be listed item by item, rather than by collections into which their captors have arbitrarily placed them. Such a cataloguing work calls for time and resources which I do not have;
hence, I decided to let my book stand simply on its footnotes. Very thorough catalogues are available from the holdings of Stanford University and Toyobunko[*] . For the documents in the archive of the Bureau of Investigation,[*] readers are referred to the following bibliographies, the best in existence:
Tokuda Noriyuki, "Yenan jiki ni okeru Chukyo[*] shuppan zasshi mokuroku" [A bibliography of magazines published by the Chinese Communist Party during the Yenan period], Ajiya kenkyu[*] , Vol. XIII, No. 3, pp. 59–89.
———, "Chukyo toshi[*] kankei shiryo[*] mokuroku" [A bibliography of materials on the history of the Chinese Communist Party], Kindai Chugoku[*] kenkyu senta[*] iho[*] , July, 1967, pp. 9–20; October, 1967, pp. 8–24.
In the footnotes, BI stands for the Bureau of Investigation, Ministry of Justice in Taiwan.
I—
Introduction
This book is addressed to the question, How did the Chinese Communist revolution succeed? It covers a rather long span of time, roughly from 1934 to 1943, because during this time the winning strategy was formulated, applied, and the final victory was nearly assured. It seeks to answer several questions which are directly subsumed under the principal question. The scope of the book is broad, in spite of an unfortunate lack of important data and monographic studies, because of my belief in the need for an overview of the revolution which restores a proper perspective to the event. There is of course a need to simply know more. But researches that pertain to a part of the whole are no substitute for a speculation about the whole itself. The need for such an undertaking seems greater than ever today because of the subtle but pervasive influence which China exerts on those who study her.
The problem of perspective is doubly complicated in the case of China, for we are dealing with a revolution, and a rather unique one at that. As a revolution it set one half of the nation against the other. Inevitably, the victor and the loser offer totally different views of the struggle. This disparity should create no more difficulty for scholars than that in other revolutions. But the Chinese revolution took place in an intimate interaction with international conflict among the powers. The link between the war and the revolution was so close that the revolution itself can be regarded as unique on that account. Without the international conflict that engulfed China, as I shall maintain, the revolution could not have taken place. Hence, those who took part in the former took part in the latter as well. Among the international actors, accordingly, one can name Britain, Germany, Japan, the Soviet
Union, and the United States as having had direct involvement in the revolution.
For these nations to have distinct perspectives of their own on the revolution is understandable. But in the case of the United States in particular, its continued involvement in the civil war to this date created the need to choose between two accounts of the revolution, the victor's and the loser's. Answers to the question, How was China lost, were bound up with answers to the question, Who should rule China? We need not of course take seriously those who answer the former by first answering the latter. Still, the compulsion to see the past events within the framework of current politics and intellectual trend is strong. Thus today we repudiate the question, How was China lost, on the assumption that it was not America's to win or lose in the first place. In so doing, we assume that the revolution in China was moved solely by forces which were internal to itself and that there was no room for external forces to influence the course.[*]
There is one other source of political distortion in the study of the Chinese revolution. Hitherto we have been unaware of it, but it accounts by and large for the uncritical acceptance of the Chinese Communist Party's official history. I hope to show that the CCP's official version of the revolution was the result of a very intense internal struggle concerning different revolutionary strategies. What has been taken in the past for a more or less frank assessment of how the revolution was won from the victor's standpoint has been in fact a justification for one faction in the CCP.[1]
A multitude of participants and perspectives, however, can impede as well as facilitate our study. Out of the clash of opinions held by the victors and the losers—including those within the CCP itself—we may be able to arrive at a more balanced account of the revolution on our own. There is thus a need to re-examine the opinions, long since dis-
[*] Barbara Tuchman's celebrated book ends with this remark: "In the end China went her own way as if the Americans had never come." Stilwell and American Experience in China, 1911–1945 (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1970), p. 531. She does not ask whether the very extensive American involvement in China, which she documented, was well directed, or whether China went the way she did partly because the Americans were there.
[1] It is easier to realize that the CCP's official history cannot be taken at face value than to know that it is also a weapon in internal power struggle. In writing Red Star Over China (London: Victor Bollancz Ltd., 1937), Edgar Snow was consciously trying to introduce the little known Communist movement to the world outside. But he did not know that he was also used by Mao's faction against its opponents both in China and Moscow. See how Heinz Shippe, who disagreed with Snow, was rebuked by Mao, in Snow, Random Notes on Red China, 1936–1945 (Cambridge, Mass.: East Asian Research Center, Harvard University, 1971), pp. 20–22. Shippe, also unaware, was supporting the Comintern's line.
carded, held by the losers. Above all, there is a need for a comprehensive framework for our analysis which is not marred by partisan or international differences. Such a framework should transcend the conventional political divisions that existed in China at the time without losing sight of their contours. In this study the revolution in China will be viewed as a conflict between its cities and the countryside.
Let us first review the major issues raised by the Maoist Party history and by some of the existing Western works. In the Party's history, the period between 1937 and 1945 is called the period of "the war of resistance against Japan" and is distinguished from the revolutionary civil wars which preceded and followed it. There is agreement among all concerned that the CCP's resurgence as a power had to do with Japanese imperialism and the war of resistance in which the CCP took part. Both contemporaneously and after the fact, the CCP has been reluctant to stress the revolutionary aspect of this war for itself. Only the Kuomintang side makes the charge that the Communists were engaged in an attempt to overthrow the government while China was under foreign invasion. The gist of the CCP's own view is that its strenuous and unstinting efforts in the resistance induced the Chinese nation to switch its allegiance to itself. Yet Mao Tse-tung states that there was an anti-feudal aspect to the CCP's war efforts in addition to the anti-imperialist aspect.[2] The focal point of my inquiry is, Whether and to what extent was the war of resistance also a revolutionary war? That is, what was the relationship between the anti-imperialist, nationalistic aspect of the war and the anti-feudal, revolutionary, class character of the war? All the important questions that can be raised about the war revolve around this issue.
It was Mao's idea that the war of resistance was a "peasant war,"[3] and that it was fought by "encircling the cities from the countryside."[4] He did not make clear whether he was referring to China's war efforts as a whole or to those of the CCP alone. There is, however, a universal agreement that the Chinese Communist movement was a peasant movement. The pioneering work which established this notion and linked it with the person of Mao was Benjamin Schwartz's. The Maoist strategy, according to him, contained the following components: (1) the existence of a strong peasant mass base; (2) the existence of a strong Leninist party; (3) the existence of a strong Red
[2] Selected Works (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1967), II, 313.
[3] Ibid. , p. 287.
[4] This notion, clearly a corollary of the "peasant war" thesis, was stated in Lin Piao, "Long Live the Victory of People's War," in A. Doak Barnett, ed., China After Mao (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1967), p. 241.
Army; (4) the control of a strategically located territorial base; and (5) the self-sufficiency of the base.[5] While speaking primarily of the civil war period, Professor Schwartz states that "the shift to the New Democracy line [during the war with Japan] involved no change in the basic Maoist strategy. . . . "[6] The notion that the "Maoist strategy" went through no major alteration from the civil war period to the resistance period originated in the official history of the CCP as rewritten after 1945. According to it, the CCP in Kiangsi was beset by two mistaken leaders, both " 'Left' opportunist" in character, who, from time to time, prevented the Party from acting on the correct rural strategy advocated by Mao. The Communists' inability to withstand the Kuomintang's encirclement campaign in 1934 is attributed to the errors of the anti-Maoists."[7] That defeat, we are told, was the price the Communists had to pay to awaken to the wisdom of Mao's line; and from the Tsunyi Conference of 1935—where Mao displaced his opponents in power—to Japan's defeat in 1945, the Party was victorious because of the rural line. Yet, can it be really said that the CCP had remained indifferent to what Schwartz defined as "Maoism" prior to the Tsunyi Conference? If not, that is, if the CCP was fully practicing the rural revolutionary line after 1928, what does its defeat in 1934 imply for Mao (or "Maoism")? In fact, did not the CCP radically alter its policy shortly after the Tsunyi Conference rather than continue to adhere to the policy of "peasant war"?
It is common knowledge that in 1937 the CCP had publicly promised to discard its policies of the civil war period in favor of the united front with the Kuomintang against Japanese imperialism. The importance of Chalmers Johnson's controversial work, now fully a decade old, lies in its recognition that the Chinese Communist movement was defeated in Kiangsi in 1934 and that this defeat had something to do with its shift in orientation in 1936 and 1937. Therefore, Johnson sought to explain the subsequent rise of Communist power in terms of factors which were absent in Kiangsi.[8] But in arguing that the
[5] Chinese Communism and the Rise of Mao (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1958), pp. 189–190.
[6] Ibid. , p. 200. Richard C. Thornton has successfully challenged Schwartz with respect to the origin of "Maoism" but agrees with him that the CCP's line of the Sixth Congress remained valid during the war against Japan and the civil war that followed it. The Comintern and the Chinese Communists, 1928–1931 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1969), p. 30.
[7] Resolution on Some Questions in the History of Our Party, Selected Works (New York: International Publishers Company, 1965) (hereinafter cited as SW ), IV, 177–186.
[8] Peasant Nationalism and Communist Power, The Emergence of Revolutionary China, 1937–1945 (Stanford University Press, 1962). The importance of this comparative method can hardly be overstressed. My book amounts to another exercise in this method.
war had galvanized the peasants into patriotic resistance, he, too, confined his attention to the rural areas. Thus the united front between the Communists and the Kuomintang is virtually ignored. This trend continues to date.[9]
One can go on enumerating the instances of ambiguity and ambivalence—toward the resistance and the revolution—in the CCP's own account and in Western works which reflect it. It is apparent that clarity in the relationship between the resistance and the revolution is the key to understanding the CCP's victory. The paradigm of Chinese revolution must therefore include both the forces of anti-imperialist nationalism and of domestic class warfare.
My paradigm is an elaboration of Mao Tse-tung's favorite and apt characterization of China as a "semi-feudal" and "semi-colonial" country. This is an adaptation of a similar idea from Sun Yat-sen. Mao used the appellation "semi-colonial" to distinguish China from India, which he felt was entirely "colonial" under direct British rule. The terms "semi-colonial" and "semi-feudal"—or literally "half-colonial" and "half-feudal"—therefore have clear geographical denotation. A "half-colonial" and "half-feudal" country meant one in which one part was under colonial rule and the other under feudal rule. Neither Sun nor Mao spelled out what the obverse sides of the two parts were. But Mao's use of the concepts suggests plainly that the "colonial" half of China was modern in the bourgeois–democratic sense, while the "feudal" half was entirely "non-colonial," that is, independent of direct foreign rule. "After the Opium War of 1840 China gradually changed into a semi-colonial and semi-feudal society," states Mao.[10] He means that as the treaty ports were opened up, colonization and modernization proceeded simultaneously there. The distinction between two halves of China, therefore, is identical with the boundary that separated China's cities from the countryside.
The proposed paradigm charts the entire universe within which the Chinese revolution took place. It consists of several pairs of polarized categories which characterize the division between the cities and the countryside. The categories on each side are interrelated among themselves.
[9] It is commonplace to regard the New Fourth Army Incident of 1941 as virtually the end of the second united front. See Richard C. Thornton, China, the Struggle for Power, 1917–1972 (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1973), pp. 115, 124. The only exception to this trend has been Lyman P. Van Slyke, Enemies and Friends: The United Front in Chinese Communist History (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1967).
[10] Selected Works , II, 309.
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The paradigm is intended to bridge a hiatus which exists in our understanding of the Chinese revolution. The hiatus is in the conceptualization of the revolution as consisting of two distinct stages, urban and rural. The term revolution is generally used rather inclusively to refer to political and social changes that have taken place in China since at least as early as the Republican Revolution of 1911 and up to contemporary times. This usage is common to the Kuomintang, the CCP, Chinese and Western scholars. The revolution thus covers a period of sixty years, a very long span of time. During the first thirty years or so, the social and political ferment was confined almost exclusively to China's treaty ports and other urban areas. The major protagonists were inhabitants of the cities. They included the traditional elites, their modern successors, the returned students, and the national bourgeoisie. Beside living in the cities, they were all literate. By virtue of their education, they took it upon themselves to act as natural leaders. A galaxy of figures of all political hues and ideologies vied with each other to effect changes in modern China. The founders of the Communist movement were all of urban extraction. During those first years of the revolution, the rural areas were virtually untouched by such ferment. The countryside was inert and immobile. Those who try to see modern ferment in the countryside during or prior to this period can do so only in areas contiguous to the cities.[11] Yet,
[*] I am indebted to Professor Philip A. Kuhn for this manner of defining the tradition in the rural areas. See Rebellion and Its Enemies in Late Imperial China: Militarization and Social Structure, 1796–1864 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1970).
[11] Frederick Wakeman, Jr., Strangers at the Gate: Social Disorder in South China, 1839–1861 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1966).
according to a well-established view, the revolution shifted its arena between the 1930s and the early 1940s. The revolution is thought to have turned away from the cities to the rural areas after the split between the Kuomintang and the CCP in 1927. Then the cities are thought to have become an arena of counter-revolution.[12] Hence, they are ignored in most accounts of the Yenan period of the revolution.
This is a misconception of the nature of the "National Revolution" of which Sun Yat-sen was the symbol. The force which animated it was nationalism; it was truly revolutionary against imperialism. The Kuomintang began to grow when it had successfully harnessed this force to its fortune. Insofar as a political movement could succeed in China's urban areas, it had to take this factor into account. The May Fourth Movement and the early Communist movement were no exceptions. Only secondarily did the leaders and the constituency of urban nationalism concern themselves with economic and social conditions of the rural areas. And the urban middle class, with strong blood ties to rural elites, placed a limit on the method of rural reform; violent insurrection was abhorred.
The split of 1927 did not remove the impulse of "National Revolution" from the Kuomintang. The coup was as much an expression of Chinese nationalism directed at Russian imperialism as it was an expression of the vested interests of the landlord class. The coup had an unfortunate effect in forcing the Communists to launch radical social reform in opposition to the Kuomintang. The latter was in turn compelled to give priority to destruction of Communist insurrection, i.e., to national unification.
The schism superimposed an ideological division on the objective division between the town and the country, and the cities continued to lead and dominate the rural areas. The cities were linked with what Lin Piao called the "cities of the world," the source of inspiration for the May Fourth Movement. They grew in population; acquired a larger body of the middle class (the national bourgeoisie), educated population (the petty bourgeoisie), and the working class; enjoyed an ever-expanding network of communication; and thrived on commerce and industry. These conditions conduced to a change in the political
[12] What kind of society China was in the 1930s and 1940s is an important question for this study, though I do not deal with it directly. It seems true enough that the Kuomintang went into a reaction after the experience of the first united front with the Communists. Still, it seems doubtful that it was a fascist dictatorship as Barrington Moore, for instance, maintains in Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy: Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World (Boston: Beacon Press, 1967), pp. 187–201. The reorganized Kuomintang always professed to be a dictatorship during the stage of tutelage. Mao's own view is that China was an "Asiatic" society and the Kuomintang a traditional dictatorship. See pp. 180–182, 187–188 below.
complexion of the cities. The potential for spontaneous mobilization grew. The common denominator of political movement remained nationalism. As Japanese imperialism emerged as the foremost enemy after the Mukden Incident, patriotic outbursts once again became the avocation of students and intellectuals; these outbursts were linked with economic interests of the national bourgeoisie against foreign competition. But the cities supported the Kuomintang's suppression of violent insurrections in the rural areas.
The Kuomintang government presided over this constituency and continued to grow so long as it met the mandate of nationalism. The backbone of its support were the financial elites and the middle class in the lower Yangtze valley and the officer corps graduated from the Whampoa Military Academy. At some point, the Nanking government shed the tradition of warlordism and became a modern government, a species distinct from all the other regional power centers. One may regard the currency reform of 1935 as the turning point. This reform freed the Kuomintang government from heavy reliance on grain tax and from the need to farm out tax source to its army. It grew modern in other respects as well. In spite of its profession of "tutelage," a synonym for one-party dictatorship, it was very much influenced by public opinion in the cities. More than any other regional power in China, it was bound to the vocal and articulate population that could bestow or withhold the Mandate of Heaven.[*]
As Chalmers Johnson correctly points out, the Communist movement in the Kiangsi period had little to do with nationalism. Its success stemmed almost entirely from factors which related to the "feudal" aspect of the hinterland and the presence of foreign imperialism. The political and sociological foundation of "Red political power" in the hinterland was explained by Mao in this way:
There are special reasons for this unusual phenomenon. It can exist and develop only under certain conditions.
First, it . . . can only occur in China which is economically backward, and which is semi-colonial and under indirect imperialist rule. For this unusual phenomenon can occur only in conjunction with another unusual phenomenon, namely war within the White regime . . . supported by imperialism from abroad. . . .[13]
It appears that the Communist movement could have continued growing indefinitely by drawing on the forces generated exclusively in the
[*] The Confucian doctrine that the emperor ruled with the sanction of heaven. When there was popular discontent with an emperor, he was thought to have forfeited his mandate, thereby opening the way for his own overthrow.
[13] Selected Works , I, 65.
rural areas—so long as there was a power vacuum created by "incessant wars" among warlords aligned with foreign powers.
The steady rise of the Kuomintang in the Decade of Nanking (1927–1937) could only mean the eventual doom of regionalism. However, both warlord regimes and colonial powers reacted in defense of status quo. Japan was particularly sensitive to the menacing implications of radical nationalism to its interests in southern Manchuria. In 1931 it pre-empted Manchuria rather than see it reintegrated into Republican China. Nanking's problem was compounded when its domestic rivals began to invoke anti-Japanese slogans to justify their separate existence. In 1932 the CCP, too, joined these regional groups with a formal declaration of war on Japan. But as long as it harassed the government's rear in every international crisis, the Kuomintang's policy of national unification as a precondition for resistance remained credible. Little did the Chinese Communists know then that Nanking's pressure against them would be deflected once again by Japanese intervention on an unprecedented scale shortly thereafter.
In the meantime, the Kuomintang refused to allow anything to get in the way of suppressing the Communist rebellion. After considerable difficulty, it finally succeeded in delivering a near-fatal blow on the revolutionary movement. The cities were more powerful than the countryside. The Kuomintang's military victory indicated that, for the rural revolution to grow, the forces generated in the cities had to be politically neutralized. Any arrangement to attain this end had to draw on the nationalistic impulse that animated the cities. The CCP had learned the critical weakness of its exclusively rural orientation, and once again it turned toward the cities. This is the meaning of the second united front. Neither the defeat of the Communist movement in Kiangsi, nor its success during the war against Japan, therefore, can be adequately explained unless the cities—exogenous to the peasant revolution—are included in the paradigm.
My main thesis is, briefly, that the Communist victory in the "war of national liberation" followed from the fortuitous circumstances which made it possible to combine the war of resistance with a full scale revolution. The CCP's own power rested on mobilized peasantry. The mobilization was impossible unless it was preceded by a thorough-going land revolution. In order to neutralize the Kuomintang against peasant revolution, a protracted international conflict which subjected China to a foreign occupation was necessary. Japan's invasion enabled the Communist forces to move in behind the enemy lines. This was the most important strategic decision. It effectively ended the perennial threat of the Kuomintang's encirclement and suppression. The Com-
munists' partisan (or revolutionary) interest in expanding their armed forces became indistinguishable from national interest in the resistance. By championing the cause of resistance, the CCP sought to marshal the patriotic public opinion of the cities to keep the Kuomintang in the war; this, in turn, granted immunity to the revolutionary expansion of Communist power.
To maintain, as I do, that the second united front was of paramount importance for the success of the revolution necessarily implies a high estimate of the bearing of foreign intervention on the outcome. The criterion for judging the impact of foreign intervention on Chinese events should not be the subjective intent of the powers—such as Japan's design to subjugate the Kuomintang or American desire to support it. Foreign intervention should be judged objectively in the light of the question: did it help or hinder the maintenance and preservation of the second united front? When looked at this way, both the United States and Japan must be said to have played important positive roles in the revolution. The rivalry or "contradiction" between these and other powers constituted the outer framework of the revolution in China.
By discarding the paradigm of the Chinese revolution which views the rural areas in isolation, we are compelled to take new stock of the presuppositions that underlie that paradigm. One of these concerns the source of Communist power. The prevailing view is that it is based on "self-reliance," that is, created entirely in the rural areas. This view results from the fallacy of ignoring the function of the second united front in protecting the revolution during the stage of its infancy and growth. It is connected with the assumption that the CCP's activities during the resistance did not include revolution-making . By removing these misconceptions, it is possible to arrive at a correct assessment of the nature and strength of China's peasantry and the sources of Communist power. This is the secondary goal of my book.
As the Chinese revolution in the 1937–1945 period consisted of a combination of anti-imperialist and anti-feudal struggles, so my account of it falls into two rather distinct parts. One deals with the Communist leadership's efforts to adapt itself to the war between China and Japan. The other deals with the peasant revolution in rural areas which fell to the CCP's control.
The book draws on internal documents issued by the CCP in order to look at the revolution from the standpoint of the revolutionaries. In a movement which was Caesaro–Papist in nature, the internal policy debate was bound up with the question of the political power of various contenders. The Party's history as we have it now—the
source of so much confusion—was an instrument of internal struggle. To understand the substantive policy questions involved, we must understand the power interest of the contenders. But this book is not a history of the internal politics of the CCP. I will deal with that subject only insofar as it is indispensable for an understanding of the revolution in China.
II—
Two Theories of Revolution
In the summer of 1932, during the Fourth Encirclement Campaign, the Kuomintang forces dealt a serious blow to the O-Yü-Wan (Hupeh–Honan–Anhwei) Soviet. The Fourth Front Army of the Chinese Red Army, which defended this soviet, embarked on what was really the first "Long March." Then in October of 1934, during the Fifth Campaign, the Central Soviet District in southern Kiangsi was overrun. The Central Committee of the CCP, the government, the Red Army, their personnel and dependents fled, with the Kuomintang forces on their heels. This was only the beginning of the worst disaster in the history of the Chinese Communist movement. The Red political power which controlled some 300 hsien (counties) at one time in Kiangsi, Hupeh, Honan, Hunan, Anhwei, and Fukien was almost wholly wiped out.[1] The revolutionary movement appeared to be on the verge of extinction. The defeat split the Chinese Communist leadership both in China and Moscow and gave rise to serious internal disputes. The disputes concerned the causes behind the fall of the Kiangsi Soviet and a general reorientation in the Party's policy to extricate itself from the critical strait. The dispute extended well into the early phase of the war of resistance against Japan. Out of it evolved the CCP's new strategies which directly contributed to the final victory of the revolution: abandonment of the civil war with the Kuomintang government and the formation of the "Anti-Japanese National United Front."
Hitherto, we have tended to neglect the gravity of the CCP's defeat,
[1] Hatano Ken'ichi, Gendai Shina no seiji to jinbutsu [Politics and personalities in contemporary China] (Tokyo: Kaizosha[*] , 1937), p. 306.
the defects of the soviet movement, and the drastic nature of the CCP's about-face. The Long March, for instance, is still thought of primarily as an heroic epic.[2] But the fact that the heroic nature of the Long March resulted from the harsh circumstances imposed on the CCP by its enemy is overlooked. Above all, we have ignored the fact that the partisan interest of one faction in the CCP was bound up with the fiction that the soviet movement and the Long March could not be faulted.[3]
In this chapter I will delineate the substance of the strategic dispute in the CCP between 1935 and 1936 that led to the adoption of the new policy. My primary purpose is to show that the end product—the united front line—was an uneasy juxtaposition of two distinct policy lines which clashed with each other.
Let us begin by touching briefly on the O-Yü-Wan Soviet and the Red Fourth Front Army, as the fortunes of this group foreshadowed those of the Central Soviet. The Fourth Encirclement Campaign was directed mainly at the O-Yü-Wan Soviet. According to Chang Kuot'ao, Chiang Kai-shek marshaled a force of 500,000 men, of which 300,000 were used directly for assault.[4] According to the Kuomintang's estimate, the Red Army forces in the O-Yü-Wan area north of the Yangtze River numbered 80,000.[5] The campaign began in the spring of 1932 soon after the Shanghai Incident. By the summer, Hsü Hsiangch'ien's forces were dislodged from the central base and fled westward across the Peiping–Hankow railway in search of a new, as yet unknown, base. Some tactical mistakes were made on the Communist side.[6] But the sheer superiority of the Kuomintang forces in number and fire power created a situation which was irreversible. Thus the Central Committee's O-Yü-Wan Sub-bureau had discussed a plan to evacuate the base prior to the attack.[7]
Of the several doubts which haunted Chang Kuo-t'ao and other leaders of the Fourth Front Army on the run, two are worthy of note.
[2] Several books have been published on the Long March both in and out of China. They all follow this interpretation. See, for instance, Dick Wilson, Long March (New York: Weybright and Talley, 1971).
[3] See, for instance, Mao's speech at Wayaopao in northern Shensi in December, 1935, where he said, "The Long March . . . has proclaimed to the world that . . . Chiang Kai-shek and his like, are impotent. It has proclaimed their utter failure to encircle, pursue, obstruct and intercept us. . . . " Selected Works , I, 160.
[4] "Wo ti hui-i" [My recollections], Ming Pao , No. 43, July, 1969, p. 93.
[5] Military History Bureau, the Ministry of National Defense, Chiao-fei chan-shih [A History of Military Actions Against The Communist Rebellion During 1930–1945] (Taipei: Lien-ho ch'u-pan-she, 1967), p. 538.
[6] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 43, July, 1969, pp. 93–94.
[7] Ibid. , p. 92.
One was the conditional nature of the peasant mass support for the Red Army. Support depended on the absolute control of an area by the Red Army. When a superior Kuomintang force entered a base, compelling the Red Army forces to take evasive action, the peasants were left behind to shift for themselves. At this point, they began to waver and local resistance to Communist programs increased. Upon reaching northern Szechuan with a considerably weakened force, the Fourth Front Army decided to adopt a program designed to appease potential local opposition. The Fourth Front Army's Program Upon Entering Szechuan was an ad hoc adaptation to current local exigencies.[8] But it suspended forcible confiscation of the property of the landlords, which amounted to an open challenge to the Party's "sovietization" policy. As Chang Kuo-t'ao put it, "At present it was not the agrarian revolution that had enhanced the forces of the Red Army, but the momentary victories that the Red Army had achieved [which] encouraged a small number of peasants to rise and distribute the land."[9]
The other doubt stemmed from the difficulties which confronted the Fourth Front Army. The prospect of finding a stable base from which a revolution could be launched appeared very bleak. Chang Kuo-t'ao seems to have felt then that there was a deeper cause for the weakness of the revolution than merely military questions. What then sustained the Red Army's growth up until 1932, and what caused its demise after that?
The Communist regulars were tactically superior to the Kuomintang's provincial units and were on a par with or even surpassed the central forces under certain conditions. Tactical leadership of the Red Army's command in mobile warfare was usually superior. The Red Army's hiking ability gave it unsurpassed mobility in difficult terrain where it usually chose to fight. In or around its own bases, the Red Army monopolized intelligence; it knew the movements of the enemy forces while keeping them in the dark as to its own whereabouts. It almost always fought on its own terms by amassing an overwhelmingly superior force against an individual column of the converging enemy forces at a decisive point. The Red Army could not be defeated by conventional means. To apply unconventional means, the Kuomintang had to marshal an extraordinary number of troops for a prolonged period.
The other major condition for the growth of the Red Army was strategic. This stemmed from the basic structural weakness of the Chi-
[8] Ibid. , No. 45, September, 1969, p. 75; ibid. , No. 46, October, 1969, p. 97.
[9] Ibid. , No. 46, October, 1969, p. 99.
nese polity. Chiang Kai-shek's war against the Communists was part of a larger attempt to establish centralized and unified government by shedding the tradition of warlordism. In his campaigns against the Red Army, he had to draw on regional forces of questionable loyalty. In fact, he frequently pitted such regional units against the Red Army in the hope that one or the other or both would be decimated. The contradiction among the motley Kuomintang forces was usually exploited by the Red Army to breach the encirclement, e.g., during the Fukien Rebellion. The CCP's strategy to establish a regional regime by "winning victory of the revolution first in one or several provinces" presupposed the "semi-feudal" political structure of China. This presupposition was also shared by the Japanese Army's leadership. Japan's aggression into China since 1931 was based on the judgment that it could exploit warlordism to carve out the Chinese territory. Every major Japanese aggression since the Mukden Incident forced the Kuomintang government to break its anti-Communist encirclement. In short, the diversionary effect of exogenous factors had maintained a situation which enabled the Red Army to exercise its tactical superiority to the hilt.[*]
The strategic situation of China could not be changed overnight. But the Kuomintang government made major tactical innovations for the Fifth Campaign. German advisers led by von Seeckt were credited with a part in it. Instead of trying to confront the Red Army in conventional mobile warfare, the Kuomintang forces adopted the tactic of depriving the Red Army of its soviet base by gradual advance. Innumerable blockhouses were built around the soviet area.[10] They were interconnected with newly constructed roads. A tight economic blockade was imposed. A small advance at a time was made toward the center, and the area taken was defended by a new blockhouse. Without adequate fire power, the Red Army was nearly powerless against the blockhouses. Chiang Kai-shek carried out the Fifth Campaign with determination. He marshaled a force of 400,000 men, assisted by aircraft and modern artillery.[11] After the split caused in the Kuomintang forces by the Fukien Rebellion had been patched up in late 1933, the Campaign came to a climax.
[*] The CCP's ability to mobilize the peasant masses has remained constant from 1928 to the present. What remains to be known is whether the Red Army's preponderance was the precondition of peasant mobilization, as Chang Kuo-t' ao suggests.
[10] Estimated to be 3,000 by Hatano, in Gendai Shina , p. 302.
[11] This is the number used directly for assault, according to Snow, Red Star Over China , p. 184. Hollington K. Tong states that 300,000 were used, in Chiang Kai-shek, Soldier and Statesman (London: Hurst and Blackett, 1938), II, 528.
The CCP's leadership shared the view that this fight was a decisive one. The Fifth Plenum of the Sixth Central Committee met in January. Mao charged later that the "third 'Left' line of Wang Ming" dominated the Plenum and that incorrect tactics of trying to defend every inch of the soviet base in positional warfare were adopted.[12] The Internationalists led by Ch'in Pang-hsien had the controlling voice, and Mao's dissenting opinion was brushed aside.
In late April, Kuangch'ang and Chünmenling fell to the Kuomintang forces, and the approach to Juichin, the soviet capital, was opened. By this time victory for the Kuomintang forces was in sight. The CCP leadership must have debated where to go and what to do. Such a discussion might have been under way since the summer of 1932, when the Fourth Front Army was forced to evacuate the O-Yü-Wan Soviet during the Fourth Campaign. When the Fifth Campaign started, some people in P'eng Te-huai's 3rd Army Corps are said to have asked, "When will there be an end to all this?"[13] On July 15, 1934, the Central Committee and the Central Soviet Government issued a joint "Declaration on the March of the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army to the North to Resist Japan."[14] This was the signal to evacuate the Central Soviet area. It was also likely that internal recrimination had begun as to the cause of the imminent defeat. I presume that Mao took the lead in criticizing the Internationalist leadership for not acting on his tactical advice. In self-defense the Internationalists seemed to have developed a line of argument which amounted to rationalization of the existing policy.
One rather precious specimen is available in a speech made by Wang Ming in Moscow on November 23, 1934,[15] just as the Kuomintang forces overran the Central Soviet area. He was working in the Comintern as a Chinese delegate. He was thus in close touch with the Party Center in China and presumably privy to the debate that was developing there. His opinion must also be regarded as representative of the Comintern's view at the time.
In this speech Wang Ming clearly identified himself with the incum-
[12] SW , IV, 185. There is some doubt as to how powerless Mao was in the Party's leadership at this time. Dieter Heinzig thinks he was "neither negligible nor dominant," in "The Otto Braun Memoirs and Mao's Rise to Power," The China Quarterly , April–June, 1971, p. 284. But there is little doubt that he was not in command of the Fourth and the Fifth Campaigns.
[13] Jerome Ch'en, "Resolutions of the Tsunyi Conference," ibid. , October–December, 1969, p. 25.
[14] Takeuchi Minoru, ed., Mao Tse-tung-chi [Mao Tse-tung collection] (Tokyo: Hokubosha[*] , 1971), IV, 363–367.
[15] Hsin t'iao-chien yü hsin ts'e-lüeh [New conditions and new tactics] (Moscow: The Soviet Foreign Workers' Publishing House, 1935) (BI).
bent leadership by attempting to explain away the debacle in Kiangsi. He spent a great deal of effort recounting the overwhelming military superiority of the Kuomintang forces used in the "Sixth Encirclement and Suppression"—this was the Comintern's numeration for the "Fifth Encirclement" after the Fukien Incident; the entirely new tactics used by von Seeckt; and the use of heavy aerial and artillery bombardment.[16] "Because of this," he said, "it was impossible not to have difficulty in quickly destroying the enemy main force, so that it was impossible not to withdraw from certain soviet areas . . . ."[17] At no point did he engage in a wholesale attack on the strategic aspect of the existing policy. Mistakes were committed but they were tactical. "Does the Red Army have the possibility to win victory over these new policies of the enemy?" he asked himself, and answered affirmatively.[18] He was insistent that the soviet movement enjoyed the enthusiastic support of the people,[19] and he emphasized that the area lost to the Kuomintang was compensated for by the newly-opened soviets in the hands of the Red Fourth, Second, Sixth, and Seventh Corps.[20]
At the same time Wang Ming revealed another element of his position. Without questioning the Party's line as such, he placed the blame for the "mistakes" in Kiangsi mainly on the incorrect handling of the Fukien Incident both by the CCP and the rebels themselves. He was very critical of some elements in the CCP who refused to aid the 19th Route Army on the grounds that "the Red Army should not receive Chiang Kai-shek's blows in place of the 19th Route Army because at that time the 19th Route Army was the object on which Chiang Kaishek was concentrating all of his power . . . . "[21] Wang Ming professed to believe, on the contrary, that "if a very large revolutionary struggle broke out in the great rear of Chiang Kai-shek's army . . . the plan to encircle the Central Soviet area could have quickly and completely gone bankrupt."[22] Wang Ming was implying that had a major urban revolt—of the kind represented by the Fukien Rebellion—been properly exploited, Kuomintang pressure could have been diverted. This was consistent with Wang Ming's position which Mao labeled as the "third 'Left' line." It represented his efforts to focus the CCP's activities on the cities within the rural-oriented line of the Party at the time. Wang Ming was to make an abrupt about-face shortly, as will be shown later, but his urban orientation remained unchanged.
The Party Center and the First Front Army rested briefly in a small town in Kweichow Province in January, 1935, and conducted their
[16] Ibid. , pp. 14–16, 112–113.
[17] Ibid. , p. 18.
[18] Ibid. , p. 19.
[19] Ibid. , pp. 43, 87.
[20] Ibid. , pp. 84–85.
[21] Ibid. , p. 64.
[22] Ibid. , p. 20.
own review of the fall of the Kiangsi Soviet. The Resolutions of the Tsunyi Conference—made famous because of Mao's rise to power on this occasion—agreed with Wang Ming's review in part but disagreed with it in another. The beginning of the internal dispute concerning the second united front can be traced back to these Resolutions. Whether issues between Mao and Wang Ming were joined on this occasion was not certain. That depended on whether or not the Party Center maintained communication with the Comintern in Moscow.
Chang Kuo-t'ao shows that the Fourth Front Army and the First Front Army maintained constant radio contact with each other. Thus the Tsunyi Resolutions were transmitted to northern Szechuan almost immediately from Kweichow.[23] From the Tsunyi Conference onward, Mao seems to have monopolized all radio communication with the outside world and kept his opponents in the dark. In particular, he had an interest in censoring the messages from the Comintern since he was beginning to take a line in opposition to it. But radio or other contact between the Party Center and Moscow was not impossible.[24]
The central thesis of the Tsunyi Resolutions was that the fall of the Kiangsi Soviet was the fault solely of the Internationalist leadership which commanded the Fifth Campaign. Its major import was to defend the soviet movement, the Red Army, and by extension the peasant mass movement on which they were based, as fundamentally correct. The rural strategy of the Sixth Congress was correct and the soviets could have continued to grow but for the purely tactical error of some individuals, according to this view. The Resolutions thus agreed with Wang Ming's November, 1934, review of the Fifth Campaign in not faulting the Party's line of the Sixth Congress.
The Resolutions suggested, in passing, the views of Mao's opponents in China. Ch'in Pang-hsien, an Internationalist and the General-Secretary of the Party until he was replaced at the Tsunyi Conference, was said to have "come to the opportunist conclusion that to defeat the Fifth 'Encirclement and Suppression' was an objective impossibility."[25] On the contrary, the Resolutions maintained, "the Party of the Central Soviets, in particular . . . has achieved unprecedented successes in mobilizing the broad masses of workers and peasants to take part in the revolutionary war. The Red Army Expansion Movement aroused
[23] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 48, December, 1969, p. 85.
[24] By July, 1935, there appeared an oblique reference to the dispute in the CCP Center in a Soviet press. Charles B. McLane, Soviet Policy and the Chinese Communists, 1931–1946 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1958), pp. 53–54. See also pp. 21–23, below.
[25] Mao Tse-tung-chi , IV, 379.
great enthusiasm among the masses . . . . " But, continued the Resolutions, Ch'in Pang-hsien "underestimated" these "favorable conditions for crushing the Fifth 'Encirclement and Suppression.' " He concluded that "we were unable to crush the 'Encirclement and Suppression' by our own efforts."[26]
The Resolutions took serious issue with this view and opposed it head on.
It must be pointed out that our work still suffers from serious defects. The Party's leadership in the daily struggle of the broad masses of workers and peasants against the imperialists and Kuomintang had not made any noticeable progress. . . . These defects undoubtedly affected operations against the Fifth 'Encirclement and Suppression' and they became the important cause of our inability to smash the 'Encirclement and Suppression.' But their existence must not be misunderstood as the essential cause for our failure to smash the Fifth 'Encirclement and Suppression.' Comrade XX [i.e., Ch'in Pang-hsien] has exaggerated the defects in these areas of our work and refused to see or admit the misjudgment on the part of the military leadership and in their basic strategy and tactics. . . . Since our military leadership could not adopt correct strategy and tactics, we were unable to score decisive victory in war in spite of the bravery and skill of the Red Army, the exemplary work in the rear, and the support of the broad masses. This was precisely the essential cause for our inability to defeat the Fifth 'Encirclement and Suppression' in the Central Soviet.[27]
It followed from this point of view that "the Central Soviet could have been preserved, the Fifth 'Encirclement and Suppression' could have been broken."
It appears that the Internationalist leadership at Tsunyi had an interest in blaming the defeat on the objective circumstances, while Mao, the opposition, had an interest in fixing the blame on the subjective error of those in power. The Internationalists had shifted from blaming the tactical error in the handling of the Fukien Rebellion (as in Wang Ming's Moscow speech) to blaming the objective circumstance. I infer that the CCP leadership at Tsunyi faced two broad alternatives in its post mortem. One was to fault the tactical, subjective judgment of some individuals and uphold the Party's line. The other was to exonerate the incumbent leaders by blaming the objective circumstances. The latter necessarily implied that the validity of the Party's strategies was open to question. But Ch'in Pang-hsien, who took the position, somehow stopped short of pushing this logic to its conclusion.
I must note some peculiar features of the realignment of power that
[26] Ibid. , p. 380.
[27] Ibid. Emphasis original.
took place at Tsunyi. By the standard established in the CCP by then, the disaster in Kiangsi was bound to be followed by a full scale review and stock-taking. Such a review would have taken a very critical look at the role of the incumbent leaders regardless of actual culpability. They would have been retired from command. At the same time, the existing line of the Party should have come under criticism. The incumbent leadership and the existing Party line were in a particularly vulnerable position as the fall of the Kiangsi Soviet almost coincided with the great turn in the Comintern's line. The CCP could have held its Seventh Congress almost simultaneously with the Comintern's Seventh Congress, as was the custom up to then. But nothing of the sort happened. The Tsunyi Resolutions defended the line of the Sixth Congress, and the CCP's Seventh Congress did not convene until 1945. Error in tactical leadership was fixed mainly on a certain "Hua Fu," who was in reality a Comintern agent named Otto Braun.[28] Chou Enlai, who commanded the Fourth Campaign without much success, retired as the General Political Commissar of the Red Army.[29] Ch'in Pang-hsien was replaced in the post of the General-Secretary of the Politburo by Chang Wen-t'ien, another Internationalist. Both Chou En-lai and Ch'in Pang-hsien continued in important leadership positions in the Party.
The limited nature of the realignment at Tsunyi has been hitherto explained by the continued power of the Internationalists in the Party and the slim majority Mao could muster on his side at the time. It is my inference, however, that Mao was interested in carefully circumscribing the scope of his criticism against the "third 'Left' line" of Wang Ming. His primary goal was to preserve intact the legitimacy of the rural strategy of the Sixth Congress. The Tsunyi Conference as a "military coup d'état"[30] accomplished this. At the same time, Mao's account with Wang Ming was not entirely settled.
The next events in the development of the intra-Party dispute were the Party conferences in Moukung and Maoerhkai in western Szechuan. Here the First Front Army and the Fourth Front Army met in June, 1935. Mao Tse-tung and Chang Kuo-t'ao clashed with each other on several issues. I will limit my discussion to two of them. Chang Kuot'ao's predicament was similar to that of the Internationalists. He had failed to defend the O-Yü-Wan Soviet; and subsequently, he had abandoned the land confiscation policy on his own initiative. In defending
[28] Chi-hsi Hu, "Hua Fu, the Fifth Encirclement Campaign and the Tsunyi Conference," The China Quarterly , July–September, 1970, p. 40.
[29] Ch'en, "Tsunyi Conference," p. 2.
[30] Hu, "Fifth Encirclement," p. 44.
himself against Mao, it was natural for him to question the validity of the "sovietization" policy itself. When he saw the miserable condition of the First Front Army—reduced to 10,000 troops or one-tenth of the original size—he came to the conclusion that the soviet movement and the Long March had failed.[31] Mao chose to differ and blamed Chang Kuo-t'ao, instead, for breach of Party discipline.
They also differed on the question of where to go. At Moukung, Chang Kuo-t'ao was told of a radio instruction from the Comintern to the Party Center in Juichin in the summer of 1934. According to this instruction, the Red Army was to move closer to the border of Outer Mongolia in case of extreme necessity.[32] According to Wang Ming's Moscow speech of November, 1934, the CCP had decided to move west-ward because of the presence of Kuomintang forces in north and central China.[33] If Mao was in touch with the Comintern in Moukung, he let Chang Kuo-t'ao believe otherwise. He simply proposed moving into northern parts of Shensi and Kansu.[34] Probably influenced by the last Comintern instruction, Chang Kuo-t'ao proposed to build a base where they were (i.e., Szechuan–Kansu border with Sikang as the rear) or to move into Sinkiang. Mao felt that Chang Kuo-t'ao's proposals would take the CCP too far away from the center of China.[35]
The crucial question here was, What induced Mao to insist that the CCP move into the barren loess region of Shensi? One must remember that the Long March was justified by the "Manifesto to Go Up North to Resist Japan" issued in Mao's name in July, 1934. Did he have some specific scheme in mind? Or was this just another anti-Japanese statement which had been added to the CCP's appeals since 1932? I simply do not know. But war with Japan was shortly to become a vital precondition of Mao's vision of revolution.
It has hitherto been assumed that the Maoerhkai Conference issued the so-called "August First Declaration."[36] This appeal was very significant because it addressed itself broadly to the intermediate groups
[31] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 49, January, 1970, p. 82. See also his open letter on the occasion of his defection from the CCP, in The Commission for Compiling Documents on the 50th Anniversary of Kuomintang, ed., Kung-fei huo-kuo shih-liao hui-pien [Collection of historical documents on the ruination of the nation by the Communist bandits] (hereinafter cited as Kung-fei huo-kuo ) (Taipei: Central Committee of the Kuomintang, 1961), III, 63.
[32] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 50, February, 1970, p. 85.
[33] Hsin t, iao-chien yü hsin ts'e-lüeh , p. 119.
[34] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 50, February, 1970, p. 85.
[35] Ibid. , p. 87.
[36] Wei k'ang-Jih chiu-kuo kao ch'üan-t'i t'ung-pao shu [Letter to the whole nation for resistance against Japan and national salvation], Kuo-Kung ho-tso k'ang-Jih wen-hsien [Documents of Kuomintang–CCP cooperation] (hereinafter cited as Kuo-Kung ho-tso ) (Hankow: T'ien-ma shu-tien, 1938) (BI), pp. 1–7.
by overcoming the sectarianism which marked the CCP's policy in the civil war period. It has been suspected that the appeal was coordinated with the Comintern's Seventh Congress which had been in session since July 25. Indeed, the content of the August First Declaration shared many points with the major speech delivered by Wang Ming at the Congress on August 7.[37] Both proposed the formation of a "national defense government" based on a ten-point "common program"; an "anti-Japanese united army" which was to enlist the "Kuomintang army"; and an offer of ceasefire toward any force which was willing to join the "united army." Especially noteworthy was the exact identity of the "common program" proposed in Moscow and China as it varied in content from time to time. There were, however, visible differences between the two: while Wang Ming proposed a "national united front," the term is missing from the Declaration, which moreover left no doubt that Chiang Kai-shek was still the CCP's enemy.
The Comintern's shift to the popular front line did not take place overnight; it was preceded by at least several months of debate. According to Wang Ming,
When the Comintern's Seventh Congress was under preparation, and the basic tactical guideline of the Congress was being debated . . . the Chinese Communist Party carried out a thorough and careful study of tactical problems concerning the anti-imperialist united front under the guidance of the Center. . . .[38]
Wang Ming states that the August First Declaration was the result of that study. The suspicion that he was the author of the Declaration is strengthened by the fact that Chang Kuo-t'ao recalls neither the united front nor the Declaration being discussed at Maoerhkai.[39] Did Wang Ming then secure the Party Center's consent before the fact, as he implies, or did he issue the Declaration in the name of the Central Committee on his own initiative as a member of the Comintern's Presidium? Chang Kuo-t'ao takes the latter view.[40] If Mao did know of the Declaration at the time, he had an interest in keeping Chang Kuo-t'ao ignorant of it for fear that the latter's opposition to the
[37] The speech indicates that at least a part of it was written on July 16. Wang Ming hsüan-chi [Selected Works of Wang Ming ] (Tokyo: Kyuko[*] shoin, 1970), I, 23.
[38] Hatano Ken'ichi, Chugoku[*] kyosanto[*] 1936-nen shi [History of the Chinese Communist Party, 1936] (Tokyo: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 1937), pp. 94–95.
[39] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 51, March, 1970, p. 82.
[40] Ibid. Upon Wang Ming's return to China in late 1937, Mao is reported to have acknowledged Wang Ming's authorship of the August First Declaration in a welcome speech. Warren Kuo, "The Conflict between Chen Shao-yu and Mao Tsetung," Issues and Studies , November, 1968, pp. 35–36.
soviet program might be strengthened. It is impossible to settle these questions with finality. Again, much depends on whether or not Moscow and the Party Center were in touch with each other. There was at least a one-way communication, however. The CCP had dispatched two agents, P'an Han-nien and Hu Yü-chih, to Moscow from Maoerhkai.[41]
What amounted to a counter-thesis to the Tsunyi Resolutions was articulated in Wang Ming's August 7 speech at the Comintern Congress (July 25–August 20). He pushed to the conclusion the logic implied in Ch'in Pang-hsien's rationalization for the defeat in Kiangsi, and he used it as a premise to call for a drastic reorientation of the Chinese Communist movement. There was clearly an element of "opportunism" in Wang Ming's shift. Echoing Mao's view, Lin Piao stated in 1965 that Wang Ming, the practitioner of the "third 'Left' line," became a "capitulationist" or an advocate of the "second Wang Ming line" of "right opportunism."[42] At the same time, there was a consistent underlying dimension in Wang Ming's position throughout the Kiangsi and the resistance periods. His tactical change was derivative of that underlying dimension.
The Comintern's shift to the new policy—the popular front with bourgeois democracies in opposition to fascism and reaction—had the Soviet Union's interest primarily in view. The shift came within half a year of the debacle in Kiangsi—a most inopportune moment for Mao, who had committed himself to the defense of the existing Party line. Wang Ming, who had succeeded Li Li-san as Mao's opponent in 1931, took the rostrum to deliver a major speech dealing with the Far East. His speech was formally deferential toward Mao, listing him at the top of the hierarchy of Chinese Communist leaders.[43] Still, Wang Ming obviously had the backing of the Comintern to criticize "some comrades" in the CCP for their part in the major blunder committed in Kiangsi. Wang Ming, articulate and verbose, fully rose to the occasion.
A lengthy section of the speech, dealing specifically with China, began with a criticism of "a very greatly mistaken viewpoint" of "some people" who think that the "question of anti-imperialist national united front has no longer any meaning" because of the severity of class struggle. Wang Ming averred, on the contrary, that the united
[41] Wang Chien-min, Chungkuo Kung-ch'an-tang shih-kao [A draft history of the Chinese Communist Party] (Taipei, 1965), III, 45–46.
[42] Lin Piao, "Long Live the Victory," p. 210.
[43] See the laudatory reference to Mao Tse-tung in the speech in Wang Ming hsüan-chi , I, 25.
front "determines everything."[44] He suggested the premise for the radical reorientation he was demanding:
When the national crisis is deepening day by day, there is no way of saving the nation except by a total mobilization of our great people. . . . At the same time, for the Communist Party's part, there is no means whatever to mobilize the entire Chinese people . . . except this policy of national united front. . . .[45]
To be sure, Wang Ming admitted, the CCP had been already "practicing anti-Japanese united front policy." Georgi Dimitrov also took cognizance of this alleged fact.[46] The reference might have been to the August First Declaration. But Wang Ming insisted that "right up to now the CCP has failed to be truly thorough and to avoid committing mistakes in implementing this policy."[47] "The first among the causes of these mistakes," he declared, "is that many of our comrades in the past as at the present have not comprehended the new conditions and the new environment which have emerged in recent years in China."[48] Living in total isolation in the hinterland, he suggested, the Chinese Communists were insensitive to the stirring of public sentiment in the cities.
In this speech, Wang Ming did not mention the Kuomintang as a friend to be enlisted in the united front. However, his several references to the Kuomintang and "the Kuomintang army" were moderate and solicitous, and he maintained that Sun Yat-sen's revolutionary tradition was one to which the Communists were heir.[49] At the same time, he tried to distinguish his position from that of Ch'en Tu-hsiu. Ch'en's mistake, according to Wang, was in "juxtaposing the tactics of national united front with the task of class struggle" and abandoning the class interests of the workers and peasants. The disaster of 1927, he stressed, was "by no means the fault of the tactics of anti-imperialist united front themselves."[50] Wang Ming was evidently anticipating an attack from the left against himself, and he sought to turn the tables on his potential critics. "Some people think," he said, "that the CCP's participation in the anti-imperialist united front will only weaken the leadership of the proletariat and the struggle for soviet political power. This is completely inaccurate."[51] He maintained that only the proletarian leadership over the united front could ensure the success of agrarian revolution. In so doing, he implied that his policy was intended to bring about a new alignment in the CCP by shifting away from its excessive reliance on the peasants.
[44] Ibid. , p. 7.
[45] Ibid. , p. 9–10.
[46] Ibid. , p. 63.
[47] Ibid. , p. 11.
[48] Ibid. , p. 13
[49] Ibid. , p. 53.
[50] Ibid. , p. 47.
[51] Ibid. , p. 45.
Wang Ming gave less restrained criticisms of the rural revolution in an essay written in November of 1935 for an internal audience. He lashed out at the impotence of the Red Army:
From the standpoint of actual military strength, we are still unable to win victory over Japanese imperialism and its lackeys. From the standpoint of political trends, a very great part of the people have not yet escaped the influence of other political power. . . . They have not yet defended the soviets.[52]
Violent confiscation and class struggle promoted by the CCP invited greater and greater reaction. The Chinese soviets came to rely more and more on the Red Army alone to carry on the revolution. The revolution became synonymous with armed struggle.[53] It did not advance beyond the line of the Red Army's occupation, while it tended to alienate the inhabitants of the cities who were more concerned with foreign menace.
Wang Ming clearly shared the orthodox Marxist bias against the peasantry. As Mao put it later, he underestimated the "peculiar revolutionary character of the peasants."[54] To Wang, China's peasant masses fell far behind the inhabitants of the cities in their political awareness. Such a consciousness was at best aroused only through the process of the land confiscation struggle. Would they also rise up for purely political purposes, such as defending China against the Japanese? Wang Ming did not deny, of course, that the peasants were an important component of the Chinese revolution.
Nevertheless, a land revolutionary movement can never by itself directly solve the task of an anti-imperialist revolutionary movement. . . . Experiences prove that an anti-imperialist revolutionary movement has much broader motive force than a land revolutionary movement.[55]
Should not the CCP try more directly and deliberately to harness the political power swelling up spontaneously in the cities? To Wang Ming, simply reacting to the revolts in Chahar and Fukien was not good enough.[56]
Wang Ming also had an instrumental view of the rural soviets which subsisted by exploiting the "semi-feudal" character of China:
[52] Ibid. , p. 81.
[53] According to Mao, both Li Li-san and Wang Ming slanderously characterized Mao's approach as the "rule of the gun," SW , IV, 195.
[54] Ibid. , p. 192.
[55] Wang Ming hsüan-chi , I, 76.
[56] Hsin t'iao-chien yü hsin ts'e-lüeh , p. 21. He states, "the great armed struggles which broke out among the enemy . . . were by no means all decided by our will."
This environment enabled the revolution to obtain ample opportunity and time to train and accumulate its own forces. . . . In addition, this environment enabled the revolution to obtain a greater possibility to avoid an armed clash . . . which arises prematurely, for which we are unprepared, and which is disadvantageous to the revolution.[57]
The soviets that grew up in the interstices of the White political power by exploiting the "unevenness" of China's revolution were thus a mere preparation, a refuge from a superior enemy, and a means to some final act which was to take place beyond the borders of the rural soviets themselves. Biding of time in the hinterland was indeed a "protracted struggle." But the final act, a consummation of the revolution, was not. Wang Ming had to make this point with some trepidation, for it was only in 1931 that he had taken Li Li-san to task for making precisely the same point.[58] At the time of the Fifth Plenum in 1934, furthermore, Wang Ming was instrumental in pronouncing that a "direct revolutionary situation" existed, which led to the do-or-die battle in defense of Kiangsi.[59] Still, he made it clear that a successful revolution must draw on a sudden political tension created by larger domestic or international events. Such tension would do away with the "unevenness" of the revolution.
I surmise that Mao's ingenuity in rising to power in the wake of the defeat in Kiangsi infuriated Wang Ming. Likewise, Wang Ming's ingenuity in exploiting the same event for his own purpose must have chagrined Mao. Wang Ming's interest was to restore China's revolution to the cities on the wave of anti-Japanese political consciousness. An element of opportunism or "politics" was present on both sides. But we must also see the substantive merits of both cases. As things stood in the summer of 1935, Mao's case from Tsunyi—the peasant revolution can go on provided that it enjoys his leadership—did not carry much weight. At the time, he was nearing northern Shensi, the destination of the grueling march, with a force of a mere 4,000.[60]
Restoring the CCP to the cities presupposed cooperation with the Kuomintang. "Cooperation" with regional powers such as the Fukien People's Government would not do. Such a "cooperation" or "united
[57] Wang Ming hsüan-chi , I, 79.
[58] At the Third Plenum of the Sixth Central Committee, which carried out partial criticism of Li Li-san, Wang Ming charged that Li Li-san was ignorant of the distinction between the terms "high tide" and "objective revolutionary situation." Hsiao Tso-liang, Power Relations within the Chinese Communist Movement, 1930–1934 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1961), I, 68–69; Ibid. , II, 517–519.
[59] Ibid. , I, 261.
[60] He took the First and the Third Army Corps from Maoerhkai. "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 53, May, 1970, p. 87.
front from below" was a euphemism for inciting mutiny. The urban line of Wang Ming of necessity shifted to united front line, which in turn pointed to the Kuomintang government as the logical partner. In 1936 Wang Ming disclosed that the August First Declaration proposed a ceasefire and anti-Japanese agreements to Chiang Kai-shek.[61] According to Chiang Kai-shek, Ch'en Li-fu reported to him that "through a friend's introduction Chou En-lai had approached Tseng Yang-fu, a Government representative in Hong Kong" in the autumn and winter of 1935 in order to arrange a ceasefire.[62] Chou is reported to have attached no condition. I conclude that the Comintern had instructed the Party Center to make the proposal.
From this point on, available evidence points to deepening factional differences in the Party. Contradictory orders and proclamations were issued by the CCP in the fall before it unified itself outwardly along the anti-Chiang line at Wayaopao. On October 11, the leaders of the Northeastern Anti-Japanese United Army, which was semi-independent of the CCP at the time, issued a circular telegram proposing a ceasefire and joint resistance to Japan. The large number of addressees included Lin Sen, Chiang Kai-shek, and Mao Tse-tung.[63] The Central Committee issued a declaration on November 13, according to Ho Kan-chih, demanding a policy of simultaneous "resistance to Japan and opposition to Chiang."[64] I have no access to this document, but it seems to be identical in substance to the August First Declaration. Yet again on November 28, the CCP issued an "Anti-Japanese national salvation proclamation." There are two versions of this document. One was signed by Mao and Chu Te and was in line with the August 1 and the November 13 declarations.[65] The other, collected contemporaneously by Hatano Ken'ichi, paralleled the October 11 telegram from the Manchurian leaders.[66] It, too, began with a large list of addressees, starting with the authors of the October 11 telegram and various warlords. About midway through the list, as if he were an equal among the rest, was "The supreme commander of Nanking, Chiang Chung-cheng." The declaration was signed by several leaders of the Red Army. Chu Te was at the top, listing himself as the supreme commander of the Red Army and the chairman of the Military Commission. Chou En-lai came next as the vice-chairman of the Military Commission. Mao's name was conspicuous by its absence. The simultaneous exis-
[61] Wang Ming hsüan-chi , I, 134, 139.
[62] Soviet Russia in China (New York: Farrar Strauss and Cudahy, 1957), p. 72.
[63] Chugoku[*] kyosanto[*] 1936-nen shi , pp. 386–389.
[64] A History of the Modern Chinese Revolution (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1960), p. 288.
[65] Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 9–11.
[66] Chugoku kyosanto 1936-nen shi , pp. 181–184.
tence of contradictory declarations suggests that, since the Maoerhkai conference, some leaders of the CCP supported, while Mao objected to, the idea of proposing a ceasefire to the Kuomintang.
In order to understand Mao's position, it is necessary to assess his interest as a background factor. By the end of 1935, the Communist forces that gathered in the Shensi–Kansu Soviet after the Long March numbered 15,000.[67] The new home of the Party Center had already been subjected to two encirclement campaigns by the time the Red Army had arrived. Nanking had an upper hand. It was intent on delivering the final blow. Wang Ming's proposal stemmed from the judgment that the Red Army was too weak to continue the civil war. But precisely because it was so decimated, the Kuomintang could not be expected to grant a ceasefire, let alone cooperation. Mao's objection might have been that a ceasefire proposal under the circumstances would only encourage Nanking in its belief that the CCP was desperately weak and suing for peace. The Kuomintang did in fact come to regard the origin of the united front in this manner. Chiang Kaishek's reply to the August First Declaration, the Northern Bureau bitterly complained later, was a stepped-up suppression campaign.[68] When that happened, I presume, Mao's position was strengthened while Chou En-lai suffered a temporary setback.
The idea of the united front with Chiang Kai-shek must have appeared to Mao to border on fantasy. Nevertheless, if Moscow was serious about bringing the two Chinese parties together again, it could very well have been contemplating an offer of considerable concessions to Nanking. The first united front was engineered by the Comintern on the basis of such a compromise. Mao's efforts since 1927 in building the Red Army and peasant soviets had been to pick up the pieces when that compromise led to a disaster and to safeguard the interest of the revolution against its recurrence. His own power in the CCP rested on the Red Army and the soviets.[69] But if the CCP refused to abandon its independence in these respects, could the central government be expected to co-exist with it in peace?
Between 1935 and 1936, Mao was in all likelihood apprehensive of Moscow's good faith. The Comintern's call for a popular front signaled a new turn in Moscow's external relations. The Russian national interest was increasingly taking priority over its revolutionary programs represented by the Comintern. In East Asia, Stalin was acutely inter-
[67] Stuart Schram, Mao Tse-tung (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1966), p. 176.
[68] Chugoku[*] kyosanto[*] 1936-nen shi , p. 219.
[69] For an excellent exposition of this point and its partisan implications, see Thornton, Comintern , pp. 103–120.
ested in maintaining neutrality with Japan in order to avoid a twofront conflict with it and Germany. He proposed a neutrality pact to Japan in 1931 and 1932, though Tokyo remained unresponsive until 1940.[70] His fears were not unfounded. In October, 1935, the German government proposed an anti-Soviet defense alliance to Tokyo. In November of the following year, this was to culminate in the Anti-Comintern Pact. In order to secure the Soviet Union's Far Eastern borders with Manchuria, Stalin wished to strengthen and embolden the Chinese government in its running conflict with Japan. By creating a tension in the rear of the Kuantung Army facing north, this would divert Japan's pressure from the Soviet Union itself. Stalin judged correctly that only the Kuomintang government could put up a meaningful resistance to Japan. The Soviet government took initiatives to improve its relations with Nanking as early as 1931.[71] Faced with this solicitous diplomacy, Nanking could prevail on Moscow to curtail the revolutionary activities of the Comintern's arm in China. In the fall of 1936, a secret negotiation was started between the two governments to explore the possibilities of an anti-Japanese alliance. Although the result was a rather innocuous nonaggression pact, it included clauses by which Moscow promised to aid Nanking but not to aid the CCP.[72]
Mao's fear that Moscow and Nanking might arrive at mutual accommodation at the expense of the CCP was probably exacerbated by the fact that Wang Ming was handling united front questions for the Comintern. Wang Ming's utterances indicated that he was critical of the lopsidedly rural orientation of the CCP leadership. Mao probably had good reason to suspect that Wang Ming was using the recent turn of events to his advantage in order to assert his control over the CCP. Wang Ming had taken credit for himself at the Congress by announcing the cessation of the policy of confiscating the property of the rich peasants.[73] The CCP fell in line four months later.[74] Wang Ming still upheld the policy of confiscating the landlords' property at this stage.[75] Nevertheless, he was in a position to benefit from a curtailment of the Maoist machine in the countryside in the name of the united front with the Kuomintang.
[70] War History Office, The Defense Board, Daitoa[*] senso[*] kokan[*] senshi [Publicly recorded history of the Greater East Asian War], Vol. VIII: Daihonei rikugunbu [The Imperial Army General Staff] (hereinafter cited as Imperial Army General Staff ) (Tokyo: Asagumo shinbunsha, 1967), No. 1, pp. 338, 347.
[71] Soviet Russia in China , p. 69.
[72] Lyman Van Slyke, p. 65.
[73] Wang Ming hsüan-chi , I, 97–98.
[74] See the order of the Standing Committee of the Chinese Soviet in Mao Tsetung-chi , V, 13–14.
[75] Wang Ming hsüan-chi , I, 91.
Mao's policies on united front questions from the very outset to the end of the war in 1945 were consistent with those of the civil war days in one respect: under no circumstances should the interests of the Red Army and the territorial bases—whatever they were called under different circumstances—be abridged and his control over them curtailed. He would not agree to the united front with the Kuomintang until he found a specific scheme which made the independence of the CCP compatible with it.
In December, 1935, a Politburo conference was held in Wayaopao. Its Resolution can be regarded for the most part as Mao's answer to Wang Ming. This was an important document as it was one of the more comprehensive statements of Mao's over-all strategy in the war against Japan.[76] Many of the wartime policies of the CCP, later elaborated into specific programs, could be seen in an inchoate form. As a document which was intended to set Mao off from Wang Ming, it also foreshadowed some of Mao's later indictments of Wang Ming.[77]
It would be an error to characterize the Wayaopao Resolution as representing any leaning to the right. The idea of "united front" appeared for the first time. It was the Party's policy from then on. At the same time, the Resolution reaffirmed the militant revolutionary line of the Party, not for a distant future but parallel with the united front.
The Resolution was marked distinctly by the sense that China was on the eve of an upheaval. Japan's relentless advances had been generating and damming up an enormous reaction in China. The reaction "grew automatically" or spontaneously. It was the political task of the Party to act on it for its own revolutionary end.
The current political situation has already caused one fundamental change and marked off a new era in the history of the Chinese revolution; it manifests itself in the transformation of China by the Japanese imperialism into a colony, in the preparation and entry of the Chinese revolution into a great revolution of nationwide character, and in the fact that the world is on the eve of revolution and war.[78]
If Wang Ming's lectures from Moscow were full of circumlocutions, a kind of double talk which insured the social engineers against mistakes in judgment, so was this Resolution. Thus, while affirming the coming of a precipitous and nationwide (i.e., "even") "revolutionary high tide," it also warned against the possibility that the revolution might be "protracted" and "uneven." Mao appeared to be conceding Wang Ming's point without giving up his own.
[76] Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 19–40.
[77] See the warning against "closed doorism" which turns Marxism and Stalinism into "dead dogma," Ibid. , p. 36.
[78] Ibid. , p. 19.
As for the enemy of the revolution, the Resolution disagreed with Wang Ming that it was primarily Japanese imperialism. "The main enemy of the moment is the Japanese imperialism and the ringleader of the traitors, Chiang Kai-shek," it stated.[79] Then it went on,
The Party should call upon all the people who oppose Japan to struggle in protecting their bases. It should call upon these people to oppose the traitors in their attempt to harass the rear of the war against Japan and . . . obstruct the path of the Red Army's march. To join together the civil war in China with national war is the basic principle of the Party in guiding the revolutionary war .[80]
The last sentence may be regarded as the keynote of this Resolution. Here was the germ of the idea elaborated later that neither the war against the Kuomintang nor against Japan could be waged separately from, and independently of, the other. Hence, the Red Army and the soviets were to brook no opposition to their growth.
The Party affirmed that "the workers and peasants were still the basic motive force of the Chinese revolution."[81] But the point of the Resolution was to enable growth of the revolution within the framework of the united front against Japan, that is, by exploiting Japan's menace. "The relationship between each class, each political party, and each armed force in the Chinese political life has changed anew and is presently changing."[82] The new united front would include all those who were opposed to both Japan and Chiang Kai-shek. For this purpose, the Party made two concessions to those who were to the right of itself. The Soviet Workers' and Peasants' Republic was henceforth renamed the Soviet People's Republic.[83] In addition to the workers and peasants—the "basic motive force" of the revolution—the new republic was to include the vast masses of petty bourgeoisie and revolutionary intellectuals as "reliable allies."[84] The Resolution announced a change in the Party's policy toward the rich peasants in line with Wang Ming's proposal.[85]
Treatment of the landlord class was not specifically dealt with, as though continuation of the standing policy toward it was a matter of course. A section of the national bourgeoisie was definitely in the united front. So were the warlords loosely aligned with Chiang Kaishek and the officers and men of the White army. The Party re-
[79] Ibid. , p. 24.
[80] Ibid. , p. 34. Emphasis added.
[81] Ibid. , p. 25.
[82] Ibid. , p. 24.
[83] Ibid. , p. 29.
[84] Ibid. , p. 25.
[85] Ibid. , p. 30. Henceforward their land was not to be confiscated regardless of whether they tilled it themselves or rented it out. When a village carried out an equal distribution of land, the rich peasants were entitled to the same grade of land as the poor and the middle peasants, though an additional order of the Soviet Government prohibited the participation of the rich peasants in the Red Army and in elections, Ibid. , p. 14.
affirmed its offer of truce on condition that they unite with the Red Army in the struggle against both Japan and Chiang Kai-shek. The united front, according to the Resolution, was hence a united front "from below and from above."[86]
All this, in the Party's jargon, sounded rather bland. Underneath, a heated debate was going on in downright practical terms. When Mao asserted at Wayaopao that simultaneous war and revolution were his goal, he was in effect saying that under certain circumstances the CCP could force the Kuomintang government into a war against its will. Then the CCP could carry on the revolution with impunity. That is to say, the CCP could start a local war with the Japanese Army and force the rest of the nation into a total war, thus creating a "unity" of sorts. Wang Ming was in agreement with Mao that a total war was one thing that was needed. But he seems to have insisted that, unless the CCP curtailed its revolutionary policy, the Kuomintang government would be determined more than ever to adhere to its policy of "unification first." He felt that the Kuomintang's participation was a precondition for a total war. Thus, the issue was whether a war was necessary to create a "unity" (Mao) or whether a unity was a precondition for waging a total war (Wang Ming).
Mao hinted at his formula for combining the revolution and resistance in his interview with Edgar Snow in July, 1936. Mao affirmed that the national united front was the condition for defeating Japan. Then questions and answers followed:
Question: Would the Red Army agree not to move its troops into or against any areas occupied by Kuomintang armies, except with the consent or at the order of the supreme war council?
Answer: Yes. Certainly we will not move our troops into any areas occupied by anti-Japanese armies—nor have we done so for some time past. The Red Army would not utilize any war-time situation in an opportunistic way.[87]
Mao was thus promising that the Red Army would not move into an area unless it was occupied by the Japanese Army. The Japanese Army would stand between the Red Army and the Kuomintang forces. Later events would show that Mao made this promise in good faith so far as the geographical area of the Red Army's occupation was concerned. Mao went on:
Besides the regular Chinese troops we should create, direct, and politically and militarily equip great numbers of partisan and guerrilla detachments among the peasantry. What has been accomplished by the anti-Japanese vol-
[86] Ibid. , p. 24.
[87] Red Star Over China , p. 103.
unteer units of this type in Manchuria is only a very minor demonstration of the latent power of resistance that can be mobilized from the revolutionary peasantry of all China . . . [88]
The volunteer units in Manchuria had been coming under the CCP's direction since 1933. To build such units on an immense scale and operate them behind the advancing Japanese forces—this was how the revolution and resistance were to be combined.
Judging from the CCP's activities in 1936, one can discern two alternatives that Mao had in mind for initiating war. First, the Communist forces could take the initiative and provoke the Japanese forces in north China or Inner Mongolia. Second, the CCP could enlist disgruntled warlord forces in a regional united front to initiate war. In the spring the CCP started working on both plans. One failed, the other nearly succeeded.[*]
A careful reading of Mao's definition of the "united front from below and above" at Wayaopao suggests that the regional forces only loosely affiliated with Nanking were the upper ceiling among his allies. Mao had in mind such regional power holders at Yen Hsi-shan, Chang Hsüeh-liang, Yang Hu-ch'eng, Li Tsung-jen, and Sung Cheyüan. As soon as the CCP's Center settled in northern Shensi, it started acting directly on all of their forces except perhaps Li Tsungjen's. I will touch briefly on the CCP's dealings with Yen Hsi-shan in Chapter IV. The Northeastern Army of Chang Hsüeh-liang, which had been dislodged from Manchuria by the Japanese and used by Nanking against the Communists in northern Shensi, was the first object of the Red Army's attempt at "distintegration" (wa-chieh ). The effort began typically with an appeal in January to the "officers and men" of the Northeastern Army.[89] In March a division of this force was surrounded, disarmed, and released unharmed by the Red Army after being given agitation–propagada on the need to unite against Japan and Chiang Kai-shek.[90] After this an effective ceasefire
[*] The Annals of diplomacy are full of examples in which a lesser partner in an alliance drags its major ally into an armed conflict, usually restorationist in aim, against the latter's will. Since the time of the Eisenhower administration, Washington has lived in fear that the governments of South Korea or Taiwan may start a war of reunification. The Arab-Israeli conflict is another instance of such a threat. Note the parallel between the Palestinian guerrilla organizations, the Arab states, and Israel on the one hand and the CCP, the Kuomintang government, and Japan on the other.
[88] Ibid. , p. 105.
[89] Ho Kan-chih, p. 300.
[90] Hsi-an shih-pien chen-hsiang ti chui-shu [A recollection of the truth about the Sian Incident] (no date, no publisher listed) (BI). Chang Kuo-t'ao states that a regiment led by Wang I was won over in January, in "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 53, May, 1970, p. 89.
was maintained between the two sides, apparently with the tacit approval of Chang Hsüeh-liang. Yang Hu-ch'eng was also in touch with the CCP by May.[91] In June, Ch'en Chi-t'ang, Pai Ch'ung-hsi, and Li Tsung-jen, the leaders of Kwangtung and Kwangsi cliques, hard pressed by the "centralization" policy of the Nanking government, revolted in the name of resistance to Japan. The CCP's resolution of June 13 noted that "the Southwestern War is not a pure warlord war but has some significance as a national revolution."[92]
The Northern Bureau of the CCP was acting more directly on the forces under Sung Che-yüan, a follower of Feng Yü-hsiang, who had been named to head the Hopei–Chahar Political Commission to handle the tense and delicate liaison between Nanking and the Tientsin Garrison Army of Japan. Japanese military police noted with apprehension that Liu Shao-ch'i and the student groups led by him were frequenting some of Sung's forces garrisoned near Peiping.[93] By July 16, Feng Chih-an's division stationed in Fengt'ai near Lukouchiao (the Marco Polo Bridge) had its first confrontation with the Japanese forces.[94] This division was in the immediate vicinity of Lukouchiao on July 7, 1937, when the fatal incident took place. Japanese observers had noted by then that Sung Che-yüan had lost control of his forces which were fired up with strong anti-Japanese senments.[95] He was going the way of Chang Hsüeh-liang.
Whether Moscow was informed of the details of the CCP's plans cannot be known. But Wang Ming was apparently concerned. Writing in early 1936, he said "the main weakness [of anti-imperialist united front] is that the bulk of the Kuomintang army is yet to be drawn into this all-people struggle and is to date still under the influence of the Kuomintang and the Nanking government . . . There is friction in the Kuomintang, but the friction has not led to a split in the Kuomintang."[96] He was pointing out that the intermediate groups in the Kuomintang army could not be won over except from the top down, i.e., with Chiang Kai-shek's support.
By July of 1936, Wang Ming had articulated the terms of cooperation. To reassure the skeptics on the left that the united front he was
[91] Snow, Random Notes , p. 4. This was arranged with Wang Ming's knowledge, but he did not follow through with it.
[92] Chugoku[*] kyosanto[*] 1936-nen shi , p. 236.
[93] Teradaira Tadasuke, Nihon no higeki: Rokokyo[*] jiken [Japan's tragedy: the Lukouchiao Incident] (Tokyo: Yomiuri shinbunsha, 1970), pp. 40–41, 46–47.
[94] War History Office, The Defense Board, Daitoa[*] senso[*] kokan[*] senshi , Vol. XVIII: Hokushi no chiansen [Pacification war in north China] (hereinafter cited as Pacification War ) (Tokyo: Asagumo shinbunsha, 1968), No. 1, p. 9.
[95] Nihon no higeki , pp. 353–355.
[96] Chugoku kyosanto 1936-nen shi , p. 139.
proposing was "absolutely not a repetition of Ch'en Tu-hsiu's opportunist mistake," he drew the following distinction for the second united front: "The CCP, the Kuomintang and other organizations to take part in the anti-Japanese national united front will all retain the plenary power to preserve their own ideology, their own political program, and their own organization."[97] Thus Wang Ming's idea of the "national defense government" was as follows:
What should we do with those governments which exist in China at present? For example, the Chinese Soviet Government, the Nanking Central Government, and those governments which are nominally local governments but in fact disobey the central political power. The Chinese Communists' answer to this problem is: In order to turn the governments already formed into a truly all-China and truly defensible government, political power in the nation must be concentrated in the hands of one central government. We must eliminate the phenomena of disunity in Chinese politics and administration. . . .
But suppose someone asks . . . are the Chinese Communists going to maintain the struggle for the Chinese Soviet Government? The Chinese Communists will answer . . . In principle as in ideology, we firmly believe that only by having the soviet can we save the entire Chinese people and entire mankind; . . . only by having a soviet can a weak and defenseless nation be changed into a strong and defensible nation. . . .[98]
But in the spring of 1936, Mao was not given to such a devious line of thinking. He must have known from his experiences in Kiangsi that the Kuomintang would grant a de facto ceasefire only under one set of circumstances: a military conflict between China and Japan. So why wait passively for war? Between February and May the Red Army invaded Shansi Province[99] —quite possibly over objections from Moscow.[100] On the face of it, it conformed to Mao's basic line in the Wayaopao Resolution. The CCP formally declared its bellicose intention in manifestos. On March 1, it proclaimed,
Whereas Japanese imperialism [commits] outrage in north China, no one stops [it]. Chiang Kai-shek, Yen Hsi-shan, Sung Che-yüan [put on] the appearance of slaves and [bend their] knees in servitude, sycophancy with foreigners having become their nature. Ruination of the whole country is imminent;
[97] Wang Ming hsüan-chi , I, 129.
[98] Ibid. , p. 141.
[99] For the best account of the raid, see Chugoku[*] kyosanto[*] 1936-nen shi , pp. 3–55.
[100] A recent Soviet publication blames the raid on Mao's ambition. K. V. Kykyshkin, "The Comintern and Anti-Japanese United Front in China," L. P. Delyusin, et al., eds., Comintern i Vostok [The Comintern and the East] (Moscow, 1969), cited in James P. Harrison, The Long March to Power, A History of the Chinese Communist Party, 1921–72 (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1973), p. 264.
the Chinese Soviet People's Republic . . . dispatches this army to go east and resist Japan.[101]
The purpose of the expedition, according to the April manifesto, was to "engage in direct combat with Japan."[102] It denounced Chiang Kai-shek for sending the central forces to aid Yen Hsi-shan, thus blocking the path of the Red Army's march eastward while using Chang Hsüeh-liang and Yang Hu-ch'eng to disturb the Shensi–Kansu Soviet. Hatano Ken'ichi suspected that with the arrival of Mao's and Hsü Hai-tung's forces in the new soviet, food and other supplies were exhausted. The raid looked to him like a foraging.[103] The Red Army took twenty-seven hsien , roughly one-third of the province, and carried out severe and bloody land confiscation and redistribution. The Red Army had no trouble in routing Yen Hsi-shan's forces in battle after battle. But the nine divisions of the central forces commanded by Ch'en Ch'eng and Shang Chen were a different matter. The Red Army seemed to have been mauled seriously. Liu Chih-tan, who founded the Shensi Soviet, was killed in action. The Red Army retreated across the Yellow River in early May.[104]
There was nothing which suggested that the CCP was not serious in its declared intention to "engage in direct combat with Japan." If obstructed, the Communists stood to gain a propaganda victory. If unobstructed, the Red Army could have moved into Chahar or eastern Hopei and conducted hit-and-run raids on the Japanese garrisons. That would have created a grave international crisis. The Japanese Army was likely to take a stern retaliatory measure against Nanking, as was the pattern in every incident. The Nanking government might try to win time by assuming responsibility for the act of the "bandits" and by making further concessions. The Umezu-Ho Ying-ch'in and Doihara-Ch'in Te-ch'un Agreements of June 1935, belonged to this class of events.[105] That would have only inflamed public opinion more and pointed up the vulnerability of Nanking's position. What the Shansi raid demonstrated was that the decision for war or peace still rested in Tokyo and Nanking rather than in Yenan or Moscow at this time and that as long as there was international
[101] Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 41.
[102] Ibid. , p. 44.
[103] Hatano, Gendai Shina , pp. 336–337.
[104] Chugoku[*] kyosanto[*] 1936-nen shi , pp. 5–55.
[105] Anti-Japanese terrorist activities prompted the Japanese government to impose these demands. By these agreements the Kuomintang was forced out of the area north of Paoting in Hopei, including Peiping and Tientsin as well as Chahar Province. Ministry of Foreign Affairs, ed., Nihon gaiko[*] nempyo[*] narabi ni shuyo[*] bunsho, 1840–1945 [Chronology of Japan's diplomacy and major documents, 1840–1945] (Tokyo: Hara shobo[*] , 1965), pp. 293–295.
peace the Kuomintang government was capable of containing Chinese communism.
It seemed that the miserable result of the Shansi raid induced the CCP to propose a ceasefire for a second time. On May 5, Mao and Chu Te, representing the soviet government and the Red Army respectively, issued the Circular telegram on ceasefire and peace negotiation to unite in resistance to Japan to the Military Commission of the Nanking government.[106] It made no mention of the united front. Outwardly, Mao seemed to concede Wang Ming's point, raised in February, that "it is utterly impossible to fight with Japan without waiting for the completion of the united popular front."[107] But serious differences remained between them. Ho Kan-chih states that with the ceasefire proposal of May the policy of "forcing Chiang to resist Japan" (pi-Chiang k'ang-Jih ) was adopted.[108]
The CCP's options were not simply for or against the united front with the Kuomintang. The initiative to choose between those options rested in Nanking, and it showed no interest in ceasefire or cooperation at this stage. According to Chiang Kai-shek, Chou En-lai and P'an Han-nien, the latter representing the Comintern, came to Shanghai shortly after May 5 for a peace talk. Conditions laid down by the Kuomintang amounted to a demand for total surrender by the Communists:
1. Abide by the Three People's Principles.
2. Obey Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek's orders.
3. Abolish the "Red Army" and integrate it into the National Army.
4. Abrogate the soviets and reorganize them as local governments.[109]
Thus, even if full scale cooperation in the united front was the CCP's desired goal, a simple pledge of allegiance and show of sincerity on its part would not necessarily lead to that result. It had to maintain a high state of vigilance and military alertness while showing its willingness to cease hostility on a reciprocal basis. Above all, it had to exert public pressure to make the government's stance untenable. Thus the policy of "forcing Chiang to resist Japan" could be either an end in itself or a means to attain a fuller cooperation in
[106] Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 47–49.
[107] Chugoku[*] kyosanto[*] 1936-nen shi , p. 146.
[108] Ho Kan-chih, p. 302. Note, however, that on April 25, while the Red Army was still in Shansi, the Central Committee issued a proclamation proposing a "popular front" to the Kuomintang and other groups. Chung-Kung chung-yang wei ch'uang-li ch'üan-kuo k'e-tang k'e-p'ai ti k'ang-Jih jen-min chan-hsien hsüan-yen [Declaration of the CCP Central Committee for establishing anti-Japanese popular front among the nation's parties and groups], cited in Wang Chien-min, Chungkuo Kung-ch'an-tang , III, 55–56.
[109] Soviet Russia in China , p. 73.
"resist Japan along with Chiang" (lien-Chiang k'ang-Jih ) or "support Chiang to resist Japan" (Yung-Chiang k'ang-Jih ).
The differences between Mao and Wang Ming seem to have been over the kind of pressure to be exerted on the Kuomintang government. It is interesting to note that both the Internationalists and Mao approved of the December Ninth Movement.[110] But it is doubtful that Mao seriously expected the Kuomintang to grant even a ceasefire unless its hands were forced by a "united front from below." This was indicated by the circular telegram of July 11, The Declaration on behalf of the Departure of the Kwangtung–Kwangsi Forces for North to Resist Japan , signed by Mao and Chu Te.[111] Addressed to the forces of Li Tsung-jen and Ch'en Chi-t'ang, it was an open encouragement for rebellion in the two provinces in the name of resistance. Predictably, Moscow and Wang Ming were dismayed by this revolt.[112]
Let us now consider what was behind this residue of sectarianism in Mao. Since the Wayaopao meeting where Mao averred that "the people's republic stands in direct opposition to the jackals of imperialism, the landed gentry and the comprador class," there had been discussion in the CCP as to the class composition of the united front. The Wayaopao Resolution included the rich peasants and the petty bourgeoisie in the united front. It is my inference that the Internationalists considered the Kuomintang to be a party of the national bourgeoisie in order to enlist it in the united front. After all, it was so defined by the CCP before the rupture of the first united front.
A major stumbling block between Mao and Wang Ming seemed to be Mao's insistence that the Kuomintang was also a party of the landlord class. Mao was evidently opposed to abandoning the policy of confiscating and redistributing the property of the landlord class. This was the motive power that energized the revolutionary peasant movement. Without it his machine in the rural areas would be without fuel. On July 22, the Party issued the Directive concerning the Land Policy .[113] The Directive renewed the standing order to confiscate all land and property of traitors. In addition, as though to clear up the confusion following the relaxation of the policy toward the rich peasants, it reconfirmed the order to confiscate land, grain, houses, and property of the landlord class. What a landlord would be allowed to keep to meet his own needs for sustenance was left to the majority decision of the peasants in the area concerned.
[110] Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 210.
[111] Ibid. , pp. 55–58.
[112] Wang Ming hsüan-chi , I, 139; Van Slyke, p. 64.
[113] Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 63–65.
Earlier in July, Chang Nai-ch'i and three other well-known leaders of the national salvation movement had published an open letter. They straddled the positions taken by Mao and Wang Ming, though they leaned toward Wang Ming's side. They stated that "if a local authority dispatches an army to resist Japan under the conditions of opposition to the central government, it is bound to fail." But they also said, " . . . resistance against Japan and national salvation is the most urgent enterprise. . . . We can never agree to the policy of resistance which waits for the completion of mobilization of the entire country."[114] Mao wrote a reply to the four leaders, stating,
[the Red Army] is capable of conducting a lone operation against Japanese imperialists, and it will necessarily unite with all armies and the people of the whole nation in the course of a protracted resistance, thus achieving a victory in a coordinated war. Your opinion that "the final victory is attainable only on the basis of concentrating the energy of the whole nation . . . " is correct. But you are mistaken in holding that "real resistance against Japan cannot be initiated unless the energy of the whole nation is concentrated." It is possible to resist Japan with a partial force.[115]
The letter by Chang Nai-ch'i, et al., further demanded that the Red Army adopt a lenient policy toward the rich peasants, the landlords, and the merchants in its area of occupation.[116] In his reply, Mao expressly acknowledged this point. He explained the CCP's new policy toward the rich peasants and merchants but avoided any reference to the landlords.[117] Exactly one week later, the CCP issued its Directive Concerning the Land Policy . Chang Nai-ch'i wrote again shortly afterward and deplored the Party's decision, saying,
In the letter written to the four of us recently, Mr. Mao Tse-tung made clear that he accepts our political program. . . .
What needs to be pointed out is that their method is still revolutionary. Substantively there is considerable distance between this and the reformist method which we have proposed.
It is impossible for us to demand that the program of the united front in China stipulate confiscation of the landlords' land through the insurrectionary method of the peasants.[118]
By the middle of 1936 anti-Japanese public sentiment in the cities had reached flood proportions. It was independent of any "outside
[114] "Shen Chün-ju teng t'uan-chi yü-wu ti chi-ke chi-pen t'iao-chien yü tsui-ti yao-ch'iu" [Some basic conditions and minimum demands of Shen Chün-ju, et al., on unity and resistance], Kuo-Kung ho-tso , p. 61.
[115] Chugoku[*] kyosanto[*] 1936-nen shi , p. 416.
[116] Kuo-Kung ho-tso , p. 68.
[117] Chugoku kyosanto 1936-nen shi , p. 418.
[118] Ibid. , pp. 434–435. We cannot rule out the possibility that Chang Nai-ch'i had a close connection with Wang Ming.
agitators"; hence it was exerted upon any group that stood in the way of national unity and resistance. Chang Nai-ch'i's letter shows that Mao, no less than Chiang Kai-shek, was under pressure. The CCP's Northern Bureau was evidently very sensitive to the demands of the intellectuals in the Peiping–Tientsin area with whom it was working closely. Shortly after the May Politburo conference, the Bureau advised the Party Center to adopt a policy more in tune with the non-Party masses.[119]
In February, 1937, the CCP announced in its telegram to the Third Plenum of the Kuomintang's Fourth Central Executive Committee (CEC) that confiscation of the property of the landlord class was to be discontinued as the CCP's concession to the united front.[120] However, the landlord class was never included in the second united front throughout its entire existence. Mao stated in May of 1937 that the CCP was "prepared to solve the land problem by legislative and other appropriate means."[121] What was meant by this remark will be shown in subsequent chapters.
The CCP adhered to the policy of initiating a war first to create a "unity" as of the end of July 1936. By August, Wang Ming's line evidently prevailed. On August 25, the Central Committee issued a letter to the Kuomintang and urged it for the first time to join the united front: The CCP conceded that "the key to Kuomintang–Communist cooperation is at present in the hands of your honorable party."[122] The letter also pledged the CCP to the goal of building a "Democratic Republic."[123] By this act it renounced the title of "People's Republic" for its government. This made it possible to admit the national borgeoisie into the united front at the Politburo conference in September.[124] Simultaneously, the CCP began to show restraint. By October 15, the Red Army had been ordered to refrain from initiating any hostile action against the Kuomintang forces, and not to obstruct them in their movement if it was related to actions against the Japanese forces.[125]
What accounts for this shift must be left to conjecture at present. It is possible that the CCP was influenced marginally by public pressure. In this respect the CCP's contacts with Chang Hsüeh-liang are of some importance. Ishikawa Tadao suggests that Chang was truly a middleman between the Kuomintang and the CCP in the
[119] Hatano Ken'ichi, Chugoku[*] kyosanto[*] 1937-nen shi [History of the Chinese Communist Party, 1937] (Tokyo: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 1938), p. 137.
[120] Selected Works , I, 269.
[121] Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 199.
[122] Ibid. , p. 75.
[123] Ibid. , p. 72.
[124] Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 357.
[125] Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 81–82.
political spectrum at the time.[126] The CCP was negotiating with him by early summer in order to enlist him in a regional united front in the northwest against Chiang Kai-shek and Japan. In the course of this liaison, Chou En-lai was persuaded to move one step closer to Chang Hsüeh-liang. Chang is said to have inquired of Chou how serious the Communists were about resistance to Japan. Upon hearing an affirmative answer, he implored the CCP delegation to accept the "support Chiang to resist Japan" line. Chou En-lai settled for "resist Japan along with Chiang."[127]
But by September, a much greater force than the left-of-center public opinion was at work to bring the Kuomintang and the CCP together. According to Izvestia , the Sino–Soviet negotiation that led to the non-aggression pact of August, 1937, had been underway "for more than a year" prior to it.[128] Since Soviet solicitation for rapprochement with China had been long standing, the initiative must have been taken by Nanking. Chiang Kai-shek dates the beginning of pro-Soviet policy from October, when he appointed T. F. Tsiang the new ambassador to Moscow.[129] As early as September 1, the CCP leadership was apprised of Nanking's move toward an "alliance with Russia."[130] In view of Japan's nervousness about such an alliance, the Kuomintang must have undertaken the negotiation with full awareness of its repercussion on Japan.
In fact, it seems logical to connect the beginning of the Sino–Soviet negotiation with the visibly stiffened attitude of Nanking toward Japan. In September a series of discussions designed to adjust the Sino–Japanese relations were started between Chinese Foreign Minister Chang Ch'ün and Japanese Ambassador Kawagoe but the discussions made little headway. An unmistakably hard anti-Japanese line came to the fore in Nanking in early November when irregular Mongol forces, masterminded by the Kuantung Army, invaded Suiyüan Province. The Chang–Kawagoe talk deadlocked[131] while Chiang
[126] Chugoku[*] kyosanto[*] shi kenkyu[*] [A study of Chinese Communist Party history] (Tokyo: Keio[*] tsushin[*] , 1962), pp. 230–245.
[127] Ibid. , p. 239. Ishikawa quotes Miao Feng-hsia, Chang's adviser.
[128] Charles B. McLane, p. 86.
[129] Soviet Russia in China , p. 71. However, cultural exchanges with obvious political implications were revived in late 1935 under Sun Fo's leadership. See Chugoku kyosanto 1936-nen shi , pp. 261–270.
[130] Photostatic copy of Chou En-lai's letter to Ch'en Li-fu and Ch'en Kuo-fu, dated September 1, 1936, in this author's possession.
[131] Hata Ikuhiko, Nitchu[*] senso[*] shi [History of the Sino–Japanese War] (Tokyo: Kawade shobo[*] , 1961), pp. 101–104; Association of International Political Studies of Japan, ed., Taiheiyo[*] senso e no michi [The road to the Pacific War], Vol. III: Nitchu senso [The Sino–Japanese War] (Tokyo: Asahi shinbunsha, 1962), No. 1, pp. 219–220.
Kai-shek arrived in Taiyuan (Shansi) to direct the successful Chinese operation against the Mongols. In sum, the strong anti-Japanese line in Nanking, the improvement of Sino–Soviet relationship, and the softening of the CCP toward Nanking occurred almost simultaneously.
There is some indication that Mao was on the defensive in the Party in August and September.[132] Probably considerable differences remained between him and Wang Ming over the means of bringing about the united front, primarily because the Kuomintang's attitude remained unchanged. The practical result of the CCP's August proposal was, therefore, a rather subtle one. By openly recognizing that war of resistance depended on the Kuomintang, the CCP seems to have conceded that Nanking could not be mechanically forced into war by means of local incidents. Rather, it seems, the emphasis shifted to political mobilization of the Kuomintang from within. This probably meant continued encouragement for the splinter groups such as Chang Hsüeh-liang and Yang Hu-ch'eng, insofar as they demanded war.
The delicate nature of the CCP's stance—neither supporting the Kuomintang nor opposing it—can be seen in the CCP's resolution of September. It amounted to a tactical revision of the Wayaopao Resolution:
In order to concentrate the strength of the whole nation to resist the invasion of the Japanese bandits . . . we must put together still broader power of the people. . . . To propel the Kuomintang, the Nanking government, and its armed forces to take part in the anti-Japanese war is the necessary condition for carrying out a national, large-scale, and strenuous anti-Japanese armed struggle. But this is absolutely not to neglect stringent criticism of and struggle against all the mistaken policies of the Kuomintang. . . . The Center must point out strongly: in struggle to realize the most extensive anti-Japanese united front the Communist Party must not only wage a strenuous struggle against the public and secret enemies of the united front but also maintain perfect freedom to criticize those pseudo anti-Japanese elements who agree in speech but drag their feet in practice. . . . But the important thing is to use all means and exert all power so as to promote most expeditiously a large-scale, nationwide and true armed struggle against Japan .[133]
[132] The resolution of the September Politburo conference expressly repudiated two points in the Wayaopao Resolution. See Chungkuo Kung-ch'an-tang kuan-yü k'ang-Jih chiu-wan yün-tung ti hsin-hsing-shih yü min-chu kung-ho-kuo ti chüeh-i [The CCP's decision concerning the new situation in the anti-Japanese salvation movement and the democratic republic], Kuo-Kung ho-tso , p. 46. The Wayaopao Resolution stated that in Party recruitment social background is not the main criterion and that carelessly administering blows on erring cadres should be stopped. Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 38–39.
[133] Kuo-Kung ho-tso , pp. 42–43. Emphasis added. For the full title of the resolution, see above, note 132.
War was the immediate goal. That would force Nanking to seek domestic unity. But the united front would also stiffen its back and induce it to initiate the war. Therefore, it became the twin goals of the CCP to pursue k'ang-Jih ("resistance against Japan") and min-chu ("democracy"), a variation of anti-imperialist and anti-feudal struggle. Mao had moved one step closer to Wang Ming. From this point on, the idea of the united front with the Kuomintang as such was no longer an issue between them. Yet the collusion of the Red Army and the Northeastern and Northwestern Armies went on. On December 3, Chiang Kai-shek flew to Sian to push for the last bandit suppression or possibly a peaceful "abolition" of the Red Army.
It is not necessary to go into the details of the Sian Incident here, as my purpose is to outline the different strategies advocated by Mao and Wang Ming. One major cause of the incident, however, needs to be borne in mind: In spite of his already stiff anti-Japanese attitude, Chiang's stand was still "unification first." This meant that the CCP was in need of some decisive leverage. Both Edgar Snow and Chang Kuo-t'ao report that Mao intended to put Chiang on a public trial and eliminate him.[134] Here was an opportunity beyond anyone's wildest dream. It is not surprising that the thought of destroying Chiang should have crossed Mao's mind. But it is not by any means certain that he actually demanded such a course of action.
It was Mao's highest disideratum to force the Kuomintang into war. Execution of Chiang Kai-shek under the circumstances was likely to place the Nanking government in the hands of Wang Ching-wei and Ho Ying-ch'in, both pro-Japanese and anti-Communist. Hence, if the CCP could extract a promise of ceasefire from Chiang in captivity, it had all the more reason for working for his release. Still, in view of Mao's opposition to the united front with Chiang in the recent past, the news of the incident must have caused genuine consternation in Moscow. Stalin cabled the CCP on December 13, the day after Chiang's capture, countermanding any scheme to eliminate him.[135] On the fourteenth, the Soviet press began to condemn the incident categorically as a Japanese plot.[136] The Kuomintang, too, has scrupulously avoided blaming the Communists ever since.
Chiang Kai-shek did agree to a ceasefire in Sian. What other agreement, if any, was reached is not known. Judging from subsequent
[134] Snow, Random Notes , p. 1; "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 55, July, 1970, p. 86. In plotting to kidnap Chiang Kai-shek, Chang seems to have had in mind a traditional remonstrance. See also Snow, Random Notes , p. 6.
[135] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , no. 55, July, 1970, p. 87.
[136] Charles B. McLane, p. 82.
events, he seems to have agreed to a ceasefire pending further and fuller discussion of the terms of united resistance. He left suddenly with Chang Hsüeh-liang without making any public commitment. The CCP was left with nothing but what Chou En-lai called Chiang's "self-appointed heroism" to make good his promise.[137] On that rested the CCP's line of domestic unity before resistance. It remained to be seen how the CCP would dodge the Kuomintang's terms of "cooperation" by delaying tactics until war commenced.
In February 1937, the Kuomintang called the Third Plenum of the Fourth CEC to "settle a large number of questions which arose out of the Sian affair."[138] Mao was apparently buoyed by this event, for it seemed as though public opinion would not permit Chiang to renew the civil war. He professed to believe that "the stage of 'fighting for peace' was over" and that the new task of the Party was "fighting for democracy."[139] In order to commit Chiang Kai-shek to the united front, Mao was demanding that the CCP increase its public pressure. "However, some comrades argue," Mao complained in May, "that this view of ours is untenable . . . . " What concerned Mao's opponents was the fact that the Japanese government had realized in early 1937 that its policy of confrontation in north China was too risky. "Japan is retreating," said Mao's opponents, "and Nanking is wavering more than ever; the contradiction between the two countries is becoming weaker and the contradiction within the country is growing sharper."[140] They further maintained that "to put the emphasis on democracy is wrong. . . . The majority of the people want only resistance . . . . "[141]
In rebuttal, Mao articulated his conception of the relationship between "anti-imperialist" and "anti-feudal" struggle:
As the contradiction between China and Japan has become the principal one and China's internal contradictions have dropped into a secondary and subordinate place, changes have occurred in China's international relations and internal class relations. . . .[142]
Thus Mao conceded the point that Wang Ming had been raising against him. But he continued to clash with his opponents over the question, To what extent should the united front with the Kuomintang be exploited for the CCP's own purposes?
In order to see what was at issue, we must know the content of
[137] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 56, August, 1970, p. 87.
[138] Hollington K. Tong., II, 491.
[139] Selected Works , I, 285.
[140] Ibid.
[141] Ibid. , p. 288.
[142] Ibid. , p. 263.
"democracy" which Mao was championing. Apparently in response to the Kuomintang's demand for "abrogation" of the soviets, the CCP in August of 1936 proposed the slogan of "Democratic Republic." As far as the soviets were concerned, the new appelation meant no change in substance, according to Ho Kan-chih.[143] But the slogan did not apply exclusively to the Communist government any longer. It was a goal to be attained across the entire nation in the course of the resistance and within the framework of the united front. Hence, the content of "democracy" to which Mao's opponents took exception was identical in substance with the "Democratic Republic" he was seeking to establish. Many of Mao's comrades are said to have raised questions concerning it.[144]
"The class character" of the democratic republic," said Mao,
is based on the union of several classes, and in the future it can develop in the direction of non-capitalism. Our democratic republic is to be established under the leadership of the proletariat; and it is to be established in the new international circumstances (the victory of socialism in the Soviet Union and on the eve of the world revolution). Therefore, though according to the social conditions it will not in general transcend the bourgeois state character, yet according to the concrete political conditions it ought to be a state based on the union of the workers, the peasants and the bourgeoisie. Thus, regarding perspectives, although it still may face toward capitalism, it does have the possibility of robustly turning in the direction of non-capitalism, and the party of the Chinese proletariat should strive hard for the latter prospect.[145]
Mao fell just short of saying that the Chinese Communists would seek to establish socialism in the course of the war or at the end of it, but he also fell just short of expressly recognizing the current stage as bourgeois–democratic in nature. This formulation foreshadowed the concept of "New Democracy" he was to enunciate in 1940. In the remainder of this book, I will treat further development of Mao's thoughts on this point. But one thing was clear at the stage. For Mao, the task of the CCP was to create a "Democratic Republic." This meant that the CCP would struggle with the Kuomintang for leadership over the united front.[146]
Fundamentally Mao's position had remained the same since Wayao-
[143] He states that "the two slogans, 'for a people's republic' and 'for a democratic republic,' meant essentially the same thing despite the differences in wording," p. 303.
[144] Selected Works , I, 275.
[145] Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 203.
[146] For taking this stand, Mao appears to have been accused of being a Trotskyite. See his defense of the tenuous distinction between the theory of permanent revolution and the "theory of the transition of the revolution," in Mao Tes-tung-chi , V, 214.
pao. He was trying to use the united front as a shield to protect the interest of the revolution during its growth into socialism. Consternation among Mao's opponents was justified. However, it cannot be said that Mao's position on the united front with the Kuomintang was in essence more opportunistic than that of his opponents. His position amounted to a sweepingly logical resolution of the problem which was posed by no other than Wang Ming himself when he proposed the united front. That problem was how to reconcile friendship with hostility; unity with struggle; and revolution with counter-revolution.
If Mao's position was difficult to maintain, so was that of his opponents. Their difficulties stemmed from the fact that neither unity nor struggle alone would suffice to preserve the united front and therewith the CCP. Hence, their consensus on the need for the united front with the Kuomintang did not eliminate internal disagreement. For instance, Wang Ming offered a practical rule for dealing with the Kuomintang. It was intended to minimize the Kuomintang's anxiety and suspicion as to the Communists' intention and to reduce friction in the united front. Speaking of the popular front in Europe as an example in July 1936, he upheld the French slogan, "Everything for the popular front."[147] To preserve the united front the CCP was to clear its decisions and policies with the Kuomintang government. Unless a prior consent was forthcoming, the CCP was to refrain from acting. While insisting on the CCP's independence, Wang was admitting that the united front would not function without Nanking's support. Mao ridiculed the "French" or the "Spanish method."[148] The slogan, "everything through the united front," became a slur and a weapon against the Internationalists later.
The process of the development of the united front, especially the resolution of the Sian Incident, was inconclusive in vindicating the correctness of Mao's line or Wang Ming's. Hence, both of them remained convinced of their respective positions. In December 1936, Mao delivered one of the longest lectures of which we have record to the Red Army College in Yennan. Entitled "Strategic Problems in China's Revolutionary War," it was "the result of one great controversy which indicated the views of one line in opposing another and is also useful for the current war against Japan," according to its author.[149] The lecture reviewed in detail all the battles involved in the five encirclement campaigns in Kiangsi and drew generalizations from
[147] Wang Ming hsüan-chi , I, 148.
[148] Kao ch'üan-tang t'ung-chih shu [A letter to the comrades of the entire Party] (April 14, 1937), Kuo-Kung ho-tso , p. 98.
[149] Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 83.
them. It affirmed the major assumption underlying the Tsunyi Resolutions: victory or defeat of the revolution in China depends primarily on armed struggle. This was Mao's message to the officers of the college as well as to his critics. The Fukien Incident, the symbol of the united front, was mentioned just once in passing.[150]
In July and August of the following year, amid the initial turmoil of the war, two more lectures of higher theoretical abstraction were delivered. Entitled "On Practice" and "On Contradiction" respectively, they were directed against "doctrinarism" and "empiricism" but especially the former. The criticism of "doctrinarism" was but a forerunner of Mao's later criticism of Wang Ming during the Rectification Campaign. The central thesis of "On Contradiction" was the postulate: two aspects of a contradiction are at once in struggle with, and identical with, each other because they transform themselves into each other. It was a theoretical justification of the CCP's double-edged policy toward the Kuomintang in the united front. He drew out the logic which was only hesitantly advanced by Wang Ming earlier. From then on the united front as simultaneous unity and struggle became a maxim for Mao.
I have outlined the internal disputes in the CCP in 1935 and 1936. In the course of the disputes, two distinct strategies of revolution were articulated. One placed its reliance on the forces generated in urban areas, on anti-imperialist struggle, and on cooperation with the party of urban middle class. The other insisted that the Party's line of civil war period was essentially correct. It put its major reliance on peasant revolution and the Red Army. For Mao, the united front with the Kuomintang was but a tactical retreat for carrying the rural revolution forward by legal and public means. The CCP's strategy in the war against Japan was a synthesis of the two. They did not sit well with one another, but neither alone could have sufficed to lead the CCP to its victory.
[150] This is the only reference to the Fukien Incident in all of Mao's Selected Works .
III—
From the Lukouchiao Incident to the Sixth Plenum
On the night of July 7, 1937, two companies of Japanese infantry troops—part of the force that was stationed in north China in accordance with the Boxer Protocol—were engaged in a routine maneuver along the bank of the Yungting River in the western suburb of Peiping. At 10:40 P.M. and again later, they were fired upon from some unknown source. A defensive reaction invited reaction. Less than a month later, China and Japan were at war. Focusing attention exclusively on the Chinese Communists and looking at events from their standpoint, one might be led to believe that they alone retained the initiative, while the other parties were pushed along by events to move on a trajectory which insured the CCP's success. But this was definitely not the case. The initiative continued to rest for a long time in the Kuomintang government and Tokyo. The margin of maneuverability for the CCP was very small. The united front remained fragile after the commencement of hostilities because the continuation of the war itself was far from certain. For the CCP to adopt a double-edged policy of carrying on "anti-feudal" struggle within the united front was risky. The dispute as to how much revolution was compatible with the resistance continued in the Party as long as there was the possibility of peace between China and Japan. In this chapter I will trace the outline of that dispute and its provisional settlement at the Sixth Plenum.
Marxist theory imputes the quality of necessity to revolutions in modern times. The Chinese Communists make no exception of their case. If this judgment had a semblance of validity, it is pertinent to ask, To what aspect of the revolution could this quality be plausibly
ascribed? In 1936 and 1937 it would have taken a wholly sanguine temperament to prophesy that peasant revolution would inevitably triumph. What did seem unavoidable was a collision between China and Japan. The judgment that it was inevitable seemed well nigh unassailable from the time of the Far Eastern Military Tribunal. It assumes that the Nanking government had pursued consistently a policy of appeasement toward Japan between the Mukden Incident and the "China Incident." Thus, the cause of the war is sought in factors internal to Japan, namely, its alleged policy of deliberate and unremitting expansion into north China. Recent research shows, however, that the latter assumption is questionable.[1] I cannot of course hope to settle the question of what caused the war, nor to exonerate Japan's part in it. Still, to bring to light Mao's strategy of "forcing Chiang to resist Japan" is necessarily to reopen the possibility that the war resulted from an interaction of several complex factors—including those internal to China itself. It also implies that the war—on which peasant revolution so utterly depended—was a contingent event rather than a foregone conclusion.
Japan's major interest on the continent was to husband Manchuria. It could not and would not relinquish Manchuria, from which it had expelled Chinese and Russian powers at the cost of two wars. It was willing to incur the resentment of the Anglo-American powers and to withdraw from the League of Nations, if necessary, to keep its hegemony there. In the 1930s the major threat to Manchuria was posed by the Soviet forces. North China was the rear of Japan's defense against this threat. As the Kuomintang's national unification proceeded, the Kuantung Army became preoccupied with the question of how to neutralize China in the event of a conflict with Russia. Incursions into north China started when the Kuantung Army found it difficult to control the anti-Japanese guerrillas—as yet only remotely connected with the CCP—operating in the stretch of areas from Jehol to Liaotung Peninsula. The Kuantung Army saw that Nanking's refusal to recognize Manchukuo's independence was ultimately responsible for local instability. A desire to deprive the guerrillas of the sanctuary in Jehol and beyond the Great Wall to the south led to the creation of a demilitarized zone in 1933 (the T'angku Agreement).
With eating came appetite, defined vaguely in pan-Asian terms, and by 1935 the Japanese government openly pursued the policy of excluding the Kuomintang government from north China by fostering "au-
[1] James B. Crowley, Japan's Quest for Autonomy: National Security and Foreign Policy, 1930–1938 (Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press, 1966).
Map 1
The Frozen Battleline: The China Expeditionary Forces in late 1939
Map 2
Co-habitation of the Communists and the Japanese: An overview of the
Communist bases during the war
tonomy" based on collaboration of warlord regimes. In June two local agreements between the Japanese Army and the Chinese authority forced the Kuomintang's influence out of Hopei and Chahar Provinces.[2] Still, Nanking leaned over backward to avoid direct confrontation, and in September, Chiang Kai-shek proposed de facto recognition of Manchukuo in exchange for Japan's support of the Kuomintang in north China.[3] But Japan persisted in its anachronistic scheme, and some time in the summer and fall of 1936 its policy seems to have pushed Nanking over the brink.
Having invited a situation quite adverse to its basic interest, Japan belatedly decided to reverse itself. In April, 1937, the Hayashi cabinet abandoned the policy of detaching north China.[4] Yin Ju-keng's Eastern Hopei Autonomous Government was to be liquidated.[5] I have already shown how the Communist leaders concerned themselves with this retreat.
Thus the outbreak of the war cannot be explained solely in terms of Japanese actions. Who fired the mysterious shots at Lukouchiao will perhaps never be known. I can think of at least two groups which might have been involved in the provocation, the Chinese Communists and the disgruntled Chinese puppet officials. But the question of "outside agitators" is irrelevant to urban nationalism. Much more important was the question of whether the Nanking government was in control of militant public opinion or was controlled by it. On July 11 a local truce was established between the Tientsin Garrison Army and Sung Che-yüan's forces. " . . . but the public pronouncements of the generalissimo, as well as his veto of the local settlement," states James Crowley, "eventually yielded a major crisis which vindicated his prognosis of subsequent Japanese demands."[6] By July 27, the Konoe cabinet was demanding a "fundamental solution of the Sino–Japanese relations" involving de facto recognition of Manchukuo, an anti-Comintern pact, and the creation of a demilitarized zone in the Peiping–Tientsin area.[7] Yet only three divisions were dispatched to north China with the intention of confining the hostility to this area. The Operations Division of the Army General Staff in Tokyo was simply unwilling to be drawn away from Soviet threat.[8] Thus, when the Chinese government advanced more than 50,000 troops to Shanghai against 4,000 Japanese marines there on August 13, Tokyo was caught off guard.
[2] See above, note 105, chap. II.
[3] Crowley, p. 227.
[4] Imperial Army General Staff , No. 1, pp. 422–423.
[5] Hata Ikuhiko, p. 135.
[6] Crowley, p. 340.
[7] Ibid. , pp. 340–347.
[8] See the role of Colonel Ishiwara Kanji, the head of the Operations Division, in the debate in Tokyo, in Imperial Army General Staff , No. 1, pp. 430–456.
It was speculated that China was spreading the fire to the lower Yangtze valley, the hub of British colonial interest, to invite Anglo–American intervention on its behalf.[9] Chinese leaders also appear to have been unduly optimistic about the efficacy of the German-trained Chinese divisions. The fateful war was on. Yet it seems reasonable to suggest that there was an even chance for a modus vivendi on the basis of Kuomintang control of north China and Japanese control of Manchuria before the Lukouchiao Incident. Furthermore, several attempts were to be made, both in China and Japan, to return to that formula in search of peace.
The realization of uneasy domestic peace after the Sian Incident enabled the CCP to use a wider assortment of means to hasten the coming of war, including steps to assure the Kuomintang of its loyalty. Chou En-lai handled the extremely tense negotiation with Chang Chung, a member of the Kuomintang's Central Executive Committee. Nanking still adhered to it searlier demand for surrender by the Communists. Precisely what it was that the CCP agreed to is not certain. Chang Kuo-t'ao states that the Kuomintang allowed only yes-or-no answers to its terms and that the CCP Center instructed Chou En-lai to accept them in spite of the fear that, unless war commenced soon, the Communists would be forced to live up to them.[10] When the secret agreement was reached, I infer, the Kuomintang instructed the CCP to issue a public statement asking for peace. The Kuomintang, according to this plan, would then respond by offering its terms.
On February 10, the CCP issued its statement addressed to the Third Plenum of the Kuomintang's Central Executive Committee; but the CCP's terms were at variance with the Kuomintang's. The CCP promised that:
(1) The policy of armed insurrection to overthrow the National Government will be discontinued throughout the country;
(2) The Workers' and Peasants' Democratic Government will be renamed the Government of the Special Region of the Republic of China and the Red Army will be redesignated as part of the National Revolutionary Army, and they will come under the direction of the Central Government in Nanking and its Military Council respectively;
(3) a thoroughly democratic system based on universal suffrage will be put into effect in the areas under the Government of the Special Region; and
(4) the policy of confiscating the land of the landlords will be discontinued
[9] Crowley, p. 347.
[10] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 57, September, 1970, p. 96. Chiang Kai-shek also states that his terms were accepted prior to the Lukouchiao Incident, in Soviet Russia in China , p. 73.
and the common programme of the anti-Japanese national united front resolutely carried out.[11]
The crux of this statement was that the CCP did not promise anything more than redesignation of the Red Army, renaming of the soviets, and discontinuation of confiscation. Moreover, the CCP was united on these points. Wang Ming railed at the "harsh demands" of the Kuomintang and opposed "bodily disintegration" of the Red Army during the negotiation.[12]
The Kuomintang's conditions were formally announced in The Resolution Concerning the Complete Eradication of Red Menace passed by the Third Plenum on Febraury 21. The Resolution demanded "thorough liquidation of the so-called 'Red Army'"; a similar liquidation of the soviet governments; cessation of Communist propaganda; and cessation of class struggle.[13] Most writers take this Resolution to be a subterfuge to conceal the fact that Nanking was granting a ceasefire to the CCP. But it must be pointed out, in the light of subsequent events, that the Kuomintang was serious in its declared intention to "eradicate Red menace." The Resolution simply signified that Nanking was willing to forego military means for the time being to attain this end. Therefore the Third Plenum can be regarded as the major turning point in the Kuomintang's strategy. It was here that the Kuomintang switched from the strategy of "unfication first" to one which sought unification within the framework of resistance—an exact counterpart of the CCP's strategy.
The CCP's position was precarious, and only a full scale war could have given it a respite. Whether the CCP played a part in triggering the fighting cannot be known; but it was obviously more than a mere bystander. The conference of the Party delegates in May—at which Mao was rebuked by his critics for his radicalism—was the occasion on which the CCP placed itself on war footing. From this conference, Party organizers were dispatched to many parts of north China in anticipation of war.[14] On the night of July 7 the initial shooting took place at 10:40 P.M. ; Tokyo did not receive a rather routine report until early the next morning.[15] The situation was uncertain and murky, since it resembled several other instances of attack on Japanese citizens and troops that had preceded it. But the CCP re-
[11] Selected Works , I, 281–282.
[12] "The key to the salvation of the Chinese nation," Chugoku[*] kyosanto[*] 1937-nen shi , pp. 92–119. In this criticism of the Kuomintang's Third Plenum, Wang Ming vows that the Red Army will keep all offices of political workers and that the soviet will retain its soviet character, Ibid. , pp. 107–108.
[13] Wang Chien-min, III, 103–105.
[14] See below, p. 91.
[15] Imperial Army General Staff , No. 1, p. 429.
acted with surprising swiftness. On July 8 the Central Committee issued a circular telegram urging armed resistance.[16] Following the local truce of July 11, tense confrontation continued between Sung Che-yüan's 29th Army and the Japanese forces. For several nights both sides complained that the other side was firing at night in violation of truce. On the night of July 22, Japanese military police entered the no man's land lying between the two sides and arrested a band of Chinese students who were firing guns into the air. They confessed that they were working under Liu Shao-ch'i's direction.[17]
The CCP forwarded a declaration on the united front to the Kuomintang on July 15 with the expectation that Chiang Kai-shek would make it public at his discretion with a parallel declaration of his own. But Chiang-Kai-shek kept the declaration in abeyance for more than two months thereafter.[18] On August 21, one week after the fighting spread to Shanghai, he signed a nonaggression pact with the Soviet Union. By an accompanying agreement, the Soviet Union promised a credit of 100 million yuan (some US$30 million).[19] On the following day, Nanking announced the appointment of Chu Te and P'eng Tehuai as the supreme and vice commanders respectively of the 18th Group Army, to be made up of former Red Army forces. The 18th Group Army or the Eighth Route Army, as the Communists preferred to call it, was assigned to the Second War Zone in northern Shansi Province under Yen Hsi-shan's command. The timing of this announcement suggested Russian involvement in the united front, but what was agreed upon, if anything, remains unknown.
At last, on September 22, the Kuomintang made public the CCP's declaration. The four-point pledge made by the CCP on this occasion is identical with those points in the February 10 statement with respect to the status of the Communist army and government. But the CCP made some additional concessions: it dropped its earlier demand for a "common program" and pledged its support for Sun Yat-sen's Three People's Principles.[20] On September 23 Chiang Kai-shek reciprocated with his own message commending the Communist party
[16] Chungkuo Kung-ch'an-tang wei Jih-chün chin-kung Lukouch'iao t'ung-tien [Circular telegram of the CCP on Japanese attack on Lukouchiao] Kuo-Kung ho-tso , pp. 102–103.
[17] Teradaira, Nihon no higeki , pp. 282–287; Imperial Army General Staff , No. 1, p. 446.
[18] Selected Works , I, 37.
[19] Arthur N. Young, China and the Helping Hand, 1937–1945 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1963), p. 22.
[20] Chung-Kung wei kung-pu Kuo-Kung ho-tso hsüan-yen [The CCP's declaration for the proclamation of Kuomintang–CCP cooperation], K'ang-Jih min-tsu t'ung-i chan-hsien chih-nan [Guide to the anti-Japanese national united front] (hereinafter cited as Guide ) (Chieh-fang-she), II, 18–20.
for "surrendering its prejudices."[21] This formalized the second united front.
The war and the united front were on. But the CCP leadership suffered from internal differences and did not have coherent policies for the resistance or the united front. Moscow was evidently concerned over the indirection of the CCP and smuggled Wang Ming back to Yenan in late 1937.[22] The dispute between him and Mao came to a climax shortly thereafter. The subjects of dispute in the Party were as follows:
(1) The most generic question was the nature and purpose of the united front. Was it to be primarily an anti-imperialist struggle based on the unity of all Chinese, transcending old partisan differences? Or was it to be a combination of anti-imperialist and anti-feudal struggles?
(2) Wang Ming sought to convene the CCP's Seventh Party Congress early with a blessing from the Comintern.[23] This Congress was to formally terminate the Party's line of the civil war period and to bring the CCP in line with the new popular front line of the Comintern.
(3) The CCP demanded in its February 10 telegram that the Kuomintang and the CCP adopt a common program for the united front. This raised two questions. First, there was a question as to whether the CCP should presume to be the full equal of the Kuomintang and propose such a thing at all. Second, if the Kuomintang were to rebuff the CCP, there remained a question as to what sort of public platform the CCP should adopt. Such a program amounted to a statement of the CCP's goals for the bourgeois-democratic stage of the revolution or an outline of the "Democratic Republic" it vowed to build. In either case, this program would spell out a broad range of reforms for China, e.g., convocation of a national assembly to promulgate a new constitution, convening of a new parliamentary institution to replace the Kuomintang's "tutelage," the nature of the "national defense government," social and economic reforms, and the like.
(4) Questions related to organizational form of the second united front. Even though the Cominterm stipulated at the Seventh Con-
[21] Chiang Kai-shek, The Collected Wartime Messages of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, 1937–1945 (New York: The John Day Co., 1946), I, 42. See Chiang Kaishek's own understanding of the agreement, in Soviet Russia in China , p. 81.
[22] All Russian flights in China had to have the government's permission, but this was one of the exceptions. Chang Kuo-t'ao puts the date of Wang Ming's return as late December. "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 61, January, 1971, p. 90.
[23] That the Comintern supported the convening of the Seventh CCP Congress is my own inference.
gress that "right opportunism" which blurred the class line must be avoided,[24] specific questions seem to have been left open. The CCP had to decide whether its members should join the Kuomintang as individuals as during the first united front; whether, instead, the two parties should act as equals in a coalition; or whether the Communist party should infiltrate Kuomintang organizations.
(5) The land program of the CCP during the resistance period. This was formally subsumed under the question of common program. Although some major decision had already been made by May, the CCP seems to have been still divided when the war began. The Kuomintang demanded, and the CCP agreed to, cessation of confiscation of the property of the landlord class. The seriousness of problems entailed by this agreement can hardly be overstressed. Could the CCP carry out peasant revolution without distributing land among the poor? Should the Communist forces subsist on the government's pay and not expand themselves? Because of its importance, I will deal with the land program in Chapters IV and VII.
(6) Questions concerning the organization of the Communist forces, the Eighth Route Army in the north and the remnants of the Red Army in central China. The key question was, Should the Communist forces be integrated into the Kuomintang forces?
(7) The question above was a part of larger issues having to do with the CCP's military strategy in the war.
Different solutions to these issues affected two other major questions which were, however, never explicitly articulated on their own terms. One concerned the struggle for power between Mao Tse-tung and Wang Ming. With respect to the united front with the Kuomintang, formal differences between them disappeared during the Sian Incident. The essence of the contention from then on was the extent and manner in which the united front should be made to serve different visions of the Chinese revolution. The other question—bound up with the first one—concerned the latent differences between nationalism in the Chinese Communist movement and the interest of Soviet Russia.
On August 25, the Politburo opened an important conference at Loch'uan in Shensi Province to lay down policy guidelines for the
[24] Georgi Dimitrov, "Fa-hsi-ssu chu-i ti chin-kung ho Kung-ch'an-kuo-chi wei tsao-ch'eng kung-jen chieh-chi fan-tui fa-hsi-ssu chu-i ti t'ung-i erh tou-cheng ti jen-wu" [Fascist aggression and the Communist International's struggle and task in uniting the proletariat against fascism] (Dimitrov's report to the Seventh Comintern Congress, passed on August 20), Mu-ch'ien hsing-shih ti fen-hsi [Analysis of the current situation] (no date, no publisher listed) (Hoover), p. 16. For a good study of the gradual shift in the Comintern's line in 1935, see Van Slyke, pp. 48–53.
Party on the eve of the departure of the Eighth Route Army to the front. Military leaders such as P'eng Te-huai, Ho Lung, Liu Po-ch'eng and Lin Piao were present.[25] Several major decision—representing a compromise between Mao and his opponents—were made.
The conference debated a common program for the united front. A ten point program appeared originally in Wang Ming's speech to the Comintern Congress and in the August First Declaration. It was his platform for the united front. On July 23, 1937, Mao had offered an Eight Point Program and contrasted it sharply with another set of measures, which he identified with the government of "the bureaucrats, compradors, gentry and landlords."[26] The Loch'uan conference adopted the Ten Point National Salvation Program (Shih-ta chiu-kuo kang-ling) .[27] A textual comparison of the three programs does not reveal any significant differences since they all consisted of abstract generalities.
But internal differences over a common program remained. Mao apparently demanded a program for the united front as he defined it, i.e., one in which the CCP would exercise independent leadership. Wang Ming, I surmise, maintained on the contrary that a common program must be acceptable to the Kuomintang. The CCP's September 22 declaration, which received Chiang Kai-shek's compliments, dropped the earlier demand for a common program. Shortly after the convocation of the Kuomintang's Extraordinary National Congress (March 27–April 2, 1938), which adopted the Program of Resistance and Reconstruction , Wang Ming announced that he was prepared to accept the Kuomintang's program as the common program of the united front. Ch'in Pang-hsien and Chou En-lai concurred.[28]
The Loch'uan conference also debated the CCP's participation in the Kuomintang government, though a resolution was not issued until September 25.[29] It forbade CCP members to take part in the government at any level so long as it remained a "one-party dictatorship"
[25] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 58, October, 1970, p. 90.
[26] "Policies, Measures and Perspectives for Resisting the Japanese Invasion," Selected Works , II, 13–20. It is possible that Mao was criticizing Wang Ming by criticizing the Kuomintang.
[27] "For the Mobilization of All the Nation's Forces for Victory in the War of Resistance," ibid ., pp. 25–28. This document was originally issued by the Propaganda Department of the CCP on August 15 as agitation–propaganda manual. See Guide , II, 11–17. A footnote in Selected Works , II, 23, states that Mao wrote it. But the document ends with Wang Ming's slogan, "independent, free, and happy China." See below, p. 80, for my inference that this slogan was Wang Ming's.
[28] Ch'en Shao-yü, Ch'in Pang-hsien, Chou En-lai, "Wo-men tui-yü pao-wei Wuhan yü ti-san-ch'i k'ang-chan wen-t'i ti i-chien" [Our opinion concerning the defense of Wuhan and the third stage of resistance], Guide , V, 126.
[29] Selected Works , II, 72–73.
under the Kuomintang. Participation in a government which did not acknowledge the CCP's own program, it was feared, would undermine the Party's independence. There were two exceptions to this rule:
Communists can participate in the local governments of certain particular regions such as the battle areas, where on the one hand the old rulers, unable to rule as before, are in the main willing to put into effect the proposals of the Communist Party and the Communist Party has obtained freedom of open activities, and on the other the present emergency has made Communist participation a necessity, in the opinion of both the people and the government. In areas occupied by the Japanese invaders, Communists should furthermore openly come forward as organizers of the political power of the anti-Japanese united front.[30]
The other exception was participation in a popular assembly such as the National Political Council which the Kuomintang established shortly thereafter.
Chang Wen-t'ien gave a keynote report with Mao's support and revived the thesis of the Wayaopao Resolution that the CCP should combine the resistance with the revolution. Chang Kuo-t'ao led the opposition by pointing out that such a policy was likely to compel the Kuomintang to join hands with Japan against the Communists. The report was withdrawn. It was revised by deleting all direct references to revolutionary effort.[31] As approved later the report stated that "a great danger lurks in the present state of resistance. The main reason for this danger is that the Kuomintang is still unwilling to arouse the whole people to take part in the war."[32] The report demanded that, in order to turn the war into a total national war, the CCP should mobilize the masses by assuming the leadership over the united front. The report was meant to be a theoretical justification for the solution of two urgent problems on hand.
The order of battle for the Communist forces had just been issued by Nanking.[33] The three divisions of the Eighth Route Army—the 115th under Lin Piao, the 120th under Ho Lung, and the 129th under Liu Po-ch'eng—were to move out of the newly designated Shensi–Kansu–Nighsia Border Region to join Yen Hsi-han's command. The questions of their relationship to the Kuomintang's command and their conduct on the battlefield had to be decided.
The Kuomintang still clung to the hope of integrating the Communist forces into its own. It proposed to attach its officers as cadres
[30] Ibid. , p. 73.
[31] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 59, November, 1970, p. 86.
[32] Resolution on the Present Situation and the Tasks of the Party, Selected Works , II, 70–71.
[33] Soviet Russia in China , p. 83.
of the Communist forces. In addition, it demanded the abolition of the system of political commissars and political department.[34] Mao and Jen Pi-shih were reported to have opposed any compromise of the independence of the Communist forces.[35] Chou En-lai and Chu Te were inclined to move closer to the Kuomintang's demand. Chang Went'ien worked out an internal compromise.[36] The office of political commissar was abolished and the former commissars were re-appointed as deputies to the commanders of a unit or as directors of the political department. The political department was to keep its organization and function intact but was renamed the political training department.[37] The Eighth Route Army was to refuse any Kuomintang officers, but a small staff was to be allowed to work in Yenan for liaison purposes.[38] However, the changes in the system of political commissar and political department were undone by November, and these offices functioned as before.[39]
The question of reorganization was actually subsidiary to the more fundamental issues concerning military strategy of the CCP in the war. The war situation as it confronted the Party leadership at the end of August, 1937, demanded answers to several urgent questions. What were Japan's intentions in China and elsewhere? Did Japan renounce the policy of localizing the war when it vowed to "chastise" the Chinese government in August? Was not the policy of "chastisement" still limited in its purpose? Was Tokyo secretly in touch with Nanking in an attempt to arrive at some political solution to the war? What were the chances of intervention or mediation by a third power? What was Japan's capability in military as well as in broader terms to back up its announced intentions? How did the Japanese forces compare with the Kuomintang forces with which the Red Army had had long experience? Were tactics sanctioned by the Party leadership for use against the latter equally adequate against the former? What should be the relationship of the Eighth Route Army to the Kuomintang's regular forces and other "friendly forces" on the battlefield? If the initial thrust of the Japanese invasion could be maintained, would the Kuomintang defense collapse or would it be able to hold out in the interior? What sort of strategy should it follow to stay in the war? Should the Eighth Route Army actively assist the other Chinese forces or should it follow an independent course?
[34] Selected Works , II, 67.
[35] Warren Kuo, "The Conference at Lochuan," Issues and Studies , October, 1968, p. 43. Kuo quotes Chen Jan, his informer, here.
[36] Ibid. , pp. 43–44; "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 59, November, 1970, p. 85.
[37] Selected Works , II, 67.
[38] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 59, November, 1970, p. 86.
[39] Selected Works , II, 67.
Inasmuch as the role of the army loomed so large under the wartime conditions, these questions brought out all the political differences in the Politburo. The conference was wracked by a sharp clash of opinions and had to be adjourned for three days to recompose itself.[40] It was reported in 1967 that the meeting "decided to adopt the strategy of independent guerrilla warfare in the mountains."[41] This was Mao's line. Extrapolating from later events, it can be assumed that Chu Te, P'eng Te-huai, and Liu Po-ch'eng, among the military leaders, sided with Chang Kuo-t'ao against Mao.[42] A military strategic dispute, comparable in significance to the one that took place at Tsunyi, was under way. Both Mao and his opponents produced a considerable amount of literature to develop and defend their respective positions taken at Loch'uan. The nature of the dispute will become clear in the light of subsequent events.
As the Peiping–Tientsin area was cleared of the Chinese resistance, the Japanese forces, now beefed up to eight divisions and a mixed brigade, were placed under a new command, the North China Army Army under Terauchi Hisaichi. In early September, the Area Army began its advance southwestward toward Paoting to attack the Chinese forces led by Wan Fu-lin. Once unleashed, the Japanese forces did not stop until they took Taiyuan in early November. The Area Army moved in three prongs, the main force moving down the Peiping–Hankow railway, another force on its southern flank moving along the Tientsin–Pukow railway. A third, made up of the Fifth Division commanded by Lieutenant General Itagaki and a detachment of the Kuantung Army was to secure the northern flank across the Great Wall in Chahar. The Itagaki Division crossed the Wall around Nank'ou and began sweeping westward along the Wall toward Lingch'iu, where it was to cross the Wall again to enter Shansi Province. The pass was defended by the Shansi Army (Yen Hsi-shan's forces) led by its deputy commander Yang Ai-yüan.[43] Lin Piao's 115th Division, along with Ho Lung's 120th and Liu Po-ch'eng's 129th Division, had crossed the Yellow River near T'ungkuan in early September and moved northeastward by the Tat'ung–P'uchow railway to join the Second War Zone's command. The 115th Division and the 17th Army
[40] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 59, November, 1970, p. 85.
[41] Li Hsin-kung, "Settle Accounts With Peng Teh-huai for His Heinous Crimes of Usurping Army Leadership and Opposing the Party," Peking Review , September 1, 1967, p. 13.
[42] Ibid . This author accuses P'eng Te-huai of following the second Wang Ming line at the Loch'uan conference.
[43] A very good study of the Battle of P'inghsingkuan, using Communist sources, is in Sydney Liu, "The Battle of P'inghsingkuan: A Significant Event in Lin Piao's Career," The China Mainland Review , December, 1966, pp. 161–173.
Map 3
The 8th Route Army's Movements, September–November, 1937
of the Northeast Army led by Kao Kwei-chih were to take part in the campaign around Lingch'iu by taking flanking actions.
Bitter fighting commenced when the Japanese 21st Brigade, composed of three infantry battalions, was surrounded by Yen Hsi-shan's forces, ten divisions strong, on September 22. Post-war Japanese accounts show that the Shansi Army fought courageously and nearly decimated the 21st Brigade before the Brigade was rescued by the
main force a week later.[44] The Shansi Army and the Communist forces appeared to have been poorly coordinated, however. Both Yang and Lin ignored the original plan and failed to send reinforcements to each other.[45] Lin left the battle four days before Yang but not before he had laid a successful ambush independently on a unit of the 21st Brigade in a narrow gap near P'inghsingkuan.
Two days before the ambush, Lin Piao spent a good deal of time by himself at the bivouac site writing up a report to be presented to the cadres of the division the following day. The report lasted for two hours. According to an eyewitness, Lin Piao said at the end,
At present we want to have combat in this area, to give the beastly army a blow, to show the friendly forces [ours] cooperation, and to give our forces a tonic. . . . These several days I have been involved in a study to see what method will be required of this battle to win a complete victory, to capture several prisoners to send straight back to the rear, and to drum up sentiment for resistance and confidence in victory among the masses. . . .[46]
The division moved out during the night to take up positions along a narrow gap overlooking a highway. In the immediate battlefield were the 343rd Brigade and an independent regiment of roughly 6,500 troops, backed up by a protective force of the 344th Brigade of 5,000 near by.[47] In the early morning of September 25, a transport unit of the First Battalion of the 21st Brigade moved into the ravine. The trap was sprung by disabling the leading vehicle. Then the entire unit was wiped out. It was a good example of a set-piece battle of annihilation. Only four men survived. Chinese Communist propaganda has claimed ever since that Lin Piao annihilated the 21st Brigade of 4,000 troops.[48] According to the survivors as well as to P'eng Te-huai's revelation, however, the unit concerned was no more than one hundred in strength, including an escort of one platoon.[49] The Communist account stated that the battle lasted from 7 A.M. until 3 P.M. and included the successful repulse of a Japanese counter-
[44] Pacification War , No. 1, pp. 37–39.
[45] Sydney Liu, pp. 164–165.
[46] Lin Piao, et al., Chin-pei yu-chi chan-cheng chi-shih [Annals of guerrilla war in north Shansi] (Changsha: Chan-shih ch'u-pan-she, 1938) (BI), p. 37.
[47] Sydney Liu, p. 169.
[48] K'ang-Jih chan-cheng shih-ch'i ti Chung-kuo jen-min chieh-fang chün [The Chinese People's Liberation Army during the resistance against Japan] (hereinafter cited as PLA during resistance ) (Peking: Jen-min ch'u-pan-she, 1954), p. 14.
[49] Kyodo[*] butai hishi: 21i, yanagi no hana to heitai to [Secret history of the home town troops: the 21st Infantry Regiment, the willow blossoms and soldiers] (Tottorishi: Shimane shinbunsha, 1962), pp. 117–137. Incidentally, the survivors recall being strafed in the ravine by aircraft marked by "blue sky and white sun." P'eng Tehuai revealed later that Lin Piao's division collected less than 100 rifles, in Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 351.
charge to take a hill overlooking the road.[50] According to Chang Kuo-t'ao, Lin Piao's division suffered casualties of one thousand or more.[51] Both of these stories seem too inflated to be true.
As organized resistance subsided toward the end of the battle, the Communist forces were treated to an eerie sight. The surviving Japanese troops, most of them probably wounded, destroyed the supplies, the wagons, and themselves. The Communist troops had approached them with the assumption that they were like any other foe encountered in the civil war. They stood up and called out to the Japanese to surrender, but to no avail.[52]
Lin Piao wrote "summing-up" reports of his experiences at P'ing-hsingkuan, for external and internal consumption. Both served political purposes. In sharp contrast to the Party's propaganda and his own external report, the internal report indicated that the battle had had a sobering effect on him. One of the reports, dated October 17, is summarized below.[53]
(1) Once the enemy gets to a combat in the mountains, his fighting capacity and special strength decline greatly. His artillery, tanks, and aircraft are not very useful.
(2) The enemy has built up a habit of belittling the Chinese armed forces. He disregards proper caution and reconnaissance, and is reluctant to do construction work and neglects field fortification. We often find him resting in a ditch even under our attack.
(3) The enemy relies considerably on transport from the rear for his ammunition. His food is all shipped from Japan. The enemy's rear has already extended for several thousand li . [Chinese mile]. Once cut off from his supplies, his difficulty is easy to imagine. This is precisely what we did at P'inghsing-kuan.
(4) To strike the enemy's flank or rear when he is engaging our friendly forces in the latter's position is the best method of fighting. This is better than engaging him while in movement or when he has just arrived at a position and not yet established his perimeter.
(5) In order to avoid his artillery and aircraft, we must quickly advance on the enemy upon the commencement of combat, and throw in hand-to-hand assault in successive waves. This will make his artillery useless.
(6) Coordination by the friendly forces is in reality extremely bad. They decide on a plan for attack but are unable to follow through with it themselves. "You strike, they stand by and watch." They are irresolute and unable to strike a decisive blow at the enemy. They do not know how to concentrate
[50] Jen-min jih-pao , August 1, 1963.
[51] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 60, December, 1970, p. 88.
[52] PLA during resistance , pp. 15–16.
[53] "P'inghsingkuan chan-tou ti ching-yen" [Experiences of the Battle of P'ing-hsingkuan], Guide , II, 187–190.
an absolutely overwhelming force at a decisive spot. Their command is incompetent in the extreme.
(7) The enemy soldiers have enormous fighting ability. We never encountered such a strong foe in the Northern Expedition or Soviet period. Their infantrymen are able to deploy themselves with individual initiative in combat situations. Although wounded, they refuse to give up arms.
(8) The Japanese soldier's refusal to surrender comes from his bushido and fascist education, and at the same time from the fear of reprisal by the Chinese people after having inflicted atrocities on them. It is important to note that the North China forces have in the past taken a mistaken policy toward Japanese prisoners, such as burying them alive, burning them, or cutting their bellies open. We must also strengthen our propaganda in Japanese.
(9) Night assault is an important method of defeating the Japanese forces. The enemy fears night assault. His technological superiority is reduced at night.
(10) Under the present strength and technological conditions of the Eighth Route Army, basically we ought to concentrate on attacking the enemy's rear and the road to his rear. Cutting the road to his rear is the best method of obstructing his advance and winning the protracted war. Constantly amassing a large force and engaging the enemy in mobile warfare is inappropriate.
(11) If the central forces persist in defensive tactics, they are inviting real trouble. They should wage quick battle or mobile warfare, improve their political work and mass work.
(12) Our army's military skill and training still leave a great deal to be desired. In the past half year, our troops have had a chance to rest and regroup, and their discipline, morale and regularization have progressed greatly; but in combat training we have a long way to go yet.
Lin did not make clear in this report whether he regarded the battle as mobile warfare or guerrilla warfare, properly speaking. But he seemed to assume that mobile warfare was for the Kuomintang regular forces to wage. It developed soon that Lin Piao's position on strategic and tactical questions of the anti-Japanese war was exactly identical with Mao's. It appears that Mao instructed Lin to engage the Japanese forces in a successful battle to demonstrate his military line and to propel the CCP into the limelight of public attention.
The Chinese public responded with enthusiasm to the news that a Japanese brigade was wiped out. It mattered little whether the credit belonged to Yen Hsi-shan or the Communists. But Yen Hsi-shan could not have taken the falsification with equanimity, and P'eng Te-huai was concerned about the consequence on the united front.[54]
Shortly after the fall of Shanghai and Taiyuan, the Central Com-
[54] Union Research Institute, The Case of Peng Teh-huai, 1959–1968 (Hong Kong, 1968), p. 191.
mittee issued a directive which stated that "in north China regular warfare which relies mainly on the Kuomintang has already been concluded, and guerrilla warfare which relies on the Communist Party has entered its main phase."[55] Mao was ordering his field commanders to disengage from the enemy and to start building bases. Again, Lin Piao wrote an essay amplifying and supporting Mao's views.[56] At the same time, Mao complained of a "new type of warlordism" and "individualistic heroism" in the Eighth Route Army.[57] The military strategic dispute was intensifying.
Mao surmised correctly that Japan's leadership was internally divided over the China policy and could not follow a consistent line.[58] The fear of a two-front war against the Soviet Union and China, and Japan's limited resources, kept the General Staff from committing an overwhelming force at the outset to break the Kuomintang's resistance. Mao evidently felt that as long as the Kuomintang forces avoided decisive battles thereafter they would provide the mainstay of a protracted resistance. He estimated correctly that the roughly thirty divisions operating in China in 1938 were the upper limits in the force level which Japan could spare for the China theater.[59] Continued resistance by the Kuomintang's regular forces to keep the bulk of the Japanese forces stalemated was the single most crucial factor in Mao's prediction of a protracted war, though this is not immediately apparent in his writings. Obviously addressing himself to the Kuomintang, he counseled: "We should absolutely avoid a strategically decisive engagement on which the fate of the nation is staked," especially in the early stage of the war.[60] In this sense, Mao could not have been more agreeable to Chiang Kai-shek's slogan of "trading space for time" and seemed much relieved when a near-disaster was averted at Hsüchow by the Kuomintang forces beating a timely "strategic retreat."[61]
Related to Mao's call for the Kuomintang regulars to tide over the "early" stage of the war was the stand he had presumably taken that whatever the Communist forces could do by way of resistance had little influence on the course of the war in and of itself. With this, other Communist leaders could not have disagreed. The Eighth
[55] Chi Wu, I-ke ke-min ken-chü-ti ti ch'eng-ch'ang [The growth of one revolutionary base] (hereinafter cited as Growth of one revolutionary base ) (Peking: Jenmin ch'u-pan-she, 1958), p. 16. This message can be found in Selected Works , II, 62.
[56] "Lun hua-pei cheng-kui-chan ti chi-pen chiao-hsün yü yu-chi-chan-cheng ti fa-chan t'iao-chien" [Discussion on the basic lessons of regular warfare in north China and the conditions for development of guerrilla warfare], Guide , V, 55–73.
[57] Selected Works , II, 66–67.
[58] Ibid ., II, 63, 178, 179.
[59] Ibid ., p. 178–179.
[60] Ibid ., p. 180.
[61] Ibid ., pp. 179, 181.
Route Army was understrength at roughly 30,000 when the war began;[62] it had no artillery; in training and combat experience it was no match for the Japanese forces. Lin Piao's report was very emphatic that the Japanese were much tougher than the Kuomintang forces. It followed that strategies and tactics to be used against the Japanese forces should be different from those sanctioned by the Party vis-à-vis the Kuomintang forces in the civil war. The sober tone of his internal report stemmed from this political purpose. When Mao proposed at Loch' uan that the Communist forces should fight "independent guerrilla warfare in the mountains," he was in fact advocating a new military line in a rudimentary form. To use current terminology, Mao was ordering the Communist forces to de-escalate. He was discouraging "mobile warfare" for the Communist forces. He was opposed by P'eng Te-huai. P'eng issued a directive in October on his initiative as the deputy secretary of the Front Branch of the Military Commission demanding "mobile guerrilla warfare."[63]
Against this backdrop of political dispute in the Party, the other element in Mao's military proposal took on added significance. To retain the element of surprise and initiative in battle had always been an important part of Mao's military line. But in the context of the second united front, "independent guerrilla warfare" or "to fight on our own initiative" meant refusal to follow the directions of Kuomintang command and to assist the "friendly forces." Again there were good reasons for avoiding tight tactical coordination with sundry Chinese forces operating on the battlefield. Parochial concern of regionalized Chinese forces for self-preservation was reinforced by old suspicion toward the former Red Army. At Loch' uan Mao expressed the fear that the Kuomintang command might use the Communist forces as a sacrifice to the Japanese forces.[64] But ultimately Mao's line of "independent guerrilla warfare" was dictated by his revolutionary goal. The areas behind the advancing Japanese line was the only place where the Communist forces would enjoy freedom from the Kuomintang forces. Hence, Mao instructed his forces to carry out "exterior-line operations within the interior-line operations."[65]
The strength of the opposition to Mao did not rest solely on the authority of the Comintern. As was to become a pattern hereafter, the political fortunes of the opposing sides were tied to the objective developments in the war. The war was going badly for China toward
[62] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 58, October, 1970, p. 90.
[63] The Case of Peng Teh-huai , p. 190.
[64] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 59, November, 1970, p. 86.
[65] Selected Works , II, 82.
the end of 1937. Taiyuan fell in November in spite of stubborn resistance by a combined operation of the central forces, the Shansi Army, and the Eighth Route Army. A wedge was driven southwestward along Tat'ung–P'uchow and the Peiping-Hankow railways. Shansi Province with its rich mineral resources and a good part of north China was about to fall. After the fall of Shanghai, Nanking was threatened; the Chinese government moved its seat upriver to Wuhan on November 16.
In Tokyo an intense debate was going on between the Army General Staff and Premier Konoe. Colonel Ishiwara Kanji of the Army General Staff led the group which demanded a quick settlement of the war in order to build up the forces in Manchuria and to proceed with long-range preparation against the Soviet Union and the United States. He insisted that Japan should seek a political end of the war in China by offering terms which would be acceptable to the Kuomintang government.[66] The cabinet decided on October 22 to probe the Kuomintang government's willingness to enter into peace negotiations by using the channel provided by the German government.[67] Chiang Kai-shek in effect refused the initial terms by demanding the status quo of July 7. But as the Japanese forces shifted their weight to central China and started advancing toward Nanking, he reconsidered his original position. On December 2, Chiang was reported to have met with Pai Ch'ung-hsi, T'ang Sheng-chih, Hsü Yung-ch'ang, and Ku Chu-t'ung. The meeting decided to accept the earlier Japanese conditions as the basis for negotiation. On the following day, Chiang notified the German ambassador O.P. Trautmann of his decision.[68]
The CCP got wind of the peace contact.[69] It is interesting to note that the CCP was informed of every major peace discussion between China and Japan from this point on. The Politburo met for a conference between December 9 and 13. How to keep China in the war, I infer, was the question of overriding urgency at the conference. The Japanese terms of peace of November 3 were relatively lenient. If, having demonstrated its military superiority, the Japanese army suddenly withdrew from north China, the militant public opinion that demanded a reckoning with Japan would have been dampened. Moreover, the terms of peace stipulated China's cooperation with Japan against the Comintern. With or without such an agreement, the end
[66] Crowley, pp. 351–353.
[67] Ibid ., pp. 354–358.
[68] Ibid ., p. 358; Kindai no senso[*] [Modern wars], Vol. V: Imai Takeo, Chugoku[*] to no tatakai [The war with China] (Tokyo: Jinbutsu orai-sha[*] , 1966), p. 103.
[69] Warren Kuo, "The Conflict between Chen Shao-yu and Mao Tse-tung," Issues and Studies , November, 1968, p. 40.
of the war was likely to bring about a renewed campaign to suppress the Communist forces.
At this time, Mao's dialectics took him quite far in a sectarian direction. At a meeting of the Party activists in Yenan in November, he characterized his opponents by saying, "class capitulationism is actually the reserve force of national capitulationism . . . . "[70] This remark was evidently divorced from the sentiment of the majority in the CCP leadership. "Resistance against Japan is of paramount importance," said Wang Ming,
and everything must be subordinated to its needs; all efforts must be directed at the anti-Japanese united front, all things must be channeled through the anti-Japanese united front. . . . it is no time to engage in a power struggle for leadership.[71]
With Wang Ming's presence, the most basic questions concerning the united front were revived. Later, in December, the Party issued a manifesto to allay the Kuomintang's suspicions and restore credibility to its pledge of cooperation. It pointed out that the main stumbling block in the resistance was not China's military weakness but "rather the intensified Japanese plot to 'pit Chinese against Chinese.'"[72] It even went so far as to promise to "cooperate with the Kuomintang for national reconstruction after the successful conclusion of the war."[73]
The military critics of Mao fell in line. As military men, they were as conscious as Mao of the power of the new enemy and the relative inferiority of the Kuomintang and the Communist forces. A retreat in the initial phase was inevitable. But the war would be "protracted" only if "capitulation" was averted. Undue stress on "self-preservation" (Mao), "trading space for time" (Chiang Kai-shek), "scorched earth strategy"[74] and other negative defenses only tended to strengthen the attitudes of passivity, despondency, and longing for Western intervention.
The military leaders might have differed from Mao in the first instance in their judgement on the combat capability of the Eighth
[70] Selected Works , II, 70. This was delivered on November 12 and "met with immediate opposition from the Right opportunists in the Party," ibid ., p. 61.
[71] "The Current Situation and Tasks in the War of Resistance," cited in Warren Kuo, "The Conflict between Chen Shao-yu and Mao Tse-tung," Issues and Studies , December, 1968, p. 49.
[72] Chungkuo Kung-ch'an-tang tui shih-ch'ü hsüan-yen [The CCP's declaration on the current situation], Guide , III, 2.
[73] Ibid .
[74] In November, 1938, the Chinese garrison in Changsha set the city on fire in the name of "scorched earth war." This prompted Wang Ching-wei to point out the ominous implications of the destructive war for Republican China.
Route Army. This was ostensibly an empirical question. On the grounds that it was as yet weak and understrength, Mao counseled its expansion and buildup. To his opponents in the army, expansion of the army made sense only if it were directly applied to armed resistance. It was one thing to argue for strategic defensive. It was something else to de-escalate.
Both P'eng Te-huai and Chu Te were convinced that guerrilla warfare could not make a dent in the Japanese military power. P'eng and Chu Te maintained that the Eighth Route Army was capable of carrying out missions large enough to inflict substantial losses on the Japanese forces.[75] The extent of opposition to Mao among the army leadership was surprising. They rested their case formally on military grounds, though they were no doubt aware of the implication of their stand for internal politics. Military professionalism and nationalism seem to have swayed some of them to become strange bedfellows of Wang Ming, so to speak.
But then there were others whose opposition to Mao was more overtly political. Hsiang Ying, the vice commander of the New Fourth Army, was the most outspoken advocate of mobile warfare. His personal conflict with Mao dated back to Kiangsi. This was said to be one of the reasons that he was left behind in Kiangsi to fight a diversionary action as the main Red forces departed. After his death during the New Fourth Army Incident, and Wang Ming's demise, the Party chose to single Hsiang out as the major culprit in the disaster in southern Anhwei. The Party's indictment was that he neglected to guard the Party's "independence" in the united front by conniving with the class enemy.[76] His stand on the military question was evidently based on his support for the Internationalists, and contemporary evidence corroborates the Party's charges against him. For instance, one finds him making very strong statements in support of mobile and positional warfare as late as January, 1939, more than one year after the Sixth Plenum.[77] Taking into account the fact that the New Fourth Army had then just crawled out of conditions of "primi-
[75] For further discussion of the military dispute, see Kataoka, "Mao and Strategic Disputes in the CCP in the War against Japan," presented to the annual meeting of the Association for Asian Studies in April, 1970.
[76] See, for instance, Teng Tzu-hui, "Hsin-ssu-chün ti fa-chan chuang-ta yü liang-t'iao lu-hsien ti tou-cheng" [Strong development of the New Fourth Army and the struggle of the two lines], Hsing-huo liao-yüan (Peking: Jen-min wen-hsüeh ch'u-pan-she, 1962), VI, 375–400. This volume was published when Mao and the "revisionists" were struggling over P'eng Te-huai's status after his dismissal. Hence, Teng's comment on Hsiang Ying has a peculiar double-edged character.
[77] Hsiang Ying chiang-chün yen-lun-chi [Collection of general Hsiang Ying's speeches and essays] (Chi-na ch'u-pan-she, 1939), p. 61.
tive men" (in the words of one of its officers),[78] one sees how subjective (i.e., political) Hsiang Ying's stance on the strategic question was.
To summarize, Mao's opponents in the army maintained: (1) The major burden of fighting rested on the Kuomintang's regular forces, and they should be supported by the Communist forces. None probably went so far as to call Mao's line treason, as Chang Kuo-t'ao did when he defected from the Party in early 1938. They maintained that the CCP's survival rested on the continued resistance by the Kuomintang. (2) The combined Chinese forces should rely mostly on mobile warfare but should not shun positional defense of some key points under favorable circumstances. By the time of the December conference of the Politburo, the assault on Nanking was in progress and a siege on Wuhan appeared a matter of time. Mao's military opponents rallied to Wang Ming's call for a decisive campaign in defense of Wuhan. (3) The Communist regular forces should fight mobile warfare behind the Japanese lines. They should do so in some flexible coordination with the "friendly forces" without abandoning the independence of tactical command. (4) Underneath the opposition of professional soldiers to Mao was a pervasive desire to advance their forces to a regular status and their dislike of return to guerrilla status.[79] Regularization in turn presupposed close cooperation with the Kuomintang government to receive military supplies.[80] Guerrilla warfare, on the other hand, meant going down among the peasants to build up popular forces through mass work. This was in turn connected with the land revolution.
Between December 13 and 15, the Japanese forces committed shocking genocide in the course of mopping up the last Chinese resistance in Nanking. On December 16, Chiang Kai-shek issued a statement expressing China's determination to fight on.[81] But the Trautmann mediation was continuing. It was not the "rape of Nanking" that ended the negotiation. Additional demands heaped upon the original terms by the Konoe cabinet following the victory in Nanking caused the Chinese government to procrastinate. Then on January 16, 1938, Konoe terminated the negotiation in spite of strong opposition from the Army General Staff. "Henceforth we will not deal with the Kuomintang regime," went the ill-considered demarche of Konoe. He
[78] Hung-ch'i p'iao-p'iao (Peking: Chungkuo ch'ing-nien ch'u-pan-she, 1958), XII, 117.
[79] See, for instance, Liu Chen, "Huai-hai-ch'ü cha-ken chi" [Memory of setting roots in the Huai-hai District], Hsing-huo liao-yüan , VI, 454–464.
[80] See below, pp. 159–160.
[81] "After the Fall of Nanking," Collected Wartime Messages , I, 49–52.
proclaimed the goal of establishing a "New Order in Asia" by cultivating a friendly government in China.[82] This left the Kuomintang government no choice but to fight on.
The Japanese forces in central China moved inland in pursuit of a decisive engagement. The Chinese forces did not offer that opportunity and retreated farther west. It was anticipated that the war would reach a turning point as the Japanese supply line stretched. Public attention and concern was focused on the fate of Wuhan in early 1938, and the tension mounted as the year wore on. It was against this background that Wang Ming gambled his career in an attempt to impose his concept of the united front both on Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Tse-tung. He unfurled the banner of "defense of Wuhan."[83] Proposing a joint, determined effort by all Chinese to defend the city, he sought to re-create the defense of Madrid. This was to be China's finest hour. If successful, his notion of the united front would have been vindicated. As the foremost Communist spokesman of Chinese nationalism, he launched the campaign in Wuhan.
The earliest of Wang Ming's essays on military questions was written in August, 1937, after the fighting had spread to Shanghai.[84] He asked, "Will China's armed struggle against Japan be victorious or not?," and answered himself affirmatively. He castigated those in China who were afflicted with the "disease of Japanese scare."[85] He granted all the points mentioned by them, which added up to Japan's superiority over China in military terms, e.g., China's lack of modern industry and armaments, its unpreparedness, etc. True, he admitted, China could not hope to win the war without modern armaments. But this was no excuse in his mind for not carrying out determined armed resistance, particularly since Japan's war aim was precisely to deprive China of what little foundation in modern industry and commerce she already possessed. Wang Ming understood the rationale for the "autonomous defense state" advanced in the Japanese military circles. Japan was trying to create satellite states in occupied areas "to provide for war by means of war." As large modern cities of China fell one by one without much resistance, the balance might be tipped so far in favor of Japan as to be irreversible.
[82] Crowley, pp. 371–374.
[83] Ch'en Shao-yü, et al., "Wo-men . . . ti i-chen," pp. 95–130.
[84] "Jih-k'ou ch'in-lüeh ti hsin-chieh-tuan yü Chungkuo jen-min tou-cheng ti hsin-shih-ch'i" [The new stage in aggression by the Japanese bandits and the new period in the struggle of the Chinese people], Wang Ming hsüan-chi , I, 151–184.
[85] Ibid. , p. 155.
Wang bemoaned the likelihood that Shanghai would be lost. He pointed out the danger this posed for China's ability to contract foreign loans in the future.[86] He was aware that Chiang Kai-shek's power rested largely on the support and the vitality of the so-called Kiangsu–Chekiang financial clique based in the lower Yangtze valley. What dire consequences were in store for the Kuomintang's continued resistance if it were to meekly abandon Shanghai, Canton, Wuhan, and the most populous part of China, and retreat into the hinterland? He seems to have doubted whether the Kuomintang, uprooted from its urban, coastal constituencies, could survive for long in the countryside. Should not the Kuomintang attempt a determined defense of one of the remaining cities, mustering all its might? Did not China's sons give a good account of themselves in Shanghai in 1932 and again in 1937? Wang Ming was thus advocating a forward strategy. According to his reckoning, the first stage of the war ended when the invasion began, and the second stage would last until the siege of Wuhan. The last stage was counter-offensive. Wang Ming was in effect advocating a two-stage theory of war: the defense of Wuhan was to be the pivot.[87] China was to turn the defense of Wuhan into a counter-offensive to drive the Japanese out.
As Nanking was lost in December, forcing the Kuomintang government to seek peace with Japan, he gained wider support in the Party. With the Comintern's authority behind him, he set to work to readjust the united front relationship. There was a reorganization of the central leadership organs in accordance with the Comintern's directives.[88] Two regional bureaus, the Yangtze Bureau and the Southeastern Bureau, were created. The former was to supervise the Party's work in the Kuomintang areas, while the latter controlled the New Fourth Army's area.[89] Intense factional struggles and maneuvers were under way, and were paralleled by doctrinal disputes. At the December conference of the Politburo, a resolution was passed calling for the Seventh Party Congress to be "convened as soon as possible."[90] Mao managed to become the chairman of the preparatory committee for the Congress.[91] Wang Ming still kept his initiative. The March conference proposed
[86] Ibid. , p. 158.
[87] See Mao Tse-tung-chi , VI, 183, for Mao's criticism of those who opposed his three-stage theory of war.
[88] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 61, January, 1970, p. 93. According to Warren Kuo, citing Chen Jan, Wang Ming coveted the post of the General Secretary but the post was abolished. "The Conflict between Chen Shao-yu and Mao Tse-tung," Issues and Studies , November, 1968, p. 40.
[89] Ibid. , p. 41.
[90] Ibid. , December, 1968, p. 51.
[91] Ibid. , p. 52.
the defense of Wuhan as the urgent common objective of the CCP and the Kuomintang.[92]
On June 15, Wang Ming, Chou En-lai, and Ch'in Pang-hsien jointly published an article proposing the defense of Wuhan. "Naturally the crux of the problem no longer lies in whether we have general capability to defend Wuhan," they stated, "it lies mainly in how we proceed to implement the work . . . . "[93] China had the wherewithal, the defense was a matter of will. Everything else Wang Ming wished to accomplish hinged on the retention of Wuhan. His stated views on cooperation with the Kuomintang lost that cautious double-edged character which he had maintained when he was initially proposing the united front. In criticizing Mao's radicalism, he abandoned the previous attempts to distinguish himself from Ch'en Tu-hsiu:
The National Government is the all-China government which needs to be strengthened, not reorganized. The unified national defense government, with improvement in its top-level institutions and coordination among its lower echelons, must be based on the unity of the people. Democracy and freedom must be geared to the task of fighting Japan and not run counter to it. Improvement of the people's livelihood must be realized for the task of fighting Japan and not against it. The people's armed forces must grow in their fighting with the Japanese and must not contradict this fighting.[94]
As he was prepared to accept the Kuomintang's Program for Resistance and Reconstruction as the basis of cooperation, so was he willing to defend it as the government of all Chinese—or so he was saying.
This was made more explicit in regard to the question of military command. From March on, he began advocating "national defense divisions" (kuo-fang-shih ), an outgrowth of his former idea of "united anti-Japanese army." These divisions would be staffed by and recruited from the elite elements in all the Chinese forces including the Eighth Route Army.[95] They would be equipped with modern weapons in order to undertake mobile and positional warfare. These divisions as well as all the other Chinese forces, Wang insisted, "must use every means to tighten the unity of all forces on the front—all existing units must clearly understand that they are part of the unified National
[92] Wang Ming, "San-yüeh cheng-chih-chü ti tsung-chi" [The summing-up of the March Politburo conference], Guide , IV, 21–54. In addition to the questions of Wuhan and mobile warfare, the conference again pressed for convening of the Seventh Congress.
[93] Ch'en Shao-yü, et al., "Wo-men . . . ti i-chen," p. 98.
[94] "The Current Situation and Tasks in the War of Resistance," cited in Warren Kuo, "The Conflict between Chen Shao-yu and Mao Tse-tung," Issues and Studies , December, 1968, pp. 94–95.
[95] "Wo-men . . . ti i-chen," pp. 107–108.
Revolutionary Army, and they must completely do away with the various so-called organizational viewpoints of the past . . . . "[96]
It was quite apparent that most of Wang Ming's project depended on the consent of the Kuomintang government. He was making a risky assumption that Chiang Kai-shek would reverse his policy of strategic retreat at the doorstep of Hankow. Where was Wang Ming to acquire the influence necessary to prevail on the suspicious government? Stalin was showing active interest in China's defense. He extended new credits of US $50 million each in March and July.[97] But the Soviet Union was not in a position to influence the strategic decisions of the Chinese government.
Thus, the only leverage Wang Ming had was public opinion in the Kuomintang's own constituencies. He hoped to mobilize one million men directly for the defense of Wuhan.[98] The cause of the Chinese nation became indistinguishable from the factional interest of the Internationalists in restoring China's revolution to the cities. While criticizing the way in which Mao put "democracy" to use, Wang Ming, too, obviously needed "democracy" as an integral part of his scheme. Hsin-hua jih-pao (the New China Daily News ) began publication in Hankow in January and became an important instrument of propaganda for Wang Ming's point of view. The CCP's agitation for popular assembly resulted in the establishment of the National Political Council by the act of Kuomintang's Extraordinary National Congress. Seven CCP members were appointed as members. Wang Ming personally led the Communist members at the first session in July and succeeded in passing resolutions which were intended to commit the government to defense of Wuhan.[99]
Mao was forced to rebut his critics and defend his position. Nineteen thirty-eight was one of the most productive years in his career as a political writer and pamphleteer. In the span of six months between May and November, he wrote all of his best-known essays dealing with military problems in the anti-Japanese war. They consumed his soul.[100] "Strategic Problems in the Anti-Japanese Guerrilla War" was addressed to those who viewed guerrilla war only from a tactical point of view and, justifiably perhaps, missed its strategic significance. Mao concurred with his critics that guerrilla warfare was insignificant from
[96] Ibid. , p. 102.
[97] Young, China and the Helping Hand , p. 57. See also Stalin's letter of June 10 to Chiang Kai-shek, in Soviet Russia in China , p. 87.
[98] Joho[*] , No. 31, December 1, 1940, p. 12.
[99] Ibid. , No. 7, December 1, 1939, p. 37.
[100] Jerome Ch'en, Mao and the Chinese Revolution (London: Oxford University Press, 1965), pp. 208–209.
a strictly military point of view and in the short run: the war could not be finally settled except by a "decisive battle" in regular warfare. Throughout the essay, Mao used the term "strategic." To understand what Mao meant by the term is to understand the true import of his stand. All the varied meanings of the term were subsumed under one root meaning, which had to do with Mao's grand strategy: guerrilla warfare was strategically significant to the extent that it developed into mobile and regular warfare at the end of the war. As he put it,
The mobile warfare of the third stage will no longer be undertaken solely by the original regular forces; part, possibly quite an important part, will be undertaken by forces which were originally guerrillas but which will have progressed from guerrilla to mobile warfare. . . .[101]
That is to say, the strategic task of the CCP was to expand its forces within the three-cornered struggle between Japan, the Kuomintang, and itself into a fully regular force capable of defeating both of its foes in the end. The whole point of fighting in the "strategic interior-line" was to use the Japanese presence to segregate the Kuomintang army from the Communist forces. This purpose would be undermined if the Communist forces drew the attention of the Japanese forces by revealing their strength prematurely; it would not do to escape the pursuit of one enemy only to fall into the hands of the other. If that were to happen, the Kuomintang would certainly "stand by and watch" (Lin Piao) and not come to the aid of the Communist forces.
With respect to the Japanese forces, the choice of the "strategic interior-line" for the Communist theater of operation was based on several prior assumptions. (1) Guerrilla warfare should create a diffuse sense of insecurity for the Japanese forces over the entire occupied area rather than jolting them with sharp shocks.[102] (2) Even if the Japanese forces were alarmed by Communist expansion, their ability to suppress and uproot the Communist guerrillas and their infrastructure would be far inferior to that of the Kuomintang forces in civil war. For one thing, the force level of the Japanese army would be such as to leave many areas simply unoccupied.[103] (3) Some native forces might contribute to the "Sinification" of the war, so to speak. But Mao assured his audience that puppet forces would be wholly ineffective against the Communist partisans fighting a patriotic war.[104] (4) Both Mao and Lin
[101] Selected Works , II, 173.
[102] The diversionary effect of this diffuse sense of insecurity was the upper ceiling of the CCP's "cooperation" with the Kuomintang. This was what Mao meant by "strategic coordination," the only kind he permitted. Where he talked of tactical cooperation between regular and guerrilla forces, he clearly had in mind cooperation of Communist regulars and Communist guerrillas. See ibid ., pp. 91–92, 109–111.
[103] Ibid. , p. 99.
[104] Ibid. , p. 97.
Piao dismissed the possibility that the Japanese forces could adopt the blockhouse method (i.e., clear and hold type of mission) of the Kuomintang because of the insufficiency of troops and different military tradition.[105] (5) The significance of guerrilla warfare was not in its ability to inflict decisive damage on the enemy. That is, local and tactical inferiority of the guerrillas to the Japanese was of no account. The significance of popular war was to force the enemy to engage in an indecisive war for a very "protracted" period of time in the context of an international conflict which might expose the enemy to strategic hazard emanating from other sources. Mao seems to have placed his hope on eventual disintegration of Japan and on a third power intervention.[106]
The Kuomintang was bound to be alarmed by the prospect of continued Communist expansion. The CCP had to expand while judiciously holding the political tension with the Kuomintang just below the point where it might touch off an open civil war. It was Mao's judgment that such an expansion was possible only if it took place at the expense of the national enemy and not of the Kuomintang. I surmise that this judgment was derived from two lessons in the CCP's own experiences. One was the rather surprising persistence of Chinese guerrilla activities in Manchuria in spite of disorganized and incompetent leadership. The Nanking government refused to intervene militarily there, but on the other hand it never formally abandoned Manchuria. The parallel between this and the situation after 1937 is obvious. The other lesson, a negative one, seems to have been born of the civil war. During that time the Communist bases were always behind the Kuomintang forces as the latter faced foreign menaces on China's frontiers. During the Chinese Eastern Railway crisis of 1929, the CCP harassed the government's rear as it sought to deal with the Russian incursion into Manchuria. This provoked Ch'en Tu-hsiu's criticism of the Party. The CCP continued to exploit every Japanese menace after 1931. The Chinese government could not deal with foreign and domestic foes simultaneously. Hence, it appeased Japan. This meant that an international war, the vital precondition of a revolution, would not last very long even if it came. The war would be protracted only if the CCP took part in the resistance.
"On the Protracted War" was written for public release—much to
[105] Ibid. , p. 105. Lin Piao elaborated this point by enumerating four reasons: (1) the size of the occupied area; (2) insufficiency of Japanese troops; (3) the lack of natural material for fortification in north China, such as timber; and (4) the absence of "blockhouseism" in the Japanese military tradition, in "Lun hua-pei cheng-kui-chan . . . ," p. 71.
[106] Selected Works , II, 122–123.
the consternation of P'eng Te-huai, it was reported.[107] The essay was a masterpiece for its synthetic quality. On the one hand, it was a prognosis of how the war would be necessarily protracted. This point was made vis-à-vis the pessimists outside the Communist party. On the other hand, it was a plea for protracting the war, a point made vis-à-vis Wang Ming and his "hawkish" followers inside. But the potentially antagonistic points were sewed up into a seemingly consistent whole; the protracted war seemed at once inevitable and desirable.
Judging from Japan's over-all war-making capacity, Mao apparently perceived in May that the war was soon entering "on the new stage."[108] He divided the war into the well-known three stages and assigned specific forms of warfare to each: China's strategic retreat based on mobile warfare; strategic stalemate based on guerrilla warfare; and strategic counter-offensive by means of mobile and positional warfare.[109] Provided China survived the stage of strategic retreat, the subsequent stage of stalemate was the most important one for the revolution. The protracted nature of the whole war derived from the protracted nature of stalemate. Mao was apprehensive of the "impetuous friends" who might gamble on the destiny of the nation in a strategically decisive engagement in which victory was not certain.[110] This would be the "worst policy." Refusal to fight decisive engagements meant abandonment of territory. But, said Mao, "we must have the courage to do so . . . . "[111]
This was formally a message to the hawks in the Kuomintang who wished to defend Wuhan. But Chiang Kai-shek's agreement with Mao on this point made the advice superfluous. Mao quoted Chiang extensively in his report to the Sixth Plenum.[112] In so doing, he was in fact lecturing Wang Ming against defense of Wuhan on no less an authority than Chiang Kai-shek. Wang Ming was to Chiang and Mao at this time what Mao was to Chiang before the Lukouchiao Incident: a hawk and a source of embarrassment. Mao's three-stage theory of the war was directed in part at Wang Ming. In calling for abandonment of Wuhan during the stage of stalemate, he was trying to deprive the Internationalists of an urban base.
The pessimists outside of the CCP (the "theory of national subjugation") were the more difficult ones for Mao to rebut. He counted on
[107] P'eng said, "A book written by an individual can only be published in his own name, but not in the name of the Central Committee," The Case of Peng Teh-huai , p. 191.
[108] This was the title of his report to the Sixth Plenum, Mao Tse-tung-chi , VI, 163–240.
[109] Selected Works , II, 136–138.
[110] Ibid. , p. 114.
[111] Ibid. , p. 181.
[112] Mao Tse-tung-chi , VI, 174.
Japan's imperialistic ambition to foreclose political settlement of the war in the first stage. But as Japan exhausted its power, he expected, it would seriously seek such a solution. The second stage was most likely to give rise to "capitulationism" in China; and the longer the stalemate, the stronger it would grow, Mao admitted. This was precisely what his opponents maintained. Yet Mao could offer no plausible solution to the problem except that the CCP should operate behind the Japanese lines.
The Sixth Plenum
The Sixth Plenum met in a very long session—between September 28 and November 6 according to one source[113] —to compose the differences in the Party and to lay down coherent policies. The time was inauspicious for the Internationalists. The Japanese assault on Wuhan and Canton began in late August. The Chinese government did not wish to be forced by public opinion into a risky campaign. Least of all was it willing to dance to the tune called by the Chinese Communists and perhaps the Soviet Union. It suppressed the CCP's mass mobilization. It suspended the Hsin-hua jih-pao three times and disbanded sixteen mass organizations of more radical character in August.[114] By October 7, Chou En-lai was editorializing in the Hsin-hua jih-pao against staking everything on the defense of Wuhan. Canton and Wuhan fell on October 21 and 27 respectively while the Sixth Plenum was in session.
At the Sixth Plenum Mao's military line since the Loch'uan conference was formally accepted as the Party's line. At the juncture of the civil and international wars, he said, "our change in strategy was an extremely serious one." He went on to say, "In this special situation we had to transform the regular army of the past into a guerrilla army . . . . "[115] For the first time, Mao offered an empirical referent for his concept of guerrilla and mobile warfare and gave them substantive content. According to him, there were actually two kinds of guerrilla warfare. One was used in the early period of the civil war. The other was the guerrilla warfare conducted by the regular forces of the Eighth Route Army in the early period of the war against Japan. The latter was in fact not different from the regular warfare of the later period of the civil war. It was a regular warfare of the "Chinese type." It was "only guerrilla warfare raised to a higher
[113] Warren Kuo, "The CCP after the Government Evacuation of Wuhan," Issues and Studies , May, 1969, p. 41.
[114] Joho[*] , No. 31, December 1, 1940, p. 12.
[115] Selected Works , II, 228.
level."[116] Mao's line was clear: the regular forces of the Eighth Route Army were to fight guerrilla warfare. This was the end of the first round of the strategic dispute.
The Comintern was apparently very satisfied with the changes that took place in the CCP through the summer of 1938.[117] Mao made many verbal concessions to the Internationalists, and therewith to the Kuomintang at the Plenum. It seemed that Mao's report, On the New Stage , was jointly authored by him and Wang Ming.[118] It repeated the CCP's pledge to cooperate with the Kuomintang into the post-war years.[119] It stated that the democratic republic which the CCP was trying to establish would be "independent, free, and happy."[120] This was Wang Ming's slogan for the second united front. It was his counterpart of Sun Yat-sen's Three People's Principles, i.e., nationalism, democracy, and people's livelihood. In addition, the report stated,
The anti-Japanese national united front is based on the Kuomintang and the CCP, and of the two parties the Kuomintang is the foremost and the larger party. The commencement and the support of the war of resistance is unthinkable without the Kuomintang.[121]
But on substantive decisions passed by the Plenum, in addition to the one concerning the strategic questions, Mao had his way. The Plenum passed another resolution calling for the Seventh Congress, but Mao's report stated that "because the preparatory work is still incomplete, it is difficult to convene the Congress this year."[122] As the chairman of the preparatory committee for the Congress, he seemed to have tabled it for the time being. The Plenum passed a Fifteen Point Program, apparently a model for the administrative program of border region governments.[123] It is my inference that a tax policy and treatment of the landlord class were in this Program.
[116] Ibid. , p. 227.
[117] Mao Tse-tung, Lun hsin-chieh-tuan [On the new stage], Mao Tse-tung-chi , VI, 166.
[118] In addition to the points noted below, this report also proposed the "creation of mechanized army group," Ibid. , pp. 211–212.
[119] Ibid. , p. 223.
[120] Ibid. , p. 233.
[121] Ibid. , p. 198.
[122] Ibid. , p. 239.
[123] P'eng Chen, "Kuan-yü Chin-Ch'a-Chi pien-ch'ü mu-ch'ien ti shih-cheng kang-ling" [Concerning the current administrative program of the Chin-Ch'a Chi Border Region], Chieh-fang , No. 119, p. 22. It is possible that the first administrative program to come into existence, the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region Administrative Program (passed in April, 1939), was based on the Fifteen-Point Program. See Shen-Kan-Ning pien-ch'ü ts'an-i-hui wen-hsien hui-chi [Collection of Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region political council's documents] (Peking: K'e-hsüeh ch'u-pan-she, 1958), pp. 39–41.
Correspondingly, a definite policy for handling of traitors was adopted, though I have no access to this document either.[124] The Plenum decided on further expansion of Communist power. The CCP was to become "an all Chinese, vast mass-character, bolshevized political party." There was also a decision on the organization of local Party hierarchy. I infer that there were corresponding decisions on the parallel hierarchies of government and military districts.[125]
The Plenum's resolution proposed an organizational form of the united front to the Kuomintang. On this issue the formal differences between Mao and Wang Ming are impossible to detect. In Wang Ming's original proposal for a "national defense government," the Kuomintang and the CCP were to maintain their distinct identity, organization, and ideology. Formally it was a coalition of two independent parties. In late 1937, Mao was vowing that the CCP would not enter the government as long as it was a "one-party dictatorship." One exception was made in a resolution apparently proposed by Mao in September 1937: the CCP was to take an active part in a local or regional united front behind the Japanese lines.[126] Upon returning to China, Wang Ming upheld Mao's stand, but he also stated that "if the Kuomintang is in need of our assistance, it may seek our participation."[127] What they meant by participation is not clear. Neither of them objected to participation in a popular assembly such as the National Political Council; hence, the reference seems to have been to participation in administrative posts. Wang Ming approved of the Kuomintang's appointment of Chou En-lai as deputy director of the political department of the National Military Commission under Ch'eng Ch'en in February, 1938.[128]
The decision of the Plenum was enigmatic. The telegraphic message to the nation pledged that the CCP would "not establish secret organization of the Communist Party within the Kuomintang and its armed forces."[129] But it proposed that the CCP members be allowed
[124] Tang ti cheng-ts'e chiang-shou t'i-kang [Manual for explaining the Party's tactics] (central Anhwei?, 1942) (BI), p. 45.
[125] See below, pp. 137–139.
[126] Selected Works , II, 73.
[127] Chugoku[*] kyosanto[*] 1937-nen shi , p. 472.
[128] Wang Ming, "San-yüeh cheng-chih-chü ti tsung-chi," 37–38. The day after Chou's appointment, Mao is reported to have reiterated his objection to Communist participation in the government. Warren Kuo, "The 6th Plenum of the CCP 6th Central Committee," Issues and Studies , March, 1969, p. 41.
[129] Selected Works , II, 439; Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 68, 74. But by 1940 the CCP was ordering its members to infiltrate the Kuomintang and the San-Min-Chu-I Youth Corps. See Kuan-yü pao-chia-ch'ang kung-tso ti shih-chih [Directive concerning the work of pao-chia chiefs], Ibid. , p. 534.
to join the Kuomintang and the San-Min-Chu-I Youth Corps.[130] The Plenum's resolution suggested two alternative methods. One was identical with the "bloc within" tactics of the first united front: the CCP members were to join the Kuomintang individually by announcing their Communist affiliation. The resolution, however, rejected a reciprocal arrangement to let the Kuomintang members join the CCP.[131] The other method was cooperation of two distinct party organizations. The resolution stated that the first method was the "best organization form" for the united front.[132]
Judging from the subsequent action of the CCP, there were additional decisions of extreme importance, though these were not necessarily the decisions of the Plenum as such. Ho Lung and the 120th Division were ordered to move out of the Chin-Sui Border Region (actually northwestern Shansi) into central Hopei to help reorganize Lü Cheng-ts'ao's former Northeastern Army and consolidate the area as a part of the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region. The 115th Division also began to move out of Shansi, across Hopei, and into Shantung in force in early 1939. It is likely that this decision, too, was made during the Plenum. The most important decision concerned the redeployment of the bulk of the New Fourth Army's units from the southern bank of the Yangtze River to northern Kiangsu across the river.[133] This was a direct application of Mao's strategic principle. The southern bank of Yangtze belonged to the Kuomintang's Third War Zone; north Kiangsu was behind the Japanese lines. Subsequent chapters will deal with the far-reaching consequences of this decision.
I have reviewed the process by which the contending factions in the CCP implemented their respective concepts of the united front. The dispute concerned the extent to which the united front with the Kuomintang could be exploited for the CCP's interest. Mao's position followed from the premise that the end of the war with Japan was the beginning of a Chinese civil war. Therefore, the Chinese Communists could not do otherwise than to capitalize on the war to strengthen themselves. For him the united front meant an absence of peace be-
[130] Chungkuo Kung-ch'an-tang k'uo-ta ti liu-chung ch'üan-hui tien-wen [Telegraphic messages of the CCP's Sixth Plenum], K'ang-chan chien-kuo shih-liao wen-hsien [Collection of historical materials concerning the resistance and reconstruction], No. 3, p. E–3.
[131] Mao Tse-tung-chi , VI, 228.
[132] Ibid.
[133] Liu Shao-ch'i states that the Sixth Plenum decided to establish the Central Plains Bureau, in Chugoku[*] kyosanto[*] kachu-kyoku[*] dai-ichi-ji kakudai kaigi ketsugi [The resolution of the first plenary meeting of the Central China Bureau of the CCP] (hereinafter cited as Central China Bureau First Plenum ) (Shanghai: Embassy of Japan, 1942), p. 1. The Central Plains Bureau was renamed the Central China Bureau in the winter of 1940, ibid. It was located in north Kiangsu.
tween China and Japan. He was beginning to revert to the stand he took at Wayaopao, but total dependence of the war on the Kuomintang's efforts at this stage weakened his position. Wang Ming's position was not an enviable one either. He would gain an upper hand internally only when the Kuomintang appeared to be on the verge of collapse. This was because, unlike Mao and Chiang Kai-shek, he did not have his own army, a prerequisite for political power in China. But his setback at the Sixth Plenum was only a temporary one. The compatibility of the united front with the revolution was yet to be fully tested.
IV—
The Initial Expansion in North China
This chapter will describe the initial expansion of the Communist forces and their bases in the rural areas of north China. I attribute the spectacular expansion of Communist power during the first stage of the war to three factors. First and foremost was the fact that the Communist forces were virtually all alone as an organized force in the rural areas for the first two years of the war. This also explains in part the second factor: the Communist forces were able to carry out a revolutionary land program, which accomplished basically the same results as in the civil war days but by different means. A third factor which aided Communist expansion was what Philip Kuhn calls the "militarization" of China's countryside or the mobilizational potential of the peasantry within the traditional social and political structure.[1]
Troop Movements and Base Construction
The Kuomintang government's hold on north China was never firm. Its strategy after the Lukouchiao Incident was to draw the Japanese forces deep into central China, its own stronghold, for a stiff resistance. It left the defense of north China to the collateral warlord forces, which easily crumbled. Hardly a hsien magistrate could be found remaining in his post behind the advancing Japanese forces. The CCP seemed to have anticipated just such a state of affairs. Since as early as the spring of 1936, when the Communist forces raided Shansi Province, the CCP had been working toward initiating a local war with the Japanese forces. The raid failed because the central government
[1] Philip A. Kuhn, Rebellion and Its Enemies .
came to the aid of Yen Hsi-shan. In 1937, the Japanese forces removed that obstacle. Single-mindedly the invading horde pursued the retreating Kuomintang forces into the interior. Liu Shao-ch'i noted with glee in early 1938 that the plains of Hopei and Shantung Provinces were empty.[2] The Japanese forces occupied only major towns and the transportation link between them at this stage.
The CCP's activities and the deployment of its forces before and during the invasion indicated that it was ready to move into the vacuum and begin constructing "anti-Japanese bases." The CCP intended to take Shansi Province as its permanent home base. Good ground work had been done through the local united front since 1936. From Shansi, the Communist forces began to move eastward across the Peiping-Hankow railway into Hopei in the spring of 1938.[3] The shortage of troops and cadres prevented the CCP from moving further east into Shantung in force until the spring of 1939,[4] though local guerrillas were already organized there. There was very extensive and spontaneous mobilization of the peasants for self-defense in the wake of the invasion. But such mobilization had limited parochial goals which were often inimical to the CCP's purposes. Communist mobilization proceeded entirely from "above to below." For this reason the relative freedom enjoyed by Communist organizers injected from the outside was important.
The CCP's Northern Bureau drew on a huge pool of educated and patriotic youths who had taken part in various phases of popular front type organizations that sprang up after the August First Declaration of 1935. The first big demonstration of the anti-Japanese feeling among the students was the December Ninth Movement. During this campaign the mobilized youths were led by Liu Shao-ch'i down into the countryside to conduct agitation and propaganda among the peasants.[5] After this, the tense international situation in north China spurred the organizing activities of various National Salvation Associations on college campuses. Prior to the outbreak of hostilities, the focus of activities was public demand for resolute resistance and cessation of the civil war. Some students went through short para-military
[2] "Hua-pei chan-ch'ü kung-tso ti ching-yen" [Experiences of work in north China war zone], Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 300.
[3] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 26.
[4] Yang Shang-k'un, "Hua-pei tang chien-she-chung ti chi-ke wen-t'i" [Several problems in the process of building the Party in north China], Yang Ch'ing, et al., Kan-pu pi-tu chung-yao wen-hsüan [Selected important documents required of all cadres] (no date, no publisher listed) (BI), p. 335.
[5] I-erh-chiu yü ch'ing-nien [The December Ninth and the youth] (Hua-chung hsin-hua shu-tien, 1948), p. 19.
training and fraternized with the troops of Sung Che-yüan's forces.[6] During the Lukouchiao Incident a small band of students, under Liu Shao-ch'i's direction, took part in more direct actions to sustain the momentum of hostility.[7] When the full scale war was on, they descended on the rural areas in considerable numbers to help organize "anti-Japanese governments." They were usually given the appellation of "refugee students from Peiping and Tientsin" (P'ing-Tsin liu-wan hsüeh-sheng ) and cropped up in widely scattered areas of north China.[8]
The activities of the Sacrifice League (or the League for National Salvation through Sacrifice, Hsi-sheng chiu-kuo t'ung-meng-hui ) were the best example of the role played by mobilized urban youths. The Sacrifice League was also an example of the "united front from below" tactics of Mao directed at warlord groups prior to the war.
In many ways Yen Hsi-shan's predicament from 1935 onward prefigured Chiang Kai-shek's. Both were subjected to three identical pressures: the Japanese, the Communists, and each other. Yen's position was particularly vulnerable because he was surrounded by all three sources of pressure without having a rear. Shansi Province bordered on Suiyüan and Chahar Provinces, the object of the Kuantung Army's manipulation, and was itself one of the five northern provinces included in Japan's scheme of autonomy. After 1935, the main forces of the Red Army arrived one after another to build up the Shensi–Kansu Soviet across the Yellow River to the west. Communist military pressure on Yen's domain erupted in the raid in 1936. Yen's rear was occupied by Chiang Kai-shek, intent on "centralizing" the country under his rule. When Yen asked for Nanking's help against the threat posed by the Communists and then the Japanese, the central government's action revealed its ulterior motive. During the Shansi raid, Yen's request for aid was met belatedly by the dispatch of the central forces, which let it be known upon arrival that "we did not come to fight the Reds."[9] During the Suiyüan Incident, Chiang Kai-shek appeared in
[6] Teradaira, Nihon no higeki , pp. 40–41.
[7] See above, p. 55.
[8] Liu Shao-ch'i put it this way later: "The revolutionary enthusiasm of the student masses as aroused by the 'December 9' Movement . . . had no way of widespread development until the 'July 7 Incident' in 1937. . . . It was then that the revolutionary students in the cities were able to unite with the broad masses of workers and peasants as well as the armed forces of workers and peasants. . . . Many of those who took part in the 'December 9' Movement now became military commanders on battlefields behind the enemy, political personnel, local administrators and directors of economic and cultural work . . . . " Collected Works of Liu Shao-ch'i (Hong Kong: Union Research Institute, 1969), I, 456.
[9] Donald G. Gillin, Warlord Yen Hsi-shan in Shansi Province, 1911–1949 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1967), p. 288; Chugoku[*] kyosanto[*] 1936-nen shi , p. 511.
person in Taiyuan but refrained from using his forces in the fighting against Prince Te's forces. It was widely rumored that he was using the occasion to assert his control over north China.[10]
The vulnerability of Yen's position induced him to opt for the united front sooner than did Chiang Kai-shek, and presumably he in turn hastened Chiang's move toward the united front. Later, when the Communists became his major threat, he would turn to the Japanese. The examples of Yen Hsi-shan and Chang Hsüeh-liang point up the basic structural weakness of the Chinese polity and lend support to Mao's thesis that the central government could be stampeded into the united front by means of a regional united front.
Yen Hsi-shan was evidently compelled to go to great lengths to compete with and outbid the Communists in a time of peasant unrest and student agitation. Within the framework of opposition to communism, rather surprising programs of economic and social reforms were undertaken. Even before the Communist raid into Shansi, Yen proposed to nationalize and redistribute cultivated land in Shansi to absorb the landless.[11] Most of the measures he put on the statute book, however, he was powerless to enforce. He also created the Justice Force (or Force for the Promotion of Justice, Chu-chang kung-tao t'uan ), an anti-Communist mass organization staffed by his followers.[12] Its purpose was to curb the abuse of the poor by the rich and powerful.
The progressive character of his reforms, however, provided a convenient cover for the Communists to exploit in the name of the united front. Liu Shao-ch'i mockingly described Communist pressure on Yen this way:
At first supreme commander Yen was afraid of the Communist party. While in Taiyuan we proposed setting up a college to train young cadres, but he would not agree. Later when we set up a training group and gathered all the youths, he quickly set up the so-called "People's Revolutionary College" in Linfen. Then concerning the abolition of heavy and miscellaneous taxes, supreme commander Yen would not agree to the proposals we made in the past. Later when we began to win the support of the vast masses, then supreme commander Yen promulgated the statute. . . .[13]
If there was a demand among Yen's liberal followers for resistance along with the Communists, he met them more than halfway. Po I-po states that he, as a Communist, was invited openly to come to Shansi to assume the leadership of the new Sacrifice League, a col-
[10] Gillin, p. 233.
[11] Ibid. , 201–207.
[12] Ibid. , pp. 220, 229; Van Slyke, pp. 131–139, passim .
[13] Liu Shao-ch'i, "Hua-pei chan-ch'ü . . . ," p. 297.
Map 4
Confused Battlefront in North China
lateral organization of the Justice Force created to accommodate younger men of talent on the basis of the united front.[14] The League came into existence in September, 1936. Yen apparently set great store by the new organization and appointed his close confidants, Liang Hua-chih and Liang Tun-hou, to leadership positions.[15] By early 1937, a total membership of 600,000 was reported in the League.[16]
The organization of the League was shoddy and chaotic because it had a rather diverse membership as a united front organization. Around Wut'ai, Yen Hsi-shan's home, strong local elites related to Yen may have controlled the League. The radicals there took over the Mobilization Committee, another local mass organization formally created by Yen Hsi-shan.[17] The rather uneven distribution of the League members in Shansi Province was also related to the internal politics of the CCP. Nieh Jung-chen and the unit of the 115th Division that opened up the forerunner of the Chin-Ch'a-Chi (Shansi-Chahar–Hopei) Border Region northeast of Wut'ai did not draw on a large number of civilian cadres for mass work.[18] The Sacrifice League's presence was most conspicuous in the southeastern corner of Shansi, which was the home of the 129th Division and P'eng Te-huai. P'eng was very concerned about the united front with Yen Hsi-shan, his immediate superior.[19] It seems that the Sacrifice League provided a cushion between them.
At what point, and for what motive, Yen Hsi-shan turned over the local administration of his province to the leaders of the League is obscure. According to one source, it was not until the northeastern half of the province fell to the Japanese forces that he appointed the League members to administrative posts in the occupied areas.[20] This paralleled Chiang Kai-shek's practice toward the Communists. Sung Shao-wen was given the post of hsien magistrate in Wut'ai.[21] Then
[14] Gillin, p. 232.
[15] Ibid.
[16] Van Slyke, p. 134.
[17] Lin Piao, et al., Chin-pei yu-chi chan-cheng chi-shih , pp. 79–80, 105–106. According to this account, the Mobilization Committee was authorized only in areas occupied by the Japanese forces.
[18] K'ang-Jih yu-chi-tui ti tsu-chih yü chan-shu [Organization and tactics of anti-Japanese guerrillas] (K'ang-Jih chan-cheng yen-chiu-hui), p. 41. One other area where hostility toward the Sacrifice League is often expressed by the Communist cadres is northwestern Shansi, commanded by Ho Lung. See Lo Kui-po, "K'ang-chan liang-chou-nien ti Chin hsi-pei yü wo-chün" [Northwestern Shansi and our army on the second anniversary of resistance], Chün-cheng tsa-chih (hereinafter cited as Military Affairs Journal ) (Chün-cheng tsa-chih-she, the Eighth Route Army), September, 1938, pp. 58, 60.
[19] The Case of Peng Teh-huai , p. 191. The Chin-Chi-Yü District had many cadres who supported the Wang Ming line on united front questions. Their local slogan was "everything through Shansi." Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 199.
[20] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 211.
[21] Ibid. , p. 86. He was to head the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region government.
Yen interceded with Nanking to secure recognition of the Communist base in this area as a border region.[22] Precisely what was authorized is not known. But it is certain that neither Yen nor Chiang authorized what was later called the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region, which went beyond the Second War Zone in Shansi.[23] In addition, the third district special commissioner's office in the southeast (Po I-po), the fifth district in the southwest (Jung Wu-sheng), and the sixth district in the northwest (Chang Wen-ang) were given to the Communist members of the League.[24] In these places Communist bases were built up on the basis of the pre-existing government structure or through "united front from above."[25]
Outside of Shansi, Communist bases had to be constructed from the ground up. Just before the Lukouchiao Incident, the CCP dispatched small groups of Party cadres as organizers to many areas of north China. The Conference of Party Delegates in May of 1937 seems to have been the occasion for putting Communist organizations on war footing in north China. For instance, some thirty cadres—"professional revolutionaries"—began building the forerunner of the Chin-Chi-Yü District Party Committee by reviving old underground contacts.[26] A similar work began in Shantung. "Far in advance of the war of resistance," it was reported,
responsible Communist party members who returned to Shantung from a meeting in Yenan planned how to develop guerrilla warfare when the Japanese bandits attacked. Before there was any invasion of Shantung by the enemy, each local Party organization in all of Shantung entered the stage of detailed implementation. . . .[27]
By early November, six divisions and one brigade of Japanese forces remained in north China. At this point, the Party Center issued its directive stating that the stage of regular warfare by the Kuomintang forces was ended.[28] This was an order to the Communist units to concentrate their efforts on base construction. All four quadrants of
[22] Gillin, p. 275.
[23] The Eighth Route Army was authorized to operate in northern Shansi. Soviet Russia in China , p. 83. In 1937, the areas along the Peiping–Hankow railway were designated as the First War Zone. Pacification War , No. 1, p. 52. They did not belong to Yen Hsi-shan's command.
[24] Van Slyke, p. 136.
[25] Growth of one revolutionary base , pp. 48–49.
[26] Ibid. , p. 198. See also Ibid. , pp. 18–20, 198–206, for a most detailed account of Party expansion in the early stage of the war.
[27] K'ang-Jih chan-cheng shih-ch'i chieh-fang-ch'ü kai-kuang [General conditions of the liberated areas during the anti-Japanese war] (hereinafter cited as Liberated Areas ) (Peking: Jen-min ch'u-pan-she, 1953), p. 81.
[28] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 16.
Shansi Province, divided by the Tat'ung–P'uchow railway running north and south and the Chengting–Taiyuan railway running east and west, were taken up. After the Battle of P'inghsingkuan in the north-east, the 115th Division left a unit of 2,000 men around Wut'ai under Nieh Jung-chen's command to build the forerunner of the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region. Below the Wut'ai area on the southern side of the Chengting–Taiyuan railroad and Niangtzukuan was the home of the 129th Division led by Liu Po-ch'eng. What was later to become the Chin-Chi-Yü (Shansi–Hopei–Honan) District of Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü (Shansi–Hopei–Shantung–Honan) Border Region started from a tiny circle around Hoshun, Yüshe, and Liao hsien . In the northwest corner between the Yellow River and the Tat'ung–P'uchow railway the 120th Division led by Ho Long dug in on both sides of the Great Wall around Ningwu, Shuo, and Shench'ih hsien .[29]
The main force of the 115th Division, led by Lin Piao, followed the Japanese forces moving into the southwestern corner of the province. Apparently it was ordered to build a base in Chungt'iao mountain, which runs north and south on the west side of the T'aihang mountain.[30] Lin Piao's unit had once taken this area in the spring of 1936. Some of its troops were natives of the area recruited on that occasion. There is no evidence, however, that the division succeeded in building a base here. Shortly afterward, the division was redeployed to Shantung. P'eng Te-huai was later accused of ordering some Communist units withdrawn from the Linfen area for fear of offending Yen Hsi-shan.[31] It is my inference that he was removing Lin Piao's unit from the area for the sake of better relations in the united front.
In contrast, Nieh Jung-chen's vigorous efforts in building the Chin-Ch'a-Chi base so closely conformed to Mao's line that his base was upheld as the "model anti-Japanese base" in 1939.[32] The speed of expansion of this base was phenomenal. Until about March, 1938, it relied almost wholly on the original contingent of military personnel to conduct its mass and political work. A desperate shortage of cadres was reported, though this was not peculiar to this area. "From all sides," we are told, "came the cry, 'we need cadres.' " Old security personnel, clerks, stable hands, and cooks were all assigned to the task of being a guerrilla leader or a cadre "whether or not they wanted it."[33] The first winter was cold and miserable. But with the setting up
[29] Johnson, Peasant Nationalism , pp. 104–106.
[30] Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 325.
[31] The Case of Peng Teh-huai , p. 191.
[32] See Mao's prefatory remark to K'ang-Jih mo-fan ken-chü-ti Chin-Chi-Ch'a pien-ch'ü [The model anti-Japanese base Shansi–Hopei–Chahar Border Region] (Chün-cheng tsa-chih-she, 1939), pp. 1–2. This was written on March 2, 1939.
[33] Ibid. , p. 6.
of the infrastructure and mass organizations, the system of requisitioning grain from the countryside began to work. Already in February most of the guerrilla units began training and regrouping for "regularization."[34] In March, the army withdrew from the job of running mass work and played only a supplementary role in it.[35] What started as a guerrilla district was gradually growing into a base. In January, the Border Region Temporary Administrative Commission came into being. In March, hsien representatives of various national salvation associations—mass organizations—met.[36]
This base expanded eastward into central Hopei by establishing a liaison with the remnants of the Kuomintang forces under Lü Cheng-ts'ao. The union of Lü and the Eighth Route Army was in fact the tail end of the long process of the CCP's united front from below with Chang Hsüeh-liang, which earlier resulted in the disintegration of his forces and his revolt against Chiang Kai-shek at Sian. Lü began his military career as a youth by joining Chang Tso-lin's Northeastern Army and moved upward rapidly to become an officer. After the Mukden Incident he was assigned to work under General Wan Fu-lin. By the time the CCP started to infiltrate the Northeastern Army, then being used for anti-Communist campaign, Lü was a regimental commander. It is said that Chang Hsüeh-szu, Hsüeh-liang's younger brother, had persuaded Lü to join the CCP secretly by the time the war began.[37] During the defense of Paoting in October, 1937, his regiment separated from Wan Fu-lin who connived with the Japanese to flee. The military hardware of Lü's regular unit impressed the poorly-equipped Communist forces. Nieh Jung-chen contacted him and succeeded in recruiting the whole unit into the Eighth Route Army. Lü also served concurrently as the head of the Central Hopei Administrative Office. It is quite possible that the Communists had some difficulty in dealing with the troops of the Northeastern Army under Lü's command.[38] In early 1939, Ho Lung descended on central Hopei with the main force of the 120th Division and secured
[34] Jo Fei, "Hua-pei yu-chi-tui yü min-chung yu-chi chan-cheng fa-chan ti ching-yen" [Guerrillas in north China and experiences of developing popular guerrilla war], Cheng-chih kung-tso lun-ts'ung [Collection of essays on political work] (Chün-cheng tsa-chih-sha, 1940), p. 118.
[35] Shu T'ung, "Chin-Ch'a-Chi pien-ch'ü k'ang-chan san-nien-lai cheng-chih kungtso kai-kuang" [Overview of political work in the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region in the three years of war], Ibid. , p. 215.
[36] K'ang-Jih mo-fan ken-chü-ti Chin-Chi-Ch'a , p. 18.
[37] Huang Chen-hsia, ed., Chung-Kung chün-jen-chih [Mao's Generals ] (Hong Kong: Research Institute of Contemporary History, 1968), pp. 97–98.
[38] Kusano Fumio, Shina henku no kenkyu[*] [A study of China's border regions] (Tokyo: Kokuminsha, 1944), pp. 15–17.
the area as a source of grain for Nieh Jung-chen's mountain base.
In the spring of 1938, Sung Shih-lun and Teng Hua led a unit of the 120th Division, called the Yenpei Detachment into eastern Hopei. This area constituted the link between Manchuria and north China. The Detachment settled in Fanshan hsien in Yenshan mountain range. It was made up of six hundred soldiers of southern extraction from the former Red 29th Army, and they appeared to have abused the peasants. The natives organized themselves into an association called Liu-shan-hui and refused to supply the Detachment with grain. The conflict erupted into a peasant insurrection, in the course of which the peasant association was destroyed.[39] It is not known whether the Japanese were behind this insurrection. In that summer, the Japanese forces in turn launched a campaign against the Communist unit and routed it. Later Sung Shih-lun was reprimanded by the Party for his failure and for his abuse of the peasant masses.[40] In the following winter, Hsiao K'e, the vice commander of the 120th Division, led a unit into the same area to resume Sung's mission. By the summer of 1941, he had established a guerrilla base called the Chi-Je-Liao (Hopei–Jehol–Liaoning) Military District, subordinated to the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region. The unit maintained a lean existence.
It became the task of the 129th Division, operating in the Shangtang area just below the Chengting–Taiyuan railway in Shansi Province, to expand eastward into the southern Hopei where it borders on Shantung. Southern Hopei provided the lateral link between the durable bases in the mountains of Shansi and Shantung. In the spring of 1938, a small reconnaissance patrol of cavalry descended on the plain and was met by a band of guerrillas organized by refugee students from Peiping and Tientsin.[41] The guerrilla group was led by Yang Hsiu-feng, formerly a professor of history at the National Normal College in Peiping and the Director of the Education Department in the Hopei Provincial Government. Some time during the political upheaval preceding the war, he had been recruited by Liu Shao-ch'i to work with the CCP. For a brief while after the war, he worked in the Paoting headquarters of the Kuomintang forces in mobilizing the
[39] Ibid. , pp. 22–23.
[40] Kuan-yü Sung Shih-lun t'ung-chih ti chüeh-ting [The decision concerning comrade Sung Shih-lun], cited in Pao-shu, ed., Chien-wei chung-yao ts'an-k'ao tzu-liao hui-pien [Collection of important reference data about traitors and puppets] (no date, no publisher listed) (BI), p. 35.
[41] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 25.
youths.[42] He took with him some units of the Hopei People's Army, a Kuomintang regional force. Between March and May, his and several other guerrilla units were joined by the regular units. Hsü Hsiang-ch'ien and Sung Jen-ch'iung brought with them parts of the 129th and the 115th Divisions. Yang Hsiu-feng moved into Nankung with Teng Hsiao-p'ing, the political commissar of the 129th Division, to build a base government for the Southern Hopei Military District.[43] By September, they were competing with the Kuomintang's Hopei governor Lu Chung-lin who was dispatched to Nankung to reclaim the lost area.
In the spring of 1938, as Hsüchow and K'aifeng on the Lunghai railway fell, the CCP seems to have anticipated that the North China Area Army and what was then called the Central China Expeditionary Forces, moving up Yangtze River, would link up with each other across Honan Province. Wu Chih-p'u and P'eng Hsüeh-fen organized the Sixth Detachment of the New Fourth Army, in what was then called the Yü-Wan-Su (Honan–Anhwei–Kiangsu) Border Region, with the help of students from K'aifeng.[44] The anticipated link-up of the Japanese forces of north and central China did not take place, and the area was designated the Fifth War Zone by the Kuomintang. The designation of the Yü-Wan-Su Border Region was later withdrawn by the CCP.[45]
One should not be misled by the CCP's maps of its border regions into thinking that they indicate the boundaries of Communist areas in the early stage of the war. These maps show the state of affairs at the end of the war; they conceal the difficulties encountered in some areas by the Communist forces early in the war. In contrast to the initial success in most of Shansi Province, the CCP encountered serious problems in Shantung and on the border of southern Shansi, northern Honan, and western Shantung. For some reason there is very little data concerning the Communist forces in Shantung. What little that are available today show that the Eighth Route Army did not make much headway there until the war was nearly over. In the early part of the war, serious opposition to the Communists came from the natives, not the Japanese forces.
The border area of southern Shansi, western Shantung, and northern Honan was called Hsiao Chi-Lu-Yü (Small Hopei–Shantung–Honan) District to distinguish it from the latter-day Chi-Lu-Yü (Hopei–
[42] Who's Who in Communist China (Hong Kong: Union Research Institute, 1970), II, 748.
[43] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 26.
[44] Central China Bureau First Plenum , pp. 40–41.
[45] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 7.
Map 5
The Chin-Ch'a-Chi (Shansi–Chahar–Hopei) Border Region, circa 1944
Shantung–Honan) or the Ta Chi-Lu-Yü (Large Hopei–Shantung–Honan) District, which encompassed the Southern Hopei District and the Hsiao Chi-Lu-Yü District.[46] P'eng Te-huai went on an inspection tour of north China to solve "local confusion" at the behest of Chiang Kai-shek in the spring of 1938. He conceded that the conditions in northern Honan were most unsatisfactory. "There are no genuine mass movements there yet," he said, "and the feudal Hui-men organization is still very widespread."[47] Northern Honan along the Lunghai railway was the stronghold of the China Youth Party, a rival of both the Kuomintang and the CCP. In 1938, the Japanese Army sought to prevail on Wu P'ei-fu to lead a puppet government, but he refused. Native cooperation with the Japanese in the Hsüchow–K'aifeng area was the by-product of that plot. The China Youth Party had a membership of 20,000 at the end of 1940, and its own military forces actively assisted in the defense of the Lunghai and the Tientsin–Pukow railways.[48]
The Ta Chi-Lu-Yü District included western Shantung west of the Tientsin–Pukow railway. Here was one of three clusters of Communist guerrilla activities in Shantung. In this marshy area in the Old Yellow River basin, the father and son team of Fan Chu-hsien and Fan Shu-shen activated traditional rural self-defense when the warlord governor of Shantung, Han Fu-ch'ü, fled from the Japanese forces. Fan Chu-hsien was the Kuomintang's Sixth Area Special Commissioner. It is reported that he was assisted by 1,600 students.[49] In the twelve hsien in the Sixth District around Liaoch'eng, he organized 30,000 peasants into ten groups (t'uan ). Early in the war he seemed to have been on good terms with Shen Hung-lieh, Han Fu-ch'ü's successor. Shen paid for and equipped the peasants. The guerrillas grew to a force of 50,000 in thirty units.[50] In November, 1938, however, the Kuomintang's Shantung Provincial Government organized the landlords and the Hui-men into a "big insurrection." Many
[46] Ibid. , pp. 29, 50.
[47] "Chien-ch'ih hua-pei k'ang-chan yü kung-ku t'uan-chi," [Uphold the resistance in north China and strengthen the unity], Ch'ün-chung , No. 8–9, May 25, 1938, p. 241.
[48] Pacification War , No. 1, pp. 69, 417–419, 486.
[49] Johnson, Peasant Nationalism , p. 111.
[50] Fan Chu-hsien fu-tzu hsün kuo-nan [Sacrifice of Fan Chu-hsien father and son for national crisis] (The Political Department, the Kweilin Headquarters), pp. 9, 14. This, a Kuomintang propaganda pamphlet, gives us to believe that Fan Chu-hsien was killed by the Japanese. Actually, the Japanese forces were not capable of tracking down and assassinating a popular leader like him.
thousands of peasants put down Fan Chu-hsien's guerrillas and killed Fan Chu-hsien himself.[51]
After this, western Shantung had only one cluster of guerrilla activities. The Hsien Party Committee of T'aian, a short distance south of Tsinan, organized guerrilla bands in Mt. T'ai (T'aishan). The force grew to one thousand by May, 1938, and called itself a unit of the Shantung Column. It was also assisted by students. The activities of this band were indistinguishable from ordinary peasant insurrection. It seemed to have made its living by attacking landlords.[52] Mt. T'ai was in the large square bounded on the north by the Tsintao–Tsinan railway, on the west by the Tientsin–Pukow railway, on the south by the Lunghai railway, and by the Yellow Sea on the east. In the center was Mengshan, which provided the base of operation for the Kuomintang forces until 1943. After the fall of Tsinan and Tsingtao, regional forces led by the new governor Shen Hung-lieh moved into the area. The foundation of his power was 260 local self-defense groups, including militia (min-t'uan ) and Hui-men.[53]
Toward the end of 1938, the Kuomintang government was alarmed by the expansion of the Chinese Communist bases in unauthorized areas in north China, and it began sending its officials and armed forces behind the Japanese lines. Yü Hsüeh-chung was appointed commander of the Shantung–Kiangsu War Zone. He and Shen Hung-lieh cooperated with Lu Chung-lin, the governor of Hopei, against the Communists. By April of 1939, the Kuomintang forces were beefed up by the 51st and 57th Armies which had infiltrated into western Shantung.[54] The CCP, too, overcame its initial shortage of cadres as the bases in Shansi and Hopei were built up. Ch'en Kuan, who assumed the command of the 115th Division when Lin Piao was wounded in 1938, moved the 343rd Brigade from southeastern Shansi. At the same time Hsü Hsiang-ch'ien, the vice commander of the 129th Division, led a part of the Division into western Shantung.[55] The life of the Communist regulars of the Shantung Column seems to have been rather difficult. According to Hsü Hsiang-ch'ien, in late 1940, "the development of the anti-Japanese forces is uneven" in Shantung. He continued, " . . . strictly speaking up until today Shantung is still not a consolidated base." He mentioned the T'aishan area in western Shantung and Fenglai, Huanghsien, Kaiyang, and Yehhsien in
[51] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 305.
[52] Liberated Areas , pp. 81–82; Ho Kan-chih, p. 333.
[53] Liberated Areas , p. 83.
[54] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 160.
[55] Huang Chen-hsia, Mao's Generals , p. 281.
Chiaotung as the only two areas where the Communist forces were in control.[56]
The guerrilla movement in Chiaotung was evidently an outgrowth of the tradition of coastal self-defense as well as piracy. Shantung's coast had been ravaged by Japanese pirates in Ming and early Ch'ing times, and fishermen and peasants of these areas had a tradition of para-military organization. In many places defensive fortifications against old pirates still remain. The peninsula also had its own pirates. By September, 1938, the so-called Fifth Detachment of the Eighth Route Army's Shantung Column had come into being, and included a water-borne force.[57]
Not very much is known about the conditions in northwestern Shansi, the forerunner of the Chin-Sui (Shansi–Suiyüan) Border Region. The movement of the Communist forces here was confined to the narrow strip between the Peiping–Suiyüan railway in the north and the Lishih–Fenyang highway to the south. Yen Hsi-shan kept his own forces below the Lishih–Fenyang highway, in the southwestern corner of the province. There were twenty-seven hsien in the northwestern corner, but the Communist control of the area appeared to be tenuous. Northwestern Shansi was very mountainous and underpopulated. Its value was in the fact that it was the corridor connecting Shen-Kan-Ning with Chin-Ch'a-Chi and other north China bases. But this route was nearly severed later when Japanese pacification intensified. Peasant mobilization in the area was frustrated, and collaboration by the landlords with the Japanese forces was conspicuous.[58] This may have been related to Yen Hsi-shan's hostility toward the Communists and to the collaboration of the Mongols in the north. Ho Lung, who commanded the Communist base here, spent all of 1939 in central Hopei with the main unit of the 120th Division. During that time one brigade and one regiment of regular troops stayed behind. No local government came into existence until 1941. One notable development in this base was the growth of the Shansi New Army, a regional force that was wrested from Yen Hsi-shan's command by the Sacrifice League. Hsü Fan-t'ing played a major role in the New Army.[59]
[56] Chieh-fang , No. 119, p. 26.
[57] Hsüeh-chan pa-nien ti Chiaotung tzu-ti-ping [Son-and-brother-soldiers of Chiaotung in eight years of bloody war] (Chiaotung hsin-hua shu-tien, 1945), p. 3.
[58] Lo Kui-po, "K'ang-chan liang-chou-nien ti Chin hsi-pei . . . ," p. 56; Ho Lung, "Chin hsi-pei chih chin-hsi" [Northwestern Shansi today and yesterday], Military Affairs Journal , April, 1939, pp. 5–9.
[59] About Hsü Fan-ti'ing and the origin of the Shansi New Army, see Johnson, Peasant Nationalism , pp. 105–106; Van Slyke, pp. 135–138.
The foregoing survey of the Communist bases in the early stage of the war shows that their development was highly uneven. The gross and imprecise nature of available data does not permit accurate assessment. But it is safe to conclude that a spectacular growth of Communist power was correlated, on the one hand, with the disintegration of the old regime in the wake of the Japanese blitz and, on the other, with the careful groundwork that preceded the war. The CCP enjoyed both of these conditions in Shansi. The strength of the opposition in most of Shantung Province seemed to have something to do with local organization of the landlords and its linkage with regional Kuomintang leadership. It is interesting to recall that the Japanese forces stopped at the door to Shantung and negotiated for nearly three months with Han Fu-ch'ü for a peaceful surrender before moving in. This was very unlike the manner in which Hopei was taken. This fact might have given the local elites a chance to prepare for possible anarchy. Clearly there were some conditions peculiar to Shantung. Unfortunately, we do not know what accounts for the success of Communist mobilization in the Chiaotung area and the failure elsewhere. The case of the Liaoch'eng area, where the peasants were mobilized by one set of government officials and countermobilized by another, suggests the importance of leadership at this stage.
Spontaneous Mobilization within the Tradition
It is well known that in developing the rural strategy of revolution with the sanction of the Sixth Congress, the Chu–Mao Group put together some axioms to be followed in selecting the sites for the revolutionary bases. The soviets were to be built in areas difficult of access; they should fall between the spheres of influence of various warlords, and between the jurisdiction of several provincial authorities. In addition, areas where pre-existing social organizations were well entrenched and hostile to the revolution had to be avoided. These organizations included armed landlords, lineage organizations, secret societies, bandits, and the like. In November, 1928, Mao reported from Chingkanshan that "wherever the Red Army goes, it finds the masses cold and reserved; only after propaganda and agitation do they slowly rouse themselves . . . We have an acute sense of loneliness and are every moment longing for the end of such a lonely life."[60] Subsequently, this base was abandoned. Mao wrote to the Party Center of the advisability of building the soviet in southern Kiangsi
[60] SW , I, 99.
Map 6
The Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü (Shansi–Hopei–Shantung–Honan) Border Region, circa 1944
with the remark that "the economy in Kiangsi is chiefly feudalistic; the power of merchant capital is relatively weak, and the armed forces of the landlords are weaker than in any other southern province."[61] Even a single landlord, non-aligned with regional power, could pose a problem for the Red Army on occasion. I quote from Mao:
Some of our comrades put their faith only in political influence fancying that problems can be solved merely by influence. This is blind faith. In 1936, we were in Paoan [in northwestern Shensi]. Forty to fifty li away, there was a fortified village held by a landlord despot. The Central Committee of the Party was then in Paoan and our political influence could be considered very great indeed, but the counter-revolutionaries in this village obstinately refused to surrender. We swept to the south, we swept to the north, all in vain. Not until our broom swept right into the village did the landlord cry out, "Ow I give up!" . . . .[62]
It took three months for the Red Army to take the walled village by a combination of political and military means.
These are some illustrations of what Philip Kuhn calls the "militarization" of China's rural life. This condition dates from the nineteenth century. Villages organized in para-military formations primarily for self-defense were related at once to the rise of the Taipings and—paradoxically—to their demise. It is also recognized that the peasant mass movement led by the CCP was an adaptation of the infrastructure provided by this tradition. One element of the CCP's power in the rural areas stemmed from its ability to reshuffle and reintegrate this institution into its own revolutionary infrastructure. The tradition of self-defense itself was politically neutral because it derived from the fiercely parochial attachment of the peasants to their villages. The uneven progress of the CCP's base construction in areas from which the Kuomintang's central forces were absent seems to be accounted for by this fact. Where the CCP failed to pre-empt the spontaneous mobilization of the peasants, it encountered serious difficulty, as will be shown in Chapter VIII. The tradition of rural self-defense was not a ready-made source of power for the Communists; it had to be transformed without emasculating it. Thus, a clear distinction must be drawn between what came "from the masses" and what the Party did "to the masses."[63]
[61] Ibid. , p. 127.
[62] Ibid. , V, 19–20.
[63] My task in explaining the CCP's power in the rural areas must reckon with the following three facts: (1) "peasant revolution" as such failed in Kiangsi; (2) rather radical "social revolution" involving redistribution of land was never abandoned by Mao; and (3) the united front as a shield to protect the revolution in itsinfancy was necessary. I question the thesis that, either because of chronic poverty or destruction caused by the war, the peasants rose up spontaneously or automatically in support of the Communist partisans. I agree with Samuel P. Huntington: "Americans typically tend to think of power in zero-sum terms: a gain in power for one person or group must be matched by a loss of power by other people or groups. The communist approach, on the other hand, emphasizes the 'collective' or expansible aspect of power. . . . The problem is not to seize power but to make power . . . . " Political Order in Changing Societies (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968), p. 144.
The readers' attention is called to map 4 made by the North China Area Army to show the dispositions of all forces as of October, 1938. What strikes the eye is the utter confusion of the battle line in north China, in spite of the fact that the map abbreviates the more complicated local situation. Except for northern Hopei, southern Chahar, northern Shansi, and the areas between Tsinan and Hsüchow along the Tientsin–Pukow railway, the Japanese forces, in their own judgment, controlled only the rail network. In the parlance of guerrilla warfare, the Japanese forces controlled only the "points" and the "lines" but not the "plane." In the spring of 1939, following the occupation of Hankow, the Japanese forces dispersed themselves into the countryside, thus adding further to the complicated pattern. Mao describes this state of affairs as ch'üan-ya hsiang-ts'o (literally "dog's teeth gnashed together" or "jigsaw pattern").
The unique character of the war was the extreme complexity of the relationship that obtained among various forces operating on the battlefield, something which will never be repeated elsewhere. These forces can be grouped into four categories: the Japanese forces and those that were affiliated with them; the Kuomintang forces and those that were affiliated with them; the Communist forces and their affiliated guerrilla units; and those forces that were primarily neutral. With the exception of the Japanese forces proper, all forces in north China varied among themselves as to degree of combat worthiness and shades of loyalty or political ideology. The war was not a simple resistance against foreign invaders. It is the sociological foundation of this jigsaw pattern in which we are interested.
About one year after the war had begun, Liu Shao-ch'i wrote a report on the conditions of guerrilla warfare in north China. In spite of its peculiarly detached style, intended for an external audience, he was definitely describing in part the process of the expansion of forces under his control on the battlefield marked by the jigsaw pattern.[64]
[64] "Chien-ch'ih hua-pei k'ang-chan-chung ti wu-chuang pu-tui" [Firmly uphold the armed forces in the resistance in north China], Chieh-fang , No. 43–44, pp. 49–53.
In the wake of the Japanese invasion, the countryside of north China seethed with armed organizations of predominantly native character. In Shantung, it is reported that "in the spring of 1938, groups of t'u-hao ["local tyrants"] and yu-min ["drifters"] in the area . . . established guerrilla forces everywhere, cleverly finding excuses and appointing themselves 'commanders'."[65] To the invaders, all of these armed organizations looked like "local bandits," and in some sense they were. Many of the bandits, Japanese observers noted, were "ideologicalized" (shisoka[*] ). Liu Shao-ch'i called them "get–rich–against–the–Japanese bandits" (k'ang-Jih fa-ts'ai t'u-fei ).[66] They were apparently setting up road blocks to collect transit tax in the name of the resistance to Japan.
An interesting example of the "ideologicalized" bandit is reported from northern Fukien. A Communist unit 3,000 men strong, left behind by Fang Chih-min, was eking out a bleak existence in the vicinity of the stronghold of the Big Sword Society. The bandits numbered 10,000 and were led by a chieftain named Lin Hsi-min. After some unsuccessful skirmishes with the bandits, the northern Fukien Special Committee opted for a peaceful co-existence. An agent was sent to Lin Hsi-min to negotiate a truce, which was successfully concluded. The chieftain, who was fond of wearing the yellow robe of a Buddhist monk and cherished the hope of becoming an emperor of China some day, was given some "ideological education." Eventually he agreed to carry a new inscription, alongside the old one, on his banner: "Resist Japan and Save the Nation." The bandits and the Communists cooperated with each other in raiding the landlords in the area.[67] In north China, too, many bandit groups were raising the banner of "resistance to Japan." But "their main purpose is not resistance but looting to get rich and become powerful."[68] Being apolitical in nature, they could just as easily be bribed to become traitors. The trouble at this time, from the standpoint of the CCP, was that the regional Chinese authorities were commissioning them indiscriminately to local security duties by giving them grandiose titles.[69]
The CCP's policy toward bandits was flexible: it entered into tactical cooperation with them; then the bandits were "won over," destroyed, or "disintegrated" (wa-chieh ); and the soldiers and arms were reintegrated into the Communist forces. This was, so to speak, a combination of united front from above and below. The choice de-
[65] Hung-ch'i p'iao-p'iao , VII, 163.
[66] "Hua-pei chan-ch'ü kung-tso ti ching-yen," p. 302.
[67] Hung-ch'i p'iao-p'iao , XI, 117.
[68] Liu Shao-ch'i, "Chien-ch'ih hua-pei . . . ," p. 50.
[69] Ibid.
pended on the relative power of the Communist and the bandit forces. "If local bandits active in the enemy occupied area are adequate for the task of wrecking the enemy's order, and if the anti-Japanese forces are relatively weak there," said Liu Shao-ch'i, "then we should persuade and unite with the bandits."[70] At this point in the war, the CCP was somewhat hesitant to attack the local forces formally in the chain of the Chinese command. The CCP negotiated with the higher authorities to withdraw the commission from the bandits. In any case, bandits were not tolerated in areas where the Communist forces were building a base. Merciless execution awaited the most recalcitrant leaders. "In the anti-Japanese bases where order and government have already been established and where the army and guerrilla forces are relatively more powerful, local bandits should not be allowed to harass and wreck the rear."[71] Caution was exercised in attacking a bandit unit so as not to push them into the hands of the Japanese. Some bandits were better armed than the Communist regulars. Then the Eighth Route Army, too, had to enter into some sort of boundary agreement to keep out of the bandits' stronghold.
A second major formation of local self-defense had a more mass character. It was made up of secret societies such as the Red Spears, T'ienmenhui, and the like. In central Hopei alone, there were more than seventy varieties.[72] Liu Shao-ch'i did not explain how the distinction was to be drawn between the secret societies and the bandits. Again, under certain circumstances, they were indistinguishable. But the CCP did try to distinguish between them and to accord different treatment to each. The Party's attitude toward secret societies was marked by a degree of tenderness. This was presumably due to the inseparable tie between these heterodox organizations and peasant revolts against the imperial regime in the past. Secret societies had always been the primary source of strength and comfort for the poorer masses against oppression of the orthodox hierarchy. Though they were a historical product of "feudalism" destined to pass away, they were also a fallen ally of the Chinese Communist movement, as it were, deserving therapeutic treatment. Besides such ideological affinities to secret societies, the CCP had practical motives for mobilizing them on its side. In July, 1936, for instance, the Soviet Government proposed united front with the Kolaohui against Japanese imperialism. It extolled the Kolaohui's opposition to the Manchus and the role it played in the 1911 Revolution. It condemned the
[70] Ibid. , p. 51.
[71] Ibid.
[72] Shu T'ung, "Chin-Ch'a-Chi pien-ch'ü k'ang-chan san-nien-lai . . . ," p. 219.
Kuomintang's discriminatory treatment of Kolaohui members as "inferior human beings" and "thieves." The Kolaohui was promised the legal right to exist under the Soviet Government.[73] Liu Chih-tan, who founded the Shensi–Kansu Soviet, was a leader of the Kolaohui.
Secret societies always existed in north China, according to Liu Shao-ch'i; but since the Japanese invasion, increased incidence of disturbances by straggling Chinese troops and bandits forced them to multiply. He spoke of them in conjunction with the Lienchuanghui, a landlord organization:
They are armed organizations preserved deep among the people. They grew spontaneously without having any legal basis in the state or the government, but they have a very long history. Their chief purpose is to oppose harsh and miscellaneous taxes and the disturbances by armies and local bandits. They are simple armed self-defense organizations. If the Japanese forces, straggling soldiers, and local bandits do not harass them in their own areas, they do not actively rise up against the Japanese, strike the local bandits, or fight guerrilla war. The majority of their leadership is gentry but they are especially suited to meet the backward, narrow, and selfish interests of the peasants. Therefore they are capable of creating very strong unity. Superstition is one method of unifying the peasants (though the Lienchuanghui has no superstition and is relatively better). In dealing with any problem, they start from their own interest. Whoever harasses and plunders them, they oppose and dissolve—regardless of whether you are the Japanese Army, puppet army, anti-Japanese army and government, local bandits, or whatever. They are politically neutral.[74]
The secret societies and Lienchuanghui together constituted the direct successors to the popular defense mechanism which came into existence in the early nineteenth century. The presence of Lienchuanghui was reported in every village in central Hopi whereas secret societies were more numerous in Shantung.
In ordinary times, these organizations do not maintain formal military formations, according to Liu Shao-ch'i; but once an emergency rises and a battle is necessary, they can amass "a very great number." Their major strength is in local self-defense. If their leaders attempted to use the organizations in areas outside the narrow interest of the peasants, the organizations disintegrated easily. Liu warned the Communist forces in north China to be alert in the vicinity of these organizations, to maintain good discipline, and not to interfere with their religious beliefs or to insult the leaders.[75] Liu revealed in pass-
[73] Ssu-wei-ai chung-yang cheng-fu tui Kolaohui hsüan-yen [Declaration of the Soviet Central Government towards Kolaohui], Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 59–61.
[74] "Chien-ch'ih hua-pei . . . ," p. 51.
[75] Ibid.
ing that among some secret societies it was believed that Chu Te, the commander of the Eighth Route Army, was the descendant of Chu Hung-wu, a Ming emperor.[76]
Of the organizations managed and led by the landlords, Lienchuanghui is best known and most frequently mentioned in the Communist sources.[77] The Lienchuanghui is a more modern form of village self-defense found on the plain of north China, particularly in Hopei Province. It dates back to the beginning of the Republican era in origin, and it has been relied upon in times of disorder ever since. It is organized by village leadership made up of the landlords with the support of peasants. Agriculture was considerably commercialized in Hopei until the depression of the early 1930s frustrated further commercialization. The landholding pattern was more egalitarian here, with a larger number of more or less equal-sized holdings; this contrasted with Shansi Province, where a wide gulf separated the destitute many from the few who were rich. Rural self-defense in Hopei, therefore, relied not on the personal power and the fortified private estate of a single family but on cooperative efforts of the many. The natural village (ts'un ) was the unit, each providing a ta-tui (usually translated into "battalion"). Sometimes as many as several hundred villages joined in the formation in times of emergency. Weapons, in the possession of the landlords, were dug up from under the ground and passed out. The formation dissolved and the guns were buried again when each crisis had passed. In 1937, they came into life after the fall of Paoting and Shihchiachuang. There was one in every village in central Hopei.[78]
There were two basic methods used in procuring recruits for village self-defense. Recruits could be hired from among semi-professional mercenaries or unemployed and landless peasants. The Lienchuanghui in Hopei were so large in size and numerous as to lead one to believe that they were constituted mostly of volunteers. In either case, the recruits were mouths to be fed, which were not productive. In the Communist vocabulary, a functionary—be he a soldier or an administrator—who works full time on the job is referred to as t'o-li sheng-ch'an or "divorced from production." Full time work was the precondition for professionalization. It also presupposed a degree of collective wealth of the organization and a collective political power for redistributing it in the form of taxation
[76] Ibid. , p. 52.
[77] Li Meng-ling, "Chi-chung cheng-ch'ü Lienchuanghui ti ching-yen chiao-hsün" [Experiences and lessons of winning over the Lienchuanghui in central Hopei], Military Affairs Journal , September, 1938, pp. 87–89.
[78] Ibid. , p. 87.
Map 7
The Shantung District, circa 1944
and pay. Regional security units such as pao-an-tui , represented a standing force of higher professionalization. The Lienchuanghui were relying on both types of recruitment. Most peasants left their work temporarily during an emergency to join the formation in response to some signal. Those who could not or would not volunteer were paying the expense according to the size of the cultivated land they owned (an-mou t'ang-p'ai ). A good number were too poor to afford the luxury of taking the time off from work unless they were paid for it. They were getting from three to five yuan a month or simply fed during shorter emergencies. The Lienchuanghui also hired former militia, police, and straightforward mercenaries. Altogether in central Hopei, 20,000 men were organized, not counting those who were "puppetized" (wei-hua ). The groups ranged in size from 200 men in Tinghsien on the Peiping–Hankow railway to 7,000 men at Hochien.
A Communist cadre wrote a report showing how to "win over" the Lienchuanghui and absorb it into the base infrastructure. According to him, the Lienchuanghui was politically neutral; for those who controlled it, it served the purpose of "protecting life and property" and of "raising capital for rising to official rank." The coming of the war did not affect the Lienchuanghui's primary concern, to wit, "not resistance against Japan, not surrender to Japan, but defense against local bandits and protection of the village." Villages organized by it would not let any force station itself nearby, would refuse to provide grain for the anti-Japanese troops, and would oppose "rational burden," a form of taxation administered by the Communist forces.[79] Such an orientation of the Lienchuanghui posed a problem for the Communists.
But it was the instinct for self-preservation and political neutrality of the Lienchuanghui which enabled the Communist forces to win it over to the cause of "resistance" for the time being. In fact, the landlords were not opposed to the resistance as such. Many of them in this commercialized agricultural area fully understood the war situation. Implications of this over-all strategic factor were important even at this grass-roots level. The leaders could be persuaded. The amorphous outlook of the countryside was the result of another factor. Officials above the hsien level in the Kuomintang regime fled when the Japanese forces rolled through the area on their way south. In Shansi Province, desertion of official posts was caused in part by the fear of the Communist forces which were known to be operating behind the Japanese forces. Had these officials been present, they
[79] Ibid.
could have enlisted Lienchuanghui groups with relative ease. The success of Fan Chu-hsien in western Shantung stemmed from the mobilization of similar local organizations. In the absence of such a superstructure, the predominantly local orientation of the Lienchuanghui prevented it from uniting across the entire central Hopei. The Communist forces, the only organized force in the area, moreover, posed as an arm of the central government with perfect legality.
The isolation and parochialism of the Lienchuanghui rendered it an easy target for the application of the united front work-method by the Communist forces. There were many contradictions, it was reported, in and between Lienchuanghui groups. There were feuds of a personal nature between villages, tension between the leaders and the followers about the pay, among the leaders concerning the assessment of expenditures, etc. The Communist forces used whatever means was expedient to divide them. Political control and discipline of the Eighth Route Army was infinitely superior to the leadership of isolated villages. For instance, a Communist unit was fired upon by a Lienchuanghui group without provocation. It sustained some casualties but did not return fire. Eventually, a liaison was established with the village. There were windfalls for the Communists as well. "All that is necessary is for them and the Japanese to open fire," it was reported, "then they cannot but automatically depend on us; when they turn to us asking for title, we may first give them rather big ones, then gradually strengthen their cadres, leadership, and political work to change their two-faced attitude."[80] As the ranks of a Lienchuanghui organization were divided, stubborn opposition to the Eighth Route Army was isolated. The rebellious were marked out for treatment as traitors. The remainder of its members were reintegrated into the lower rungs of the base infrastructure.
Local self-defense was the cause for, as well as the reaction against, warlordism at the regional level. Beneath the shiny hardware of warlord armies was a continuum of armed organizations that reached down to the root in the villages. However they were articulated at the very top, these local self-defense organizations were indistinguishable at the very bottom: the recruits were by and large interchangeable among the Lienchuanghui, secret societies, local bandits, puppet troops, Kuomintang and Communist units, or between orthodox and heterodox formations. In the first two years of the war, the CCP and the Eighth Route Army went about their way collecting these archaic formations that were already in existence and slowly converted them.
[80] Ibid. , p. 89.
In addition to the three local groups discussed above, the Communists recruited small Kuomintang units that had lost contact with their command during the retreat. These cases possibly belong to the category of mutiny. The Northeastern Army under Lü Cheng-ts'ao's command seems to have subsisted by plundering the countryside before it was legitimized by co-optation into the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region. A warlord force of rather dubious quality, the unit had to go through extensive retraining and regrouping under Communist supervision.
In the Wut'ai areas, the regular army went directly down to the village to organize guerrilla forces. It is quite possible that the strength of Yen Hsi-shan's influence in the traditional self-defense groups there made them undesirable for the CCP's purposes. In Shansi Province, new hsien magistrates appointed by the Communists tried to convert police and min-t'uan and the like.[81] This was reported to be relatively difficult. In northwest Shansi, the anti-Japanese mass organizations of workers along the Tat'ung–P'uchow railway were converted into the Shansi New Army. Po I-po, Jung Wu-sheng and others were using the student leadership of the Sacrifice League to organize the Dare–to–Die Columns. Everywhere straggling Kuomintang soldiers were added on to the existing formations, though they were said to be "inadequate to harass the enemy and excessive in harassing the people."[82] The local CCP organizations multiplying in Hopei and Shantung were organizing rather elementary guerrillas in their respective areas. In 1938, Liu Shao-ch'i estimated that there were 300,000 guerrillas in north China. A good portion of these were gradually coming under the influence and leadership of the CCP. He stated that "it is by no means a difficult thing to collect men and arms to build guerrilla units . . . but . . . it is more difficult to turn them into well disciplined and operational units."[83]
The Communist efforts in building a base, whether through the existing framework of the Kuomintang government or from scratch, started with a cluster of a few hsien that corresponded to the chuan-ch'ü (special district) administered by chuan-yüan kung-shu (special district commissioner's office). When a sizable Communist unit moved into an area for base construction, it carried with it a sort of shadow government. Regiments, independent battalions, an equivalent unit
[81] K'ang-Jih yu-chi-tui ti tsu-chih yü chan-shu , p. 41. It is interesting to note that the Japanese army found the uniformed puppet forces without local connections less reliable than the irregular forces at hsien level or below, such as pao-an-tui .
[82] Ibid. , p. 42.
[83] "Chien-ch'ih hua-pei . . . ," p. 52.
or above—all had a political department with a mass work section under it.[84] A unit engaged in base construction was apparently accompanied by civilian cadres of considerable competence to staff important administrative offices at chuan-ch'ü, hsien , and ch'ü levels.[85] As a rule Kuomintang officials of hsien level or above had fled; incumbent officials of hsiang (administrative village) level or below stayed on since they had roots in their villages. They were usually allowed to stay on for a few years until a complete mobilization of the masses penetrated to the bottom of the base society. An official at any level who refused to cooperate with the Communists was gotten rid of quickly. The anticorruption measure in the Kuomintang's Program for Resistance and Reconstruction was relied on for justification.[86] In Shansi there was a similar measure promulgated by Yen Hsi-shan. Those who looked for official wrongdoing had no difficulty; some officials were assassinated.[87] But in most cases, such a measure seemed to have been unnecessary at this stage.
Posing as agents of the Kuomintang government, Communist troops and civilian cadres (e.g., the Sacrifice League or the Mobilization Committee) would enter a village. A mass meeting, including the incumbent village officials, was called, and a Communist cadre from the ch'ü level would make a speech. I offer an account of one such meeting held somewhere in the Wut'ai area in late 1937.
This evening we were to organize the Mobilization Committee in this village, and we invited the army to play skits. Peasants gathered shoulder to shoulder in front of the stage in the village, and women and children, too, were sitting in high places. . . . The chairman was a gentry. He explained in a shrill throaty voice that the Mobilization Committees have already been formed everywhere in Shanshi and that the head office exists in Taiyuan. . . . "Right now we will ask the ch'ü representative comrade XX to come forward and give us a talk." Everyone's attention was drawn to a young officer with an erect posture. . . .
"Tonight we have gathered to see the play, and I should not waste too much of your time. . . . Suppose we were to keep silent right now, can't we still hear the guns? (audience: 'Yah') The enemy has killed several thousand peasants around Lingch'iu. . . . Have you heard about that? (audience: 'Yah') The enemy's swords are about to fall on our heads. The Japanese bandits are getting ready to destroy our nation, destroy our homes. They want your lives.
[84] Chungkuo kuo-min ke-ming-chün ti-shih-pa chi-t'uan-chün cheng-chih kung-tso t'iao-lieh [Political work regulations of the 18th Group Army of the National Revolutionary Army], Military Affairs Journal , April, 1939, p. 131.
[85] For instance, see below, p. 139.
[86] Liu Shao-ch'i, "Hua-pei chan-ch'ü kung-tso ti ching-yen," p. 297.
[87] Ibid. , p. 314.
"Tonight we have gathered to organize ourselves and to drive the Japanese bandits out. First of all we must demand that harsh taxes should never ever be collected again. The destitutes cannot fight the Japanese and pay taxes at the same time. We must carry out governor Yen's principle, 'those who have money should contribute money, those who have labor should contribute labor'. . . . The chairman here, for instance. He is rich. He wants to be a model. If those who have money don't want to contribute money, we must force them with everyone's pressure . . . . "[88]
Under some such circumstances, a village branch of the Mobilization Committee was set up—again in keeping with Yen Hsi-shan's Wartime Mobilization Statute. Village officials sat ex officio on the Committee, but it was created de novo and existed outside of the government organization. Members of mass organizations being established concurrently were in all likelihood given a determining voice. These organizations, all having the title of "national salvation," were class organizations, in contrast to the formally united front character of the village government. The Communist power had just begun to reach the village level at this point, but it had a long way to go.
The tradition of mobilization for rural self-defense was still alive in 1937. It was spontaneous but very parochial in outlook. Hence, the peasants mobilized within the traditional structure could just as easily support the Eighth Route Army as oppose it, depending on leadership. The traditional leadership was neutralized in Shansi because of the united front. In Hopei, it was non-existent. Only the CCP provided the superstructure to integrate the village with hsien and special district levels. Because the mobilization under Communist leadership "developed from above to below and from outside, not from below nor from inside,"[89] it is important to examine the catalyst of that mobilization, the land program.
The CCP's Land Program:
1937–1941
It is generally assumed that the CCP's land program had gone through a major change from the Kiangsi period to the resistance period. The origin of this notion is of course the CCP itself and its pledge of February and September, 1937, that confiscation of the landlords' property would be discontinued for the sake of the united front. But William Hinton's study of the social relationship in the rural bases leads one to doubt whether a thoroughgoing peasant mobilization
[88] Lin Piao, et al., Chin-pei yu-chi chan-cheng chi-shih , pp. 29–30.
[89] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 204.
was really compatible with a continued presence of the landlord class under any circumstances.[90] To eliminate this confusion, I will examine in this section the land program of the CCP in the early stage of the war. The modified land program which was in effect after 1941 will be treated in Chapter VII. It will be shown that integration of the peasants into the infrastructure of the bases presupposed a land revolution.
To gain a proper perspective on this question, let us first take a look at the sequence of land revolution which became the standard procedure in the Kiangsi period. A succinct statement of its outline is found in a report written by Mao Tse-tung in 1933.[91] In it he described the stages of land revolution in the Central Soviet, of which he was the chairman. At the outset he affirmed irrevocably:
All past experience has proved that only through the correct solution of the land problem and only through the fanning to the highest degree the flames of class struggle in the rural districts under the resolute class slogan can the broad peasant masses be mobilized, under the leadership of the proletariat, to take part in the revolutionary war, participate in the various aspects of Soviet reconstruction, and build up a strong revolutionary base. . . .[92]
The statement is so unqualified as to cast doubt on the possibility the advanced struggle area." In the newly developed area,
After smashing the Kuomintang's main force and removing overt military threat to an area, the land revolution proceeded in three stages: the stage of land confiscation and land redistribution; the stage of land investigation; and the stage of land reconstruction. As the area advanced through these stages, it was called respectively the "newly developed area"; the "comparatively retarded area"; and the "advanced struggle area." In the newly developed area,
the unfolding of the land struggle is still in the stage of land confiscation and redistribution. Here the central problems are: the overthrow of the regime of the landlord class by armed forces, the establishment of a revolutionary provisional regime (a revolutionary committee); the build-up of local armed forces of the workers and peasants; the formation of revolutionary mass organizations; the confiscation of the land and other property of the landlord class, and the redistribution of the land of the rich peasants to the hired farm hands, poor peasants, and middle peasants.[93]
[90] Fanshen: A Documentary of Revolution in a Chinese Village (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1966).
[91] "The Land Investigation Drive Is the Central Task of Great Magnitude in Base Areas," in Hsiao Tso-liang, ed., The Land Revolution in China, 1930–1934 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1969), pp. 202–205.
[92] Ibid. , p. 202.
[93] Ibid. , pp. 202–203.
In the third stage,
solid Soviet regimes have been established, local armed forces and revolutionary mass organizations have been widely set up, the feudal and semi-feudal forces of landlords and rich peasants have been completely crushed, land has been thoroughly redistributed, and the land struggle of the peasant masses has entered upon the stage for the reform of land and the development of its productivity.[94]
The specific purpose which occasioned this report was Mao's call to carry out a thorough drive for land investigation, the most important program for the second stage in the "retarded struggle area." By this time, counter-revolutionaries who openly resisted the Communist political power had been destroyed. The locus of counter-revolutionary forces had shifted from the overt military sphere to the more amorphous sociological sphere. The old ruling elites who survived the first stage "have taken off their counter-revolutionary masks and put on revolutionary masks." They continued to exert feudalistic influence on the poorer masses by all sorts of subterfuge. The method of dealing with the class enemy in this stage was land investigation (ch'a-t'ien ). It was a drive to discover the so-called "black field" (hei-t'ien ), land which was not recorded in the land register because of under-reporting. Those found concealing a "black field" were designated counter-revolutionaries in disguise and punished accordingly. Moreover, the whole land investigation drive was to be conducted a second, a third, or even a fourth time in some areas, each time netting new counter-revolutionaries. This pattern of continued revolutionary vigilance is confirmed by William Hinton from his observation of the post-war land revolution as well. Did the Chinese Communists really dispense with these programs during the war or not? If they did, what made it possible?
The major source of confusion about the land program of the war period is the extreme secrecy in which it has been surrounded until today. All of my search has failed to turn up any major directive or resolution for the initial period of the war. I must begin with an analysis of CCP documents prior to the war. The starting point is the position taken by the Wayaopao Resolution of December, 1935. It advocated that "the Communist Party and the soviet must make sure to satisfy the peasants' demand for land." In this way the CCP was to "join together the land revolution with the national revolution."[95] The Resolution accepted Wang Ming's proposal made in Moscow that the soviet government relax its treatment of the rich peasants, and
[94] Ibid. , p. 203.
[95] Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 34.
commercial and industrial enterprises belonging to the national bourgeoisie.[96] Confiscation of the rich peasants' property ceased. But the policy of confiscating the property of the landlords and traitors in the "Japanese-occupied areas and their surroundings" remained intact.[97]
By September, 1936, the CCP had decided to accept the bourgeoisie in the united front. But the landlords were never admitted into the united front. The CCP's telegram of February, 1937, promised simply that the policy of confiscation would be discontinued. Also in February, a propaganda document was issued by the Party to allay the fears of the members who took the united front proposal as a surrender to the Kuomintang. It assured them that the land which had already been confiscated in the past would not revert to the former owners.[98] In March, confiscation ceased in the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region.[99] Then on May 12, the rights of citizenship were formally restored to the landlords in those few hsien in Shen-Kan-Ning where they had not yet been liquidated.[100] As late as May, however, some Party branches in the outlying areas were carrying out confiscation.[101] At the May conference of Soviet Area Party Delegates in Yenan, Mao was criticized for his insistence on "anti-feudal" struggle. The debate seems to have touched on some important policy question in implementing united front strategy. It is my inference that either at this conference or perhaps earlier in the spring, the CCP formulated its policy on the land question and secretly disseminated it to Party and army units in the field.[102]
It is quite possible that the CCP's pledge to cease confiscation was offered before it arrived at an internal consensus as to what alternative policy should be adopted toward the landlord class. In July, 1937, Mao offered an "Eight Point Program" and contrasted it with a policy which he condemned as "compromise and concessions." One item demanded, "Abolish exorbitant taxes and miscellaneous levies, reduce land rent, restrict usury, increase the workers' pay . . . . " The other proclaimed: "Financial policy should be based on the principle that those with money should contribute money and that the property
[96] Ibid. , pp. 30–31.
[97] Ibid. , p. 34.
[98] Warren Kuo, "The CCP Pledge of Allegiance to the Kuomintang," Issues and Studies , August, 1968, p. 49.
[99] Lin Po-ch'ü's report of January, 1939, Shen-Kan-Ning pien-ch'ü ts'an-i-hui wen-hsien hui-chi , p. 14.
[100] Electoral Laws of the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region, Ibid. , p. 53.
[101] Min-hsi-nan chün-cheng wei-yüan-hui [Southwestern Fukien military affairs committee], Wei t'ing-chih nei-chan i-chih k'ang-Jih kei k'e-pu-tui k'e-chi tang ti hsin [The letter to all armed units and the Party at all levels concerning cessation of internal war and resistance against Japan] (BI).
[102] See above, pp. 40, 90.
Map 8
The Chin-Sui (Shansi–Suiyüan) Border Region, circa 1944
of the Japanese imperialists and Chinese traitors should be confiscated . . . . "[103] The stormy meeting of the Politburo in Loch'uan in late August passed a "Ten Point Program." It repeated the same points as the Eight Point Program. Neither of them demanded a "unified progressive tax" which was stated as the Party's goal in Wayaopao.[104] The term was not to be mentioned again until Mao made his report to the Sixth Plenum[105] and the first Administrative Program of the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region was proclaimed in April, 1939.[106] The stated position of the CCP in August, 1937, therefore, was: (1) reduction in rent and interest; (2) new taxation system which reduced the rate of exaction at least on some peasants; (3) increase in pay for farm laborers; (4) continued expropriation of those who were labeled "traitors"; and (5) cessation of confiscating the property of the landlords qua landlord.
It is said that "if the relationship between the army and the civilians is handled poorly it originates mostly in the supply of food."[107] In a country where the population was in a tight balance with the ecology, imposition of an extra number of people to be fed and clothed on the existing population of a given area often meant the difference between survival and starvation. As a part of united front concessions, the Kuomintang government paid a monthly sum of 500,000 yuan for the authorized strength of the Communist forces.[108] This was hardly enough. At any rate, the Communist forces as well as their base infrastructure were rapidly expanding beyond the authorized limit. The provision for the troops and civilian personnel "divorced from production" had to be met directly by local revenue. In this, the Chinese Communists were no different from any other regional power in China's modern history. When a Communist unit occupied a new area, whose local government had not been preserved by civilian cadres through united front arrangement, it often met a rather hostile reaction. During the first winter of 1937, Nieh Jung-chen's unit northeast of Wut'ai lived a wretched life. Traitors had not yet been suppressed. During this phase, the Communist forces were carrying out an outright military occupation. The provision for the troops could not wait. Yet, the mechanism for revenue collection could not function until a local anti-Japanese government was built from the ground up. The Communist forces resorted to confiscation of the property of the
[103] Selected Works , II, 18.
[104] Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 29.
[105] Ibid. , VI, 216.
[106] Shen-Kan-Ning pien-ch'ü ts'an-i-hui wen-hsien hui-chi , p. 40.
[107] Ma Han-ping, Wang Chen nan-chen-chi [The chronicle of Wang Chen's southern expedition] (Hong Kong: Chungkuo ch'u-pan-she, 1947), p. 13.
[108] Mark Selden, The Yenan Way in Revolutionary China (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1971), pp. 139–140.
rich. The Sixth Detachment of the New Fourth Army in Huaipei area reported, for instance, that
several thousand troops and several thousand work personnel had to be fed and clothed. In everything we needed revenue, and yet nothing had started at the time. Our finance was in difficulty, and we could count on but a small tax revenue. Therefore, we had to resort to two emergency measures. One was striking the traitors, the other was to get donations from the rich households. Even that was inadequate. . . .[109]
Confiscating the property of the rich and sharing the loot with the poor had been the standard practice of the Red Army when it moved through a strange territory or in an early phase of settlement before the revenue collection mechanism was built up.[110] It seems that the Eighth Route Army had to resort to the same method in the very early phase of base construction. In addition, so-called "loans" were secured: hsi-k'uan if it was in cash and hsi-liang if it was in grain. Such loans were usually treated as an advance on tax. An I.O.U. was issued, which then became a note of credit against subsequent tax payment.
Lack of adequate data and monographic studies compels me to grope in the dark concerning the tax system in the early phase. There was considerable variation in the practice from one place to another. In Shen-Kan-Ning the government relied exclusively on confiscation and expropriation to meet its expenditure until 1937. Then the system of "national salvation public grain" (chiu-kuo kung-liang ) was instituted.[111] This was definitely a progressive taxation, though it is not known whether it was a single tax and hence displaced all the other taxes. The Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region relied on land tax (t'ien-fu ), custom duties, and internal loans at the outset. At least some part of this border region was still collecting land tax along with "national salvation public grain" in 1940.[112] It is my inference that "national salvation public grain" was an interim measure which was used before the slightly more routinized "rational burden" system was instituted. It seems that they were both quite arbitrary.
[109] Liu Jui-lung's report to the second Huaipei District political council (October, 1942), in Huaipei k'ang-Jih min-chu chien-she [Anti-Japanese democracy building in Huaipei] (Huaipei Su-Wan pien-ch'ü hsing-cheng kung-shu, 1942), p. 23.
[110] In 1948, Mao stated: " . . . hasty dispersal of social wealth is to the disadvantage of the army. Premature distribution of land would prematurely place the entire burden of military requirements on the peasants instead of on the landlords and rich peasants . . . . " Selected Works , IV, 251. While the statement was made in the civil war period, the logistic needs of the army remained constant.
[111] "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 59, November, 1970, p. 88.
[112] "Chin-Ch'a-Chi pien-ch'ü ti hsing-shih" [The situation in the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region], Chieh-fang , No. 115, p. 14.
Again Chin-Ch'a-Chi was in the lead in switching from old land tax to the new system. The new tax system was called "rational burden" (ho-li fu-tan ) and was a progressive taxation. This was clearly intended to have a socially leveling impact. Hence, if the differential tax burden was passed from the rich to the poor in the form of higher rent and interest, the tax would lose its effectiveness. The commencement of "rational burden" or any other system that favored the poor was, therefore, accompanied by measures to reduce rent and interest (chien-tsu, chien-hsi ). By February, 1938, the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region promulgated the first regulation on rent and interest reduction.[113] By March, it was already moving into the second stage of the "rational burden" system.[114] How the Communist unit there overcame the opposition so quickly is not known.
The most widely used form of rent and interest reduction in north China in the early period was called "quarter down in rent, 10 percent interest" (erh-wu chien-tsu, shih-fen chien-hsi ). It meant reduction of all existing land rent by 25 percent and freezing it until further change. This was an interim measure before a border region government had enough time, power, and cadres to conduct land investigation to make an accurate land register. Interest rate on all loans, including new ones to be contracted under the new regulation, was to be no more than 10 percent per annum.[115]
Rent and interest reduction alone presupposed a social change of great magnitude. They could not have been carried out without thorough mobilization of the masses and the backing of the Communist forces. Since I will deal with the rent and interest reduction campaign in Chapter VII, only one statistic will be noted here. The Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region carried out a campaign to return the land held as collateral by money-lenders to the borrowers by recomputing the interest at the newly enforced rate. In four special districts (or military sub-districts), all in Hopei Province, 69,400 mou (1 mou = 0.15 acre) of land was returned by June, 1940.[116] Naturally such a campaign had the effect of drying up the private source of credit, but the Party was interested in the political goal of winning mass support at
[113] Liang-nien-lai pien-ch'ü ta-shih-chi [The chronicle of important events in the border region in the two years] (The Secretariat, the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region Administrative Commission, 1939), p. 4.
[114] Ibid. , p. 7.
[115] These rates are my own inference from the post-1941 practices. See p. 249 below. Rates varied tremendously depending on the local military balance of power between the Communists and their enemies.
[116] Kung-fei fan-tung wen-chien hui-pien [Collection of documents on the reaction of the Communist bandits]: Land policy (Ministry of National Defense, Republic of China) (BI), p. 179.
this stage. It goes without saying that both rent and interest reduction and "rational burden" were enforceable only in areas where Communist control was thorough.
The "rational burden" was in effect until 1941, when it was superseded by the "unified progressive tax" in some places.[117] They both embodied the principle that "those with money should contribute money," which was another name for progressive tax. But rational burden was infinitely easier to handle from an administrative point of view, a vital requisite for application in wartime in or near the battlefield. The label and principle of rational burden originated with Yen Hsi-shan, though the CCP applied it in many places in north China. The rational burden was a single progressive tax reckoned once a year. The first phase was called the "hsien class rational burden," which was superseded soon by the "village class rational burden." The hsien class rational burden seemed to have been a slight routinization of confiscation of the property of the landlords and the rich. It was handled directly by the hsien class governments through their ch'ü level offices, both of which were in the hands of reliable Communist cadres. The number of households that could be dealt with by the hsien government must have been limited. In the Shangtang area of the T'aihang mountain (the Third Special District, Po I-po), where the 129th Division settled, the transition to the village class rational burden did not come until the fall of 1938.[118]
In this system the hsien government classified every village into one of eleven classes representing the total asset in each. Quality of land, old land tax assessments, houses, and other properties were all taken into account in a rough fashion in classifying a village. Each village was then assigned to a class with corresponding points. First class village rated 2 points, second class 1.9 points, down to the eleventh class with 1 point. Each point and a fraction thereof stood for a village's share of tax within the total budget of the hsien .[119] That is, the hsien government would distribute its levy according to the number of points represented by the villages in its jurisdiction. The actual worth of a point became known only when the total annual budget of the hsien government was closed. This was therefore similar to the work point system that was in use during the stage of agricultural cooperation in the 1950s.
[117] For details of the rational burden system, I have relied on valuable data collected by the Japanese forces which occupied the Shangtang area in the heart of the T'aihang District. Sugiyama Corps and the Huangch'eng Intelligence Center, Sansei-sho[*] Wajun-ken chiho[*] Kyosanto[*] chiku jokyo[*] chosa[*] hokoku-sho[*] [Investigation report of the conditions in the Communist district in the Hoshun hsien area of Shansi Province] (hereinafter Hoshun Investigation Report ): Vols. I and II.
[118] Hoshun Investigation Report , II, 5.
[119] Ibid. , p. 34.
The village office, with the cooperation of the village Mobilization Committee, was then charged with the task of distributing the burden among the households in its jurisdiction. The hsien government no longer interfered in tax assessment at the village level, with certain exceptions. The object of taxation seems to have been a peculiar category that reckoned property and income on a single scale. For tax purposes a household was classified in terms of (1) interest and dividend; (2) property, liquid as well as non-liquid; and (3) salaries, wages and other compensation for service.
The method used in assessing tax liability for ordinary peasant household was as follows. A village (hsin-pien-ts'un ) was divided into groups of yen —a yen being a collective security system made up of thirty households. The richest and the poorest households in any given yen were classified as the first and the twentieth class respectively. Using them as a rough standard, the remainder were fitted into the intervening classes. The twenty classes were not always filled in any one yen , as several households tended to cluster into the same class. Each class was then given corresponding points. In Hoshun hsien assignment of points to each class was left to the discretion of each village, so long as the series was discreet. In one example suggested, the first class was assigned 35 points; the second class 28 points; the third class 20 points; the fourth class 18.5 points, and so on down to the twentieth class with 1 point.[120] Collectively, therefore, a village had the power to decide who belonged to which class, and then to decide how many points should be assigned to each class.
Excluded from this classification were the rich (fu-hao ) and the destitute. When the wealth of the rich was determined by the villagers, the information was forwarded to the hsien government, which then decided special tax rates. A clear guideline for defining the rich cannot be found in the document I have. Judging from actual examples enumerated in Shangtang's case, the rich were landlords and rentier class. Generally they owned forty mou or more of land; a few owned less land but possessed other sources of income. Those who were judged to be indigent were exempted from tax and became eligible for relief administered by the village government.
According to an official propaganda leaflet collected by the Japanese in the Shangtang area:
The rules in the previous regulations of rational burden [i.e., Yen Hsishan's statute] required that distribution of burden be determined only after a thorough investigation of property and income.
This regulation does not require investigation of property but relies only
[120] Ibid. , p. 24.
on an estimate. This is entirely due to the fact that the war of resistance makes urgent demands on revenue. This cannot be met if we are to rely on the previous regulation which was very time consuming [in administration].[121]
It is my inference that under the leadership of the Sacrifice League, the Mobilization Committee, or some mass organization, the peasants were conducting a sort of collective and mutual tax assessment session. Everyone was subject to this collective judgment.
It is extremely convenient to let the village office handle [the rich]. This is because all the people in a village know well the amount of property and income of the rich. Therefore the village office cannot be deceived even though the hsien government may be fooled. . . . Even if the rich tries to conceal his income, public opinion, criticism, and guidance by the whole village will make him feel insecure not to share the burden. Those in the village who, because of some special relationship with the rich or because of their interest, try to defend the rich . . . will also be attacked by the whole village.[122]
This method of collective assessment foreshadowed the method of "democratic assessment" used in the 1950s to distribute work points to the members of an agricultural cooperative.
The hsien government of Hoshun collected its revenue in grain, cash, and other goods. Grain was presumably priced at some fixed cash value. Of the taxed goods, the most frequently collected, according to the captured file of official communications, were the hand-sewn shoes made of cotton cloth priced at fifty cents a pair; cotton cloth; and cotton suits. The Japanese investigator estimated that a household in the Shangtang area turned in three-and-a-half pairs of shoes annually to the government. Tax was not collected all at once or at fixed intervals. Grain was stored away locally and dispersed. As need arose, it was collected by the government in small installments. An advance notice would come from the hsien government, routed through the ch'ü office, such as:
Order: The Fourth Ch'ü Office; Series 99.
Mr. Chang Fu-ch'ang, Village Chief:
For the daily actions of officers and soldiers at the front, supply of shoes is in urgent demand. You are hereby ordered to mobilize 380 pairs of shoes in your village and to deliver them. You will receive 50 cents a pair for cost of manufacturing. Your assistant chief is requested to mobilize 80 pairs forthwith and to deliver them to this office by the fifteenth of the month. You will be punished severely for violation, insincerity, or failure to deliver in time. . . .
Each shoe must bear the name and address of its maker.[123]
[121] Ibid. , p. 25.
[122] Ibid. , p. 26.
[123] Ibid. , p. 40.
Or if a Communist army unit passed through a village, the village had to feed the unit in exchange for grain tickets (liang-p'iao ). The tickets then became a note of credit to be offset against the village's share of tax. Again, during emergencies forced loans from the rich were permitted. It was estimated that Hoshun hsien collected 23,000 piculs (1 picul = 133.3 pounds) of food grain and 300,000 yuan in cash or its equivalent in one year.[124]
It seems fair to say that under the rational burden system the distribution of a village's share of tax was carried out by a majoritarian method. The poor were given a choice of taxing the rich to reduce their own share. With assurances from the Communist cadres that this accorded with the principle that "those with money should contribute money," they opted for this method. In the T'aihang District, the raising of a fist at a mass meeting determined tax liability.[125] Only such an arbitrary method would have enabled the CCP to endear itself to the masses while assuring a source of revenue for itself. A thin line separated tax collection from expropriation, as witness the following report from the Chin Ch'a-Chi Border Region:
At night the soldiers gathered in the storage rooms of the village chief and the rich families to reckon and collect money, grain, oil and flour, potatoes, and administrative expenses. According to "rational burden" the village chief ought to pay most. Besides there were five big families, but they refused responsibility. In the stable in the courtyard the self-defense troops started a quarrel. "The chief's is the richest family." "No, he should give fifteen tan of potato." In the end the chief whispered consent, and he watched [the sacks of] grain and potatoes carried away from his storage cellar one after another.[126]
Apart from regular tax, the rich households were subjected to periodic pressure to provide "contributions," "loans," and the like. In the Shangtang area, the rich were also subjected to a small amount of "confiscation" from time to time, though the nature of infractions were not reported.[127] What was the amount of levy on the base area's population? A sample from the Japanese data is presented in Tables 1 through 5. The families A through D in Table 1 were the four leading landlording households in Hoshun hsien . It is apparent that they were destined to be liquidated rapidly. In a small hamlet called Sanch'i, also in Hoshun, there were altogether 167 families. Of this, the first twenty-one were rich enough to be classified as "hsien rational burden rich households." While the government's levy on these house-
[124] Ibid. , p. 70.
[125] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 149.
[126] Lin Piao, et al., Chin-pei yu-chi chan-cheng chi-shih , p. 23.
[127] Hoshun Investigation Report , II, 138–150.
holds was heavy, the bulk of the village's families, Nos. 22–117, were paying relatively little in tax. The families No. 118 through No. 167 were tax-exempt or were receiving relief.
Mao states that "In the first stage, from 1937 to 1939, we took very little from them [the people]; during this stage they were able to build up considerable strength. In the second stage, from 1940 to 1942, the burden on the people was increased . . . . "[128] In Ch'ang-chih in the T'aihang District, average tax on "the people" decreased as follows: 1937, BR$ (border region yuan ) 3.34; 1938, BR$0.85; 1939, BR$0.857. In Yangch'eng: 1937, BR$1.732; 1938, BR$1.182; 1939, BR$0.629.[129] On the whole, tax decreased in this area by four-fifths of the pre-war level for the masses. Isabel and David Crook report from another village in the T'aihang District that, as soon as a Communist-sponsored government was established in late 1939, "national salvation public grain" was collected from the richest 30 percent of the village population. Shortly thereafter, the rational burden went into effect. The tax burden continued to be borne by 30 percent of the population. "For 70 percent of the villagers to be free from taxation was a state of affairs never dreamt of before," the Crooks report.[130]
We can now reconstruct the political aspect of the very early stage of the Communist base construction. As soon as a Communist unit entered an area and overcame overt military opposition, it reduced rent and interest and practically abolished taxes for the majority of the peasants in the area. The expenditures for maintaining the Com-
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[128] Selected Works , III, 114.
[129] Growth of one revolutionary base , pp. 148–149.
[130] Isabel and David Crook, Revolution in a Chinese Village: Ten Mile Inn (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, Ltd., 1959), pp. 46–47.
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munist forces and the civilian cadres were borne mostly by a minority who were rich. The poorer majority supported the new regime and incurred the resentment of the landlords and the rich peasants, who made all sorts of threats in private. The poor were then committed to the defense of the new regime. For roughly two years, this state of affairs persisted. To pay for increased tax out of reduced income, the rich sold their property. The sort of social and political changes entailed by this confiscatory tax policy by 1940 will be discussed in Chapter VII.
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The tax and rent reduction program of the CCP was revolutionary. It amounted to confiscation by installment. Its fully revolutionary character cannot be appreciated until some inquiry is made into the treatment of the so-called traitors. If the development of a Communist base in the resistance period paralleled that in the Kiangsi period, should the traitors be considered the equivalent of counter-revolutionaries? Data concerning the suppression of hostile elements in the Communist bases and their environs are very difficult to obtain.
The Party was obviously reluctant to reveal such data. In addition, the suppressed elements did not have organized, political existence; and they left no record of their fate. Among the CCP's enemies hidden in the rural areas were bandits and traitors. Both were usually liquidated physically. In the early stage of base construction, the "anti-traitor work" (ch'u-chien kung-tso ), which included the suppression of bandits, was primarily the responsibility of the Communist forces. At this stage it was part of a military security of the unit in question. Thereafter as the boundary of a base expanded, new areas were subjected to the same program while authority in the older central district passed gradually into the hands of civilian government. The process of handling traitors gradually became routinized until, in the final stage of development, it merged with ordinary legal process.
Bandits were numerous after the outbreak of the war. In Shen-Kan-Ning, where banditry was not a serious problem, more than forty bands were eliminated by early 1939, including 800 bandits killed and wounded and 400 captured.[131] On the periphery of the border region, suppression of bandits was not yet complete, it was reported. The reference seemed to be to Suite and Lungtung Sub-districts which were not subjected to the civil war type of land revolution before the united front came into existence. In one year period ending in November, 1942, 846 bandits were liquidated in Yenfu District in Kiangsu.[132] According to Liu Jui-lung, the head of the Huaipei District government, bandit suppression by October, 1942, was as follows: Ssunan, fourteen bands; Hungtze, six bands; Ssuyang, seven bands; Hsüfengchia, five bands; Huaipao, nine bands; Ssuwulingfeng, six bands; Ssuhsiu, ten bands; P'eichüt'ung, two bands; Hsiut'ung, sixteen bands—for a total of seventy-five bands. The size of only twenty-eight bands was reported. Some were 20 or 30 strong, while the largest ones had from 200 to 400 men. Average size of the twenty-eight bands reported was 90.[133] Multiplied by 75, the putative total bandit population was 675 for the Huaipei District. As will be shown in Chapter VIII, this area was exceptionally infested.
Statistics concerning traitors are more difficult to find. According to
[131] Shen-Kan-Ning pien-ch'ü ts'an-i-hui wen-hsien hui-chi , p. 11.
[132] Jao Shu-shih, Hua-chung ch'u-chien pao-wei kung-tso ti chi-pen tsung-chi chi chin-hou ti jen-wu [The basic conclusion and the future task of anti-traitor and security work in central China] (report to the Central China Anti-Traitor Conference, November, 1942), Chen-li , No. 1, March, 1943, p. 25.
[133] Huaipei k'ang-Jih min-chu chien-she , appendix. I am assuming that the so-called "bandits" were in fact bandits, though in the case of central China in particular the distinction between bandits and armed landlords seems to have been tenuous.
Yang Hsiu-feng who was running the government of the South Hopei Military District, 279 were eliminated in one year ending September, 1939. These included 51 in Weihsien, 45 in P'inghsiang, 31 in Feihsiang, 30 in Tsaoch'iang, and 20 in Chülu.[134] Again, the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region was the model of anti-traitor work. It was an object of envy among the units of the New Fourth Army in central China, where political conditions were infinitely more complex because of the persistence of the Kuomintang's influence. In the Wut'ai area, there were a number of Buddhist temples with a total of 1,000 priests who were reported to have acted as traitors.[135] We do not know their fate. In October of 1940, Shu T'ung, who headed the political department of the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region, stated that in the three years since the founding of the government, 1,402 traitors had been eliminated.[136] As a Communist base developed with increasing mass support, anti-traitor work became part of mass mobilization and created a tense vigilante atmosphere. In Shen-Kan-Ning there were 700 traitor-weeding committees, one in every hsiang; 9,000 traitor-weeding small groups; and 100,000 members in them by January, 1939.[137] As the Japanese forces never seriously threatened this border region, the anti-traitor work there had class character.
I can only infer the identity of these traitors. There is no doubt that a substantial number of them were genuine traitors. But a large number seemed to have come from among the landlords and the rich peasants who were subjected to confiscatory taxation. Po I-po deplored in mid-1939 that "in the past we drove the landlords, the rich men, and gentry to become traitors by exploiting them."[138] But if so, why were there not insurrections by the landlords against the Communist forces? The reported figures of traitor liquidation—if they can be trusted and if they are representative—were not staggering ones. Assuming that a standard-sized hsien in Hopei had 250 villages, liquidation of fifty traitors in one year amounted to one for every five villages. Assassination and liquidation increased in number after mid–1940, as will be shown below, but even then the CCP was defi-
[134] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 209.
[135] Lin Piao, et al., Chin-pei yu-chi chan-cheng chi-shih , p. 62.
[136] Chieh-fang , No. 120, p. 24.
[137] Shen-Kan-Ning pien-ch'ü ts'an-i-hui wen-hsien hui-chi , p. 11.
[138] "Ts'ui-hui ti-wei cheng-ch'üan ti chi-pen cheng-ts'e [The basic policy for destroying the enemy and puppet political power], Wo-men tsen-yang tsai ti-hou chien-li k'ang-Jih cheng-ch'üan [How we have built the anti-Japanese political power behind the enemy] (Huang-ho ch'u-pan-she, 1939), p. 14. See also Liu Shao-ch'i, in "Hua-pei chan-ch'ü kung-tso ti ching-yen," pp. 304, 314, in which he talks about executions.
nitely more restrained than during the Kiangsi period. It seemed that somehow the Chinese Communists managed to carry out the land revolution while holding the class tension just short of the breaking point. This paralleled the CCP's relationship with the Kuomintang at the national level.
Several factors may be adduced to account for the CCP's success in this respect. First, the CCP's approach left the door open for the rich to survive by submitting to gradual fleecing. Its measures were radical only in the central base areas but were indistinguishable from the policies of the competing forces, Japanese and Kuomintang, on the periphery. The CCP leaders pointed out often that it was imprudent to pressure the landlords on the periphery of a base as they would bring the Japanese forces in.[139] Second, the landlords as a class were more literate and educated; they understood the national predicament better than ordinary peasants. In the Shangtang area of Shansi, the most radical villages were those in which educated sons of native landlords had returned home and cooperated with the CCP.[140] P'eng Te-huai pointed out that the educated sons of the landlords were somewhat detached from the material interests of their parents.[141] One hsien magistrate in Shansi held a banquet for the local notables and peasants' representatives; he revealed Yen Hsi-shan's order on rent reduction and managed to persuade the landlords to sign a pledge of cooperation which he posted in the area.[142] Last, though not the least in importance, was the military supremacy of the Communist forces in the rural areas in the first two years of the war. This supremacy enabled the Communist party to impose its definition of the situation on the rural population.
"Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun" indeed in China's countryside. But the over-all strategic milieu in which the CCP's gun was exercised added to its efficacy. The war silenced the competing guns, and the landlord class as a whole was more amenable to accepting the CCP's exactions because of the national emergency.
[139] This is mentioned repeatedly in many documents. See, for instance, Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 410.
[140] Hoshun Investigation Report , II, 39.
[141] Kuan-yü hua-pei ken-chü-ti kung-tso ti pao-kao [Report on north China base work] (Report to the cadres above the battalion and hsien class in the T'aihang District, December 18, 1942), Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 385, Liu Shao-ch'i quotes some landlords in Shansi who said, "Japan is now invading us. Pay whatever rent and debt that you can, and it's all right," in "Hua-pei chan-ch'ü kung-tso ti ching-yen," p. 314.
[142] Ibid.
The Structure of a Communist Base
The extent of the changes in Chinese society since the time of the Taiping Rebellion is indicated by the fact that a large number of heirs of the gentry class that had once defended the Confucian order fled the native places and official posts to the cities, while another part, consisting of younger literati, descended on the rural areas in opposition to the status quo. Thus, the surviving tradition of rural self-defense among the peasantry was welded to a superstructure which was at once old and new. In the early stage of mobilization, the organizational sinew that gradually extended itself among the amorphous rural masses was hardly recognizable as revolutionary bases.
Initial Communist expansion consisted mostly of wholesale absorption of armed peasants that antedated the coming of the Communist organizers. It was a long and painful process to transform them into the regular Communist army and the supporting infrastructure. Roughly two years, from 1938 to 1940, were spent in the task.[143] Nieh Jung-chen, who had started with an initial contingent of 2,000 regulars in October, 1937, had formed four detachments by December. By March, 1939, reorganization of sundry irregular forces had started. Incorrigible leaders of the native self-defense organizations were executed as traitors or bandits. But the remainder were more or less kept intact for the time being and assigned to the task of "defending the homes and villages." As government and mass organizations reached down to the hsien and ch'ü levels, ordinary peasants with decent occupations were inducted into hsien or ch'ü class guerrilla units. These were the forerunners of the Communist regional forces. Besides keeping vigilance over the rich, they went from village to village collecting hoarded weapons, including occasional machine guns.
Discipline in a newly founded unit was miserable. The greatest obstacle to regularization was desertion. Once new recruits were assigned to missions which took them away from home, they deserted in large numbers.[144] Watchful eyes had to be kept on them from the moment they left their village with escort. Large-scale "return to the post campaigns" (kui-tui yün-tung ) were conducted by mass organizations in the villages to send back deserters.
The designation of detachment (chih-tui ) was used very flexibly. A detachment could consist of as many as 10,000 or even 20,000 men.[145] When a special district, made up initially of a few hsien , had acquired
[143] Shu T'ung, "Chin-Ch'a-Chi pien-ch'ü k'ang-chan san-nien-lai . . . ," p. 218.
[144] Jo Fei, "Hua-pei yu-chi-tui . . . ," p. 120.
[145] K'ang-Jih yu-chi-tui ti tsu-chih yü chan-shu , p. 51.
a force of full-time guerrillas supporting a detachment of regulars, a military sub-district was formed. A force level of 600 to 1,000 guerrillas was suggested for this purpose.[146] Large-scale programs for training native peasant cadres got under way relatively early in Chin-Ch'a-Chi. A three-month course produced 1,500 graduates, who became company and battalion leaders.[147] The Anti-Japanese Military College had established its second branch under Nieh Jung-chen's command also. It began to train more qualified military leaders. As reliable cadres displaced the co-opted incumbents everywhere, the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region's framework was articulated.
Below the Central Committee in Yenan, there were several regional bureaus.[148] In north China, there were originally four sub-bureaus (fen-chü ) under the Northern Bureau, viz., the Shantung, the Chin-Ch'a-Chi, the Chin-Sui, and the T'aihang Sub-bureaus. All but one had jurisdiction over a border region. The Communist bases in Shantung and central China never received border region status; they were called military districts or simply districts. The Northern Bureau had moved from Tientsin to Taiyuan with the war front, then settled in southeastern Shansi with the headquarters of the Eighth Route Army. In September, 1943, the Plains (P'ingyüan) Sub-bureau was created with jurisdiction over the South Hopei and the Chi-Lu-Yü Military Districts.[149]
A typical border region consisted of two or three military districts on a mountain and a fertile plain contiguous to it, thus insuring its self-sufficiency in both military and economic terms. The Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region was made up of three military districts (chün-ch'ü ) or administrative director's offices (hsing-cheng chu-jen kung-shu ), in Peiyüeh, Central Hopei, and Chi-Je-Liao. The Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü Border Region was made up of two large sub-divisions—the Chin-Chi-Yü District west of the Peiping–Hankow railway and the Chi-Lu-Yü Disstrict on the plain to the east of it. The former was made up of the T'aihang and the T'aiyüeh Military Districts, while the latter consisted of the South Hopei and the so-called Small Chi-Lu-Yü Military Districts. Most of the military districts on the plain were listed as
[146] Jo Fei, "Hua-pei yu-chi-tui . . . ," p. 113.
[147] Nieh Jung-chen, "Chin-Ch'a-Chi pien-ch'ü ti hsing-shih" [Conditions in the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region], Tsen-yang ho ti-jen tou-cheng yü tsen-yang chien-li ti-hou k'ang-Jih ken-chü-ti [How to fight the enemy and how to build an anti-Japanese base behind the enemy] (1940), p. 71.
[148] K'uo-ta ti Chung-Kung chung-yang ti-liu-tz'u ch'üan-hui kuan-yü k'e-chi tang-pu kung-tso kui-tze yü chi-lü ti chüeh-ting [Decision of the Sixth Plenary Session of the CCP concerning the regulation and discipline of the Party at each level], Kung-fei fan-tung wen-chien hui-pien: Party work , pp. 133–135.
[149] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 321.
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second-class military districts—a rough index of their consolidation and defensibility. Strange as it may seem, the T'aihang District was also a second-class military district. Apparently, it was not very secure because of the presence of the Kuomintang's central army in southern Shansi.
The Sixth Plenum's decision on party organization stipulated that any one unit must not supervise more than eight sub-units immediately below it. Nieh Jung-chen and Lü Cheng-ts'ao each commanded five military sub-districts, the first through the fifth in the mountain and the sixth through the tenth on the plain. The government office at the military sub-district level was called special administrative commissioner's office (hsing-cheng tu-ch'a chuan-yüan kung-shu ); its jurisdiction was the special district (chuang-ch'ü ). Again, the controlling voice was that of the military because a military sub-district accommodated one detachment or brigade, the operational unit of the regular army. Huang Yung-sheng and Yang Ch'eng-wu were military sub-district commanders under Nieh Jung-chen. Each sub-district controlled an average of five or six hsien , at the height of their growth in 1941. Some time in late 1939 or early 1940, all of the regular units in military sub-districts graduated from detachment status to regiment or brigade status.
Below the military sub-district were the hsien and ch'ü level offices of government. Key posts in Party and government hierarchies down to the ch'ü level were staffed by outside cadres. Young students and intellectuals were a majority in the government offices. In Shen-Kan-Ning, more than 70 percent of government personnel at the special district level or above were intellectuals who came from the outside after the war had begun.[150] These cadres began to co-opt and train native cadres at the ch'ü and hsiang levels, while the army co-opted the natives as company or battalion class cadres. Ch'ü rather than hsien was the last rung of centrally-staffed offices. Ch'ü Party committee (ch'ü-wei ) was therefore said to be the link between the Center and locality. When Japanese pacification intensified, Communist cadres of ch'ü level and above would cease making their rounds in the villages.
Until 1941 or 1942, military organization of a Communist base had three tiers. A brigade or a detachment of the regular army at the sub-district level was at the top. Each government office at the sub-
[150] Shen-Kan-Ning pien-ch'ü chien-cheng shih-shih yao-kang [Outline for implementing the simplified government in the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region] (December, 1942), in Cheng-cheng wen-t'i [Problems of reorganizing the government] (The Northwestern Bureau, 1943), p. 27.
district, the hsien , and the ch'ü level organized guerrilla units or regional forces (ti-fang-chün ) of various degrees of irregularity. These units received designations such as independent battalion, independent regiment, cadre unit, battalion, and the like. They were "divorced from production" and could be commanded by the regular army in supporting roles, though they were formally controlled by civilian personnel. They also constituted the reservoir from which the regular army recruited its troops. It was compulsory for all males between the ages of 15 and 55 to belong to the self-defense corps (tzu-wei-tui ) at the hsiang and ts'un levels. As the land revolution proceeded at the village level, the army's complexion began to change. Nieh Jungchen demanded that his forces establish "blood relationship" with the natives. By 1939 he was able to say of his troops that they were "son-and-brother-soldiers" (tzu-ti-ping ) of the T'aihang mountain.[151]
After the spring of 1939, the Japanese forces began to conduct pacification campaign to consolidate the occupied area in north China. Most of the hsien towns reverted to Japanese control, though the countryside was still wide open. Consequently, there arose a need to redraw the boundaries of local governments. Hsien and ch'ü level offices were relocated outside of hsien seats or other large towns. They were mobile and ready to disappear at a moment's notice. Sung Shaowen, who headed the government of the Peiyüeh District, said, "Big highways and riverbeds must be made the boundary between one ch'ü and another in order to prevent the enemy from using [them] . . . to cut off the connection between ch'ü and ts'un ."[152] At this stage, the Communist base governments were consciously orienting themselves away from market towns, blockading them as though they were Japanese "colonies."
Writing in early 1939, Sung Shao-wen was very agitated about the inadequacy of the village level governments (hsiang-ts'un cheng-ch'üan ). While nobody challenged the power of the Communist government, the village officials were still by and large old incumbents. The link between the ch'ü level government and the village was the weakest. Sung entertained three alternative proposals as remedies. One was to increase the number of ch'ü branch offices. But this, he felt, would have the effect of emasculating the ch'ü office. Besides, there were not enough cadres to staff the branch offices. A second idea
[151] Nieh Jung-chen, "Chin-Ch'a-Chi pien-ch'ü ti hsing-shih," p. 72.
[152] "K'ang-Jih yu-chi chan-cheng-chung kai-ke ch'ü-ts'un cheng-ch'üan chi-kou wen-t'i ti shang-ch'üeh" [Discussion on the chü and ts'un class government mechanism during the anti-Japanese guerrilla war], Wo-men tsen-yang tsai ti-hou chien-li k'ang-Jih cheng-ch'üan , p. 43.
was to set up the so-called "newly organized villages" (hsin-pien-ts'un ), a practice adopted in Foup'ing, Wut'ai, and Laiyüan hsien , which amounted to redrawing the boundaries of hsiang . Every hsien would be divided into anywhere from thirty to eighty "newly organized villages," depending on its size. Every ch'ü office would have seven to fifteen such villages in its jurisdiction. Sung concluded that this alternative was no different in substance from the first one. Hence, he finally recommended a third alternative: increase the number of the regular ch'ü offices by one time as many, and staff them with newly-recruited poor peasant cadres. In this system, every ch'ü office would control all natural villages within a thirty-li radius. Village officials were not to be paid, as the scope of their work was smaller. Sung conceded the difficulty of carrying on business with village officials who could not read a single character, but he felt the problem could be overcome.[153]
Tight vertical integration of Communist base governments is striking; it contrasted with the disjunction between local, regional, and national governments on the Kuomintang's side. The CCP had posted competent outside cadres immediately above the villages to oversee them. This accounts in part for the cohesion of the peasant masses with the CCP. There is one important qualifier here, however. During the Rectification Campaign, Mao criticized what he chose to call "warlordism" among his military followers. The reference was to the instances of insubordination by P'eng Te-huai, Ho Lung, Liu Poch'eng, Hsiang Ying, and possibly Hsü Hsiang-ch'ien toward the Center. They were accused of developing factionalism in their strong-holds on "mountain tops" and defying Party discipline. It so happens that all of them had exercised control over a border region or its equivalent. The interaction between the peculiar conditions of a military base and its commander would produce a variety of orientations, as will be shown below. Thus, cohesion within an operational base appears to have been strong enough to give rise to occasional challenge to Party cohesion. In contrasting the Kuomintang and the CCP, therefore, the most salient distinction was not that one suffered from "warlordism" and the other did not, but rather that one failed to turn this native trait to good account while the other managed to do so. While assimilating themselves into the rural areas, the Chinese Communists had to be on constant guard against the peril of being swamped by the ocean of peasants. One facet of the problem was put this way by a Communist cadre: "A main force unit . . . should up-
[153] Ibid. , pp. 39–49.
hold to a certain degree the local character of a given area, but at the same time it must overcome its inherent localism such as not wishing to depart from a place where it was founded."[154]
[154] Kao Feng, "Lun tui-yü ti-fang wu-chuang ti ling-tao wen-t'i" [On the problem of leadership over local arms], Chien-ch'ih , January, 1942, in Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 215.
V—
Emergence of the New United Front
The Sixth Plenum had ended in a standoff between Mao and Wang Ming. Wang Ming succeeded in extracting verbal concessions from the Party which conformed relatively closely to the Kuomintang's understanding of the united front. But Mao had his way on most of the substantive decisions. After the fall of Wuhan and Canton in late 1939, the CCP proceeded to implement these decisions while the war became stalemated. If the Kuomintang entertained no illusions about the CCP's intentions up to this point, it was nevertheless disturbed when its suspicions were confirmed. Chungking began to take active counter-measures. At the same time, the Communist threat and adverse international circumstances through 1940 placed the Kuomintang's continued resistance in doubt. Mao's vision of the united front as a vehicle for the revolution was put to a test. In this chapter we will delineate the transformation of the united front in the early stage of stalemate.
The purpose of the united front in Mao's scheme was to keep the Kuomintang government in the war as long as necessary in order to build up Communist military power. But how protracted should the war be? In Mao's mind, that depended on how much military force was required for victory over the Kuomintang army in the civil war he anticipated. That force level was one million regular troops. Building an army of one million as the goal of the CCP during the war against Japan was first revealed in the Wayaopao Resolution. "In order to win victory over Japanese imperialism and its running dog Chinese traitors requires several million Red Army [troops] . . . [but]
first increase them to one million," said the Resolution.[1] The figure of one million regulars, it turned out, was not mentioned idly or for rhetorical flourish. It cropped up from time to time in Party documents throughout the war, indicating that it was part of the firm political line of the Party.
To fathom the significance of this figure, it must be placed in the perspective of the entire history of the second united front beginning with the debacle in Kiangsi and leading up to the end of the Second World War. In the Tsunyi Resolutions and again in a subsequent lecture, Mao professed to believe that the defeat of the Chinese Soviet in Kiangsi was due solely to the tactical military errors of the Party leadership then in power. By this means, he put the blame for the fall of the Kiangsi Soviet on the Internationalists and tried to preserve the legitimacy of the Party's line of the Sixth Congress. But his stand was not based merely on considerations of internal politics. It also reflected his real conviction as to the cause of the CCP's defeat in Kiangsi. That conviction, stripped of partisan rhetoric, was that the defeat was due primarily to the numerical inferiority of the Red Army.
Mao had maintained at Tsunyi that the CCP leadership had an option to wage mobile and guerrilla warfare but did not take the option. The facts were otherwise.[2] The Red Army was hemmed into an area and was compelled to engage in positional warfare for several reasons. The regular army was mobile and could break out of the encirclement. But the soviet bases were stationary. Without the rest and replenishment provided by the bases, the Red Army could not fight a protracted war. At the same time, the support of the peasant masses for the Red Army depended in the last analysis on the degree of protection provided by it. Thus, when the ring of the Kuomintang's blockade tightened in 1934, the Red Army faced two alternatives equally dangerous to itself. It had to desert the base to preserve itself or defend the base in positional warfare.
Mao laid down as a general proposition that the revolutionary war in China consisted of encirclement and counter-encirclement by the opposing forces. This was because the revolutionary forces were land-bound and could not roam too far afield. The only way out of the predicament in Kiangsi would have been to build several bases comparable to the Central Soviet in strength, and to maintain a
[1] Mao Tse-tung-chi , V, 32.
[2] See Jerome Ch'en's judgment that "if positional warfare was the order of the day, it was a matter of necessity rather than choice for the Red Army," in "Tsunyi Conference," p. 24.
certain ratio in the Red Army's over-all force level to the Kuomintang's.
This strategy would have made the time-consuming encirclement impossible against any one base. Far more reliable assistance than Japan's menace or the Fukien Rebellion would have been forthcoming to attack the blockading forces from the rear. Temporarily-abandoned bases could be recovered before the infrastructure could be completely undone. The CCP did in fact attempt to build several additional bases toward the end of the Kiangsi period, but without much success; and the Red Army, at its height in 1932, never exceeded 300,000 in strength.[3] Edgar Snow put the relative force level of the Kuomintang and the Communist forces during the Fifth Campaign as 400,000 and 180,000.[4] The Kuomintang's total strength in regular army troops seemed to have hovered somewhere in the neighborhood of one million from the early 1930s through the early phase of the resistance. This was augmented by regional and irregular forces.[5] Therefore, the goal of building a Communist army of one million meant having a force roughly equal to the Kuomintang regulars, and enough bases to support this force. This was Mao's distant goal for his next challenge against Chiang Kai-shek.
When the war broke out, the CCP had 30,000 men in the Eighth Route Army. In early 1938, the New Fourth Army was organized in central China with an initial force of 12,000.[6] Starting from a combined force of about 40,000 men, the Communist forces grew to 160,000 by early 1939.[7] It was the fact of this rapid buildup of Communist forces and its implications for the future which increasingly alarmed the Kuomintang government after 1939. It could not
[3] This is Mao's reckoning, in Selected Works , 1, 195. See also Hatano, Gendai Shina , p. 319.
[4] Red Star Over China , pp. 184–185. Hatano puts the Red Army's force level in the campaign as between 160,000 and 200,000, in Gendai Shina , p. 323.
[5] One Japanese estimate in early 1939 puts the Kuomintang's total regular force level at 185 divisions of varied quality and strength. If one takes the median figure of 10,000 men per one division, the total manpower comes to 1,850,000. Shina konichigun[*] no zenbo[*] [An overview of the anti-Japanese forces in China] (Toyo[*] kyokai[*] chosabu[*] , 1939), pp. 26–39.
[6] Ho Kan-chih, p. 330. Authorized strength was 20,000 in three divisions for the Eighth Route Army and 12,000, an equivalent of one division, in four detachments, for the New Fourth Army. Ho shang-chiang k'ang-chan ch'i-chien chün-shih pao-kao [General Ho's military reports during the war of resistance] (Nanking: Ministry of National Defense, 1945), p. 418.
[7] Pacification War , No. 1, appendix III. This map enumerates 140,000 regulars in north China as of November, 1939. I have added 20,000 to account for the New Fourth Army. The map also shows an estimated total of 600,000 to 700,000 irregular forces in north China alone.
Map 9
The Shen-Kan-Ning (Shensi-Kansu-Ninghsia) Border Region, circa 1944
deal with Communist problems without first dealing with the Japanese forces in one way or another. The war became triangular.
Four alternatives were open to the Kuomintang at this stage. They were not mutually exclusive but could be mixed to produce several varieties of policies. The most desirable course was the one which the Kuomintang seemed to have had in mind since as early as the Third Plenum of its Central Executive Committee in early 1937. This was to combine active resistance with opposition to communism. The Kuomintang's prestige went up enormously as the war began. If it could maintain its leadership over the ground swell of nationalism, the Kuomintang was in a position to turn the misfortune to its advantage by accelerating the policy of centralization and unification. Specifically, there was one set of circumstances under which its partisan interest vis-à-vis the CCP could be made to coincide with the national interest vis-à-vis Japan. The Kuomintang could have turned to the counter-offensive as the Japanese offensive ended. If it could roll back the Japanese forces toward Shanhaikuan, it could also compel the Communist forces out of the strategic interior-line. The Communist forces would have come face-to-face with the Kuomintang forces. Any defiance of the united front on the governments' terms would have constituted casus belli . Then the Communist forces would have had to submit to integration into the government's forces or flee into the interior away from the battle zone. The previous government policy of "internal unification first" would have been vindicated. At this stage of the war, however, rolling back the Japanese to Shanhaikuan was only a hypothetical option. After Pearl Harbor, the Kuomintang would attempt to do so with Allied assistance.
A variation of the first option would have been to maintain the strategic stalemate with the Japanese forces while contesting control of the occupied area with the CCP by sending in the Kuomintang's own guerrilla forces. This would also have enabled the Kuomintang to carry out national unification and resistance simultaneously.
A third alternative would have been to maintain the strategic stalemate with the Japanese forces, to abandon the areas behind Japanese lines to the Communist forces, and to wait for a favorable turn in the international situation. If third-power participation in the war could be realized, either in the Kuomintang's theater of operation or behind the Japanese forces (by the Soviet Union), this option could turn into a counter-offensive. During the holding stage, the Kuomintang would maintain the posture of resistance and let the CCP expand. But if the stalemate lasted too long, it faced an uncertain future.
Last, the Kuomintang could seek a peace with Japan which fell short of total surrender. This option was relatively practical from China's standpoint, until the beginning of the Pacific War. After 1942, the Kuomintang inclined more toward the third or the first alternatives. After the Cairo Conference of 1943, peace with Japan became all but hypothetical. For obvious reasons, the CCP characterized any peace efforts between Chungking and Tokyo as total surrender for China. But this would have been unlikely because Japan lacked the wherewithal to impose such terms. Japan's search for a political solution to the war stemmed precisely from it inability to subdue the Chinese government militarily. The terms of peace in general included anti-Soviet cooperation, Chinese recognition of independence of Manchukuo, and concessions to Japan's rights acquired by conquest.
The real issue confronting the Kuomintang in 1939 and 1940 was the relative risk involved in a partial surrender and protracted stalemate. The Japanese terms of November, 1937, were acceptable to Chungking, and these were moreover negotiable. The Kuomintang could combine strong military pressure on the Japanese forces with a negotiation to achieve conditions acceptable to itself.
After 1939, Chungking seriously explored all of the alternatives outlined above. Which course Chungking would take determined the nature of the united front. Chungking's inclinations depended in turn on the international situation surrounding the war. Between 1939 and 1941, the international situation offered little hope for the Kuomintang. Two facts stood out. Japan took all the major urban centers in north, central, and south China, and stopped its advance. If the Kuomintang expected in August of 1937 that expanding the war from north to central China would invite Anglo-American intervention to protect their colonial interests in the Yangtze valley, that expectation had no more chance of fulfillment in 1939. The cumulative impact of Japan's infringements on American interests in China antagonized Washington, but until the fall of 1940 Washington would merely demand observance of the principle of Open Door without showing any willingness to enforce it. This in turn influenced Britain, which became inclined to salvage her interests in China by accepting Japan's hegemony. In late 1938 it began to look as though Japan could enlist Britain to induce Chungking to abandon further hope for a third power intervention on China's behalf. A new search began in Japan for a political solution of the war.
Even before Prime Minister Konoe's public refusal to deal further with the Kuomintang government, moves were under way to establish regional governments under Japanese auspices. With the establishment of the Temporary Government in Peiping in December, 1937
Japan was clearly reverting to the policy of aggrandizement. Then in March, 1938, the Restoration Government came into existence in Nanking.[8] The Japanese Army started looking for a suitable figure to unify the two governments in the occupied areas. The Army General Staff opposed any step that might prolong the war. As long as the Kuomintang government maintained its strong existence, a peaceful solution to the war could not be arrived at by setting up rival regimes of dubious character. The General Staff sought to exercise control over the seemingly endless expansion of the war by defining its goals in China in the light of Japan's over-all priorities. Lest its policy of restraint be overturned by the foolhardy, the General Staff succeeded in having it approved in the presence of the Emperor.[9]The Directions for Adjustment of a New Relationship between Japan and China of November of 1938 were designed to curb any demand on China in excess of Japan's peace terms of January, 1938. However, the dissension in the Japanese government led to a compromise and a non-solution. On November 3, Konoe issued a statement which proclaimed Japan's goal in China to be the establishment of a "New Order" based on cooperation of Japan, China, and Manchukuo. Konoe retracted his earlier refusal to deal with the Kuomintang government, but his condition for Kuomintang participation in the "New Order" was a change in its leadership.[10] Chiang Kai-shek pointed out in December that the end result of the "New Order" would be to turn China into a second Manchukuo.[11]
Simultaneously with the development of The Directions for Adjustment of a New Relationship , another set of terms was being negotiated in secret. In February, 1938, Tung Tao-ning, an official of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, paid a secret visit to Japan. He met General Tada Shun, the vice chief of staff, to assess Japan's intentions after the Konoe statement of January. He returned carrying a letter from Colonel Kagesa Sada'aki, the chief of the intelligence section of the General Staff, addressed to Chang Ch'ün and Ho Ying-ch'in. In turn, Kao Tsung-wu of the Chinese Foreign Ministry paid a visit to Tokyo with Chiang Kai-shek's consent.[12]
In what manner Wang Ching-wei's faction came to take over the
[8] Ibid. , pp. 41–47.
[9] Imperial Army General Staff , No. 1, pp. 575–576; Nihon gaiko[*] nempyo[*] , II, 405–407.
[10] Ibid. , p. 401.
[11] Collected Wartime Messages , I, 134–147.
[12] John Hunter Boyle, China and Japan at War, 1937–1945 (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1972), pp. 166–182; Gerald Bunker, The Peace Conspiracy: Wang Ching-wei and the China War, 1937–1945 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1972), pp. 68–86.
secret negotiations is not clear. By November 20, ten days before The Directions for Adjustment of a New Relationship was decided, Japanese and Wang Ching-wei's emissaries produced The Record of Discussion between Japan and China . Japanese peace terms as promised in this and the accompanying secret memorandum were more lenient than those set forth in The Directions for Adjustment of a New Relationship . It was Wang Ching-wei's understanding that Japan would withdraw its forces from all of China except Inner Mongolia in two years after the conclusion of the war.[13] It is not clear why two different sets of peace terms were drawn up by the Japanese. Nor is it possible to know what relationship existed and was anticipated between Chiang Kai-shek and Wang Ching-wei.[14] The Japanese terms with Wang Ching-wei seemed to have been conditional upon Wang Ching-wei's promise that his rift with Chiang Kai-shek would be accompanied by a revolt in Yünnan and Szechuan Provinces. Wang's hope was to establish a rival regime to Chiang Kai-shek's in areas outside Japanese occupation, thus lessening the impression that it was a puppet government. Wang flew to Hanoi and proclaimed his plan in a telegraphic message, but the anticipated revolt did not come. His understanding, when he committed himself against Chiang Kai-shek, was that Japan would deal with him on the basis of the agreement he had worked out. But without military or political power of his own, he was forced to swallow the harsher terms.[15]
Japan's new war policy was spelled out in detail in the War Ministry's decision of November 18, Policy for Directing the War after the Fall of 1938 , and its companion, The Plan for Dealing with China after the Fall of 1938 , dated December 6.[16] These decisions anticipated a new turn in the international situation which might involve Japan in a two-front war with China and the Soviet Union. Inasmuch as the China war could not be quickly concluded, Japan had to face the prospect of a prolonged occupation while increasing its force level against the Soviet Union. At the time, Japan had committed 24 divi-
[13] Nihon gaiko[*] nempyo[*] , II, 401–404.
[14] On prima facie evidence the Wang Ching-wei movement was an anti-Chiang movement. Yet the tragedy of Wang Ching-wei was precisely that he never intended to be a puppet. His purpose was to save the republic from total destruction by persuading its leaders to accept peace on reasonable terms. A suspicion lingers that there was more to his estrangement with Chiang than a mere conspiracy. Many questions will remain unsolved until the Kuomintang's archives are opened.
[15] Bunker concludes that this was a Japanese "flimflam," p. 105. See Boyle on this point, pp. 203–204, 207, 213, 221. Later Japan offered Chiang Kai-shek the same terms originally promised Wang. The question for Japan was, Who could deliver peace?
[16] Imperial Army General Staff , No. 1, pp. 571–575.
sions in China against 184 Chinese divisions while having only 11 in Korea, Manchuria, and the homeland.[17] However, if the occupied China could be consolidated with a minimum of force, Japan was none the worse for having swallowed it. The Imperial Army was to sit tight on the center of China, controlling most of the land and water communication, husbanding and expropriating the bulk of China's natural wealth and population, and wait for an "internal disintegration" of its government or to "at least reduce it to a local power." The General Staff formally abandoned the hope for a quick settlement of the war, but it was still hoping to attain a political settlement on its own terms. "The use of armed power," the December decision stated,
will enter a new phase after the assault on Hankow and Canton. Henceforth, we will guide the building of new China on our own initiative. We must warn especially against haste. For this purpose the restoration of peace and security as the basic work will be the first principle for a considerable period of time, while various other measures will be subordinated to it.
We will continue to carry out our work to eradicate the remaining anti-Japanese forces as before, but it will depend mainly on the management of political strategies based on the stern presence of our army.[18]
The Japanese areas were divided into pacification zone and combat zone. Roughly, the occupied zone lay to the east of the Yellow River downstream from Paot'ou, the New Yellow River, Luchou, Wuhu and Hangchow. Special emphasis was placed on securing the following areas: northern Hopei; Inner Mongolia west of Paot'ou; Shansi Province north of the Chengting–Taiyuan railway and the Taiyuan basin; the areas along the Tsintao–Tsinan railway in Shantung Province; the Shanghai–Nanking–Hangchow delta; the Tientsin–Pukow railway; the northern sections of the Peiping–Hankow railway and the Tat'ung–P'uchow railway. The rest of the area was combat zone. A minimum force of one army each was stationed in the Hankow and Canton areas mainly for the purpose of deterring a Kuomintang counter-offensive. These strategic combat units were ordered not to expand the occupied area, to avoid small skirmishes, and to preserve their strength. As many combat units as could be spared were to be returned home, to be replaced by units newly outfitted for pacification duty such as independent mixed brigades. Strategic bombing of the interior was to be carried out "persistently," while the blockade was to be tightened to prevent the inflow of arms and strategic material.[19]
The Fifth Plenum of the Kuomintang met in late January. It took
[17] Ibid. , p. 579.
[18] Ibid. , p. 573.
[19] Ibid. , p. 574.
stock of the new situation on the domestic and international scene and laid down the Party's policy. The Kuomintang bristled with determination to resist Japan and to restrict communism. The Fifth Plenum was in part a response to the CCP's Sixth Plenum; it indicated the kind of united front the Kuomintang had in mind. It rejected the CCP's proposal to permit Communist members to join the Kuomintang and the San-Min-Chu-I Youth Corps on the basis of dual membership. Chiang Kai-shek took the CCP's proposal as an affront and a confirmation of its seditious intention.[20] Partly in response to the Communist threat and partly in response to wartime conditions, the Kuomintang was proceeding with greater centralization of Party control. The decision of the Extraordinary Congress of the year before to create the post of Tsung-ts'ai (Leader) for Chiang Kai-shek was augmented by the creation of the National Defense Supreme Council, which superseded and fused together Party and army leadership. Chiang Kai-shek, its chairman, had the plenary power to conduct the nation's affairs with executive orders.[21] Reorganization of the San-Min-Chu-I Youth Corps proceeded under Ch'en Ch'eng's leadership. The Kuomintang took on a facsistic coloration by reorganizing and incorporating the CC Clique and the Lanishe (the Blue Shirts) into the Party under various subterfuges. The Plenum approved the new order of battle, setting up ten war zones, including two guerrilla zones, as follows:
1st War Zone: Wei Li-huang; Honan and part of northern Anhwei
2nd War Zone: Yen Hsi-shan; Shansi and a part of Shensi
3rd War Zone: Ku Chu-t'ung; southern Kiangsu, southern Anhwei, Chekiang, and Fukien
4th War Zone: Chang Fa-k'uei; Kwangtung and Kwangsi
5th War Zone: Li Tsung-jen; western Anhwei, northern Hupeh, and southern Honan
Shantung–Kiangsu (Lu-Su ) War Zone: Yü Hsüeh-chung; northern Kiangsu and Shantung
Hopei–Chahar (Chi-Ch'a ) War Zone: Lu Chung-lin; Hopei and Chahar
8th War Zone: Chu Shao-liang; Kansu, Ninghsia, Ch'inghai, and Suiyüan
9th War Zone: Ch'en Ch'eng; northwestern Kiangsi, southern Hupeh (south of the Yangtze River), and Hunan
10th War Zone: Chiang Ting-wen; Shensi[22]
[20] Soviet Russia in China , p. 88.
[21] Hatano Ken'ichi, Chugoku[*] Kokuminto[*] tsushi[*] [A survey history of the Kuomintang] (Tokyo: Daito[*] shuppansha, 1944), pp. 521–522, 543.
[22] Ho shang-chiang . . . pao-kao , pp. 209–211. Lu-Su and Chi-Ch'a were guerrilla zones.
Yen Hsi-shan, Yü Hsüeh-chung (formerly of the Northeastern Army), and Lu Chung-lin (a follower of Feng Yü-hsiang) were ordered to operate partly or wholly behind the Japanese lines. Intended or not, the order of battle had the effect of forcing them to live up to their earlier demand for the united front and resistance.[23]
At about this time, extensive efforts were being made to centralize and develop the interior provinces of the southwest. When the Japanese assault on Wuhan was anticipated, the projects to build up the provinces of Szechuan, Yünnan, and Kweichou as the base of a protracted war were started. Construction of a motor road to Burma and a railway through Yünnan into French Indochina was started in order to insure the inflow of war material. Another line was opened between Hengyang on the Hankow–Canton line and Kweilin, through Kwangsi Province; it was pushing toward French Indochina. Work on Chengtu–Chungking–Suifu–Kunming–Burma railway was also in progress, as were inter-regional highways.
An important indication of the Kuomintang's intentions concerning the CCP was the adoption of the Measures to Restrict the Activities of Alien Parties , designed to curb the CCP's seditious and expansive activities.[24] The fact that these and other similar measures were put into effect was never made public, which indicated that the Kuomintang's intentions were limited and that it was not interested in escalating tension with the CCP to a breaking point. The Kuomintang distributed two more documents in February and ordered a tightening up of anti-Communist control in north and central China. Entitled Measures to Dispose of Communist Party Problems and Measures to Defend the Lost Areas against Communist Party Activities respectively, the documents were further implementation of the decision of the Fifth Plenum.[25] A third paper followed in March, according to Mao.[26] Still other measures were issued in August and October, according to Hatano.[27] The Fifth Plenum also instituted the so-called War Area Party and Political Affairs Commission in the areas lost to the Japanese forces. It was intended to be an instrument for contesting these areas with the CCP.[28] Already in August, 1938, Lu Chung-lin had been appointed the governor of Hopei and proceeded to his post.
These centralizing and anti-Communist measures were being insti-
[23] See the Japanese view that the order of battle was a part of "centralization," in "Kokumin seifu kaiso danko[*] " [The Kuomin government carries out reorganization], Shina , February, 1939, pp. 221–223.
[24] Selected Works , II, 260.
[25] SW , III, 254.
[26] Selected Works , II, 397.
[27] Joho[*] , No. 31, December 1, 1940, p. 16. See also Selected Works , II, 397.
[28] Joho , No. 1, September 1, 1939, p. 36; Edgar Snow, The Battle for Asia (New York: Random House, 1941), p. 353.
tuted within the larger framework of a shift in the Kuomintang's strategy. The new strategy was laid down at a military conference in Nanyüeh (Hunan) in late November, shortly after the fall of Wuhan, and Chiang Kai-shek proclaimed it to the Fifth Plenum:
Our present task is to build upon the accomplishments of the first stage, to carry out the plans we have formed for the second stage and to concentrate our efforts upon victory and reconstruction. We are now turning defense into attack, and defeat into victory. . . .[29]
He was much more explicit than Mao that the fall of Wuhan was a "turning point." The time for "trading space for time" was over. The Fifth Plenum approved Ho Ying-ch'in's military report outlining the decisions of the Nanyüeh conference. The government had decided to replenish the heavy losses incurred in the first stage of the war, and to streamline and expand its armed forces for counter-offensive.[30] At this point, counter-offensive was a commitment. We will see shortly how it was carried out. But the Kuomintang's over-all intentions were clear. It could not have entertained the hope of pushing the Japanese forces all the way back to Manchuria. It was no doubt counting on further deterioration of Japan–U.S. relations. It was also hoping that Soviet pressure against the Manchurian border—such as the Changkufeng Incident of July, 1938—would draw the Japanese forces away from itself. But in the meantime, the Kuomintang was taking a forward strategy of its own to turn the tide. Chungking was determined to exert military pressure along the entire front against the over-stretched Japanese defense. On this basis it was also dispatching guerrilla forces of its own into the Japanese areas to vie with the Communists.
Wang Ching-wei's rift with the Kuomintang did not trigger a revolt in the southwestern provinces as anticipated. His telegraphic message from Hanoi to Chungking proposing a peaceful solution of the Sino–Japanese relationship was met by a stern rebuff. Three days later, on January 1, the Kuomintang's CEC met in an extraordinary session and expelled Wang Ching-wei from the Party. This act formally freed the Kuomintang from any onus of having liaison with a traitor. But an actual liaison was just beginning. The elation in Tokyo for having won over such a prestigious Chinese leader was short-lived. It was
[29] Opening address to the Fifth CEC Plenum, in Collected Wartime Messages , I, 158. The decision for the counter-offensive was taken at the Nanyüeh conference in late November, 1938. See Ho shang-chiang . . . pao-kao , pp. 209–212, for the decisions of the military conferences in Changsha, Nanyüeh, and Sian.
[30] Ibid.
soon realized that Japan had no choice but to negotiate directly with Chiang Kai-shek, even if it meant sacrificing Wang Ching-wei.
Thus, while blackmailing Chungking with the prospect of setting up a rival regime, Tokyo also sought to induce Chiang Kai-shek to enter into serious peace negotiations. Wang Ching-wei's faction was clearly aware of the double-edged Japanese scheme. Wang pleaded for full confidence and generous treatment which would make for a viable regime in Nanking.[31] But his followers spurred contacts with Chungking in order to beat the Japanese government in the race for Chungking.[32] They tried to reunite with the main wing by using their mediatory role as a leverage. Having disowned Wang Ching-wei, the Kuomintang was willing to wait and see what kind of peace terms he could win for himself. If the Japanese terms were agreeable to itself, Chungking could step in to displace Wang Ching-wei. It could prevail on Japan to accept the view that the relationship between Chiang Kai-shek and Wang Ching-wei was a domestic concern of China. By holding out along the anti-Japanese line, the Kuomintang actually retained a better bargaining position. All of its options were open.
The Rally of Internal Opposition against Mao
As soon as Wang Ching-wei defected, the CCP mounted a major campaign to discredit him. It was designed to forestall the possibility that others might follow suit. For the time being, it remained for Wang Ming and other opponents of Mao to play up this danger. Mao remained silent. "Oppose Wang, defend Chiang struggles" were reported in Chungking, Changsha, and Shanghai.[33] On January 5, a rally was held in Yenan at which Wang Ming delivered the keynote speech. He exposed the long standing pro-Japanese inclinations of Wang Ching-wei and maintained that his defection was but the latest manifestation of an old Japanese plot to split the Chinese.[34] Quoting profusely from Chiang Kai-shek's own angry reaction to the defection, Wang Ming ranted at anti-Communist elements who secretly sympathized with Wang Ching-wei. They said, "The Chinese resistance is a war on behalf of the Soviet Union";[35] or "Opposition to Wang [Ching-wei] is necessarily an opposition to Chiang."[36] Wang Ming in-
[31] New York Times , November, 1939, p. 8.
[32] Chou Fou-hai jih-chi [Diary of Chou Fou-hai] (Hong Kong: Ch'uangk'en ch'u-pan-she, 1955), pp. 73–154, passim .
[33] Joho[*] , No. 7, December 1, 1939, p. 39.
[34] "Chiu yin-mao ti hsin-hua-yang" [New pattern in the old plot], Guide , VI, 105.
[35] Ibid. , p. 111.
[36] Ibid. , p. 122.
sisted, "Such people insult Chairman Chiang [by implying that he is in] secret agreement with the activities of Wang Ching-wei."[37] Evidently anti-Communist sentiment in some sectors of the Kuomintang was almost equal to the anti-Japanese sentiment. Wang Ming was trying to prevent the two halves of the Kuomintang from reuniting.
Specifically, Wang Ming's concern was the increased incidence of so-called "friction" between the Kuomintang's regional forces and the Communist forces. Local military clashes began to take place in Hopei Province in the summer of 1938, when the Communist forces expanded eastward from the Second War Zone in Shansi.[38] Chiang Kaishek called in P'eng Te-huai in February and instructed him to restrain Communist activities in southern Hopei.[39] But the CCP's Southern Hopei Administrative Office was established in August under Yang Hsiu-feng.[40] In September, the Hopei–Chahar (guerrilla) War Zone came into existence as the new Hopei governor, Lu Chung-lin, arrived in Nankung and assumed command of Kuomintang guerrillas such as those led by Chang Yin-wu.[41] Lu sought to enforce Chung-king's order to abolish the Communist government.[42]
For more than six months, between the end of the Sixth Plenum and June, 1938, Mao maintained silence about Wang Ching-wei's defection, domestic tension, and international developments. He was pushing furiously for implementation of the major decisions passed at the Plenum. I infer that two of these were uppermost in his mind. One was the establishment of a north–south link between the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army. The other was the east–west link between the T'aihang mountain and Shantung. What little Mao did say during this period related exclusively to the development of bases. He wrote the preface to Nieh Jung-chen's book, which introduced the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region. Mao extolled it as a model to be emulated elsewhere. To the leaders of the CCP, Mao's essay had a more pointed message. He seemed to be reminding some of the practitioners of "new warlordism" who "take pride in being given appointments by the Kuomintang" to get on with the task of peasant mobilization and base construction.
The decision to take the Huai River valley in north Kiangsu was Mao's own. It is my inference that this decision was made with a view to an eventual civil war with the Kuomintang. Mao apparently de-
[37] Ibid.
[38] For accounts of these skirmishes, see Johnson, Peasant Nationalism , pp. 120–122.
[39] Ch'ün-chung , No. 8–9, May 25, 1938, p. 240.
[40] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 49.
[41] Ibid. , p. 37.
[42] Ho Kan-chih, p. 351.
cided when the Japanese advance halted that the CCP must secure north China and prepare to confront the Kuomintang on that footing. As the Japanese commanders also knew, the control of Shantung Province was important, since it guarded the link between north China and Manchuria. The 115th Division was sent there, and efforts were made to establish a lateral link between Shantung and the T'aihang mountain across the plains of Hopei. This east–west link, however, could be easily cut unless the Kuomintang forces' advance into Hopei could be thwarted. Northern Kiangsu and northern Anhwei were situated to protect the soft underbelly of north China.[43] The importance of the Huai River valley to the CCP was underscored in the course of the Chungking negotiation of 1945 between Chiang Kai-shek and Mao. With American mediation, they redrew the boundaries of their respective forces as a part of futile efforts to avert the civil war. At that time, the Communist forces were in areas far to the south of the Yangtze River. Mao made concessions to withdraw them. The forces in Kwantung, Chekiang, southern Kiangsu, southern Anhwei, central Anhwei, Hunan, Hupeh, and southern Honan were moved north beyond the Lunghai railway and into northern Kiangsu and northern Anhwei. Central China was abandoned, but north Kiangsu and north Anhwei were not.[44]
As in the case of Hopei and Shantung, north Kiangsu was not assigned to the Communist forces. Subsequent events will show that the Kuomintang tried its utmost to prevent the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army from linking up with each other in north Kiangsu. It could only be taken by military conquest of Kuomintang opposition there. But north Kiangsu was behind the Japanese line. Mao's strategic rationale as applied to north Kiangsu was given by Teng Tzu-hui. Seldom can we find such an explicit statement.
Following the outbreak of the anti-Japanese war, comrade Mao Tse-tung formulated the correct line that our Party and army should expand behind the enemy. This was because . . . only by penetrating deep behind the enemy . . . could we enlarge the political influence of our Party and army . . . again only by developing behind the enemy, by operating our army in areas not ruled by the Kuomintang could we prevent frontal friction with the Kuomintang from arising, and avoid giving any excuse to the die-hard forces to plot for split and surrender . . . [and] attain the good conditions for turning the subsequent stage into a preparation for the socialist revolution.[45]
[43] Teng Tzu-hui, "Hsin-ssu-chün ti fa-chan . . . ," p. 393.
[44] Selected Works , IV, 61.
[45] Teng Tzu-hui, "Hsin-ssu-chün ti fa-chan . . . ," p. 378.
As might be expected, the Kuomintang assigned the New Fourth Army to operate in an area which was very disadvantageous to it. The area in question was contiguous to the Shanghai–Nanking–Hangchow delta,[46] the most highly developed areas in China and the Kuomintang's traditional constituency. Except for Mt. Mao, the terrain was flat and unsuitable for guerrilla warfare. Social support for the Communist forces was also absent. The Japanese forces as well as Wang Ching-wei prized the delta and its environs. Behind the New Fourth Army were the central forces of the Third War Zone under Ku Chu-t'ung, to whom the New Fourth Army was subordinate. For these reasons Mao ordered the New Fourth Army to shift most of its forces east toward the Yellow Sea and then across the Yangtze northward into the northern part of Anhwei and Kiangsu.[47]
For some unknown reason, Hsiang Ying reportedly left the Sixth Plenum before it was over. Chou En-lai was dispatched to Kiangsi in the spring of 1939 to relay the decisions of the Plenum. He seemed to have been instructed to persuade Hsiang Ying to comply with the Party Center's order.[48] Hsiang Ying reportedly objected to the order. His formal reason was that he could not leave his station in the Third War Zone without authorization from the Kuomintang government.[49] In a few extant writings of Hsiang Ying from early 1939, one finds him extolling the rich natural endowments of the Chiangnan (south of the Yangtze River) as an advantage for his operation.[50] He was not alone in showing reluctance to obey the Center's directive. Kao Ching-t'ing, the original commander of the Fourth Detachment of the New Fourth Army (one of the four detachments initially authorized by the Kuomintang), was executed by Teng Tzu-hui for defying the order to move north.[51] Hsiang Ying's defiance of Mao was connected with the Internationalists' wish to retain a foothold on the Shanghai–Nanking–Hangchow delta, the cradle of the Communist movement.
Teng Tzu-hui, writing in the 1960s, listed other cases of deviation
[46] Ho shang-chiang . . . pao-kao , p. 418.
[47] Teng Tzu-hui, "Hsin-ssu-chün ti fa-chan . . . ," p. 379.
[48] Ibid.; Warren Kuo, "The CCP after the Government Evacuation of Wuhan," Issues and Studies , May, 1969, p. 41. One wonders how effective Chou was in this task. He made a speech at a party given by the New Fourth Army and agreed with Chiang Kai-shek that the war was in the stage of counter-offensive. Shih-lun ts'ung-k'an , No. 3, p. 3.
[49] Warren Kuo, "The CCP after the Government Evacuation of Wuhan," Issues and Studies , May, 1969, p. 42.
[50] "Hsin chieh-tuan-chung wo-men tsai Chiang-nan k'ang-chan ti jen-wu" [Our task in the resistance south of the Yangtze in the new stage], Hsiang Ying chiang-chün yen-lun-chi , pp. 16–17.
[51] Teng Tzu-hui, "Hsin-ssu-chün ti fa-chan . . . ," p. 379–380.
and insubordination committed by Hsiang Ying. "Comrade Hsiang Ying . . . was afraid of violating the Kuomintang's 'conscription statute,' afraid of the Kuomintang's restrictions, and did not dare recruit a large number of new soldiers in the rural areas, nor organize guerrilla forces."[52] He also showed an inclination to depend on the supplies and pay from the government. That is, he was reluctant to procure them on his own. Under the circumstances, local procurement required confiscation of hoarded weapons and local taxation. Of this Hsiang Ying is quoted as saying,
during the war against Japan the landlord class is revolutionary; our conduct of the united front behind the enemy is precisely to cooperate with the landlord class. Particularly in areas on the periphery of the base we must organize anti-Japanese arms through the landlords. Reduction in rent and interest should be somewhat relaxed also. . . . If we enforce the 30 percent rent and reorganization of local arms, not only will it destroy the local armed forces but it will also have impact on united front work.[53]
Teng Tzu-hui was honest enough to admit that " . . . if one were to carry out a true reduction in rent and interest, it would be nothing but a severe class struggle."[54] This was the reason why Hsiang Ying objected to revolutionary mobilization. He felt it was particularly imprudent to carry on class struggle in the lower Yangtze valley.
Chiang Kai-shek is the representative personage of the Kiangsu–Chekiang financial clique, and the landlord class south of the Yangtze have ties of flesh and blood with the Kiangsu–Chekiang financial clique. If we organize the mass movement, expand our forces, confiscate weapons, and collect military pay, not only will we be blamed by Chiang Kai-shek but we are also bound to penalize the Kiangsu–Chekiang financial clique, . . . As a result we may create a split in the united front with Chiang Kai-shek. This will be disadvantageous for the resistance situation as a whole. We will lose a lot for small gains.[55]
It was probably because of Hsiang Ying's opposition to Mao that the Sixth Plenum decided to establish a new regional bureau called the Central Plains Bureau and to redraw the jurisdictional boundary of the existing South China Bureau and the Southeastern Bureau, of which Hsiang Ying was the head. The Central Plains Bureau was to assume control of areas north of the Yangtze River while the Southeastern Bureau was assigned to handle Chekiang and Fukien Provinces to the south of it. Liu Shao-ch'i was to arrive soon as the new head of the Central Plains Bureau to assume command of the units crossing the Yangtze, while some units of the Eighth Route Army were pushing
[52] Ibid. , p. 382.
[53] Ibid. , p. 392.
[54] Ibid. , p. 390.
[55] Ibid. , p. 387.
southward to link up with the New Fourth Army. The result of all this would be to deprive Hsiang Ying of most of his power.[56]
It can be shown from the case of the New Fourth Army that the issue between Mao and the Internationalists in early 1939 concerned the growing tension and friction in the united front. This tension was creating a split in the Kuomintang and induced one of its most respected leaders to defect to Japan. Many others who shared Wang Ching-wei's antipathy to communism chose to stay with Chiang Kaishek. How much longer would the Kuomintang stay in the resistance if the CCP kept up its revolutionary activities? How valid was Mao's thesis in "On Protracted War"?
Answers to these questions were not settled entirely on their merits, because they were bound up with internal politics. To settle these issues, the CCP went through a period of very intense, though highly controlled, infighting to see who would control the Party. Nothing that was done in the Party at this time failed to have some impact on the final outcome on the strategic dispute.
The terms of debate on issues related to Party building were set exclusively by the Internationalists until the fall of 1939, when Mao began to work out his own platform based on the concept of "New Democracy." In the meantime, both sides vowed their allegiance to the same concepts and same goals and attempted to outdo the other.[57] Both sides vowed to build a "bolshevized Chinese Communist Party" and accused the other of failing to do so. The concept, "bolshevized" (pu-erh-se-wei-k'e-hua ), was clearly connected with Wang Ming, the leader of the Returned Student Group. In 1931, during the period of the so-called "Third 'Left' line of Wang Ming," he had published a book entitled Two Lines . He republished the same book in July, 1940 in Yenan under a new title, Struggle for the More Complete Bolshevization Of the Chinese Communist Party , as a weapon in criticizing Mao.[58]
A whole series of questions related to "bolshevization" were raised and debated in 1939. A most prominent one was, "Is the Communist
[56] Warren Kuo, "The CCP after the Government Evacuation of Wuhan," Issues and Studies , May, 1969, pp. 38, 42.
[57] At the Sixth Plenum Mao tried to set the terms of debate by objecting to the separation of "internationalist content from national form," but "many people" dismissed the objection. Selected Works , III, 67.
[58] Wei Chung-Kung keng-chia pu-erh-se-wei-k'e-hua erh tou-cheng , in Hsiao Tsoliang, ed., Power Relations within the Chinese Communist Movement , II, 499–609. Note that in the preface to the 1940 edition, he affirms that his criticism of Li Li-san was correct, Ibid. , p. 501. His intention was to suggest that Mao's line was a 'Left' deviation.
party's class stand identical with its nationalistic stand?"[59] Another was, "Are internationalism and revolutionary nationalism compatible with one another?"[60] This was also put as a question of the relationship between communism and the Three People's Principles of Sun Yat-sen. When the Soviet–German pact was announced and the Chinese Communists were put in the uncomfortable position of explaining it to the public, the question of whether the interest of the Soviet Union is identical with the interests of all mankind was raised.[61] One cannot dismiss these concepts simply as empty political rhetoric to conceal the power struggle. The basic issue raised in this context was supremacy of Moscow and the Comintern over the Chinese Communist movement. Mao was not quite ready to deny the proposition. However, the fact that the issue was raised at all indicated that the CCP was going through a rebirth.
Naturally, the contest for control of various organizations proceeded simultaneously. Plenty of opportunities were at hand as Party, army, government, and mass organizations were expanding. The manner and speed with which they expanded became an issue. Two important organizational directives were issued by the CCP in the second half of 1939. One was the Central Directive concerning the Party Consolidation of August 25, and the other was the Decision of the Central Committee on the Work of Penetrating the Masses of November 1. It appears that the former was drafted by the Internationalists and the latter by Mao. The Party consolidation directive terminated the first stage of CCP expansion in north China by stating,
Since the beginning of the anti-Japanese war . . . the Chinese Communist Party has greatly developed itself by absorbing numerous good elements into the Party and firming up the basis of a national massive bolshevik party. Because of the very fact that the Party has expanded too rapidly within too short a period, the Party organizations are not fully consolidated and the recruitment of new Party members is fraught with serious errors and shortcomings. In competing for the largest number of new members, the Party organs in certain areas launched the so-called storm membership drives and accepted new members without careful screening of the individual candidates. Hence, many mediocre anti-Japanese elements or temporary fellow travellers have joined the Party, and chances arose for the adversaries, speculators and subversive agents to sneak into the Party. Consequently, the Party organization
[59] Lo Fu, "Lun Kung-ch'an-tang ti chieh-chi li-ch'ang yü min-tsu li-ch'ang ti i-chih" [Identity of the CCP's class stand and national stand], Guide , VIII, 10–28.
[60] Po Ku, "Kuo-chi chu-i yü ke-ming ti min-tsu chu-i" [Internationalism and revolutionary nationalism], Ibid. , IV, 55–67.
[61] Mao Tse-tung, "The Identity of Interests between the Soviet Union and All Mankind," Selected Works , II, 275–284.
has been damaged in its function as a proletarian vanguard, and rendered impotent. . . .[62]
The substance of the decision was that "further membership recruitment shall in general be suspended" and that retrenchment and consolidation of the already expanded organizations be carried out by weeding out undesirable elements. The directive further demanded unity between the older and new cadres, tightening up of Party security work, and good coordination between secret and open work in all areas.
At this time, many leading Communist cadres were writing on the subject of Party building. Ch'en Yün and Yang Shang-k'un wrote in support of the above directive.[63] The best known of all was Liu Shao-ch'i's "On the Cultivation of A Communist Party Member." This essay was noteworthy for its attempt to soften the process of weeding out the undesirable. He said, "We do not . . . adopt a mechanical, absolute attitude. We combine irreconcilability and clarity in principle with flexibility in the methods of struggle and with the spirit of patient persuasion . . . . "[64]
The November directive on mass penetration was in line with Mao's position of March by which he upheld Nieh Jung-chen's efforts in base construction as the model.[65] The linkage between the organizational struggle and the strategic dispute was indicated by the fact that the Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü Border Region under P'eng Te-huai's control was electing the delegates to the Seventh Party Congress in September.[66]
"Far Eastern Munich"
Toward the summer of 1939, domestic and world tension rose, and the united front was entering a crisis. Repeated warnings by Chiang Kai-shek to the CCP leaders in private meetings against unauthorized expansion were producing no results. Lu Chung-lin, who was dis-
[62] Decision on Consolidation of the Party , in Warren Kuo, "The CCP Campaign for Consolidation of Party Organization," Issues and Studies , December, 1969, p. 88.
[63] Ch'en Yün, "How to be a Communist Party Member," in Conrad Brandt, et al., eds., A Documentary History of Chinese Communism (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1959), pp. 322–336; Yang Shang-k'un, "Hua-pei tang chien-she-chung ti chi-ke wen-t'i."
[64] Collected Works of Liu Shao-ch'i , I, 208. Judging from his writings, Liu straddled Mao and Wang Ming at this time.
[65] Decision of the Central Committee on the Work of Penetrating the Masses, A Documentary History of Chinese Communism , pp. 346–349.
[66] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 205.
patched to Hopei to re-establish government authority, had suffered a setback in several clashes with the Communist forces. The government's anti-Communist measures were becoming more stringent. In the summer, a blockade of Shen-Kan-Ning began. Europe appeared to be heading for a major war, and the powers were shifting their positions. Chungking watched the realignment of powers to see how it would affect China's lone resistance. Amid the uncertainty over Chungking's direction, Wang Ching-wei's peace movement suddenly loomed large. Rumors about his contacts with Chungking were rife.
In the spring and summer, Britain's reaction to the crisis in Europe was the focal point of China's concern. Britain wanted to avoid a two-front conflict in Europe and Asia, which would leave her interests in Asia defenseless. While the United States stood on principles and refused to be a junior partner of Japan's New Order, Britain was willing to compromise. It sought to woo Japan away from joining the Axis. Japan let it be known that its interest in the Axis was confined to its anti-Comintern aspect.[67] Britain probed the possibility of "ceasing all aid to Chiang, recognizing Japan's military and economic predominance on the mainland, assuring her access to raw materials and markets, and trying to win back 'ultimate Chinese independence through cooperation.'"[68] The French government under Daladier was similarly inclined. As Japan tightened its control over the British settlement in Tientsin in late spring, British ambassador Clark-Kerr was meeting with Chinese leaders. In trying to forestall Britain from siding with Japan, Chiang Kai-shek and K'ung Hsiang-hsi threatened to join with Japan in excluding Britain from China.[69] Madame Chiang told an American naval attache, "The people would accept peace with Japan if the Generalissimo told them it was the best thing for China."[70]
In June, Mao broke his silence and spoke out on "The Greatest Danger in the Current Situation." In the opening paragraph, since deleted, he stated that he was replying to those who questioned his essay, "On the Protracted War," and his report to the Sixth Plenum.[71] He lashed out at the "international capitulators" and their plot to convene a "Pacific international conference" as "a preparatory step for turning China into another Czechoslovakia."[72] He clearly assessed the situation to be unfavorable for China. But the force of his attack on Wang Ching-wei and other "domestic capitulators" also suggested
[67] Nicholas R. Clifford, Retreat from China: British Policy in the Far East, 1937–1941 (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1957), p. 100.
[68] Ibid. , p. 99.
[69] Ibid. , pp. 87, 102.
[70] Quoted in Boyle, p. 222.
[71] Mao Tse-tung-chi , VI, 343.
[72] Ibid. , p. 345.
that he was dodging his internal critics by shifting the blame for the friction in the united front from himself to the Kuomintang.
The announcement of the Soviet–German nonaggression pact on August 23 took the world by surprise. This diplomatic coup injected enormous uncertainty and complexity into international relations, as the other powers were jolted in their previous orbit and hesitated in search of new orientations. Two new alignments could be foreseen as the consequence of this pact. One was the union of the Soviet Union, Germany, and Japan. Chiang Kai-shek suspected that an agreement according north China to Japan and northwest China to the Soviet Union was then in existence.[73] One year later, in fact, Japanese foreign minister Matsuoka (second Konoe cabinet), Hitler, and Stalin conducted discussions concerning the prospect of dividing various parts of the world into "pan-regions."[74] Matsuoka intended first of all to use such a sphere of influence agreement to fortify Japan's "accomplished fact" in China, and then to compel the United States to desist from further assistance to China. For the time being, Japan and the Soviet Union ended the Nomonhan Incident by signing an armistice in September. The Soviet forces were rapidly transferred to Europe to join Germany in the division of Poland, to the dismay of Chinese public. Also in September, Mao and Wang Ming began to suggest the possibility of a Russo–Japanese nonaggression pact.[75]
The shock of the Soviet–German pact led to the fall of the Abe cabinet in Tokyo. Japan was isolated for the time being and became receptive to London's solicitation to prevent her from coalescing with Germany. Serious thought was entertained in London for reviving the Anglo–Japanese alliance in view of the United States' unwillingness to live up to the Nine Power Treaty. Japan quickly recomposed herself and allowed herself to be wooed by both the fascist powers as well as by Britain. The British ambassador to Japan, Sir Robert Craigie, advised the Foreign Office to grasp this chance to "recognize Japanese preponderance in a nominally autonomous North China . . . . "[76] In spite of protests from Chungking,[77] Britain moved one
[73] Soviet Russia in China , pp. 112–113.
[74] Herbert Feis, The Road to Pearl Harbor: The Coming of the War between the United States and Japan (New York: Atheneum, 1962), pp. 145–147. The "pan-region" idea never materialized. But the Russo–Japanese neutrality pact of April, 1941, recognized Japan's hegemony in Manchuria and Soviet control of Outer Mongolia.
[75] Selected Works , II, 281; Guide , IX, 95–96.
[76] Clifford, p. 129.
[77] Chiang Kai-shek, "Appeal to Britain" (July 29) and "China and the European War" (September 9), Collected Wartime Messages , I, 307–308, 324–328; Clifford, p. 130.
step closer to Japan as the German invasion of Poland began on September 1. On September 8, Craigie requested the resumption of discussion with the Japanese government, terminated earlier. A week later he notified the Japanese foreign minister that Britain would cooperate in an embargo of war-related material into China.[78] France was willing to follow suit in Indochina.
The war in Europe was most opportune for Japan. A new cabinet came into being with a renewed determination to "solve the China Incident first." The circumstances paralleled those during the First World War when Japan exploited the absence of Western powers in Asia. On September 12, the China Expeditionary Forces were established under General Nihio Chuzo[*] to unify all the Japanese forces in China. The new command was designed to coordinate all the political and strategic operations in China in order to bring them to bear on the "Chungking operation."[79]
Mao expressed himself frequently in the fall. In an interview on the day the German invasion began (September 1), he divided the bourgeois countries into three groups. Following the Comintern's line, Britain and France were singled out for harsh criticism for their noninterventionist policy. The Munich compromise was blamed more on their policy than on Germany, which had just signed a nonaggression pact with the Soviet Union. The second bloc was the "German–Italian–Japanese anti-Communist bloc" which was just "smashed" by the Soviet–German pact. The third was led by the United States which also adopted the policy of neutrality.[80]
Two weeks later, Mao's attitude toward the international situation rapidly hardened to a point where it could be called "leaning to one side," to use a phrase made popular later. He felt that the imperialist war had entered the second stage.[81] In the first stage, the war was "non-universal" because some of the imperialist nations took a noninterventionist policy.[82] At this stage, according to Mao, it was still possible to organize an "anti-aggression united front" comprising the capitalist countries and the bourgeoisie in colonies and semi-colonies.[83] But as the war entered the second stage, the democracies and the bourgeoise deserted the united front and joined the fascists. The united front turned "from complex to simple."[84] The world, in his view, was
[78] Nihon gaiko[*] nempyo[*] , p. 129.
[79] Imperial Army General Staff , No. 1, pp. 613–616.
[80] Selected Works , II, 263–264.
[81] "Ti-erh-tz'u ti-kuo chu-i chan-cheng chiang-yen ti-kang" [Highlight of lecture on the second imperialist war], Mao Tse-tung-chi , VII, 33.
[82] Ibid. , p. 38.
[83] Ibid. , p. 39.
[84] Ibid. , p. 42.
divided into the bourgeois–capitalist–imperialist camp and the socialist camp.[85]
Mao's sweeping affirmation of loyalty to the cause of the Soviet Union was double-edged. He indicated that his view was challenged.[86] Were Mao's critics opposing him for lumping together the Anglo–American powers with Germany and Japan—a position considerably more radical than Moscow's? Or were they opposing Mao for writing off the bourgeoisie from the anti-fascist united front?
Mao's implacable ideological stance on the international situation was paralleled by a new militant stand on domestic questions, so much so that one suspects that the former was the cover for the latter. On September 16, he dropped what Hatano Ken'ichi called "the dynamite statement,"[87] which seems to have caused quite a ripple on the contemporary scene. In an interview with three presses, two of which were Kuomintang-affiliated, Mao blasted the Kuomintang for provoking friction.[88] His manner departed from the previously established rule in the united front politics. There had been minor friction between the two parties since 1937. But on each occasion the Kuomintang and the CCP Centers chose to regard it outwardly as local in origin and significance; they feigned innocence in the matter and sought to mediate in a settlement after the fact. Neither side ever blamed a "local" incident directly on the central leadership of the adversary. Mao had observed this rule through August when he made known his reaction to the P'ingchiang Incident, in which a rear office of the New Fourth Army was attacked by the Kuomintang.[89]
In the September interview, he came very close to linking the Measures to Restrict Alien Parties with Chiang Kai-shek in person. He revealed that Chou En-lai had communicated to "Generalissimo Chiang and the National Government demanding the withdrawal" of the measures. He named Chang Yin-wu and Ch'in Ch'i-yung, Kuomintang officials, as the chief "friction-mongers" in north China. He nearly conceded that a state of war existed when he proclaimed: "We will never attack unless we are attacked; if we are attacked we will certainly counter-attack."
Mao announced categorically that the war in China was entering the second stage of its own, that is, the stage of stalemate. This announcement went beyond his judgment at the Sixth Plenum, when he
[85] Ibid. , p. 41.
[86] Ibid. , p. 42.
[87] Joho[*] , No. 31, December 1, 1940, p. 16.
[88] "Interview with Three Correspondents from the Central News Agency, the Sao Tang Pao and the Hsin Min Pao," Selected Works , II, 269–274.
[89] "The Reactionaries Must Be Punished," Ibid. , pp. 257–260.
stated that the war was entering the "transition to the new stage."[90] The point apparently was to restrain some hawks, for he said, "The time has not yet arrived for an all-out strategic counter-offensive, and we are now . . . actively preparing for it."[91]
What sort of deliberations took place among Chungking's leadership in the deteriorating circumstances of September and October cannot be known. Was any doubt voiced as to the wisdom of continued resistance? Or was the Kuomintang adhering firmly to the forward strategy of counter-offensive combined with restriction of communism? Were Mao's militant and seemingly reckless pronouncements based on some knowledge of the Kuomintang's inclinations? One indication of Chungking's attitudes was the action of the fourth session of the National Political Council which met between September 9 and 18. The CCP delegates sponsored a resolution calling for convocation of the national assembly and the adoption of a new constitution, putting an end to the stage of "tutelage" by the Kuomintang. The resolution carried the Council, which was handpicked by the Kuomintang. Chiang Kai-shek spoke approvingly of the proposal in the closing address;[92] and the Sixth Plenum of the Kuomintang's CEC, meeting in November, set the date of November 12, 1940, for the convocation of the national assembly.[93] It seems that the Kuomintang was confident of its forward strategy.
This meant tightening up the restriction on Communist expansion in order to make the cost of the united front acceptable to itself. The method of using regional forces to attack Communist forces, while pretending that the government had no part in it, was viable so long as the Kuomintang side was winning. But by September, the forces of Lu Chung-lin and Chang Yin-wu in Hopei were in shambles. Chungking had to choose between acquiescence in the accomplished fact or escalation of pressure. According to P'eng Te-huai, the Kuomintang's anti-communism entered "a new stage having nation-wide and deliberate character" in January, 1939; and after November "military restriction of communism" was combined with "political restriction."[94]
There were unconfirmed Japanese intelligence reports that the Kuomintang and the CCP were exchanging emissaries in the summer and fall to settle the united front questions.[95] These meetings, if the
[90] Mao Tse-tung-chi , VI, 189–190.
[91] Selected Works , II, 269–270.
[92] Collected Wartime Messages , I, 329.
[93] Selected Works , II, 416.
[94] P'eng Te-huai, San-nien-lai ti k'ang-chan [Three years of resistance ] (Tung-fang ch'u-pan-she, 1940), p. 10; Joho[*] , No. 18, May 15, 1940, pp. 49–56.
[95] "Koku-Kyo[*] kiki no shin dankai" [The new stage in Kuomintang–CCP crisis], Toa[*] , December 1, 1939, p. 15.
reports are reliable, were an extension of the January and June meetings between Chiang Kai-shek and Communist leaders.[96] The Kuomintang probably intensified its political pressure on the CCP to stop the unauthorized expansion. It is my inference from subsequent negotiations that the CCP in turn proposed expansion of authorized combat zone by demanding Hopei Province for itself. In addition, it probably asked the government to authorize and pay for three army corps.[97]
The Chungking government took the most natural course; it took a legal or moral stand. It was the government of China, and it pretended that its authority should be obeyed. As Chiang Kai-shek had told Chou En-lai in June:
The root cause of the Communist problem is not limited to the enclaves of several counties in northern Shensi. It stems from the uncertainty over whether the Communists really and sincerely wish to obey the orders of the central government, to carry out the national laws and statutes, and to behave as a model in the revolution, or whether they want to separate themselves from the over-all state system in a special status to become ordinary practitioners of feudalism.[98]
If the Kuomintang felt that its legal case was strong, it nevertheless acted as though it was not. The "first anti-Communist high tide," to which these events were leading, was distinguished from the New Fourth Army Incident of early 1941 by the fact that the process of Kuomintang–CCP negotiation which preceded it was not made public. Chungking was in fact treating the united front question as a political one. It used its own military pressure in the field. Following the blockade of Shen-Kan-Ning in the summer, the supply of ammunition to the Eighth Route Army stopped in October.[99]
There is a presumption that the Soviet Union was mediating between the two parties to maintain the united front, though nothing definite is known. Soviet aid to China was in no mean quantity, ranging in estimate from US$250 million to US$450 million for the entire war.[100] Moreover, Soviet assistance was stepped up in inverse relation
[96] For the June meeting, see Soviet Russia in China , p. 92.
[97] Selected Works , II, 216.
[98] Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 613.
[99] San-nien-lai ti k'ang-chan , p. 46. In the summer of 1939, high Kuomintang officials began to make threatening public statements directed at the Communists. For instance, Chang Ch'ün, the vice chairman of the Supreme Defense Council, told Edgar Snow that the local Communist administration was "illegal and that the War Area Party and Political Affairs Commission would eradicate them." The Battle for Asia , p. 353.
[100] Arthur Young offers the smaller figure, p. 441, while Charles B. McLane offers the higher one, pp. 130–131.
to Soviet flirtation with the fascist powers, as though to soften its impact on China.[101] The Soviet–German pact was preceded by the signing of the Sino-Soviet commercial pact in June.[102] New Soviet ambassador A. S. Panyushkin arrived in Chungking in August, and foreign presses reported rumors of a Sino–Soviet military alliance though both Chungking and Moscow denied them.[103] Soviet assistance was again active toward the end of 1940 and in the spring of 1941—about the time of the New Fourth Army Incident and the signing of the Russo–Japanese nonaggression pact.
The aid material travelled the overland route through Sinkiang, after the Japanese blockade of South China Sea was completed. By November, 1939, a railhead was constructed from Aktogai in Outer Mongolia toward Tihua in Sinkiang. From there, an improved motor road stretched southeastward toward Lanchow in Kansu. The border checkpoint between Sinkiang and Kansu was well guarded; Sinkiang was in effect quarantined by Chinese troops. The largest Soviet outpost east of the border was in Lanchow, where 3,500 Soviet troops, technicians, and political cadres were running an airfield, arsenal, gasoline dump, and other installations. Sinkiang itself was undergoing development in Soviet hands. In Hami, there was an aircraft assembly plant.[104]
The Kuomintang was naturally acutely aware of the implications of Soviet buildup on the northwestern frontier. Chiang Kai-shek maintained in 1956 that Sheng Shih-ts'ai, a Chinese official in Sinkiang, had been a puppet since 1933 and had remained so until 1943 when Chinese pressure forced Soviet influence out of the province.[105] Outer Mongolia was drifting away from Chinese control, and by 1941 it was a Soviet satellite. The Kuomintang was also aware of the Comintern's instructions to the CCP, since 1934, to expand into Sinkiang and link up with Outer Mongolia.[106] Soviet diplomacy was no doubt doubleedged. Nonetheless, China appeared quite prepared to accept Soviet aid and pay a price for it. That is, Soviet and Chinese interests simply complemented each other so long as China remained in the war.
Ultimately, united front questions rested on the Kuomintang's decisions about the war itself. When the brief period of hesitation
[101] See McLane's revealing comments, pp. 134, 136.
[102] Soviet Russia in China , p. 89.
[103] See, for instance, New York Times , October 20, 1939, p. 8; Ibid. , October 21, 1939, p. 5.
[104] The North China Area Army, Seihoku Shina ni okeru Soren seiryoku shin-nyu[*] jokyo[*] [Conditions of Soviet power penetration into northwest China] (November, 1939).
[105] Soviet Russia in China , pp. 99–101.
[106] Ibid. , p. 100.
and uncertainty during the summer was over, the extent of Chungking's commitment to an offensive strategy in the second stage of the war became apparent. The China Expeditionary Forces reported four major campaigns in 1939. In March, the 11th Army attacked Nanchang. It cut the Chekiang–Kiangsi railway and engaged the Chinese forces along the Hsiushui River. Nanchang fell on March 27. The Chinese forces raised the slogan of "April offensive" on this front. To forestall it, the 11th Army swung northwestward across Hankow toward Ich'ang and Hsiangyang. The Chinese forces, some thirty divisions of the Fifth War Zone command, were routed. Then in September, immediately after the outbreak of the war in Europe, the Chinese forces belonging to the Ninth War Zone and numbering 215,000, challenged the 11th Army in what has since been called in China the First Changsha Campaign. Many of the battles in this campaign were rated by the China Expeditionary Forces as much more intense than those in the Nomonhan Incident. The morale and discipline of the central troops and the "anti-Japanese consciousness" of the middle-echelon cadres impressed the Japanese Army.[107]
The Chinese forces completed the second stage of reorganization one month ahead of schedule in December, and launched the "winter offensive." It started on December 12 along the entire front, but the assault on the 11th Army around Hankow was the fiercest. Before it ended on January 20, the Japanese forces counted 960 Chinese attacks and 1,340 engagements, with a combined force of 540,000 men. If it had not been for the diversion of the central forces from the Hunan front to the Nanning area to deal with the Japanese landing on the Kwangsi coast, the Chinese forces might have destroyed the 11th Army to win a strategic victory, according to Japanese army history. At no other time throughout eight years of the war did fighting come so close to taking on strategically decisive character as it did in the winter of 1939.[108]
It may be surmised that Mao's militant attitude toward the Kuomintang's pressure in the summer of 1939 was based on his assessment that the Kuomintang was not likely to surrender in the immediate future, regardless of the CCP's activities. At this point, the Communist forces were not large enough to remain in the war by themselves. Hence, Mao could not quite base his actual policies on the thesis of the Wayaopao Resolution, that the Kuomintang could be forced to stay in the war. So long as the initiative for war or peace (cum civil war) rested with the Kuomintang, the CCP had to be ready for all
[107] Imperial Army General Staff , No. 1, p. 619.
[108] Ibid. , pp. 619–620.
possibilities. On October 4, 1939, Mao gave his earliest hint that there might be some "emergency" involving a split in the united front. He demanded preparations against it so that "the Party and revolution will not suffer unexpected losses."[109]
On October 10, the Central Committee passed a resolution dealing with the "current situation." The CCP was watching closely the progress of the First Changsha Campaign, the first major risk taken by the Kuomintang forces against Mao's long-standing advice. While the stage of stalemate had arrived, the resolution pointed out, there might yet be farther enemy advance. That is, "if China does not capitulate of its own accord, the enemy may yet launch a large-scale offensive."[110] Therefore, "the stage of strategic stalemate . . . may yet be destroyed by the enemy and the capitulationists. The danger of the nation's defeat still persists abundantly."[111]
What sort of major alternatives did the CCP contemplate for itself at this point? Some general outline was suggested in intelligence collected by the Kuomintang and in turn captured by the Japanese forces when Hankow fell.[112] According to this material, there were three possibilities. First, if China won the war of resistance, the CCP was to proceed immediately to an "October Revolution." It expected to win the civil war; the Kuomintang would have been weakened by then, and the CCP would be strengthened by peasant support in the rural areas. This possibility conformed to Mao's vision at the Loch'uan conference, as reported by Chang Kuo-t'ao. Second, the resistance might end in a compromise between Japan and the Kuomintang government after the fall of Nanking and Hankow. The CCP expected that China would be divided into three parts in this eventuality. The Kuomintang would occupy the southwest; the CCP would remain in the northwest; and Japan would keep Manchuria, north China, and the coastal areas of the southeast. Third, the resistance might still end in a complete failure for China, and the disintegration of Kuomintang government. In this case, the CCP was to go underground completely. The CCP's aim, it was reported, was to work toward the first alternative, but there were strong possibilities that the second one would come to pass. It will be shown later that such alternatives continued to be debated in the CCP.
[109] Selected Works , II, 295.
[110] Mao Tse-tung-chi , VII, 88.
[111] Ibid. , p. 89.
[112] Bureau of Investigation and Statistics, Central Executive Committee of the Kuomintang, Tiao-ch'a chuan-pao , No. 5, August, 1938, pp. 5–10. See also Tada Corps, Kitashina homengun[*] sanbocho[*] koen[*] yoshi[*] hoka jusanko[*] [Summary of briefing by the chief of staff of the North China Area Army and thirteen other items] (December 1, 1939), pp. 8–13.
It seems that, in the event of Chungking's surrender, the Comintern expected the Communist forces to move closer to the Soviet border. The conference of the Comintern's Far Eastern Bureau in Tschita in January 1939, of which there is a secondhand report by the Japanese, was the occasion on which the idea of the "northwest route" was presented.[113] This was a statement of rather broad and long-range goals. The CCP was directed at the conference to expand its bases to five northwestern provinces, that is, Shensi, Kansu, Ninghsia, Ch'ing-hai, and Sinkiang; to secure the recognition of this "soviet" from the Kuomintang government; and to cross the border into the mountainous areas between Inner and Outer Mongolia in order to establish an international route. The Soviet Far Eastern Forces and the forces belonging to the Mongolian Republic were directed to make supporting moves. The substance of this directive echoed the Comintern's instruction to the CCP just prior to the fall of the Central Soviet in 1934. In July, 1936, Chou En-lai confirmed a similar move as one of the CCP's alternatives.[114]
But in the fall of 1939, such a move was only a remote possibility, since the Kuomintang's morale was high. The most likely "emergency" for the CCP was one which would take place within the framework of the resistance, one in which the Kuomintang would "restrict" the Communists within tolerable limits. Toward the winter of 1939, the CCP appeared to be keeping vigilance but not expecting a dire emergency. Some time in October, 1939, the 359th Brigade of the Communist 120th Division, commanded by Wang Cheng, was transferred to northern Shensi, presumably to the Suite area.[115] Ho Lung's forces must have left central Hopei about the same time in order to make it back to northwest Shansi by December. Ho Ying-ch'in reported other troop movements into Shen-Kan-Ning without specifying their designation.[116] There appears to have been a transfer of important cadres to the Shen-Kan-Ning area for their protection also. Chu Te, who had been moving about with the Field Headquarters of the Eighth Route Army, was back in Shen-Kan-Ning by early 1940.[117]
[113] "Kominterun kyokuto-kyoku[*] kaigi to Chukyo[*] Yenan shigatsu kaigi" [Conference of the Comintern's Far Eastern Bureau and the CCP's April conference in Yenan], Joho[*] , No. 9, January 1, 1940, pp. 97–105.
[114] Snow, Random Notes , pp. 62–63.
[115] Ho Ying-ch'in, List of Unlawful Activities of the Chinese Communists since the Outbreak of the War of Resistance with the Object of Undermining the Very Existence of the Nation , cited in U.S. Senate, Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and other Internal Security Laws of the Committee on the Judiciary, The Amerasia Papers: A Clue to the Catastrophe of China (hereinafter cited as Amerasia Papers ), 91st Congress, 1st Session (Washintgon, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1970), p. 936.
[116] Ibid.
[117] Hung-ch'i p'iao-p'iao , XI, 65.
The December Incident
The December Incident or the "first anti-Communist high tide" was confined to north China as the "second high tide" was confined to central China, and the "third high tide" to Shen-Kan-Ning. In retrospect, it was more like a carefully staged play than a prelude to a civil war. Both sides exercised extreme political control, and both sides adhered to the rules of the game in the united front. Politics manifested itself in speech, of which plenty poured forth from the Communist side in the form of protest. While striking each other in bloody clashes, both sides treated the incident at the time as "local" in character and refrained from naming a chief culprit. For the Kuomintang's part, this was related to the fact that it had kept secret the process of negotiation which preceded the December Incident. Not having publicized its demand, Chungking could claim innocence in the whole affair. It could also save face if it failed to roll back the CCP. But there is scarcely any doubt that the December Incident was deliberately planned by the Kuomintang to implement its various anti-Communist decisions made since January. Hatano Ken'ichi believed that the latest anti-Communist measure, adopted in October, was directly responsible for the Kuomintang's attack.[118]
Military clashes took place in three places: southeastern and northwestern Shansi and the Lungtung area of Shen-Kan-Ning. Fighting spread to the Suite area in northeastern Shen-Kan-Ning and lasted until March, 1940. Although the three armed clashes were coordinated by the Kuomintang to coincide with the December 12 start of the winter offensive against the Hankow area, each of the local incidents was the result of mounting friction that had a momentum of its own.
The Kuomintang never made public the nature of the original grant of power to the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region government. Some sort of autonomy was granted by an executive order, but the central government never formalized it. According to Mark Selden, there was an agreement in the summer of 1937 that the boundaries of the border region were to include twenty-three hsien , though the CCP was not in control of the Suite and Lungtung areas at the time.[119] The CCP always claimed that the twenty-three hsien rightfully belonged to it. But after 1937, parallel administrations vied with each other for control of the Suite and Lungtung areas. It was never clear whether the contests in the 1939–1940 period stemmed from the Kuomintang government's reneging of its earlier promise or from its attempt to
[118] Joho[*] , No. 15, April 1, 1940, pp. 45–48.
[119] Yenan Way , pp. 138–139.
retain control of the counties which it had never conceded in the first place.
In addition, the nature of government and administration to be established by the CCP in Shen-Kan-Ning was subject to dispute. As I have noted, the united front amounted to little more than an uneasy ceasefire. Formally, the Shensi–Kansu Soviet was to become a "special region" in the hierarchy of the Chinese government administration, but the central government refused to regard the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region as a province level government directly accountable to itself; instead, the Communist regime was compelled to deal with the provincial authorities of Shensi as its immediate superior. Boundary disputes and the like were handled at this level, while the central government preferred to take a mediational role. There was a parallel between this relationship and the Sino–Russian relationship via Sheng Shih-ts'ai's puppet regime in Sinkiang, and the Sino–Japanese relationship via Sung Che-yüan's Hopei–Chahar Political Commission prior to 1937. They closely approximated China's tradition of handling intractable barbarians on its frontier. The CCP demanded a right to deal with the central government directly.
The Kuomintang to this date remains rather taciturn about the disposition of its forces around the Shensi–Kansu Soviet after the Sian Incident in 1936. In the aftermath of the Sian Incident, central forces moved into Sian as the mutinous Northeastern and Northwestern Armies were transferred out. It is very likely that the central forces stayed on to maintain a close watch on the Communist base from a distance. In early 1939, the government established the T'ienshui Headquarters in Sian for the same purpose.[120] The blockade instituted in the summer of 1939 meant a return to conditions which prevailed before 1937. But, except in times of a military clash, the central forces seemed to have stayed well behind the provincial security forces. According to P'eng Te-huai, "peace preservation regiments" were stationed along the lines marked by Yench'uan, Suite, Michih, Hengshan, Tingpien, Yench'ih, Huanhsien, Ch'ingyang, and Ninghsien.[121] This line encircled roughly the upper half of the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region. It must be noted that eight out of the nine hsien seats mentioned were among the twenty-three that fell to the CCP's control in early 1940. From such places, Kuomintang officials and security agents fanned out to contend with their CCP counterparts. According to Selden, the clash over the Lungtung area in May of 1939 resulted in
[120] Ho shang-chiang . . . pao-kao ," p. 211.
[121] San-nien-lai ti k'ang-chan , p. 10.
4,639 killed on the Kuomintang side, of which about one-half were public officials.[122]
Methods of ousting the Kuomintang officials were identical with those used in other areas of north China. Rumors and charges of alleged corruption and the like were broadcast; then the "masses" were mobilized with the backing of the Communist forces to threaten the life of the officials, who were then replaced by Communist appointees. The method, which Mao later characterized as a combination of "justifiability" and "expediency,"[123] was used in handling the dispute over the Suite area between January and March, 1940, to oust the Kuomintang hierarchy of officials. Many messages were publicly issued to insure the "justifiability" of the enterprise. Outwardly, the messages were polite and humble, but their contents were stiff and uncompromising. On February 19, Hsiao Ching-kuang, the commander of the Eighth Route Army's Rear Echelon Forces, sent a request to Ch'eng Ch'ien, the commander of the T'ienshui Headquarters, asking him to instruct the governor of Shensi Province (Chiang Ting-wen) to remove the head of Anting, a Kuomintang appointee. Hsiao demanded that the situation of "one hsien having two hsien magistrates" be terminated, and he put Ch'eng Ch'ien under notice: "If Shensi Province does not remove [the Kuomintang appointee] of its own accord, then the border region has the right to escort the magistrate out of its borders."[124]
The Lungtung Incident, the most publicized one which touched off the December Incident, was preceded by similar skirmishes. As had been the custom up to then, the Kuomintang issued no public statements. Then on December 10, two days before the start of the winter offensive, one thousand troops belonging to the Kuomintang's 97th Division and local security forces launched a surprise attack on a battalion of the Communist forces in Ninghsien and wiped them out, according to the CCP's protest message. On December 14, two thousand troops attacked another battalion in Chenyüan and destroyed it. The Communist side named two regular divisions and three regiments as directly involved.[125] They belonged to the Eighth War Zone under
[122] Yenan Way , p. 119.
[123] "Questions of Tactics in the Present Anti-Japanese United Front," SW , III, 199. This translation is better in this instance than the rather bland one in the Peking edition.
[124] Hsiang-ch'ih chieh-tuan-chung ti hsing-shih yü jen-wu [Situation and mission in the stage of stalemate] (Chin-pu ch'u-pan-she, 1940), p. 90.
[125] Wei Lungtung shih-chien chih chung-yang tien [Telegram to the Center concerning the Lungtung Incident], Ibid. , pp. 80–84. See also Hatano in Joho[*] , No. 31, December 1, 1940, p. 19; Selected Works , II, 394.
Chu Shao-liang. The fighting lasted for two weeks and covered all of eastern Kansu.
By the time the "first anti-Communist high tide" subsided in March, 1940, the Communists controlled both the Lungtung and the Suite areas. Looking back upon it, the boldness of the CCP with respect to the dispute in Shen-Kan-Ning was striking. The CCP stuck to its demand for twenty-three hsien and managed to get them all. The CCP's margin of safety was small, and it was running risks. The transfer of some Communist units into Shen-Kan-Ning did not compensate for its absolute inferiority in military power against the Kuomintang's regular forces surrounding the base. But the central government did not choose to stand its ground to escalate the tension. Unfortunately, what political considerations restrained its hands in Shen-Kan-Ning cannot be known.
In contrast, the Kuomintang acted with boldness and decisiveness in Shansi Province. There, concessions were made by the CCP. Tension in Shansi had been mounting for some time beween Yen Hsi-shan and the Shansi New Army, Yen's collateral popular force staffed by the Sacrifice League members. The New Army grew up in two places in Shansi Province under what appeared to be separate commands. In the Shangtang district in the southeast, Po I-po and Jung Wu-shang organized the First and the Third Dare–to–Die Columns with "refugee students from Peiping–Tientsin."[126] Hsü Fan-t'ing organized the Second and the Fourth Dare–to–Die Columns, the Provisional First Division, and the Worker's Defense Brigade in the northwestern corner.[127] By 1939, the New Army was virtually independent of Yen Hsi-shan; it was operating as a regional force of the Eighth Route Army in all but name. Yen attempted to reassert his control over the New Army in the summer of 1939.[128] He was reported to have asked for Chungking's assistance in the matter but was met by indifference.[129] Not to meddle directly in "local friction" was Chungking's posture. One also suspects that it was penalizing Yen Hsi-shan for giving in to the united front with the Communists in 1936.
During the December Incident, the First, Second, and Third Dare–to–Die Columns were singled out for the initial attack. The Second Column, led by Han Chün, was in Hsihsien and Hsiaoyi in the southwest at the time, but it managed to break out and flee northward
[126] Ting Ling, I-erh-chiu-shih yü Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü pien-ch'ü [The 129th Division and the Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü Border Region] (Peking: Hsin-hua shu-tien, 1950), p. 5.
[127] Hung-ch'i p'iao-p'iao , V, 251.
[128] Johnson, Peasant Nationalism , p. 195.
[129] Joho[*] , No. 31, December 1, 1940, p. 22.
along the Yellow River.[130] The First and the Third Columns and some regular units of the Eighth Route Army in the southeast were liquidated.[131] Soon after, Communist party and government organizations in Yangch'eng, Chinch'eng, Fushan, Kaop'ing, Hukuan, and Linch'uan in the southeast were destroyed. In the southeast, 600 people were executed and more than one thousand were arrested.[132] A similar attack took place in the southwest around Hsinshui.[133]
There was confusion and mystery as to who attacked whom. Contemporaneously, the CCP never mentioned Yen Hsi-shan's name. It was not until 1944 that the CCP decided to expose Yen's part in the December Incident.[134] The role played by central forces was mentioned only indirectly. After the war, Mao singled out Chu Huai-p'ing, P'ang Ping-hsün, and Hou Ju-yung as the culprits in the destruction in the southeast.[135] In view of Yen Hsi-shan's inability to handle the Communist forces in 1936 and again after 1937, it is entirely credible that central forces carried out most of the successful assaults on the Communist forces. Independent observers credited the central forces under Hu Tsung-nan with the greatest role in destroying the New Army. According to Hatano, Hu Tsung-nan's work was like "twisting a baby's arm."[136]
The political side of the December Incident was intriguing. At the time, some people in the CCP felt that the attack was the beginning of a civil war,[137] yet the CCP refrained from blaming the incident directly on Chiang Kai-shek, Yen Hsi-shan, or Hu Tsung-nan. It tried strenuously to maintain the fiction that the whole incident was local. On December 12, for instance, P'eng Te-huai indicated this desire in a press conference. He was asked whether Chiang Kai-shek or Ch'eng Ch'ien, the commander of the T'ienshui Headquarters, knew of the various anti-Communist measures. P'eng stated that Wang Ming, representing the CCP, had had a meeting with Chiang Kai-shek and had showed him the Measures to Restrict the Activities of the Alien Parties . Chiang's reply was that he had seen the measure but that it had not been ratified yet.[138]
[130] Yen Hsi-shan p'i-p'ing [Criticism of Yen Hsi-shan] (Hsin-hua shu-tien, 1944?), p. 4.
[131] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 42.
[132] Ibid.; Selected Works , II, 393.
[133] Hsiang-ch'ih chieh-tuan . . . , p. 115. I am hard put to know what Han Chün's unit was doing here in this corner of the province.
[134] Amerasia Papers , pp. 769–770. By 1944 the CCP was ready to abandon the united front. See below, Chap. IX.
[135] In footnotes to SW , III, 254. But see also the passing reference to the central army in Hsiang-ch'ih chieh-tuan . . . , pp. 115–116.
[136] Joho[*] , No. 31, December 1, 1940, p. 22.
[137] Selected Works , II, 464.
[138] Hsiang-ch'ih chieh-tuan . . . , p. 61.
On the eleventh when I met with Commander Ch'eng, I also inquired about the Measures to Dispose of the Communist Party . Commander Ch'eng replied: "I know absolutely nothing." From this it can be seen how seriously widespread are the activities of the hidden Trotskyites and traitors. They are spreading all over the country a document which is not even ratified by Chairman Chiang; they dare to deceive the military commander defending the northwest and make secret military moves.[139]
The Communist side naturally attacked various anti-Communist measures and acts in public. As long as the Kuomintang leadership refused to be implicated in these measures, and as long as the CCP went along with the fiction, the CCP enjoyed immunity of sorts. Its public attacks sought to save the government's face. Furthermore, the CCP's stance toward the incidents in Shansi and the Lungtung Sub-district was slightly different. It was almost apologetic about the Shansi affair. Protest messages were issued, but none came from the "soldiers and people" who were attacked, as happened in other incidents. In fact, the southeastern part of Shansi under the 129th Division's command ignored the whole thing and remained silent.[140] On January 1, 1940, Hsü Fan-t'ing collected the remnants of the New Army and reorganized it under the "Northwestern Shansi anti-Japanese defend–Yen strike–the–traitors supreme command."[141] The proclamation which accompanied the occasion stressed the importance of the anti-Japanese united front and support for Chiang Kai-shek and Yen Hsi-shan, while leveling scathing criticisms at officers of the Old Army at group army, division, and brigade levels. The Japanese Army observed that this was an attempt to weaken Yen's control over his forces by discrediting his immediate subordinates and winning over the officers and men below the middle echelon.[142] On January 20, the National Defense Council ordered Yen Hsi-shan and Chu Te to arrange a ceasefire, as though Chungking had no part in the December Incident.[143] The rules of the game in united front politics were being observed by both sides.
Military friction continued in Shen-Kan-Ning and Shansi Province. But a dramatic event in late January suddenly reduced its political significance. Two of Wang Ching-wei's confidants, Kao Tsung-wu and T'ao Hsi-sheng, defected back to Chungking, causing a major setback for Japan. In Hong Kong, the former collaborators released to the press the contents of the agreement which Wang Ching-wei had been forced to accept after delivering himself into Japanese hands.
[139] Ibid.
[140] See, for instance, Hsiang-ch'ih chieh-tuan . . .
[141] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 212; Ho Kan-chih, p. 353.
[142] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 212.
[143] Ibid.
These were Japan's peace terms. Chiang Kai-shek spurned them in an indignant speech.[144] The war was on, and so was the united front. The tension in the united front in the fall of 1939 resulted not so much from the anti-Communist measures of the Kuomintang as from the CCP's own uncertainty about Chungking's basic intentions. With that uncertainty gone, friction mattered much less. The remaining Kuomintang influence in north China, it seemed, could be put to simple test of military might. And so in January, the CCP turned its attention to the north–south link between north and central China; an advance unit of the Eighth Route Army, proceeding south from Shantung, met a New Fourth Army unit moving north through Kiangsu.[145]
On January 28, Mao wrote a directive for the Central Committee concerning the general situation. For him, the danger of a "Far Eastern Munich" was over. Though Japan continued to search for a peaceful solution, Mao was assured that Chungking would not be susceptible to its offers. He noted, "Chiang Kai-shek states that he will carry on the War of Resistance."[146] He judged that for the time being the Kuomintang's policy was " 'unification against the foreign enemy' in order to attack us."[147] Thus he pronounced that the "emergencies" which had been threatening were "so far . . . on a limited and local scale."[148] Immediately Wang Ming delivered a speech, registering his objections to Mao's judgment:
It is necessary to clearly recognize the possibility and the existence of a prospect for improvement in the situation as pointed out by the Party Center. . . . This is absolutely not to say that the danger for reversal in the current situation is no longer serious. On the contrary, what the Party Center pointed out was the dual possibilities for the current situation to reverse as well as improve itself. Under the present circumstances, moreover, the danger for a reversal in the situation . . . is still the main danger.[149]
This had been the point at issue between them since early 1939 when the Kuomintang's anti-communism came to the fore. Mao was arguing in effect that, since the Kuomintang's anti-communism was an integral part of its resistance efforts, dealing with military friction on the basis of tit for tat would not affect the united front. By a strange turn of events, he found himself defending Chungking's commitment to the war and the durability of the united front.
The manner in which the Communist forces expanded, amid in-
[144] "Wang Ching-wei's Secret Agreement with Japan" (January 23, 1940), Collected Wartime Messages , I, 358–363.
[145] Selected Works , II, 436.
[146] Ibid. , pp. 386–387.
[147] Ibid. , p. 386.
[148] Ibid. ,
[149] Hsiang-ch'ih chieh-tuan . . . , p. 31.
tense political struggle and limited war, conformed to the strategy and tactics laid down by Mao in the course of his dispute with his internal critics. By way of conclusion, I will summarize their salient points and evaluate them. Mao's cherished slogan, "independence and initiative of the Communist party in the united front," meant in practice that the CCP would take all of the strategic exterior-line in disregard of the Kuomintang's restrictions. But this basic strategy had to be implemented with prudence; it had to be guided by tactical rules which combined political negotiation with a limited use of military power. The end was to create a series of accomplished facts and to secure the government's approval for them. As Mao put it,
At present there are things for which we should secure prior consent from the Kuomintang. . . . There are other things which the Kuomingtang can be told after they have become accomplished facts. . . . There are also things . . . which we shall do without reporting for the time being, knowing that the Kuomintang will not agree. There are still other things which, for the time being, we shall neither do nor report, for they are likely to jeopardize the whole situation. In short, we must not split the united front, but neither should we allow ourselves to be bound hand and foot. . . .[150]
Each expansion was to be accomplished by following the principles of "self-defense," of "victory," and of "a truce."[151] Each was to be carried out in an area where the Communist forces held a local military superiority (with the exception of Shen-Kan-Ning). To reverse it, the Kuomintang would have to exercise its military power: hence, the "provocation." If the Kuomintang could not contain the expansion locally, it might have to exert pressure at the top—in secret. Or it might overlook it. Then sooner or later the CCP would come forward of its own accord and ask for a truce to legitimize the accomplished fact. Or the Kuomintang might brandish the ultimate weapon: it could threaten to end the united front. Yet each act of expansion was small and limited. In fact, the CCP was confronting the Kuomintang with a choice between two alternatives on each occasion: to split the united front or swallow a small Communist demand of the moment. Mao's calculus was that the Kuomintang would take the lesser of two evils. He implied furthermore that it would go on doing so until the balance of power shifted in favor of the CCP.
The last proposition must have seemed preposterous to Mao's op-
[150] "The Question of Independence and Initiative within the United Front" (November 5, 1938), Selected Works , II, 216.
[151] "Current Problems of Tactics in the Anti-Japanese United Front" (March 11, 1940), Ibid. , p. 426. This, written by Mao in self-defense against his critics, is a summary of the manner in which he handled the "first anti-Communist high tide."
ponents. They confronted him, I infer, with the question: Does Chiang Kai-shek have the power to reverse the war policy and still carry the Kuomintang and the rest of the nation with him? Mao did not deny that Chiang had had such power; his strategy of piecemeal expansion was designed precisely to prevent Chungking from ending the united front. Yet, at the same time, Mao had to deny it . Thus he elaborated the theory of "united front from below," which he had expounded earlier at Wayaopao. He held that China suffered from many cleavages. The most important divisions were between the "progressive forces," the "middle forces" including warlords (the "regional power groups"), and the "die-hard forces." Because of the contradictions among these political forces, Mao implied, the CCP could manipulate them to maintain a loose coalition that favored the resistance for the time being.[152] This was the united front over which the CCP was to exercise leadership.
The differences between Mao and Wang Ming stemmed ultimately from their different views of Chinese society and of the Kuomintang. Mao held that "the Kuomintang is a heterogeneous party."[153] Chou En-lai made the point to John S. Service in 1944:
Chiang Kai-shek is . . . caught between many forces which he cannot master, and against which he can only hope to maintain his position by adroit manipulation.[154]
Mao was saying that the Kuomintang was incapable of making a daring tactical reversal of the sort which the CCP, a totalitarian movement, made in 1935 and 1936. However, in the sense that the unity of the "united front" under the CCP's leadership presupposed divisions in the Kuomintang, Mao was begging the question. Someone in the CCP retorted that "the anti-Japanese front cannot be divided into the left, middle and right."[155] In 1939 and 1940, the proposition that the Kuomintang was forced to stay in the war by the united front under the CCP's leadership had a hollow ring. Yet the CCP was making a steady advance toward that goal.
[152] Ibid. , pp. 422, 424.
[153] Ibid. , p. 427; Ibid. , III, 222.
[154] Amerasia Papers , p. 770.
[155] Mao Tse-tung, "Speech at the Enlarged Meeting of the Military Affairs Committee of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party and the Foreign Affairs Conference" (September 11, 1959), Chinese Law and Government , Winter 1968–1969, p. 80.
VI—
Consolidation of the New United Front
When the December Incident was over, it appeared that the Kuomintang would acquiesce in the new united front by conceding all the areas to the CCP from which it had retreated. But that was not to be the case. It changed its tactics. Anti-Communist pressure was increased. The Kuomintang could no longer maintain the fiction that military friction was "local" without playing into the CCP's hand. The pending negotiations were carried on against the backdrop of another international crisis in 1940. The CCP pursued the goal of taking north Kiangsu to build up the north–south corridor. Finally, the tension erupted in the New Fourth Army Incident in which the Kuomintang's central forces openly took part in the destruction of the Communist forces. When that was over without undermining the Kuomintang's resistance, the united front was consolidated on Mao's terms. During the same period, the division in the CCP leadership over united front policy was intensified. On the one hand, Mao put together a political theory of the war of national liberation in defense of his view of the united front. On the other hand, the CCP launched the Battle of One Hundred Regiments to stave off Chungking's surrender.
"On New Democracy"
"On New Democracy" has been widely regarded as a manifesto of the moderate intentions of the Chinese Communists. In terms of intra-Party politics at the time, the contrary was true. The essay was unacceptable to the Party leadership as a whole because of its radicalism. It had appeared not as a Party document but rather as the personal
Map 10
The Central China Bases, circa 1944
opinion of Mao in a journal.[1] In spite of its theoretical pretensions, it was an intensely political statement, written in the context of a very complicated struggle involving two sets of triangular relationships. One was the CCP–Kuomintang–Japan triangle; the other was the CCP–Kuomintang–Soviet Union triangle. Without an awareness of political stress generated by these triangles, Mao's intentions in writing "On New Democracy" would be lost to our sight.
Since Mao's vision of the revolution and corresponding strategies as delineated in the Wayaopao Resolution had been set aside, little that he said or wrote about the revolution's goals seemed to be fully his own. At the Sixth Plenum, for instance, he conceded the Kuomintang's initiative in the war and promised to cooperate with it after the war. In mid–1939, however, he returned to the task of defending the rural revolutionary line by raising the most basic issues. His challenge to the urban revolutionary line became more and more strident until it culminated in the concept of New Democracy.[2]
In "On New Democracy," Mao discussed extensively the various stages of the revolution in China. He began with the familiar two-stage theory of revolution—democratic and socialist. His innovation was to further subdivide the bourgeois–democratic stage into two. According to him, the Opium War of 1840 had ushered in the stage of bourgeois–democracy in China.[3] China began to be transformed from a "feudal" country to a "semi-feudal," "semi-colonial" country. The Taiping Rebellion, the Sino–French War, the first Sino–Japanese War, and the Reformist movement of 1898 continued the trend until the bourgeois–democratic stage found its full expression in the Revolution of 1911.[4] But the task of the revolution, i.e., to change a "semi-colonial," "semi-feudal" society into an independent democratic society, was not completed.
A change, however, occurred in China's bourgeois–democratic revolution after the outbreak of the first imperialist world war in 1914 and the founding of a socialist state . . . as a result of the Russian October Revolution. . . .
Since these events, the Chinese bourgeois–democratic revolution has changed, it has come within the new category of the bourgeois–democratic revolutions , and, as far as the alignment of revolutionary forces is concerned, forms part of the proletarian–socialist world revolution .[5]
[1] It appeared in Chinese Culture . See Selected Works , II, 339, 382. It was met with disapproval. See The Case of Peng Teh-huai , p. 212.
[2] His essays, "The May 4th Movement," "Introducing the Communist ," and "The Chinese Revolution and the Chinese Communist Party"—all written in 1939—were direct precursors.
[3] Selected Works , II, 342.
[4] Ibid. , p. 343.
[5] Ibid. , Emphasis added.
Ex post facto, Mao designated the Chinese revolution since the May Fourth Movement and the founding of the Chinese Communist movement as post-bourgeois–democratic, though still pre-socialist.
In fact, New Democracy was Mao's declaration of war against the Kuomintang and the Republic of China. Sooner or later there had to be a war to decide the question, "Whither China?" Mao was therefore explicit about the state system to be erected under New Democracy. After 1917,
It is no longer a revolution of the old type led by the bourgeoisie with the aim of establishing a capitalist society and a state under bourgeois dictatorship. It belongs to the new type of revolution led by the proletariat with the aim, in the first stage, of establishing a new–democratic society and a state under the joint dictatorship of all the revolutionary classes .[6]
The "dual" character of the Chinese bourgeoisie would induce the progressive elements to join the New Democracy.[7] The "joint dictatorship" thus resembled the concept of "united front from below and above."
Having sufficiently radicalized the Chinese revolution, Mao nevertheless withheld himself. He insisted that the New Democracy "will need quite a long time and cannot be accomplished overnight. We are not utopians . . . . "[8] While unmistakably subordinating the Chinese revolution to Soviet leadership in connection with the war against Japan, he hedged against identifying it with socialism proper. This was because of his conviction, I infer, that the New Democracy was "democracy of the Chinese type, a new and special type."[9] Obviously having Wang Ming in mind, he said, "the universal truth of Marxism must be combined with specific national characteristics and acquire a definite national form . . . . "[10] This nationalistic injunction stemmed from the basic proposition that
the Chinese revolution is essentially a peasant revolution and that the resistance to Japan now going on is essentially peasant resistance. Essentially, the politics of New Democracy means giving the peasants their rights. . . . mass culture means raising the cultural level of the peasants.[11]
New Democracy was radical yet uniquely indigenous because it was a peasant democracy. In this sense, the concept was a restatement of the theories of "Asiatic society" and of the "hinterland." These two theories had been advanced by Besso Lominadze, Heinz Neumann, and Ch'ü Ch'iu-pai in the debate at the Sixth Comintern Congress, which
[6] Ibid. , p. 344.
[7] Ibid. , pp. 348–349.
[8] Ibid. , p. 358.
[9] Ibid. , p. 342.
[10] Ibid. , p. 381.
[11] Ibid. , p. 366.
directed the CCP's Sixth Congress in Moscow. "This faction," according to Richard Thornton, "favored a vigorous policy of immediate action to overthrow the Nationalists" following the 1927 coup.[12] They devised a theory closely resembling the theory of continuous or permanent revolution which would bypass the bourgeois–democratic stage. By stressing that China was characterized by Asiatic mode of production rather than by feudalism, they maintained that the bourgeoisie was only weakly developed in China. Hence, the Chinese revolution "could not inaugurate a capitalist stage, and . . . a policy of immediate armed uprisings would succeed in pushing the revolution directly into its socialist phase."[13] Without strong bourgeoisie, they also argued, the anti-imperialist struggle of the workers and peasants would take on an international and proletarian character. Ch'ü Ch'iu-pai brought up the theory of the "hinterland" or of the "world rural districts."[14] According to this theory, not only the bourgeoisie but the proletariat as well were weak in China. By this means, he argued for an immediate transition to radical agrarian revolution and the formation of peasant soviets. Stalin, who was aligned with Bukharian at the time, expressly rejected these radical proposals.[15]
Behind this theoretical orientation of Mao loomed his own political predicament. His revolution was a struggle against the Kuomintang's bourgeois–democracy with Soviet assistance; yet it also pointed ultimately to the independence of the Chinese Communist movement from Soviet hegemony. To the apparent horror of his critics, he averred, "We are now living in a time when the 'principle of going up into the hills' applies . . . . "[16] He was saying in effect that, with or without the Kuomintang, he would lead a guerrilla war among the peasants. He could not reveal his animus toward Stalin with such candor; he had to resort to a parable. On the sixtieth birthday of Stalin (December, 1939), Mao wrote a message:
Living in a period of the bitterest sufferings in our history, we Chinese people most urgently need help from others. . . .
But who are our friends?
There are so-called friends, self-styled friends of the Chinese people, whom even some Chinese unthinkingly accept as friends. But such friends can only be classed with Li Lin-fu the prime minister in the Tang Dynasty who was notorious as a man with "honey on his lips and murder in his heart."[17]
A post-war edition of Selected Works , published under Mao's personal supervision, added a footnote explaining Li Lin-fu's character:
[12] Thornton, Comintern , p. 4.
[13] Ibid. , p. 16.
[14] Ibid. , p. 20.
[15] Ibid. , p. 23.
[16] Selected Works , II, 366.
[17] Ibid. , p. 335.
Although feigning friendship, he plotted ruin of all those who surpassed him . . . or found favour in the emperor's eyes.[18]
One must conclude that New Democracy pointed for the CCP a third path between Republican China and Soviet Russia.
The Latest Development
Just as Wang Ming's slogan, "defense of Wuhan," came at an inopportune time in late 1938, so Mao's New Democracy was premature in early 1940. Mao's opponents clashed with him until they overruled him, in mid-year, on some major issues. They differed with his judgment, stated in the January 28 directive on the general situation, that since the Kuomintang was committed to the policy of unification cum resistance, armed friction with it was only of limited and local significance.[19]
Two of the issues that had divided the Party since 1939 were outstanding. One was the last major effort by Japan to woo Chiang Kai-shek into a negotiated settlement of the war. The other was the Kuomintang's efforts to regain lost ground in north China, and its alarm over the latest Communist expansion into north Kiangsu and north Anhwei. A third issue was added in the spring of 1940, as the Japanese forces, which had been on the defensive since late 1938, once again turned to the offensive and struck toward the interior.
Nineteen forty was the most agonizing year for Tokyo in the whole China war. Impelled by the imminent threat of a world-wide conflagration, Japan tried to withdraw its strategic combat units from China to regain flexibility in troop deployment. Yet there was always the hope that one more push with the Chungking operation might end the war. Through November, 1940, therefore, Japan proceeded indecisively along three tracks: protracted occupation with Wang Ching-wei's regime; direct contact for peace with Chungking; and strategic sallies toward Chungking. Japan was disappointed by the apparent inability of the Wang Ching-wei faction to draw support for itself. There was still considerable pressure in Tokyo against committing itself to Wang Ching-wei, a step regarded as irrevocable by many. In January, 1940, another moderate cabinet was formed in Tokyo under Admiral Yonai, and he too sent a personal message to Chiang Kai-shek urging peaceful settlement.[20]
In early December, 1939, Lieutenant Colonel Suzuki Takuji, a
[18] Ibid. , p. 336.
[19] Ibid. , pp. 386–387.
[20] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 255.
Japanese Army attache in Hong Kong, had gotten in touch with a man who claimed to be Sung Tzu-liang through the introduction of a Hong Kong University professor. Sung Tzu-liang was the younger brother of T. V. Soong and Madame Chiang Kai-shek. Peace exploration through this channel was code-named Kiri kosaku[*] (Kiri Operation), and the Japanese high command showed a great deal of interest in it. Both sides agreed to a preliminary conference in Hong Kong in early March, which held up the inauguration of Wang Ching-wei's government.[21] In this meeting, March 7–10, the Chungking side was represented by Chang Yu-san, the secretary of the Supreme National Defense Council, and Lieutenant General Ch'en Ch'ao-lin, the vice chief of staff of the Chungking Headquarters, in addition to Sung Tzu-liang. The Japanese side was represented by Colonel Imai Takeo (of the China Expeditionary Forces), Colonel Usui Shigeki (of the Army General Staff), and Lieutenant Colonel Suzuki. A memorandum of preliminary agreement was drawn up.[22]
According to Colonel Imai, "Just before the signing [of the memorandum], the Chungking delegation received an instruction and began to show disapproval."[23] A Chinese negotiator related an allegory. Manchuria, according to him, was an unfaithful wife who left her husband for Japan. For Japan to demand Chinese recognition of Manchukuo was tantamount to asking for a formal approval of illicit relationship. Why cannot Japan, he asked, let time solve the problem by contenting itself with actual control of Manchuria? In addition to the question of Manchukuo, the Chinese side objected to regarding the Wang Ching-wei question as an international issue; and it demanded immediate and total withdrawal of the Japanese forces upon return of peace.[24] The Japanese delegation was bound by the strong opinion in the Army, which demanded Chinese recognition of Manchukuo and which objected to total withdrawal of the Japanese forces from China. The negotiation deadlocked, and both sides agreed to return home for further deliberation pending a second meeting.
While the Hong Kong discussion was in progress, the Japanese side compared Sung Tzu-liang's photograph with the man who had presented himself as Sung, and discovered that they had been dealing with
[21] Taiheiyo[*] senso[*] e no michi , IV, 230; Chou Fou-hai jih-chi , p. 52.
[22] Taiheiyo senso e no michi , VI, 232.
[23] Imai, p. 233.
[24] Boyle, p. 291; Taiheiyo senso e no michi , IV, 231. Bunker notes that Chungking was in effect willing to settle for the same terms as those originally worked out by Wang Ching-wei so long as the Wang question could be regarded as a domestic issue of China. That is, upon the restoration of peace, China was willing to enter into a secret agreement to make Manchukuo a joint protectorate of China and Japan, p. 222.
an imposter. They decided that as long as the bogus Sung Tzu-liang was in touch with the Chungking authorities, the question of his identity should not be brought up lest the contact be lost.[25] But in the meantime Japan could not hold off the Wang Ching-wei faction any longer. On March 30, the "orthodox Kuomin government" returned to Nanking with Wang Ching-wei as the vice-president—a gesture of deference to President Lin Sen in Chungking.[26]
The Chungking side requested a second meeting, which took place between June 4 and 6.[27] It also ended without an agreement, but it was decided to arrange a meeting of Chiang Kai-shek, Wang Ching-wei, and General Itagaki Seishiro, the chief of staff of the China Expeditionary Forces. The planning for the meeting proceeded on the Japanese side with the approval of the second Konoe cabinet, which came into being in July. It is against the background of this and other peace discussions that we must view the Kuomintang–CCP negotiation in 1940.
When Wang Ching-wei's lieutenants defected back to Chungking in January, 1940, it seemed as though the tension in the united front might subside. But that was not to be the case. In early January, General Ch'en Ch'eng made a speech in Shaokuan accusing the Communist forces of "roaming without striking"[28] —a stinging pun, since "roam and strike" means to fight guerrilla war in Chinese. Immediately, Chu Te and P'eng Te-huai wired a protest to Ch'en Ch'eng. They demanded that he come into the areas behind the Japanese line and see for himself that his allegations were not true.[29] Also in Jaunary, according to Chiang Kai-shek, General Ho Ying-ch'in called in Yeh Chien-ying and ordered him again to stop the CCP's unauthorized expansion.[30] This meeting was in private—outwardly conforming to the pattern of negotiation established in 1939. The content of Ho's instructions to Yeh is not known; but it seems in retrospect that this was the beginning of negotiations of a very different character.
On March 1, just before the opening of the Fifth Session of the National Political Council, the commander of the T'ienshui Headquarters, Ch'eng Ch'ien, distributed a pamphlet to the right wing members of the Council entitled Summary of facts about illegal activities and sabotage of the war of resistance by the Chinese Communists . The pamphlet pointed out that the Communist bases constituted a state within a state, bent on subverting the resistance. According to Hatano, Chiang Kai-shek was distraught and ordered the pamphlet
[25] Imai, p. 234.
[26] Taiheiyo[*] senso[*] e no michi , IV, 232.
[27] Ibid. , p. 235.
[28] Toa[*] , July 1, 1940, p. 11.
[29] Hsiang-ch'ih chieh-tuan . . . , p. 79.
[30] Soviet Russia in China , p. 93.
withdrawn.[31] But the whole affair could very well have been staged with Chiang's knowledge. In April, the Political Department of the 18th Group Army retaliated by issuing a pamphlet of its own entitled From where does friction come? It adhered to the thesis that friction was local.[32]
The Eighth Route Army proceeded to eliminate the remainder of the Kuomintang's regional forces in Hopei and southeastern Shansi in early 1940. In February, the local forces under Shih Yu-san and Ting Shu-pen, a Kuomintang special district commissioner, were withdrawing from the western part of the Chi-Lu-Yü District. Thereupon, the CCP esablished the Chi-Lu-Yü District Office.[33] Its power was still confined to the western part of Small Chi-Lu-Yü. With Small Chi-Lu-Yü in hand, it was now possible for the CCP to set up a political structure which comprised Hopei Province and southeastern Shansi. The Unified Administrative Office for the Southern Hopei District, the T'aihang District, and the T'aiyüeh District came into existence in April. Thus a foundation was laid for the latter-day Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü Border Region.[34] The forces of Chang Yin-wu and Chu Huai-p'ing were also liquidated early in the year.[35] In March, Governor Lu Chung-lin of Hopei fled into southeastern Shansi, presumably to seek protection under Wei Li-huang's central forces.[36]
In early 1940, a new phase in the Kuomintang–CCP relationship was emerging. As the Kuomintang's local and regional forces were eliminated one by one, the buffer that separated the two sides was removed; they began to confront each other. On the Kuomintang's side, more prominent leaders began to make public their opposition to communism. The center of conflict was escalating. In March, Wei Li-huang, who commanded the First War Zone and who was also keeping his eye on Yen Hsi-shan's command in Shansi, gathered ten divisions of his forces in the Lingch'uan–Kaop'ing area and threatened to attack the Eighth Route Army in the Chin-Chi-Yü base.[37]
At this point, one could detect in the CCP's pronouncements and actions signs of a split in its leadership. On the one hand was the voice
[31] Joho[*] , No. 31, December 1, 1940, p. 24.
[32] Mo-ts'a ts'ung ho erh lai (The Political Department, 18th Group Army, 1940).
[33] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 50; Selected Works , II, 418.
[34] Growth of one revolutionary base , pp. 29, 48, 50.
[35] SW , III, 254. In 1942 P'eng Te-huai stated that the Communist side went a bit too far in dealing with Chu Huai-p'ing, in Kuan-yü hua-pei ken-chü-ti kung-tso ti pao-kao , p. 360.
[36] Yen Chün, ed., Chung-Kung wen-t'i chung-yao wen-hsien [Important documents on Chinese Communist problems] (Ta-kung ch'u-pan-she, 1941) (BI), p. 26. Also driven out were Sun Liang-ch'eng and Kao Shu-hsün. Ibid.
[37] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 258.
of those who showed acute concern over the unabating tension with the Kuomintang—the voice which was moreover translated into temporizing acts. On February 1, the Central Committee passed The Decision concerning the Current Situation and the Party's Task . It amounted to a partial reversal of the January 28 directive, written by Mao. The Decision stated,
The characteristics of the current domestic situation are that, in the stage of strategic stalemate between the enemy and ourselves, the inclinations of the big bourgeoisie to capitulate and the inclinations of the proletariat, petty bourgeoisie, and the bourgeoisie to remain in resistance have developed into a struggle, more obvious and serious day by day. Because the power of the anti-Japanese progressive forces in the country to overcome capitulation and retrogression is still inadequate , the danger of capitulation and retrogression still remains serious. It is still the main danger in the current situation. . . .[38]
Oddly enough, however, the Decision added that emergencies that could be expected were "partial and local in character."[39]
The threatening maneuver of Wei Li-huang's central forces against the Chin-Chi-Yü base resulted in a large concession by the Eighth Route Army, which withdrew, of its own accord, from Lingch'uan, Linhsien, Ch'angchih, Hukuan, Chinch'eng, Yangch'eng, Kaop'ing in southern Shansi, and all of northern Honan. In May, Chu Te formalized the concession in a local boundary accord with the Kuomintang army.[40]
The Communists' withdrawal from southern Shansi was followed in April by a conference of the Northern Bureau in Lich'eng, northeast of Ch'angchih.[41] It was reported that "for a very brief period following the 'December Incident' some comrades even felt that the united front has already been split and proposed the Left deviation slogan of 'dictatorship of the workers, peasants, and petty bourgeoisie.'" "The mistake of 'Left' deviation barbarism" committed in southern Hopei and southeastern Shansi was corrected at this conference.[42] Excessive radicalism was evidently connected with the pace of land revolution, disarming and reorganizing of local armed groups. The conference decided to soft-pedal the program of rent and interest reduction and "mass mobilization" in general, as that term is specifically understood in the CCP's parlance. P'eng Te-huai and Liu Po-ch'eng apparently attended and influenced the conference. They were to con-
[38] Mao Tse-tung-chi , VII, 209. Emphasis added.
[39] Ibid. , p. 210.
[40] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 258; Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 44.
[41] Ibid. , p. 47.
[42] Ibid. , p. 48.
duct self-criticisms later for the alleged failure to "mobilize the masses" in southeastern Shansi.[43]
In contrast to the temporizing inclinations of some CCP leaders, Mao continued to defend his strategic rationale and proceeded to implement it with daring and dispatch. The Lungtung Incident of December apparently failed to intimidate the CCP's resolve to control all of the twenty-three hsien in Shen-Kan-Ning. On March 6, Mao announced that the border region government was being extended to Suite and Lungtung.[44] Five days later, he gave a report entitled "Current Problems of Tactics in the Anti-Japanese United Front" to a meeting of senior cadres in Yenan. I have already presented my analysis of it in the concluding section of the preceding chapter. The purpose of the report was to assure his critics that the Kuomintang would not surrender if the CCP followed his tactics of piecemeal expansion. The message was Mao's reply to the February 1 Decision of the Central Committee. But this was not all. Mao gave an enormous boost to the CCP's expansion into the Huai River valley in north Kiangsu—areas to the north of the Yangtze River.
The leadership organ for this expansion had been completed when Liu Shao-ch'i arrived in the newly established Central Plains Bureau in September, 1939. It seems that he had some difficulty in securing Hsiang Ying's cooperation. This prompted Mao to write a directive to Hsiang Ying in early 1940. Though I do not have access to this directive, it seems to have been similar to another written by Mao in May:
The Central Committee has pointed out this policy of expansion to you time and again. To expand means to reach out into all enemy-occupied areas and not to be bound by the Kuomintang's restrictions but to go beyond the limits allowed by the Kuomintang, not to expect official appointments from them or depend on the higher-ups for financial support but instead to expand the armed forces freely and independently, set up base areas unhesitatingly, independently arouse the masses in those areas to action and build up united front organs of political power. . . . The Central Committee previously instructed you to enlarge the anti-Japanese armed forces to 100,000 men. . . . Opportunities have been missed before, and if this year they are missed again, things will become still more difficult.[45]
The Sixth Plenum's decision to redeploy most of the units of the New Fourth Army on the north bank of the Yangtze had been delayed
[43] For P'eng Te-huai's self-criticism, see below, p. 276. Liu Po-ch'eng "Kuan-yü T'aihang chün-ch'ü chien-she yü tso-chan wen-t'i" [Concerning the problems of building the T'aihang Military District and combat operation], Tang ti sheng-huo , No. 31, February, 1941, pp. 8–25. This was written after the Battle of One Hundred Regiments.
[44] Selected Works , II, 418.
[45] Selected Works , II, 431–432.
by nearly one year. Mao's impatience stemmed from two considerations. His scant regard for the Kuomintang notwithstanding, Mao was not deliberately provoking a civil war. On the contrary, his position was that in the face of mounting pressure from the Kuomintang, the New Fourth Army should disengage from exposed areas and get in behind the Japanese lines. If, in addition, the Kuomintang was in danger of capitulation to Japan, that was all the more reason for making haste in building up solid contiguous bases from north to central China. Only by having such bases could the CCP hope to survive the Kuomintang's suppression campaign until some favorable turn in the international situation. Still, Mao was pushing his luck to the limit in early 1940. There was no more of that willingness to carry on the revolution under cover:
It is wrong to make the opposite appraisal or adopt the opposite tactics in the belief that the more our forces expand, the more the die-hards will tend towards capitulation, that the whole country is on the verge of a split and Kuomintang–Communist co-operation is no longer possible.[46]
In September, 1939, Liu Shao-ch'i had proposed to the Party Center that the New Fourth Army be divided into the North Yangtze Command and the South Yangtze Command; and that the former be subordinated directly to the Central Plains Bureau. He had also requested dispatch of a main force unit of the Eighth Route Army into north Kiangsu to dislodge the forces under the Kiangsu Governor Han Tech'in. The Party Center had agreed.[47] From this time on, Hsiang Ying seems to have exercised actual command over only those forces south of the Yangtze. What the relationship was between the Party Center and Hsiang Ying in 1940 remains a mystery. Contrary to the later accusations against him, the May directive cited above demanded that he move into Chekiang Province.
In January, an advance unit of the Eighth Route Army from Shantung moved south and linked up with the New Fourth Army in north Kiangsu. The Fourth Detachment of the New Fourth Army, whose insubordination had troubled Liu Shao-ch'i, had been split into two after the execution of its Commander Kao Ching-t'ing. It was reorganized into the Fourth and the Fifth Detachments.[48] To insure their loyalty and subordination to the Central Plains Bureau, the Fourth Detachment was merged with the Eighth Route Army unit that came down from the north, though the unit designation remained unchanged. The Fifth Detachment absorbed the reliable cadres from the Third
[46] Ibid. , p. 434.
[47] Teng Tzu-hui, "Hsin-ssu-chün ti fa-chan . . . ," p. 394.
[48] Teng Tzu-hui, "Hsin-ssu-chün ti fa-chan . . . ," p. 380.
Detachment which had been transferred from the South Yangtze Command.[49] By June, the only unit that remained on the south side of the Yangtze was the headquarters unit. The New Fourth Army's life was very precarious in north Kiangsu. But for the first time, base construction began in earnest. In March the Huaipei Su-Wan (North Huai Kiangsu–Anhwei) base was set up around Lake Hungtze.
It is interesting to speculate on why the Fourth, the Fifth, and the Sixth Detachments were west of the Tientsin–Pukow railway in 1939 and 1940. The area to the west of this railway included western Anhwei and eastern Honan, directly south of Hopei and Shansi Provinces. When the battle line was stabilized at the end of 1938, the Japanese forces took most of Shansi and both banks of the Yangtze up to Wuhan but left the area lying between them unoccupied. This area constituted a great loop of the Kuomintang's forward line inserted between north and central China. Northern Honan and southern Shansi was the First War Zone, the remainder of Honan and Anhwei belonged to the Fifth War Zone commanded by Kwangsi warlord Li Tsung-jen. In Communist documents, the area was referred to as the Yü-Wan-Su (Honan–Anhwei–Kiangsu) Border Region through 1939. The term disappeared after the local truce and boundary agreement between Chu Te and Wei Li-huang in May, 1940, by which the CCP abandoned northern Honan.[50] The official map of the CCP for the resistance period does not include the area as anti-Japanese bases.[51] But in 1939, and well into 1940, some leading cadres of the CCP expected the Japanese forces to advance westward from the Tientsin–Pukow railway to occupy the area. During the strategic dispute in 1938, Mao himself predicted that the Japanese forces would occupy the area east of the line connecting Lanchow, Wuhan, and Canton.[52] P'eng Hsüehfen, an officer of the Eighth Route Army and admirer of P'eng Te-huai, was dispatched south from Shansi into northern Honan to build a base around K'aifeng in 1938.[53] He disobeyed Liu Shao-ch'i's order to move eastward because of his belief that the Japanese forces would move farther westward. The main force of his unit did not move east until it was seriously mauled by the Kwangsi army in 1941.[54]
This pointed up a problem which was likely to have been raised among the CCP leadership. The principle that the Communist forces should move in behind the Japanese lines to avoid unnecessary friction with the Kuomintang forces had better applicability in north
[49] Ibid. , pp. 381, 385.
[50] Growth of one revolutionary base , pp. 6–7.
[51] See map 2.
[52] Selected Works , II, 137.
[53] Hung-ch'i p'iao-p'iao , V, 161.
[54] Central China Bureau First Plenum , pp. 44–45, 95–100.
China than in central China. The Japanese Army had permanent designs in north China and sought to eliminate all opposition. In central China, with the exception of the Nanking–Shanghai–Hangchow delta, the mission of the Japanese forces was strategic deterrence of the Kuomintang's central forces. Most of the areas that lay behind the Japanese forces were combat zones rather than pacification zones. Moreover, north Kiangsu was the boundary of jurisdiction between the North China Area Army and the 13th Army, which was directly under the command of the China Expeditionary Forces. Pacification campaigns in north Kiangsu were sporadic, less intense, and not well coordinated. The first one did not come until September, 1940.[55] Hence, the central forces of the Fifth War Zone were capable of backing up the regional forces under Han Te-ch'in and Li P'in-hsien, governors of Kiangsu and Anhwei respectively, without much fear of running into Japanese reaction in the areas east of the Tientsin–Pukow railway.[56]
In addition, the fact that the CCP did not move into north Kiangsu until 1940 added to its difficulty. By then, the Kuomintang side was fully prepared to thwart unauthorized Communist expansion by military means. If north Kiangsu was to be taken, it was certain to be accompanied by outright military confrontation on an unprecedented scale. The tension began to rise in March as the Fourth, the Fifth, and the Sixth Detachments moved eastward against the western border of Kiangsu. Han Te-ch'in and Yü Hsüeh-chung of the Shantung–Kiangsu War Zone had a force numbering 60,000 to 70,000.[57] In April, a division and a brigade of Han's force besieged the headquarters of a New Fourth Army's "division" and a training unit east of the Tientsin–Pukow railway for two weeks before being driven back by rescue forces.[58] On the west side of the railway, the Kwangsi forces were pressing against the New Fourth Army units of Chang Yün-i, P'eng Hsüeh-fen, and Li Hsien-nien.[59] Then in June, landlords of Hsüi, Laian, T'iench'ang, and Liuho—south of Lake Kaoyu—carried out an insurrection against the Communists,[60] while Han Te-ch'in ordered fourteen regiments to attack the Communist forces in Kaots'un
[55] Teng Tzu-hui, "Hsin-ssu-chün ti fa-chan . . . , " p. 395.
[56] This was the reason why Liu Shao-chi asked for the dispatch of the Eighth Route Army's main force unit. Ibid. , p. 394.
[57] Johnson, Peasant Nationalism , p. 133.
[58] Ch'en I, Wan-nan shih-pien ti chen-hsiang [The truth about the Southern Anhwei Incident] (Report to Col. David D. Barrett, U.S. Army Observer Section, August, 1944) (Hoover), p. 9.
[59] Selected Works , II, 453.
[60] Teng Tzu-hui, "Hsin-ssu-chün ti fa-chan . . . ," p. 386.
on the border of Chiangtu and T'aihsien.[61] At the same time, the South Yangtze Command moved across the river to escape the pressure from Ku Chu-t'ung's attack. Shortly thereafter, the remainder of the Eighth Route Army unit, three brigades of the Fifth Column, moved into north Kiangsu. In early fall, Han assembled the largest force totalling 25,000 men against 7,000 Communist troops at Huangch'iao in T'aihsing.[62]
The deteriorating domestic and international circumstances in the summer were clearly at odds with the foolhardiness implied in Mao's "On New Democracy." The CCP was not in a position to force the Kuomintang to swallow the revolution cum resistance by mobilizing a "joint dictatorship of several revolutionary classes" from below, nor was it as yet strong enough to forego the united front with the Kuomintang by "going up into the hills." It is my inference that the Internationalists and some generals rallied against Mao again. It must have appeared to them far wiser to forego an immediate territorial gain and avoid the seemingly inevitable military confrontation. Chang Went'ien indicated this view when he said in August,
the danger of the Left deviation manifests itself in the wavering of the anti-Japanese united front policy. There are some comrades in the Party who think that the united front is necessary only when the national situation is favorable but unnecessary when the national situation turns unfavorable. In certain areas some comrades have completely forgotten about united front work while carrying out the anti-friction struggle with the die-hards. Some even carry on the struggle so that the united front period will quickly pass away and the days of land revolution will quickly arrive. In this, moreover, they feel elated.[63]
He conceded that struggle within the united front was unavoidable, but it was "only for the purpose of expanding and consolidating the united front, not for the sake of splitting or destroying it."[64] It was one thing to fight in self-defense but something else to provoke a fight.
To be sure, one also finds Mao warning in March: "At the moment the 'Left' tendency . . . is the most serious danger."[65] This directive ordered the establishment of the so-called Three-thirds system which marked the turn toward liberalization in the administration of the Communist bases, as will be shown later. But the Three-thirds system was applied only in areas where Communist political power was well
[61] Wan-nan-shih-pien ti chen-hsiang , p. 9.
[62] Ibid. , p. 10.
[63] Lo Fu, "K'ang-Jih min-tsu t'ung-i chan-hsien-chung ti tso-ch'ing wei-hsien" [Left deviation danger in the anti-Japanese national united front] (August 10, 1940), in Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 452–453.
[64] Ibid. , p. 453.
[65] Selected Works , II, 418.
consolidated and beyond any challenge. It had no application in areas which were militarily contested by the Kuomintang and the CCP—areas which were most likely to give rise to friction.
The residual influence of the Comintern, too, was brought to bear in support of closer cooperation with the Kuomintang. On February 22, according to Japanese sources, the Far Eastern Bureau of the Comintern met in Tschita again. With twenty-seven Asian members attending, the Bureau directed the CCP to oppose the peace movement and to step up its war efforts in coordination with Chungking's counter-offensive.[66] The previous directive, reported by the Japanese source, made a similar demand on the Chinese Communists in January of 1939.[67] A lively debate was no doubt under way among the Communist leaders concerning the desirability of a large-scale offensive against the Japanese. The debate was focused on the impact of the new Japanese offensive on the sagging will of the Kuomintang.
The limited offensive undertaken by the China Expeditionary Forces in 1940 was the direct result of the amazing aggressiveness exhibited by the Chinese forces in the winter offensive of December and January. It indicated that Japan's own protracted war—holding the line and exerting political pressure on Chungking—was producing no result. Contrary to earlier expectations, an equivalent of nine divisions had to be added to the China theater by the end of 1939 to make for a total force of thirty-five divisions.[68] Clearly the existing policy was not a solution for defense against the Soviet Union nor for the China Incident. Again, the Operations Division of the Army General Staff put forth a proposal for a large-scale withdrawal from China in December, 1939. Field commanders advised an aggressive scheme to go for Chungking once more before the proposed reduction in force level. The Army supported the plan for a last offensive in the fall of 1940, followed by a reduction in early 1941.[69] In April, the 11th Army, which had borne the brunt of the winter offensive, was ordered to launch the Ich'ang Operation in May and June. There were plans for the Hunan Operation aimed at taking Kweilin and an operation to take the Peiping–Hankow railway in Honan. In addition, a plan was discussed to augment the forces in Nanning with five additional divisions to advance on Kunming, in order to cut the route between Yünan and French Indochina.[70] Ich'ang was taken on June 12. In order to assist
[66] "Soren no kyokuto[*] sekika shirei" [Soviet directive on communizing the Far East], Shina , April, 1940, pp. 186–187.
[67] Joho[*] , No. 9, January 1, 1940, pp. 97–105.
[68] Imperial Army General Staff , No. 1, p. 622.
[69] Ibid. , pp. 626–628.
[70] Taiheiyo[*] senso[*] e no michi , IV, 66.
the Kiri Operation which was under way, the 11th Army remained poised against Chungking.
The Shift in Local Balance of Power
Besides watching the ominous move of the Japanese strategic combat units up the Yangtze in the spring and summer of 1940 and gauging its impact on Chungking, the Chinese Communist leaders had another development on their minds. It concerned the balance of power between the Japanese and themselves.
When the North China Area Army launched the pacification program in early 1939, it paid little attention to the partisan affiliation of the enemy—Kuomintang or Communist. The Eighth Route Army was less numerous then and less of a threat than the non-Communist irregular forces. As the year wore on, the Chinese side enacted armed skirmishes in the Japanese presence while intelligence reports of crisis in the united front circulated. On many occasions, both the Kuomintang and the Communist forces sought to pit each other against the Japanese forces. The Japanese forces in turn learned to exploit the situation.
By the end of 1939, it was apparent to the North China Area Army that the Eighth Route Army posed by far the greatest threat in the long run, while other Chinese forces could be used for its own purpose. Usually a sizable victory in pacification involved Kuomintang units, and the vacuum thus created was filled by the Communist forces. The Japanese forces were indirectly aiding Communist expansion in areas which they could sweep but could not hold. The custom developed of leaving alone the Kuomintang units which were simply subsisting in the countryside without showing active hostility. The more irregular non-Communist units also began to seek Japanese protection against attack by the Communist forces. In the fall of 1939 the Area Army decided to place emphasis on finer discrimination among the enemies: the Eighth Route Army became the major target. This was formalized in a policy laid down in March, 1940. The new program stated, " . . . for the foreseeable future in areas where the Imperial Army's power cannot be extended, take initiative in tacitly recognizing the presence of irregular forces which do not resist the Imperial Army. If necessary they may be induced to occuy [an area] temporarily and be used for preventing the clandestine entry of the Communist forces."[71]
[71] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 268.
Table 7 gives statistics of defection compiled by the North China Area Army between August, 1939, and November, 1940. The figures reported are incomplete. Units listed here as defectors are those which formally announced it; the table does not include those units whose attitude was uncertain or those which defected to smaller Japanese units in outlying areas. The value of the table is in what it shows about the long-term trend and the probable causes which lie behind it. There was an increase in over-all defection after December of 1939 and a sudden jump in March and April of 1940. Early defections could be related to the disintegration of the Kuomintang forces under Lu Chung-lin, Chang Yin-wu, and Chu Huai-P'ing in the spring of 1940. The Mongolian Garrison Army carried out a large-scale campaign between January and March, which might account for the large defection in March. But the important factor behind the large defection in March and April was the emergence of the Wang Ching-wei government in Nanking. When the Kuomintang's winter offensive was over and the real stalemate began, a general decline in morale and anti-Japanese sentiment was reported. Hard pressed between the Japanese and the Communist forces, the irregular local units found in Wang Ching-wei a means of achieving security without losing face.[72] The next wave of defection in August might well have been related to the squeeze on the non-Communist forces, as the Eighth Route Army wheeled into position for the Battle of One Hundred Regiments offensive. The increase in November could be accounted for by the Japanese counter-offensive.
At the time of the reporting, there was no defection from among the Chinese regular forces. The central forces seldom defected throughout the war. Defectors came from regional or local forces. Political reliability and quality of these troops were low. "Part of the defecting troops usually revolt and desert after several months," it was reported.[73] Desertion from the Japanese side at this time was ascribed not to the policies of the Chinese side to win them back but to the lack of a maintenance fund on the Japanese side. After the spring of 1940, the major problem for the Japanese forces in handling defection was the sheer number of defectors. The North China Area Army was not prepared to accept them. "It is impossible to count the number of units which are simply left alone because of our army's inability to accommodate them," it was stated.[74] All defecting units expected to continue their existence on Japanese pay. At the time of reporting in January 1941, some Chinese units were negotiating for better terms
[72] Ibid. , pp. 485–486.
[73] Ibid. , p. 485.
[74] Ibid. , p. 490.
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and pay. Some were located in areas which were in the way of Japanese operations and had to be relocated. Some units which definitely wished to defect were restrained by the presence of another Chinese unit in their vicinity.[75] The report stated that the majority of armed groups in the occupied areas other than the Communist forces were willing to defect.
The units which had been in touch with the Japanese forces since the spring of 1940 and could be regarded as potential defectors included: (1) Shih Yu-san's unit in south central Hopei, 70,000; (2) Sun T'ien-ying's unit in southeastern Shansi, 40,000; (3) Mou Ch'eng-liu's unit in southeastern Shantung, 20,000; and (4) Feng Shou-p'eng's unit in southwestern Shantung, 20,000. The total of Chinese troops which were in some sort of liaison with the Japanese forces in early 1940 was estimated to be in the neighborhood of 300,000.[76] At the top of the whole group, and much more cautious in revealing their political intentions, were the two war zone commanders: Yen Hsi-shan of Shansi and Yü Hsüeh-chung of Shantung–Kiangsu War Zone. They had been, the report said, "giving us an eye of late although they are as yet at the stage of sending secret emissaries to probe our intentions."[77]
It is worthwhile to study the profile of some of these units to better appreciate the war conditions in north China. Of the countless groups of bandit cum tsap'ai (irregular) forces that had dotted China's countryside during the war and that had vanished since, there is virtually no record, as both the Kuomintang and the Communists despised them. Liu Kuei-t'ang was an exception. He came from a background of "green forest" or banditry. It seemed that he went to Manchuria from his native place in Shantung as a coolie and joined Chang Tso-lin's army, which was indistinguishable at lower echelons from local bandits of Manchuria, usually skilled horsemen. Under Chang Tsung-ch'ang, one of Chang Tso-lin's generals, Liu was a leader of a sizable contingent by 1932, when Chang Tsung-ch'ang switched his loyalty to the Japanese side.
The Kuantung Army was having a difficult time eradicating the disruptions created by sundry groups of native popular forces, especially in Liaotung Peninsula and Jehol Province where these groups became extremely politicized because of proximity to north China. The Kuantung Army enlisted the native armed groups into the Kenkoku dainigun (National Construction Second Army), founded in 1932, as a regional force of its own. Its leadership and liaison with
[75] Ibid.
[76] Ibid. , pp. 489–490.
[77] Ibid. , p. 486.
the Kuantung Army was provided by a band of Japanese soldiers of fortune (ronin[*] ). Date Junnosuke, sworn to brotherhood with Chang Tsung-ch'ang and calling himself Chang Tsung-yüan, commanded the Kenkoku dainigun .[78] Not much is known of the activities in which this self-appointed friend of the Chinese people and his unit had engaged on both sides of the Great Wall in the turbulent days preceding the Lukouchiao Incident.
Apparently with the secret support of the Kuantung Army, Pai Chien-wu, Liu Kuei-t'ang, and Shih Yu-san had put together a ragtag force calling itself Tung-ya t'ung-meng tzu-chih-chün (East Asian League Autonomous Army) in 1935. In June, the Umezu-Ho Ying-ch'in Agreement was signed, and the Kuomintang forces that were to be forced out of Hopei were disgruntled. On July 27, Pai Chien-wu's group attempted a coup in Peiping.[79] Their plan was to bribe the troops of Yü Hsüeh-chung and Wan Fu-lin to side with them in an anti-Chiang uprising. Date's forces, too, prepared to join the event but did not have the opportunity.[80] The bribery attempt was discovered prematurely and obstructed. Thereupon, Pai Chien-wu with one hundred men robbed an armored train and headed toward Peiping, but was soon subdued by Shang Chen's (Kuomintang) forces.
The outbreak of the war removed the restraining hand of the Tientsin Garrison command, as it was incorporated into the North China Area Army. In January 1938, Terauchi Hisaichi, the new commander, asked Date to organize the Shantung tzu-chih lien-chün (Shantung Autonomous United Army) to help the Japanese forces occupy the province. Date and Liu Kuei-t'ang, who had been plotting to instigate a mutiny among Han Fu-ch'ü's forces for some time, proceeded to Tsinan. It is said, however, that officers of the Japanese Fifth Division which occupied Shantung resented the seeming popularity of Date's mixed contingent, and finally disbanded it in 1940.[81] But Date's former comrades continued their gray existence on their own. Liu Kuei-t'ang carved out a small territory in southern Shantung and, according to Communist sources, served concurrently as the commander of the Tenth (puppet) Army and of the Kuomintang's New 36th Division.[82] The Japanese 12th Army continued to use Liu for
[78] Watanabe Ryusaku[*] , Bazoku: Nitchu[*] senso[*] shi no sokumen [Mounted bandits: a side history of the Sino–Japanese War] (Tokyo: Chuo[*] koron-sha[*] , 1964), pp. 81–82, 128–129.
[79] Taiheiyo[*] senso e no michi , III, 144–145.
[80] Tuzuki Shichiro[*] , Date Junnosuke no ayunda michi [The life of Date Junnosuke] (Tokyo: Taisei shinbunsha, 1964), pp. 182, 202.
[81] Bazoku , p. 174; Date Junnosuke , pp. 210, 215–216.
[82] Hsing-huo liao-yüan , VII, 274–275; Hung-ch'i p'iao-p'iao , VI, 215.
liaison with Yü Hsüeh-chung.[83] Judging from the write-ups in Communist memoirs, Liu's activities presented serious problems for the Eighth Route Army in the Southern Shantung Military Sub-district. Being more native than the Communists, he monopolized intelligence and eluded capture. One night in 1943, a small Communist unit finally trapped him by a ruse and assassinated him.[84] He seems to have been typical of what the Communist side called the "bad boss" (epa ).
Having no tradition of "people's war," the Japanese forces as a rule mistrusted these irregular native units. As the Communists often pointed out, these units had a good number of opium smokers and criminal elements. They frequently abused authority conferred on them by the Japanese forces. Half-hearted efforts were made to weed out the undesirable elements, and retrain and equip the rest; but for the most part they were allowed to retain their original organization. Large-scale defection was therefore not an unblemished blessing for the Japanese. But these irregular forces did help to overcome the critical shortage of manpower for the occupation forces.
Mention should also be made of local security forces recruited by the Japanese Army in cooperation with the Temporary Government in Peiping; this government was later renamed the North China Political Commission and enjoyed some autonomy under the Nanking government. The Hopei provincial governmet under Wu Tsan-chou controlled Peiping, Tientsin and 129 hsien towns. In March, 1940, the provincial office moved from Tientsin to Paoting. It had trained a 20,000-man police force and a 2,500-man security force. They were distributed in hsien towns and important hsiang . The Shansi provincial government under Su T'i-jen, who received the appointment because of his connection with Yen Hsi-shan, controlled Taiyuan and 92 hsien towns. The Shantung provincial government under T'ang Yang-tu, controlled all but four of its 105 hsien towns. The Honan provincial government under Chen Ching-chi had its office in K'aifeng and was expanding to the western bank of the New Yellow River. It had 42 hsien towns. In addition, a special district commissioner's office was established in Hsüchow and supervised 18 hsien in north Kiangsu and, from 1940 on, 10 hsien in north Anhwei.[85] It was the goal of the North China Area Army to have 300 police or security troops in each hsien .[86] At the rate of 200 men per hsien , a putative total police force in early 1940 in Shansi, Shantung, and Honan Provinces would be roughly 50,000. With the addition of Hopei's
[83] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 488.
[84] Hung-ch'i p'iao-p'iao , VI, 215–225.
[85] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 492.
[86] Ibid. , p. 485.
22,500, there were 72,500 men. If this figure is added to the strength of irregular armed groups interested in defection between the spring of 1940 and January of 1941, the total is roughly 370,000.
A most remarkable change was the defection of 300,000 men from the united front. Even if allowances are made for their dismal quality, this constituted a major shift in the balance of power in north China in favor of the Japanese forces. The North China Area Army commanded 245,000 men in early 1941.[87] Japanese estimate of the Communist forces in north China in 1940 is 250,000 regulars and 150,000 guerrillas.[88] According to P'eng Te-huai, the Communist regulars numbered 220,000 in mid–1940.[89] Thus, even if the sizable Japanese troops tied down in containing the Kuomintang forces in southern Shansi, along the Lunghai railway and in Shantung, are discounted, the total anti-Communist forces roughly equaled the Communist forces.
Such native collaboration made it possible for the Japanese Army to carry out dispersion of its troops on the plain of Hopei Province. A Communist cadre of the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region noted with alarm in mid–1940, "The enemy has adopted the policy of blockhouse method of the civil war period. They are spread like a galaxy. In central Hopei alone, there are about 500, separated by several to more than ten li ."[90] Entrusting the more secure areas to the native allies, the Japanese forces cut deep into the Communist bases in the mountains also. The phrase "transportation war" cropped up frequently in the Eighth Route Army's journal.[91] The Communist field command was watching with apprehension the construction of new roads, which doubled as blockade lines. In the T'aihang range, the Taiyuan–Shihchiachuang railway separated the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region from the Chin-Chi-Yü District. The latter was cut into four pieces by two new roads that crossed each other. The narrow-gauge Paichin railway, running north to south, was built along an old
[87] Ibid. , p. 439.
[88] The North China Area Army estimated the Communist strength to be 250,000 regulars and half a million self-defense forces. Ibid. , p. 447. In November, 1939, the Japanese estimate was 140,000 regulars, 110,000 regional forces, and half a million self-defense forces. Ibid. , appendix III. In January, 1941, the regular forces were estimated to be 290,000 in north China and 40,000 in central China. Ibid. , appendix V. I have reckoned the regional forces to be at least 150,000 for 1940.
[89] San-nien-lai ti k'ang-chan , p. 46.
[90] Shu T'ung, "Lun chien-ch'ih Chin-Ch'a-Chi k'ang-Jih ken-chü-ti jen-wu chi fang-chen" [Discussion of the duty and policy of firmly defending the Chin-Ch'a-Chi anti-Japanese base], Military Affairs Journal , September, 1940, p. 31.
[91] See Liu Po-ch'eng in Pa-lu-chün pai-t'uan ta-chan t'e-chi [Special issue on the Eighth Route Army's Battle of One Hundred Regiments] (The Political Department, the Eighth Route Army, 1941), pp. 14–15.
highway connecting Paikui and Ch'angchih. Thus, the T'aihang and the T'aiyüeh Districts were separated by 1940. The two districts were subdivided by a road, running east to west, between Linfen on the Tat'ung–P'uchow line and Hantan on the Peiping–Hankow line. The Taiyuan–Schihchiachuang line was extended east through south Hopei to reach the Tientsin–Pukow line at Techow. A new highway connected Hantan and Tsinan.[92] Of these the transport network in Shansi Province became the prime target of attack in the Battle of One Hundred Regiments.
The Last Debate between Mao and Wang Ming
While the bloody contest was going on in the spring of 1940 over north Kiangsu, Kuomintang–CCP negotiations to settle the terms of the united front were continuing. In January, Ho Ying-ch'in called in Yeh Chien-ying and ordered the CCP to stop illegal expansion. Yeh in turn demanded that the Kuomintang authorize nine divisions for the Communist forces and enlarge the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region's boundary, according to Chiang Kai-shek.[93] In June, the CCP formally presented the so-called "June Proposals."[94] The first two of the three parts related to the CCP's standing demand on the Kuomintang for more "democracy."
The most important was the third part dealing with the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region, the 18th Group Army, and the New Fourth Army. The CCP demanded unambiguous boundary settlement in Shen-Kan-Ning. It asked that the twenty-three hsien be recognized as belonging to the border region and that the border region be made directly subordinate to the Administrative Yuan. Second, the CCP "request[ed] that the 18th Group Army be expanded to nine divisions in three armies and that the subordinate guerrilla forces receive the same accommodation as other guerrilla forces in the same war zone."[95] Third, the New Fourth Army was to be expanded to seven detachments. Fourth, the CCP asked that "in order to establish responsibility for fighting and to avoid misunderstanding and clashes" a
[92] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 32; Pacification War , No. 1, p. 405.
[93] Soviet Russia in China , p. 93.
[94] K'ang-chan lun-wen-chi [Collection of essays on the resistance] (no date, no publisher listed) (Hoover), pp. 5–7. This is a Communist source published probably shortly after the New Fourth Army Incident. It was written by the man who wrote Mo-ts'a ts'ung ho erh lai for the Eighth Route Army's Political Department. See preface, Ibid. , p. 1. I rely on it because it matches Kuomintang data where the latter are available.
[95] Ibid. , p. 6.
boundary be drawn distinguishing the areas of operation for the Communist forces and the "friendly forces." Whether this item was accompanied by a specific proposal for new boundaries cannot be ascertained. Last, a request was made for equal provision of arms, ammunition, clothing, rations, medical and communication materials.[96]
The international situation in July, 1940, was very grave for China. The German blitz ended in France's surrender on June 17. Two days later the Indochina route to Chungking was closed. On July 12 Britain succumbed to Japan's pressure and notified Tokyo that it was closing the Burma Road for three months.[97] Washington protested without results. German victory stimulated the Japanese Army, frustrated by the stalemate in China. The advocates of "southward advance" began to prevail, with the view that the China war could not be solved except within the framework of a new international alignment which would cut China completely off from American influence. In order to guard against the Tripartite Alliance, the Soviet Union began showing an interest in a nonaggression pact with Japan. Moscow might go further, as Chiang Kai-shek suspected then, and side with the Axis powers. The Kiri Operation was then in progress, as was the latest German attempt at mediation in Chunking designed to help Japan regain maneuverability. The Japanese strategic units were in Ich'ang and Nanning; they might move farther inland. Japanese occupation of French Indochina was also anticipated. It was reported that Chungking was watching with intense concern the final process of negotiation between Japan and Wang Ching-wei (from July 5, in Nanking) leading to the formal recognition of the Nanking government.[98] A high Kuomintang official confided after the war that the situation was most critical then.[99]
In a crisis atmosphere, the Seventh Plenum of the Kuomintang's CEC met between July 1 and 7. According to an unconfirmed Japanese intelligence report, the Plenum debated the search for a peaceful solution of the war.[100] On July 2, the government offered a counter-proposal to the CCP. The so-called "First Counter-Proposal by the Kuomintang" included the following points: (1) "The party question" should be postponed until after the promulgation of the new constitution. (2) The Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region was to be renamed the
[96] Ibid. , pp. 6–7.
[97] Nihon gaiko[*] nempyo[*] , II, 137. China was probably notified of it in advance as a courtesy.
[98] Joho[*] No. 24, August 15, 1940, pp. 93–94.
[99] Taiheiyo[*] senso[*] e no michi , IV, 67.
[100] Joho, No. 24, August 15, 1940, pp. 93–94; Toa[*] , September 1, 1940, p. 40 ff.
Northern Shensi Administrative Area, and to be placed temporarily under the Executive Yuan but subject to the control of the Shensi provincial government. Fifteen hsien were to be recognized as part of the border region with some minor qualifications. The chairman of the Administrative Area and the hsien magistrates were to be nominated by the 18th Group Army and appointed by the Central Government. Issuance of separate currency was forbidden. In the Suite area, the government's Military Commission was to maintain an administrative office and a garrison.[101]
(3) Chu Te was to be relieved of the post of vice commander of the Second War Zone in Shansi under Yen Hsi-shan, and appointed the vice commander of the Hopei–Chahar War Zone. The Kuomintang had two alternate proposals for the redeployment and boundary settlement for the 18th Group Army and the New Fourth Army. The first one would authorize the entire Communist forces to operate in the two provinces of Hopei and Chahar. This meant that the New Fourth Army would be included in the order of battle of the Hopei–Chahar War Zone. According to the second plan, the Kuomintang would authorize the transfer of the entire Communist forces into the Hopei–Chahar War Zone but in addition permit some of the 18th Group Army units to operate in northern Shansi. Such forces as were to operate in Shansi Province were to remain under the command of the Second War Zone. In either event, the boundary of the war zone was to be "temporary and not permanent in nature." The Communist forces were given one month to complete this redeployment and were forbidden to leave any "rear office," "liaison office," and the like in the former areas of occupation. The Communist forces were absolutely forbidden to move beyond the boundary of the new war zone; and within the war zone, they were forbidden to interfere with "local government and Party affairs." Within Hopei and Chahar Provinces the central government claimed the cities of Peiping and Tientsin as belonging to its direct administration. The central government was to appoint governors for the two provinces. The two incumbent governors—P'ang Ping-hsün, who succeeded Lu Chung-lin in Hopei, and Shih Yu-san in Chahar—were reconfirmed in their positions.[102]
(4) The 18th Group Army was authorized to organize six divisions in three armies plus five regiments. The New Fourth Army was to be reorganized into two divisions. Upon collecting and incorporating all the guerrilla or irregular units into the designated areas by the deadline, the CCP was forbidden to organize any additional collateral
[101] K'ang-chan lun-wen-chi , pp. 7–9.
[102] Ibid. , pp. 9–11.
unit under whatever title. The government promised to put the authorized Communist units on the government's pay provided that they submitted to government inspections.[103]
By offering the Communists a choice between two alternatives, the Kuomintang's July 2 "decision" took less than a final form. In either case, it was Chungking's intention to seal up the Communist forces in Hopei, Chahar, and northern Shansi—areas which were subjected to the most intense pacification by the Japanese forces. The Kuomintang was not willing to concede Shantung, Kiangsu and Anhwei Provinces. By forcing the New Fourth Army out of the Shanghai–Nanking–Hangchow delta, the Kuomintang was also unwittingly undermining the Internationalists as it did over the question of defense of Wuhan.
Between July 1 and 7, at the time of the third anniversary of the Lukouchiao Incident, the CCP passed two major decisions and issued a manifesto.[*] They were permeated with the sense of grave and imminent crisis; together they amounted to a reaffirmation of the united front policy advocated by the Internationalists. The Central Committee's manifesto of July 7 (issued on July 4) stated that "at present China faces unprecedented danger of capitulation and unprecedented difficulties in resistance. We ought not to conceal these dangers and difficulties."[104] It acknowledged that the pressure for peace exerted by Germany and Italy was replacing the danger of a "Far Eastern Munich," and it demanded that "the Kuomintang–Communist relationship must be adjusted, the danger of civil war must be eradicated, the anti-Japanese united front must be consolidated."[105] To this end, it renewed once again the most far-reaching pledge of cooperation it had made: "We always carry out our own promises," it stated, "We never once deviated from our manifesto of September 22, 1937: to struggle for the complete realization of the Three People's Principles, to stop the land revolution, to liquidate the insurrectionary policy. . . . "[106] In criticizing the anti-Communist measures without naming the Kuomintang, it warned against a "two-front policy" against an external enemy and domestic ally—a statement which could just as well apply to Mao's line. In an unsigned appeal in July, the Party conceded once again that "the rise and fall of the Chinese nation is the responsibility of the Kuomintang."[107]
Once again one can detect inconsistency in the Party's documents
[103] Ibid. , pp. 11–12.
[*] The Central Committee's decision of July 1 is not available.
[104] Mao Tse-tung-chi , VII, 254.
[105] Ibid. , p. 255.
[106] Ibid.
[107] "T'uan-chi tao-ti" [Unity to the very end], Ibid. , p. 259. Unlike the Party's manifesto, this essay appears in the Peking edition of Selected Works , though the passage has been deleted.
of early July. An internal directive of July 7 stated, for instance, that "unprecedented danger of capitulation has fast arrived, but . . . the possibility for winning a favorable turn has also increased."[108] It went on to say, "The big landlords and the big bourgeoisie . . . are unable to change completely for the better, but it is possible to prolong the period of cooperation and resistance."[109] Such cooperation was justified on the ground that "at the moment the anti-Communist high tide is ebbing ."[110] The July 7 manifesto, moreover, rejected the Kuomintang's July 2 counter-proposal with respect to the boundary question. It declared that the Communist forces would keep "the war zones, the enemy's rear, and the twenty-three hsien of the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region."[111] That is, the CCP was demanding for itself all of north Kiangsu and a permission to keep its troops in the Third War Zone south of the Yangtze. Thus, the CCP's stand at this point closely resembled its earlier stand at the Sixth Plenum, where it renewed verbal promises without any substance.
The movement of the Communist forces in and around north Kiangsu in July and August suggested that they were there to stay. By July, Ch'en I and Kuan Wen-wei had led the South Yangtze Command across the river. Kuan Wen-wei clashed with local units of Han Te-ch'in's forces in Kuots'un, near T'aihsien, between June 28 and July 7.[112] This came to be called the first battle of Huangch'iao. In August, as the remainder of the Fifth Column arrived from Shantung, a decisive battle was threatening around Huangch'iao.[113] In the meantime, the Communist forces increased pressure in southern Shantung. On August 11, Hsü Hsiang-ch'ien's unit was attacking the Shantung provincial government in Luts'un and drove away the Kuomintang forces under Governor Shen Hung-lieh.[114]
However, Chungking remained adamant about keeping the Communist forces out of north Kiangsu. According to Chiang Kai-shek,
On July 16, the Government, with a view to preventing more clashes in various parts of the country, worked out an arrangement with the Communists represented by Chou En-lai and Yeh Chien-ying. This agreed arrangement was later handed to Chou En-lai, who took it to northern Shensi on July 24, for observance by Communist field commanders.[115]
[108] Mao Tse-tung-chi , VII, 71.
[109] Ibid. , p. 72.
[110] Ibid. , p. 73. Emphasis added.
[111] Ibid. , p. 256.
[112] Wan-nan shih-pien ti chen-hsiang , p. 9.
[113] Ibid. , p. 10. Ch'en I states that his side exercised great restraint, which is entirely credible. He seems to have been ordered to hold the ground without provoking a fight if at all possible. See his telegram to Chungking, in Ibid. , p. 15.
[114] Chung-Kung wen-t'i chung-yao wen-hsien , p. 27.
[115] Soviet Russia in China , p. 93.
Actually there is no indication that the CCP agreed to the government's demand. It was issued unilaterally as "the Center's final decision" dated July 20.[116] Compliance was demanded of the Communists within one month; thus, August 20 was the deadline.
For the Communist forces, the government conceded thirty-six hsien in northern Shantung north of the Yellow River, in addition to Hopei and Chahar Provinces.[117] The Hopei–Chahar War Zone was to be abolished, and the area plus the thirty-six hsien in northern Shantung were to come under the command of the Second War Zone under Yen Hsi-shan. Chu Te and Wei Li-huang were to act as vice commanders under Yen Hsi-shan. Specifically, Yen Hsi-shan was to be directly responsible for the southwestern part of Shansi; Wei Li-huang for the southeastern part; and Chu Te controlling the rest, namely, northern Shansi, Hopei, Chahar, and the northern Shantung. The size of the authorized Communist forces remained the same as in the July 2 Kuomintang counter-proposal.[118] The government conceded three more hsien to the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region to make a total of eighteen,[119] the other provisions for the border region remaining the same.
What sanctions the central government invoked to enforce its decision is not known, but it apparently made clear to Chou En-lai that it was dead set against allowing the Communists in northern Kiangsu. In August, the CCP appeared to give in. The Communist leadership formulated a counter-proposal in which it offered to withdraw all of the Communist forces from central China. This so-called
[116] Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 219; K'ang-chan lun-wen-chi , p. 12.
[117] They were: Litsin, P'ut'ai, Pinhsien, Chanhua, Wuti, Loling, Huimin, Tep'ing, Shangho, Linghsien, Linyi, Chiyang, Tehsien, P'ingyüan, Yuch'eng, Ch'iho, Enhsien, Wuch'eng, Hsiatsin, Linch'ing, Kaot'ang Ch'ingp'ing, Pop'ing, Jenp'ing, Liaoch'eng, Ch'iuhsien, Kuant'ao, T'angyi, Kuanhsien, Hsinhsien, Chaoch'eng, Yangku, T'aochang, Fanhsien, Kuangch'eng, and P'uhsien. Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 221.
[118] Ibid. , p. 220.
[119] The list of hsien named by the two sides for the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region are as follows:
[*] The CCP's June proposal: Yenan, Yench'ang, Yench'uan, Paoting, Anting, Ansai, Kanch'üan, Luhsien, Tingpien, Chingpien, Ch'unhua, Kouyi, Ninghsien, Chengning, Ch'ingyang, Hoshui, Huanhsien, Yench'ih, Suite, Michih, Wupao, Chiahsien, and Ch'ingchien. K'ang-chan yen-lun-chi , p. 6.
[*] The Kuomintang's July 2 counter-proposal: Suite, Michih, Wupao, Chiahsien, Ch'ingchien, Yenan, Yench'ang, Yench'uan, Paoan, Anting, Ansai, Kanch'üan, Luhsien, and parts of Tingpien and Chingpien. Ibid. , p. 7.
[*] The Kuomintang's July 20 decision: Suite, Michih, Wupao, Chiahsien, Ch'ingchien, Yenan, Yench'ang, Yench'uan, Paoan, Anting, Ansai, Kanch'üan, Luhsien, and parts of Tingpien and Chingpien in Shensi Province; Hoshui, Huanhsien, and part of Ch'inyang in Kansu Province. Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 220; K'ang-chan yen-lun-chi , pp. 12–13.
"August counter-proposal" by the CCP is available in a document published by the Communist side. The counter-proposal asked for authorization of nine divisions for the 18th Group Army and three divisions for the New Fourth Army (instead of seven detachments for the latter, as in the June Proposal). It demanded that the CCP be given the right to appoint governors of Hopei and Chahar Provinces. Finally, it asked that "the five provinces of north China be defined as the area of operation for the 18th Group Army and the New Fourth Army."[120] According to this proposal, the CCP was abandoning central China bases in exchange for Hopei, Chahar, Shantung, Shansi, and Suiyüan Provinces.
At the time, rumors were abroad alleging that a mutually acceptable settlement had been reached between the Kuomintang and the CCP. But the Kuomintang has never acknowledged the existence of the "August counter-proposal." A prefatory remark accompanying the document states that the proposal was decided in the middle of August and presented to Chang Chung, the Kuomintang's liaison officer in Yenan, in early September to be transmitted to Chungking. However, it went on, the proposal was shelved on account of the military clash in north Kiangsu.[121] The authenticity of this document cannot be verified. Nevertheless, it seems credible that the CCP should have been inclined to make such a concession in late August. It was entirely in keeping with the purpose of the other decisions, especially the one to launch the Battle of One Hundred Regiments. That offensive would have been meaningless unless the CCP had been willing to compromise with the Kuomintang over the north Kiangsu question.
Simultaneously in August, the CCP made several substantive decisions of major importance and began to live up fully to the pledge made on July 7. The question of how to cope with the landslide of defection among the irregular non-Communist forces was the central concern of the August 15 directive. It stated:
In accordance with the decision of July 7, it is necessary to broadly expand united front work. In friendly forces, enlargement of the work of making friendships is necessary to win over the two million members of these friendly forces to continued resistance to Japan. In the making of friendships, there have been absolutely no achievements. You must accept a severe reprimand
[120] Ibid. , pp. 18–21. See Chen-ching chung-wai ti "Wan-nan ts'an-pien" mien-mien kuan [Several perspectives on the world shaking "southern Anhwei massacre"] (Shih-chieh ch'u-pan-she, 1941), pp. 16–17, for another version of the CCP's August counter-proposal. According to this, the CCP demanded five northern provinces in addition to north Kiangsu.
[121] K'ang-chen yen-lun-chi , p. 18.
from the Party, and you must examine your work on the basis of this decision. . . .
Especially since the Kuomintang began carrying out its anti-Communist policy, many cadres—even including some leading cadres—have come to feel that the Kuomintang and the central armies are all die-hards, and that our line is one of opposition, struggle, and preparation for a split.[122]
Several other directives followed in close succession, all demanding improvement of united front work at lower levels.[123] Sweeping reforms in the administration of the Communist bases were initiated by the Northern Bureau on August 12, just prior to the Battle of One Hundred Regiments. The reforms reversed the civil-war-like sectarian radicalism which had affected the Party since the December Incident. I will review the new administrative programs in the next chapter.
The Battle of One Hundred Regiments
The August 20 deadline for transfer of the New Fourth Army units was chosen by the Communist leadership to commence the large-scale and the only offensive by the Communist forces in the war. The offensive took one month's preparation, according to a Communist source.[124] Hence, the idea of an offensive to buttress the united front must have been on the agenda for the Central Committee at least since early July. The Political Department of the Eighth Route Army's Field Headquarters was also holding a political work conference in July.[125] Regardless of the offensive, Communist units were in all likelihood placed in a high state of alert as the Kuomintang–CCP negotiation had reached the critical passage in early summer. The Japanese officers who negotiated in early June with Chungking's emissaries in the Kiri Operation came away with a distinct impression that the Kuomintang was anticipating a general insurrection by the Communists once an official, high-level peace talk was announced.[126] If so, the CCP was in the difficult position of having to decide be-
[122] Chung-Kung chung-yang kuan-yü k'ai-chan t'ung-i chan-hsien kung-tso ti shih-chih [The CCP Central Committee's directive concerning expansion of united front work], in Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 470.
[123] See, for instance, the directive issued by the United Front Work Department on November 2, The Organization and Work of United Front Bureau , in Van Slyke, pp. 266–270.
[124] PLA during resistance , p. 109.
[125] Cheng-chih kung-tso lun-ts'ung , p. 32.
[126] Boyle, p. 292. Boyle quotes a Japanese officer's recollection of a Kuomintang negotiator that tension between Chungking and Yenan "would become evident in August."
tween a civil war or a general offensive against the Japanese to forestall a civil war.
The decision for the offensive was made by the Central Committee, according to Ch'en I speaking in 1944:
The Central Committee . . . perceived that if this flood of opopsition to the people and democracy was not halted, it might cause the war of resistance to end in defeat. Accordingly the Central Committee ordered the Eighth Route Army to carry out the Hundred Regiment Offensive in north China in order that the determined attack on the Japanese bandits might strengthen faith of the whole country in ultimate victory and stop the tide of capitulationism.[127]
It is clear that the CCP feared the demoralizing impact on Chungking of Anglo–Japanese cooperation in closing the "southwestern international route." That left the Sinkiang route—dependent on the uncertain friendship of the Soviet Union—as the only link to the outside world. It was probably for this reason that the "defense of northwest" was mentioned by the leaders of the Eighth Route Army as one of the aims of the offensive.[128] Since the Japanese forces never seriously threatened the northwest throughout the war, the CCP's concern for it at this time must be taken in a political sense.
The offensive was also designed to solve the tactical problems that concerned the Communist field commanders, as I have noted above. Both P'eng Te-huai and Chu Te stated at the time that undermining the confidence of puppet forces was one of their goals.[129] The transport and blockade lines in Shansi were chosen as prime targets. Simultaneous attack on small Japanese outposts and the transport link between them was intended to make the dispersion of pacification forces difficult. If successful, moreover, such an attack would compel the Japanese forces to abandon the more exposed outposts and to seek security in larger enclaves, thus leaving the countryside once again to the Communist forces.
In the CCP's history, rewritten by the Maoists since, the Battle of One Hundred Regiments receives little or no mention.[130] Further-
[127] Wan-nan shih-pien ti chen-hsiang , p. 4.
[128] See Chu Te's remark at a cadre conference in Yenan in August, cited in Pacification War , No. 1, p. 336. See also Tso Ch'üan, the chief of staff, in "Chien-ch'ih hua-pei k'ang-chan liang-nien-chung chih pa-lu-chün" [Firmly uphold the Eighth Route Army in two years of resistance in north China], Military Affairs Journal , November, 1939, pp. 19–33.
[129] Pa-lu-chün pai-t'uan ta-chan t'e-chi , p. 7.
[130] Chu Te's major report to the Seventh Congress barely mentions the campaign. Lun chieh-fang-ch'ü chan-ch'ang [On the battlefield of the liberated areas] (Tung-pei shu-tien, 1947). Ho Kan-chih ignores it altogether.
more, it was revealed during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution that P'eng Te-huai "arbitrarily started the 'campaign of a hundred regiments' in support of Chiang Kai-shek and in aid of the Kuomintang" without Mao's knowledge.[131] But the campaign was on such a large scale that it could not have been started by personal initiative of a vice commander of the Eighth Route Army, that is, without the authorization of the Party. The real meaning of Mao's denial of his part in it seems to be that he opposed it but was overruled.
The offensive was intended to create a diversion in the rear of the Japanese forces, and to bolster Chungking's morale, as Communist sources openly boasted contemporaneously. The North China Area Army suspected that the offensive was planned jointly during the Kuomintang–CCP negotiation in July.[132] All signs, however, point the other way. It was very doubtful that the Communists would have entrusted the Kuomintang with vital intelligence concerning their surprise attack. The "coordination" was thus strategic and not tactical.
The paucity of clues makes reconstruction of Mao's motive for opposing the offensive entirely conjectural. On a tactical level, Mao's difference with his field commanders was an extension of the military dispute which was supposed to have been settled at the Sixth Plenum. So far as the Japanese forces were concerned, Mao seems to have felt, the offensive was more likely to provoke rather than intimidate them. On this occasion, however, a substantial number of officers in the field might have sided with P'eng Te-huai in demanding a square fight with the enemy. The professional soldiers had acquired a good deal of experience in dealing with the Japanese in the three years of war. They could have been tired of observing the rule of hit and run. In 1959, P'eng conducted a self-criticism of his role in the campaign and said,
[The Battle of One Hundred Regiments] exposed too early our own strength and attracted the main force of the Japanese Army from the frontal battlefield—to the advantage of the Kuomintang—and brought about serious difficulties to our anti-Japanese bases in the rear of the enemy. Obviously it was a case of nationalistic indignation blurring the class stand.[133]
The effectiveness of the campaign in achieving its strategic objective—to keep the Kuomintang in the war—depended on mutual trust between Chungking and Yenan. Without it, the Eighth Route Army's
[131] Li Hsin-kung, "Settle Accounts With Peng Teh-huai for His Heinous Crimes . . . ," p. 13.
[132] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 384.
[133] The Case of Peng Teh-huai , p. 34.
military victory over the Japanese forces would not necessarily lessen Chungking's suspicion and anxiety. The most critical issue in inter-Party relations was the CCP's disposition of the north Kiangsu question. Unless the CCP was prepared to abandon north Kiangsu, the offensive would forfeit its strategic aim. If the Kuomintang–CCP relationship was bordering on civil war in the summer, the Communist forces could have been running the risk of exhausting themselves against the Japanese without any assurance that the Kuomintang forces would not pounce on them in turn. Mao's objection to the offensive might well have been related to his resolve to take north Kiangsu. He might have bracketed his stand with an assurance that Chungking would not surrender.
The CCP divided the campaign into three phases: the first phase, August 20 to September 10; the second, September 20 to the end of October; and the third phase, "resistance to Japanese mopping-up," October 6 to December 5.[134] Preparations were started in the middle of July and took about one month. During this period, the Eighth Route Army carefully surveyed the terrain around Japanese garrisons in Shansi, collected intelligence, selected roads, stockpiled explosives and grain, printed anti-Japanese propaganda materials, and mobilized the peasants in the vicinity of selected targets.[135] There were many small signs which collectively pointed to some large-scale operation, as recalled by the Japanese side afterward. To take only one instance, in Yangch'üan on the Chengting–Taiyuan railway a number of husky strangers were seen during a local fair on August 15 and 16. Half of the peddlers were new faces. Local Chinese police were ordered to investigate, but nothing came of it.[136] Had the North China Area Army been properly mindful of Communist military strength, it could have read ominous portent in such reports.
Most of the regular units of the Eighth Route Army and the Shansi New Army took part. One main force unit, presumably the 115th Division, stayed out of the first phase of the campaign.[137] The reason for this cannot be identified. It is possible that the division was tied down in southern Shantung in the operation to assist the New Fourth Army. Nieh Jung-chen led the units from the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Military District to attack the P'ingting–Shihchiachuang section of the Chengting–Taiyuan railway. This line separated Nieh Jung-chen's base from P'eng Te-huai's to the south; on it were the garrison of
[134] PLA during resistance , pp. 109, 114, 116.
[135] Pa-lu-chün pai-t'uan ta-chan t'e-chi , p. 56.
[136] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 341.
[137] Pa-lu-chün pai-t'uan ta-chan t'e-chi , pp. 59, 82.
Niangtzukuan and the Chinghsing coal mines. The line was the main target of the campaign. Liu Po-ch'eng and Teng Tzu-hui led the 129th Division against the line west of P'ingting. Ho Lung and Kuan Hsiangying led the 120th Division against the Tat'ung–P'uchow railway around Yangchü, primarily to stall the Japanese reaction force from reaching the Chengting–Taiyuan line.[138]
The attack came at 8 P.M. on all fronts in north China. Shortly thereafter, the Japanese side monitored a Communist radio message reporting the campaign to Yen Hsi-shan's Second War Zone headquarters. Destruction of railway lines, bridges, highways, and telephone lines was carried out simultaneously, with the result that regrouping and reaction by the Japanese forces was obstructed. On the Shihchiachuang-Taiyuan railway the Fourth Independent Mixed Brigade, under Lieutenant General Katayama, defended some twenty outposts west of Niangtzukuan. The size of defending forces at each post ranged from a platoon to a battalion.[139] They were attacked by fifteen regiments under Liu Po-ch'eng. The Eighth Independent Mixed Brigade, commanded by Major General Mizuhara, was defending the line east of P'ingting to Chengting, including the Chinghsing coal mines.[140] It was attacked by fifteen regiments under Nieh Jung-chen from the north. In the first few hours, all the outposts were isolated from one another. From a map captured from the Communist forces, it was learned that the Communist forces outnumbered the Japanese by five to ten times.[141] It soon dawned on the defenders that the Eighth Route Army forces meant to stay this time, attacking them in their fixed positions. Faced by an overwhelming force, most of the outposts soon lost initiative. All the smaller units could do was to stave off attacks in the bunkers and wait for relief forces to arrive.
The Japanese company posted at the citadel in Niangtzukuan was treated to a bone-chilling sight on the night of August 20: the dark surrounding valley was dotted with flickering torch lights carried by peasants guiding the Communist troops into position. At about 11 A.M. on August 22, a messenger bearing a white flag approached the garrison and handed over a letter urging the defenders to surrender. It took General Katayama's brigade headquarters three days to get a complete picture of the situation under its command, and it was fully one week before relief forces could be sent on foot to the outlying areas.[142] By then, most of the smaller units had exhausted their ammunition and had been overrun. The Fourth Independent Mixed
[138] PLA during resistance , pp. 109–113.
[139] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 343.
[140] Ibid. , p. 350.
[141] Ibid. , p. 347.
[142] Ibid. , p. 349.
Brigade was again the major target of Communist assault during the second wave. The 385th and 386th Brigades, the elite units of the 129th Division, attacked it from September 24 on—again overrunning several posts.[143]
According to an interim report written by the North China Area Army on October 15, the damage to the Shihchiachuang–Taiyuan railway was the heaviest. Forty-eight bridges with a total span of one kilometer were destroyed, while 3.5 kilometers of rail were either blown up or carried away. The Tat'ung–P'uchow line was destroyed in thirteen places and the Peiping–Hankow line in eighty-six places. Altogether 44 kilometers of rail, excluding bridge span, were lost. The Chengting–Taiyuan railway did not complete "emergency repairs" until September 20. The Peiping–Hankow and the Tat'ung–P'uchow lines were restored by August 25 and September 8, respectively. The mine at Chinghsing sustained heavy damage, though the Communist forces merely set fire to it rather than using explosives. Anshan steel mills in Manchuria depended on the high grade coal extracted from Chinghsing. The new mine was inoperative for six months.[144] An official public release by the Eighth Route Army, published on December 10, estimated that five Japanese battalions were wiped out, including the two belonging to the Fourth Independent Mixed Brigade.[145] According to the brigade's casualty report, it suffered some sixty and eighty killed during the first and second waves respectively.[146] The wounded numbered several times those figures. These statistics do not include the casualties among the Japanese civilian employees of the railway and the Chinese security troops.
The initial attack sent a shock-wave through the North China Area Army. Organized Japanese reaction did not come until September. By October the initiative passed to the Japanese forces, and the campaign turned to the phase of Japanese mopping-up. On the whole the Communist forces, especially the regular units, fought well and with determination—though, as at P'inghsingkuan, there were many minor problems, according to a captured internal review.[147] The impact of the campaign on the Japanese forces was more psychological than military. In fact, the total damage to the Japanese side might be
[143] Ibid. , p. 358.
[144] Ibid. , pp. 354–355.
[145] Pa-lu-chün pai-t'uan ta-chan t'e-chi , pp. 59–60.
[146] Pacification War , No. 1, pp. 353, 358. See also the casualty report filed by the brigade in War History Office, The Defense Board.
[147] "Tazan no ishi" [Learn from the experience of others] (combat report written by Yang Ch'eng-wu, the commander of the First Military Sub-district of the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region, and subsequently captured by the Japanese), Kaikosha[*] kiji , August, 1941, pp. 93–109.
said to have been light in view of the number of troops and civilians mobilized on the Communist side. This was partly because of the inferiority of arms available to the Communist forces and the nature of the targets they attacked. The Eighth Route Army lacked adequate heavy weapons, good explosives, and supply of ammunition. It attacked with rifles the Japanese forces in well-fortified fixed positions. The Communist units seem to have overrun Japanese positions only after repeated charges exhausted the defenders' ammunition. Casualties on the Communist side were heavy. By November the North China Area Army noted that the Communist forces had exhausted their supplies and were avoiding contacts.[148] In the Chin-Chi-Yü District, according to a Communist source, "the big battle also inflicted very extensive casualities on our army (7,000 were wounded or killed among the border region's forces alone), and the morale was not easily restored for a while . . . . "[149] Total casualties were reported at 22,000.[150]
Chungking's reaction to the campaign is not known. But if the CCP's strategic objective in launching the campaign was to thwart the peace talk, neither Chungking nor Tokyo was affected by it. In any event, on September 10—at the end of the first phase of the campaign—the CCP ordered its forces to use the opportunity for stepped-up expansion in central China, though it warned against unnecessary provocation of Kuomintang forces.[151]
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.
VII—
New Democracy in the Communist Bases
In the preceding chapter, I have shown that the concept of New Democracy had a dual character: it stood midway between socialism and bourgeois democracy. I have also connected this dual character with Mao's struggle against Chiang Kai-shek and Stalin. At best, the concept was a statement of broad objectives for the revolution. It offered very little specification as to the substantive content of New Democracy. The concept had so much leeway, in fact, that Mao applied it to the revolution from 1917 onward. After Mao enunciated it in 1940, it remained the Party's line until 1952.[1] Actual practice of the CCP was, therefore, influenced by factors other than the general objectives as defined by Mao in his essay. My task in this chapter is to show, first, the specific circumstances which gave rise to the reorientation in the administration of the Communist bases, which later came to be identified with New Democracy; and, second, what the new administrative programs and the accompanying reforms were designed to accomplish.
There is enough evidence to indicate that the CCP's great debate between the fall of 1939 and the summer of the following year was not confined to strategic or military questions alone. There was a parallel and equally intense debate concerning the general orientation of the Party's administrative program within its bases. It dealt with the question of the kind of revolution to be accomplished in the course of the war of resistance. Unfortunately, available data do not permit me to probe into the debate in depth. One reason that factional differences are not clearly visible, I suggest, is that practical necessities forced the
[1] In 1952 it was replaced by the "General Line of Socialist Construction." Again, the latter was applied retroactively to the period beginning in 1948.
Communist leaders to come to a consensus with respect to the orientation of rural administration. The governments of the Communist bases took a turn in the direction of "liberalization" in 1941, and they did not deviate from that course until the end of the war.
The 'Left' Deviation
New Democracy as a set of political, economic, and social institutions of rather liberal and benign character came into being in reaction to a brief period of 'Left' excesses that swept the Communist bases from the middle of 1939 through 1940. The full dimension of the excesses will perhaps never come to light. For my purposes, however, it is enough to show that they existed and presented serious problems for the stabilization of the Communist bases. The basic condition that gave rise to these excesses was the conjunction of foreign occupation and the latent civil war of class character. As direct causes and background factors for the radicalism committed in Communist bases, I will discuss (1) the changing sociological complexion of the Communist movement after it began base construction in the rural areas; (2) the impact of military friction with the Kuomintang; and (3) counter-blockades against the Japanese and premature attempts at market control.
By the end of 1939, the Communist bases in north China had extended the infrastructure down to the grass roots by co-opting and mobilizing the poorer majority. From the top down, the pre-existing structure of political and social power was undone and replaced by another, which was "democratic" in the majoritarian or plebiscitary sense. In the process, the sociological complexion of the rural bases took on a populistic character with the so-called "basic masses" in the saddle. If the previous regime of the landlords and officials was a "dictatorship" as the Communists maintain, so was its successor a "dictatorship of several revolutionary classes," as Mao put it. Both belonged to the genus of peasant authoritarianism.
In the fall of 1939, Yang Shang-k'un, the secretary of the Northern Bureau, took a trip through north China to observe the implementation of the August directive on Party consolidation. On the basis of a rough survey, he found that 60 to 80 percent of Party membership in north China was of peasant background; 5 to 10 percent of worker origin; and one-quarter were intellectuals in some places. Anywhere from 2 to 10 percent were women. Among the cadres, as many as 70 percent were from intellectual backgrounds, as in some areas of
Shansi. Yang recalled that two years earlier, when the Party entered north China in force, almost all of the cadres in the middle to upper echelons of the Party organizations came from outside. At the time of his trip, they still occupied more than half of the leading positions—except in Shantung and southern Hopei, where local cadres were in the majority.
Yang had an occasion to meet with soldiers of a Communist unit. He asked them, "What is the Communist Party?" In reply, they parroted the capsuled formula: "The Party is the supreme commander of the revolution," "It's the supreme commander." Yang had enough guile to snap back with another question, "Who is the supreme commander?" The replies disappointed him. Some said, "Chu Te is the supreme commander," while others said, "Yen Hsi-shan is the supreme commander." Yang also recalled the experience of a Communist cadre on an inspection tour of Shansi Province. His task was to observe the manner of transmitting the directives of the Sixth Plenum. When he mentioned the Plenum to a local Party member, the reaction was, "Yes, I know the Sixth Plenum. It was attended by Marx, Stalin, and Mao."[2] Li Wei-han, a veteran Communist and a long-time critic of Mao, indicated his displeasure at the changing social composition of the Party:
Ordinary peasants always have very simple social background and are politically very pure, so to speak. These people have joined the Party in considerable number. In their minds the Communist party is "small Eighth Route," and joining the "small Eighth Route" means to "strike the local bosses and divide their land" and to "rob the rich to help the poor." On the other hand, [politically] conscious and talented men are rejected by the Party because of their complex social background. . . .[3]
Communist expansion was made possible by the ready reserve of cadres recruited from among the educated youths of urban areas. But there was a tension between them and the old cadres of the former Red Army. Secretarianism in the army was serious enough to prompt Mao to draft a decision in December, 1939. He said, " . . . many of the army cadres are not yet alive to the importance of the intellectuals, they still regard them with some apprehension and are even inclined to discriminate against them or shut them out."[4] This was part of the more general problem of "new and old cadres," a topic of wide dis-
[2] "Hua-pei tang chien-she-chung ti chi-ke wen-t'i," pp. 324–325.
[3] "Tsen-yang chih-hsing tang tsu-chih shang ti ching-kan cheng-ts'e ho yin-pi cheng-ts'e" [How to carry out the picked cadre policy and the concealment policy in Party organization], The Communist , No. 10, in Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 136.
[4] Selected Works , II, 301.
cussion at the time. It resulted from the cultural, class, ideological, and generational gaps that separated the two groups.
Lo Jui-ch'ing, a close follower of P'eng Te-huai, portrayed the collective traits of the Long March cadres. The old cadres, he stated, were marked by political steadiness and reliability. This they owed to the fact of having come through the prolonged and cruel "revolutionary fire." They hailed from the vast masses in the rural areas of south-central China. Their peasant–worker origin gave them a personality of honesty, sincerity, loyalty, and straightforwardness. They were well adjusted to stringent organizational life and discipline. "Individualism" or "anarchism" were altogether absent in them. On the other hand, their cultural level was low. They understood little of political ideologies and military science. "Study" was a pain for them. Burdened with "the remnant of peasant consciousness and habit," they were inadequate in handling themselves in complex situations. The lower cadres in particular lacked agility and social sensibility in dealing with united front problems. When forced to relate themselves to the world outside, they were ill at ease and clumsy.[5]
Together, the comments by Yang Shang-k'un, Mao, and Lo Jui-ch'ing give us a glimpse into the changing sociological complexion of the Communist organizations in the rural areas by early 1940. At the top of each hierarchy was the Eighth Route Army controlled by former Red Army men. From the time of the December Ninth Movement and throughout the war, this core element was augmented by an influx of intellectuals and students from Peiping and Tientsin. Liu Shao-ch'i, Teng Hsiao-p'ing, P'eng Chen, and others, contributed to mobilization and "sending down" of urban youths who staffed the upper echelon in border region governments and mass organizations. They in turn helped train and recruit cadres of native peasant origin. Then in 1939 civil war was superimposed on the resistance. As the poor peasants gained the upper hand everywhere, border region governments shed their earlier united front character and became Communist bases in fact. The army was composed almost wholly of the natives. Its texture was coarse, and it was suspicious of alien elements. Then, too, the political tension between Mao and Wang Ming at the top must have created reverberations below. Consciously or unconsciously the Communist movement assumed an anti-urban, anti-intellectual, and anti-landlord orientation. This manifested itself in military friction with the Kuomintang forces and ostracism of urban youths.
[5] "Hsin-lao kan-pu kang chin-mi ti t'uan-chi ch'i-lai" [Further increase the unity between the new and old cadres], Cheng-chih kung-tso lun-ts'ung , pp. 89–90.
Contemporary signs that something was wrong in the Communist bases began to appear after the December Incident of 1939. In April, the Central Committee passed a decision demanding retribution for a serious error committed by a unit of the 115th Division in Shantung and transmitted that decision by radio:
In the Huhsi District (on the western side of the Weishan Lake in Shantung) in August, 1939, during the so-called anti-Trotskyite struggle, a serious political mistake was committed; instigated by the saboteur Wang Hsü-jen the methods of framing such as cruel punishment and examination by torture, demand for confession by random choice, and immediate arrest upon confession, etc. were adopted. As a result not only was the terror of random striking and random killing perpetrated but also the Huhsi District's political–military–mass work had incurred an extremely large loss; the work which had been concluded with difficulty by the local Party in the district has been completely destroyed. Loyal Party members and the masses were sacrificed without a cause. The political prestige of our Party and army has also received enormous injury. At the same time the anti-Communist elements and the Japanese bandits are exploiting the opportunity . . . to sever the relationship between our Party and army and the masses.[6]
The 115th Division was reprimanded for not investigating the incident upon receiving a report; the chief culprit was expelled from the Party, court-martialed and imprisoned; and a funeral was ordered for the victims. In Shantung and Kiangsu where base construction got off to a late start, Kuomintang opposition was considerable. In the P'in-chiang and Chuk'ou Incidents, the Kuomintang executed CCP cadres and their families.[7] In the course of subduing the opposition, the Communist forces were drawn into that fratricidal atrocity that marked the civil war. The tension erupted in the December Incident.
In March, 1940, Mao warned in a directive, "At the moment the 'Left' tendency of neglecting to win over the middle bourgeoisie and the enlightened gentry is the more serious danger."[8] This directive introduced the Three-thirds system. In April, the Northern Bureau
[6] Chung-yang kuan-yü Huhsi ti-ch'ü fan-T'u tou-cheng-chung piao-hsien ti yen-chung ts'uo-wu ti chüeh-ting [The Central Committee's decision concerning the serious errors which occurred in the anti-Trotskyite struggle in the Huhsi district] (April 20, 1941), in Tang ti sheng-huo , No. 4, pp. 10–11. It is conceivable that this decision was involved in the intra-Party dispute between Mao and Wang Ming. Wang Ming showed an extraordinary interest in anti-Trotskyite struggle. "Wo ti hui-i," Ming Pao , No. 61, January, 1971, pp. 90–94, passim . But the kind of terror described here seems to have been quite common in connection with the anti-traitor campaign, which was a veritable witch hunt. See Isabel and David Crook, Ten Mile Inn , pp. 80–88.
[7] These were the Kuomintang's raids on the New Fourth Army's organizations.
[8] "On the Question of Political Power in the Anti-Japanese Base Areas," Selected Works , II, 418.
held the Lich'eng conference in the T'aihang District to "rectify the mistakes in 'Left' deviation barbarism" committed in southern Hopei and southeastern Shansi following the December Incident.[9] The conference curbed mass mobilization. At about same time, Chang Went'ien was warning that "many comrades in the Party . . . light-heartedly take the die-hard elements to be traitors, the intermediate elements to be die-hard elements."[10] To be branded a traitor probably entailed the same consequence as being branded a "counter-revolutionary" during the civil war. Toward the end of 1940, Mao warned again, " . . . there must not be too much killing, and no innocent person should be incriminated."[11]
Agricultural production and exchange began to decline in north China as the war began. Severe strain and destitution began to appear toward the end of 1939: mortgaging of land increased suddenly; subsidiary productions ceased as raw materials were used up; railroad rollingstock, brokers, and peddlers stopped circulating; periodic markets and market towns were practically dead; landlords demanded rent in produce; farm laborers went begging for jobs which could not be found; and consumption of salt declined to two-thirds of the pre-war level. Japanese investigators noted that the poor peasants had reached the "limit of their lives."[12] Guerrilla war, counter-guerrilla war, and increase in banditry were directly responsible for this state of affairs. If poverty was related to the revolution, therefore, the most massive poverty came with the revolution rather than as its precondition.[*]
The Communist bases were no exception to the general decline in production and exchange. But serious countermeasures were not taken until the middle of 1940 because, I surmise, expenditures were met by the savings of the rich. In the meantime, the Communist governments followed economically irrational policies. There was consider-
[*] Ramon Myers' authoritative findings on Chinese agriculture are very important in this respect. He states that in Shantung and Hopei, between 1890 and 1937, the standard of living among the peasants remained constant except in times of wars and natural disasters. The Chinese Peasant Economy: Agricultural Development in Hopei and Shantung, 1890–1949 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1970), p. 124. I must acknowledge my debt to this book. Its refutation of the so-called "distribution theory" cleared up a large problem in my work.
[9] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 48.
[10] "K'ang-Jih min-tsu t'ung-i chan-hsien-chung ti tso-ch'ing wei-hsien," p. 454.
[11] "On Policy," Selected Works , II, 446.
[12] North China Economic Investigation Section, Research Division, South Manchurian Railway Co., Jihenka no hokushi noson[*] : Kahoku-sho[*] Tei-ken nai ichi noson jittai chosa[*] hokoku[*] [North China village in the war: investigative report of the conditions in one village in Tinghsien in Hopei Province] (1941) (hereinafter cited as Tinghsien Investigation Report ), chaps. III, IV, V, passim .
able improvisation by each border region in response to the most pressing current needs. Maintenance of the army was the greatest fiscal demand, and it was met by a haphazard confiscatory policy directed at the rich. No systematic effort was made to promote production or commerce. In attempting to increase revenue, the Communists resorted to static methods such as hunting down the "black field."[13]
When the Japanese forces dispersed themselves for pacification campaigns in 1939, they occupied junctions of communications network and administrative–commercial centers. The Communist governments had to adjust their boundaries without regard to the ecology and structure of traditional rural markets. Furthermore, the CCP sought to undermine the significance of Japanese-controlled towns by instituting stringent trade control. A Japanese-controlled area was regarded as a "colony" or a foreign country.[14] For example, Wujench'iao in Ankuo hsien was one of the largest market towns in central Hopei.[15] It was linked with Tientsin by a canal, and in peace time it was a trading center for nearly one hundred villages in the surrounding countryside. In 1937 Lü Cheng-ts'ao collected his forces in the Shentze–Ankuo area and started guerrilla activities. In the fall of 1938 Ho Lung's 120th Division moved in to organize the Central Hopei Military District of the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region. Wujench'iao was supervised by the Eighth Special District Commissioner's office. In September, 1939 the Japanese 110th Division occupied Wujench'iao. Pacification and blockade war began.
The Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region's currency, of which 300 million yuan were issued in early 1938, appeared in Wujench'iao in the summer.[16] When the Japanese forces moved in, they discovered that the currency of the North China United Reserve Bank (Japanese-controlled) exchanged at 20 percent discount for the border region currency.[17] The border region bank issued its currency against a reserve in Fapi (national currency) and Chinch'ao (Shansi currency). In Communist-controlled areas, Fapi and Chinch'ao were forcibly exchanged for border region currency. Possession and use of United Reserve Bank's currency were severely punished. Those found carrying less
[13] Growth of one revolutionary base , pp. 147–151.
[14] Ibid. , p. 150.
[15] "Kahokusho[*] ichi noson[*] ni okeru Chukyo[*] no tai-noson[*] shisaku" [Chinese Communist agricultural policy in a village in Hopei Province], Chosa[*] geppo[*] , Vol. 1, No. 11, November, 1943, pp. 1–54. For information on the Wujench'iao area, I rely on this valuable document.
[16] Shina kosen-ryoku[*] chosa[*] i'inkai [Committee to investigate China's capacity to resist], Research Division, South Manchurian Railway Co., Shina kosen-ryoku[*] chosa[*] hokoku[*] [Report of investigation into China's capacity to resist] (Tokyo: San'ichi shobo[*] , 1970), p. 168.
[17] "Kahokusho ichi noson . . ., " p. 25.
than ten yuan of it had to submit to confiscation. Those who were caught having more than 100 yuan were executed.[18] Currency control went hand in hand with trade control.
A wall went up around the Communist bases. All traffic in and out of the bases was checked rigorously as a part of anti-traitor activities. Exchange of goods was supervised by Trading Departments. In the Shangtang area of southeastern Shansi, which had a bank of its own, those who purchased goods from outside with Fapi without a permit from the government were treated as traitors.[19] In this area a misguided trade policy of buying as much as possible from the Japanese-occupied area and refusing to sell anything in return was adopted temporarily in 1939, with the result that the excess of imports had to be paid for by Fapi.[20] Cotton production once flourished in Hopei as an important cash crop. The Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region government banned its production in the guerrilla areas and caused serious depression in the rural economy.[21]
In Wujench'iao the CCP's counter-blockade caused severe hardships for its inhabitants, many of whom were not peasants. They had to seek out friends and relatives in the outlying villages to buy food in secret. What was more surprising was that the CCP banned the free market in its own area of control. The purpose behind this seems to have been anti-inflationary price control. In the Shangtang area, each hsien government was empowered to determine a fair price for each item of goods. Anyone who speculated or otherwise ignored the government price could be punished.[22] In central Hopei inter-village as well as intra-village fairs were banned. Those who needed food for consumption had to report to the manager of a cooperative. The buyer was then taken by a member of the cooperative and a broker to a seller. But because of stringent enforcement of low prices, few peasants were willing to part with their surplus. In the village of Hsipeima, near Wujench'iao, which had 238 households, an average monthly transaction of three to five piculs of grain was reported. There was a flood in Hopei in 1940, and food was in short supply in many families. When the poor peasants and hired laborers went hungry, relief was sought in "contributions" from the rich.[23] Japanese observers in Wujench'iao noted that the period of one year from the fall of 1939 was the "most radical and most Left excessive."[24]
[18] Ibid. , p. 27.
[19] Hoshun Investigation Report , II, 17.
[20] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 149.
[21] Tinghsien Investigation Report , pp. 71, 86, 91.
[22] Hoshun Investigation Report , II, 5.
[23] "Kahokusho[*] ichi noson[*] . . . ," pp. 19–22.
[24] Ibid. , p. 19.
Three years of taxation under the "rational burden" system began to show its impact by the middle of 1940. A Communist source states:
In 1939 the enemy turned his forces on north China . . . and with destruction, burning, and killing by the enemy, the economy of the bases suffered serious losses. At that time relatively comfortable landlords, gentry, and merchants everywhere fled to Chiang Kai-shek-controlled areas or enemy-occupied areas en masse. Although the burden on the basic masses was greatly reduced, productive spirit was not raised and agricultural production drastically declined. . . .[25]
In order to avoid paying taxes, poor and middle peasants were reluctant to be reclassified upward in tax brackets.[26] The landlords, who had borne the cost of the Communist bases for three years, had been taxed out of existence in some places. The initial goal of the CCP in liquidating this class and winning the support of the masses had been accomplished. It was time to redistribute the burden and appease the landlords who chose not to side with the Japanese or the Kuomintang.
The virtual freeze on rural markets was undone in August, 1940. There was a parallel between this freeze—thaw cycle and the similar cycle at the end of the First Five Year Plan (1955–1956) and again during the Great Leap Forward (1958–1959). In all instances it was the effectiveness of the CCP's control over the masses which led to a kind of self-strangulation. In presenting a reform measure, Yang Shang-k'un said,
To imagine that officially managed enterprises can substitute for free enterprise is bound to lead to the result that we blockade ourselves. Within the production relationship of the society today, free trade is a necessary means of commodity distribution. Therefore all restrictions on free enterprise are mistaken.[27]
In early 1940, a comprehensive program for liberalization in political, economic, and social spheres was being proposed in the highest councils of the CCP leadership. These reforms were no doubt debated as part of the over-all adjustment of united front relationship. The immediate result of this debate was the "Double Ten Program" (Shuang shih kang-ling , so-called because it had twenty points) or The Current Administrative Program for the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region adopted by the Northern Bureau in mid-August, just prior to the Battle of One Hundred Regiments. "The Double Ten Program" in
[25] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 150.
[26] Ibid.
[27] "Kahokusho[*] ichi noson[*] . . . ," p. 19.
turn served as a model for a series of administrative programs for each border region government.[28]
In April, 1941, the Northern Bureau issued the Proposal Concerning the Base Construction in the Chin-Chi-Yü Border Region containing fifteen points ("the Northern Bureau Fifteen Points").[29] On May 1, the Politburo adopted The Administrative Program for the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region .[30] This was the most important one of all and was accompanied by a directive that it be disseminated and explained in the Party–army–government hierarchies. In October, the Huaipei Su-Wan Border Region issued its program. The Huainan Su-Wan Border Region passed its own program in May, 1942. The Chin-Sui Border Region passed its program at the first session of its temporary council in October of 1942. In August, 1943, the Shantung Sub-bureau of the Northern Bureau adopted a program for the Shantung bases.[31]
New Democracy was the label for the sum total of all the institutions which came into existence as a result of these programs. Four major traits distinguished the New Democratic regime from its predecessor. First, all of the new administrative programs established the Three-thirds system. The new program for Shen-Kan-Ning demanded not only that Communist party members should not exceed one-third of those nominated for public offices; it also stipulated that when a Communist party member was elected a chief officer of an administrative organ, at least two-thirds of other offices must be filled by non-Communist candidates. An exact share of one-third for CCP members could not be exceeded in nomination and election.[32]
Second, a system of universal direct election was instituted in all the border regions.[33] Voter participation in three elections—at the border region, hsien , and hsiang or at comparable township levels—
[28] Kung-fei fan-tung wen-chien: Politics , pp. 181–184. The report by Yang Shang-k'un cited above accompanied the Double Ten Program. That the Double Ten Program served as a model for other administrative programs is my own inference. P'eng Chen stated at the time that the Double Ten Program was a local implementation of the Anti-Japanese National Salvation Ten Point Program of August, 1937, but that it was not national in application. Chieh-fang , No. 119, p. 22. The Administrative Program of the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region was presented as a national model, though it was identical in substance to the Double Ten Program.
[29] Growth of one revolutionary base , pp. 306–310.
[30] Shen-Kan-Ning pien-ch'ü ts'an-i-hui wen-hsien hui-chi , pp. 103–106.
[31] Kung-fei fan-tung wen-chien: Politics , pp. 174–187.
[32] Shen-Kan-Ning pien-ch'ü ts'an-i-hui wen-hsien hui-chi , p. 104.
[33] Universal direct election was in contrast to the system in use during the soviet period. At that time, ballots were weighted in favor of the voters of proletarian origin. Elections were conducted indirectly by levels. A voter cast his ballot only once to choose his delegate, who in turn voted for a higher delegate.
was required. Free election was the goal of the Anti-Japanese National Salvation Ten Points Program of August, 1937, as well as of The Administrative Program of the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region of April, 1939. But popular election was never promoted with such vigor prior to 1940. There was a special reason for this, having to do with the stage of development in the Communist bases, as will be shown below.
Third, the new administrative programs signaled the transition in the taxation system from rational burden to unified progressive tax. This stood for rationalization of taxation. Shen-Kan-Ning's 1939 program already stipulated unified progressive tax. But it was very certain that most of the Communist bases were not yet ready to institute such a complicated system of taxation at an earlier stage. Stability and security of a base were prerequisite. The switch to the new taxation system took more than one year in the more advanced bases, while others made do with the rational burden system until the end of the war.
Fourth, the over-all economic design of the new programs could be characterized as controlled "liberalization." Labor discipline was tightened and work stoppage was curbed. While the tax burden was distributed more widely among the poorer masses, business and industrial enterprises were given tax privileges. The new programs continued to pay lip service to rent and interest reduction, but the emphasis after 1941 was on punctual payment of rent and interest that were due. Depression in the rural economy was reversed in order to weather the most intensive phase of Japanese pacification. Eventually the policy of "liberalization" led to the emergence of Chinese NEP men,[*] so to speak, among the new proprietors.
The foregoing shows some of the contingent factors which shaped the New Democratic regime. There were others, and they will be dealt with as I explain the actual implementation of the programs in detail in the rest of this chapter. Voluminous statutes, regulations, and directives were passed and enforced in all border regions in pursuance of the new administrative programs. I will concentrate on only two aspects of the New Democratic regime: (1) Political intention of the CCP in instituting the Three-thirds system; and (2) Political intention and designs of the CCP behind the new economic system.
[*] Small capitalist traders that emerged in Soviet Russia in 1922–1928 when the stringent War Communism was replaced by the liberalization of the New Economic Policy.
The Three-Thirds System
There were debates in the CCP about whether to have such an institution at all and what its purpose should be. Very early in the war Mao opposed a popular representative institution in the Communist bases by castigating the idea as "parliamentarism."[34] The Chin-Chi-Yü District, under P'eng Te-huai's control, experimented with a so-called "One-half system" (erh-i-chi ) in late 1939, though details are not known.[35] Mark Selden notes quite correctly the affinity between the Three-thirds system and Chiang Kai-shek's order, toward the end of the first united front, to restrict the Communists in any important organ of the government and the Kuomintang to one-third.[36] It is possible that Mao co-opted the idea from his opponents and put it to his own use. It was probably for this reason that there were disagreements about its purpose. The first known application of the Three-thirds system took place in the Suite and the Lungtung Sub-districts of the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region, with Mao's blessing.[37] These areas fell to the CCP's control in the spring of 1940. Land revolution could not be carried out as in the more established part of the border region, and the landlords remained in force. The Three-thirds system was used to appease them. But there was much more to it than that. It was put to a use whose thoroughly modern character is astounding.
The system expanded democracy in the sense in which the term is understood nowadays: simple increase of participation by the masses in public affairs. Yet it increased the power of the government and the Communist party over the people at the same time. Neither mass participation nor increased government power alone can adequately explain the Three-thirds system. The two were fused together in a unique combination: democratic centralism.[38]
It went without saying that the Three-thirds system reflected the CCP's confidence in having its way in well-consolidated bases. In this sense, the system was only a formal concession to the proclivities of
[34] Selected Works , II, 67, 73. This was in November, 1937.
[35] Li Hsüeh-feng, Ken-chü-ti chien-she yü ch'ün-chung kung-tso [Base construction and mass work] (December, 1940) (BI), p. 45. This report concerned the Chin-Chi-Yü District. It was accompanied by a brief introduction by P'eng Te-huai who extolled it as "the basic final sum-up of peasant mass work during the three years of resistance," Ibid. , p. 1. Li Hsüeh-feng's concern in the report was that the rent and interest reduction campaigns were resulting in too rapid transfer of land ownership, Ibid. , p. 3 ff.
[36] Yenan Way , p. 162.
[37] Ibid. , p. 163. See Selected Works , II, 418, for Mao's support for it.
[38] For further discussion of this interpretation of the concept of "democratic centralism," see Kataoka, "Political Theory of the Great Leap Forward," Social Research , Spring 1969, pp. 93–122.
the non-Party elements. Of the enlightened gentry and the national bourgeoisie, Mao said,
We unite with them not because they are a political force to be reckoned with nor because they are of any economic importance (their feudal landholdings should be handed over with their consent to the peasants for distribution) but because they gave us considerable help politically during the War of Resistance. . . .[39]
In co-opting and mustering their "help"—so that they would carry out the Party's decisions "gladly and whole-heartedly"[40] —the CCP was not unilaterally relinquishing its power but was trying to increase it. It is in this sense that the CCP's modernity stands in contrast to the Kuomintang.
The Three-thirds system served one purpose vis-à-vis the intermediate groups in the White areas and quite another vis-à-vis the border regions. In the border regions, it is again possible to draw a distinction between the functions served by border region political councils in relatively urbanized areas such as Yenan and the functions of the councils down in the villages. As it moved down into the rural areas, the Three-thirds system took on quite a revolutionary character.
Vis-à-vis the Kuomintang-controlled areas, the Three-thirds system was geared to a specific campaign after 1940. As I have noted, the Sixth Plenum of the Kuomintang's CEC decided to call the national assembly in November of 1940. But the December Incident intervened, and the convocation of the assembly was put off. In March, 1941, the Kuomintang announced that the assembly would be postponed until the end of the war.[41] In early 1940, the CCP decided to launch a campaign to "urge constitutional government." Associations for Promotion of Constitutional Government were formed in the Communist bases.[42] In the context of this campaign, it was timely for the CCP to carry out local and regional elections in its own areas on the basis of universal franchise. These elections were evidently designed to point up the "democratic" character of border region governments in contrast to "one-party dictatorship" in Chungking.
Border region councils were the showcase of democracy, and the CCP took care to elect to them non-Party personages of as prominent a background as possible. To have even a sprinkling of independent and progressive men of literary or civic renown added a tremendously
[39] Selected Works , IV, 209.
[40] Ibid. , II, 419.
[41] Collected Wartime Messages , II, 562.
[42] "New–Democratic Constitutional Government," Selected Works , II, 407–416. Editorial comment states, "Comrade Mao Tse-tung here exposed Chiang Kai-shek's deceit, wrested the propaganda weapon of 'constitutional government' from his hands and turned it into a weapon . . . ," Ibid. , p. 407.
benign air to the "anti-Japanese political power."[43] The sophistication of the CCP's approach to the intermediate groups was indicated by a directive of the Propaganda Department in October. It contained carefully drawn up instructions for wooing the intellectuals to the Communist side:
We ought to realize the importance of cultural personalities and rectify the backward mentality of some comrades in the Party to belittle, loathe, and mistrust [them]. . . . We should realize that a cultural personality with considerable social position, prestige, and skill in some art and its product often has very great influence internally and externally.
We ought to use every means to guarantee the spiritual, material, and other necessary conditions for their literary production. . . .[44]
At about the same time, another directive instructed the Party organizations to exploit the Kuomintang's "exclusionism" which left many youths frustrated. It named a dozen or so well-known civic leaders as the target of wooing. It sounded as though the CCP was feeling their pulses individually.[45]
It was easier to postulate democratic centralism theoretically than to practice it. The working of border region councils was an uneasy compromise between democracy and centralism. Some councils acted as mere rubber stamps. For instance, from the Huaipei Su-Wan Border Region, the following "lesson" was reported:
Generally speaking, in parliamentary debate and legislation every legislator ought to compete for time and opportunity to speak. This ought to be recognized as his right. In elections, every legislator, party, and group exhaust energy in competition. . . . This right is inalienable. . . . But there are still many people who have never competed to raise their hands to this day. And why is it that some members of our council still need "mobilization" and "encouragement" before they agree to speak up and run for elections?[46]
[43] See the series of biographical columns on the members of the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region political council in Chieh-fang jih-pao , November 3–19, 1941.
[44] Chung-Kung chung-yang hsüan-ch'uan-pu kuan-yü k'e-k'ang-Jih ken-chü-ti ch'ün-chung ku-tung kung-tso shih-chih [The CCP Central Committee Propaganda Department directive concerning mass agitation work in each anti-Japanese base] (BI).
[45] Chung-Kung chung-yang kuan-yü ch'üan-kuo chiao-yü-hui k'e-hsiao-p'ai-pieh hsiao-t'uan-t'i tui-chan t'ung-i chan-hsien kung-tso ti shih-chih [The CCP Central Committee's directive concerning the expansion of national united front work in the small factions and small organizations in the educational circle of the country], Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 476–479.
[46] Liu Tzu-chiu, "Huai-pei Su-Wan pien-ch'ü ti-erh-chieh ts'an-i-hui ti ching-yen chiao-hsün" [Experiences and lessons of the second political council of the Huaipei Su-Wan Border Region], Fuhsiao (the 4th Division, New Fourth Army), May, 1943, p. 62.
Lin Po-ch'ü, the chairman of the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region, criticized some Communist members for abusing the method of "inviting" the intermediate groups to the council. They said, "The Three-thirds system is just a way of display to create a good impression on the outside. . . . Just bring in some celebrities to make up the number!" Lin warned that "putting numbers together" was "Left deviation," while conceding the need for "invitation."[47]
It would be a mistake to assume that the political process in the councils was simply rigged from behind to disguise the CCP's dictatorship. The intent of the Party was no less than to fabricate "spontaneous" support. In pursuing this goal, it leaned over backward. At the same time, many members of border region councils were articulate and independent men. They endorsed the CCP insofar as it supported the Three People's Principles and the resistance against Japan. A summing-up report of the first Hupeh-Honan Border Region assembly (March, 1943) stated:
We ought to study the Kuomintang's statutes in detail. Many intermediate persons still regard the Kuomintang's statutes as orthodox. With respect to the important ones, such as the Compendium of Civil Laws and the Elementary People's Rights , we must improve our skill in citing the revolutionary passages in order to solve various legal disputes.[48]
After the councilors and officers for the second council were elected in Shen-Kan-Ning in 1941, according to Lin Po-ch'ü, a dispute arose among the CCP members as to the power and competence of the council.[49] The statute which enacted the council empowered it to be a legislative organ: it was authorized to elect the chairman of the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region and the Higher Judicial Yuan; to supervise administrative officers; to pass the government budget; and to legislate.[50] But the administration apparently had veto power.[51] Some Communist members set forth a "two power theory" on the basis of "parallel existence of legislature and administration" (i-hsing ping-li ), or a "two and a half power theory" whereby the judiciary was to
[47] "Pien-ch'ü san-san-chi ti ching-yen chi ying-kai ch'i chiu-cheng ti pien-hsiang" [Experience of the Three-thirds system in the border region and how to correct its bias] (report to the senior cadre conference in March, 1944), Ibid. , December, 1944, pp. 8–9.
[48] "O-Yü pien-ch'ü ti-i-tz'u k'e-chieh jen-min tai-piao ta-hui ti ch'ing-hsing chi ch'i tsung-chi" [The situation of the Hupeh-Honan Border Region's first people's representative assembly and its conclusion], Ibid. , April, 1943, p. 55.
[49] "Pien-ch'ü san-san-chi . . . ," p. 11.
[50] Shen-Kan-Ning pien-ch'ü ts'an-i-hui wen-hsien hui-chi , pp. 56–57.
[51] This was the case in the Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü Border Region. See Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 92.
enjoy semi-autonomy alongside the legislature and administration.[52] Jen Pi-shih also revealed that some people advocated the "theory of uninterrupted elections" to preserve democracy. He maintained that the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region was already a democracy, yet these people felt that the Communist party was the ruler and that a real democracy in which the people are free to do as they like was far away.[53] Such "misunderstanding," according to Lin Po-ch'ü, stemmed from the failure to distinguish the Three-thirds system from the soviet system, or bourgeois–democracy from New Democracy. He argued that the council and the administrative organs were both "organs of political power" under the formula: "unity of legislature and administration" (i-hsing ho-i ).[54] The dispute concerning the power of the council was not settled until the senior cadre conference in Shen-Kan-Ning in 1942.[55]
Apparently the CCP was having some discipline problems as it adopted the policy to eliminate sectarianism. Its solution was to draw a sharp distinction between the class stand of the Party and its external relations or "severity within the Party and leniency without."[56] This was the line laid down by Mao in a major directive, "On Policy," in December of 1940.[57]
The Three-thirds system and the general election at the hsiang level in the rural areas were not purely political reforms.[58] They had organic connection with social and economic revolutions that had been in progress since the establishment of the Communist bases. Turning the general election into an occasion for stepping up the land revolution to the higher stage was Mao's intention. This was implied in the republication of "An Investigation of Hsinkuo" under the new title, "Rural Surveys," with a new preface and a postscript in April, 1941.[59]
The republication of the document was apparently intended to match Wang Ming's republication of his Two Lines of 1931 under the new title, Struggle for the More Complete Bolshevization of the Chi -
[52] Lin Po-ch'ü, "Pien-ch'ü san-san-chi . . . ," p. 11.
[53] "Kuan-yü chi-ke wen-t'i ti i-chien" [My opinion concerning several problems], Fuhsiao , April, 1943, p. 9.
[54] "Pien-ch'ü san-san-chi . . . ," p. 17.
[55] Ibid. , p. 11.
[56] In the directive of July 7, 1940, in Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 75.
[57] Selected Works , II, 441–449.
[58] According to Lin Po-ch'ü, the "intermediate" groups were always more numerous than the "progressive" groups (i.e., the poor peasants and hired laborers) in councils of the hsien class or above, while the latter were dominant at the hsiang level. "Pien-ch'ü san-san-chi . . . ," p. 7.
[59] "'Nung-ts'un tiao-ch'a' hsü-yen"; "'Nung-ts'un tiao-chi'a' pa," Mao Tse-tung-chi , VII, 289–292. By this time, incidentally, Mao was looking forward to the Seventh Party Congress. See Ibid. , p. 289.
nese Communist Party , in July, 1940. Mao stressed repeatedly in the preface and the postscript that the substantive policy laid down in "Rural Surveys" was not applicable to the resistance period as a "tactical line."[60] He thus implied that strategically there was a parallel between the land revolution of the civil war period and that of the resistance period. Mao's message seems to have been that the land revolution in the resistance period had reached the stage which corresponded to the land investigation stage in the civil war period, for which Mao wrote the original document. He was reminding his audience that the election campaign of 1941 under the Three-thirds system was comparable to the land investigation drive which preceded the Second National Soviet Congress and which created a large turnover in soviet personnel at all levels.
"The entire border region carried out a re-election from below upward," reported Lin Po-ch'ü.[61] In keeping with democratic centralism, the election was preceded by sending down of propaganda teams into the countryside to mobilize the peasantry. One district in Shen-Kan-Ning was saturated by 115 teams and 881 workers.[62] A voter turnout of 80 percent was secured in Shen-Kan-Ning as a whole and 95 percent in Suite, Ch'inchien, and Yench'uan.[63] The latter figure may indicate the relative intensity of the CCP's efforts in the peripheral areas. The result, as revealed in statistics from this and the Chin-Chi-Yü District, was stunning. Two-thirds of the incumbent officials at the hsiang level were voted out and replaced by new ones. In Yenan hsien 113 were re-elected to the hsiang level administrative commissions while 185 were newly elected. Among the 61 hsiang chiefs, 41 were new faces. In Anting hsien 70 percent of hsiang and township officers were newly elected. In Suite 1,001 incumbents were voted out.[64]
The reform in the Chin-Chi-Yü District fell behind. The "formalism" of mass organization between 1940 and 1941 is blamed today on restraints imposed by P'eng Te-huai,[65] though the presence of the central army had as much to do with it. By 1942 in any event, the policy was reversed, and the quickened pace of social and political change was reflected in the class distribution of local officials in the T'aihang District. The Fifth Special District in She, Lin, and Tz'uwu hsien had gone through a "reorganization" in 1942. Of the 821 officials in twenty-five villages (ts'un ) after that, only 6 were landlords. (See Table 8.) Of the 598 officials in the Third Special District in Wu-
[60] Ibid. , pp. 289, 297.
[61] Shen-Kan-Ning pien-ch'ü ts'an-i-hui wen-hsien hui-chi , p. 88.
[62] Yenan Way , p. 165.
[63] Shen-Kan-Ning pien-chü ts'an-i-hui wen-hsien hui-chi , p. 88.
[64] Ibid .
[65] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 94.
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hsiang, Yüshe, and Hsiangyüan hsien , only 39 were landlords. Most of the rich peasants in both cases could very well have been the so-called "new rich" (hsin-kui ) rather than former rich peasants. The landlord officials were obviously "enlightened gentry" who met the conditions set by the CCP. The former officials, who had stayed in office under watchful eyes of the CCP and mass organizations, were reduced in their economic status and finally swept out of office in the election of 1942.
Bourgeois Democracy or New Democracy?
The political change that took place in the election of 1941 in north China was a ratification of sub-political changes that had been under way since 1937. Revolution in China's countryside was predicated on redistribution of land. Under the New Democratic regime, the CCP continued to adhere to the basic policy of liquidating the landlords as a class and giving land to the peasants. However, the specific determinants of the New Democratic regime were the drastic decline in the economy of the Communist bases and an excess in class struggle. As Japanese pacification was intensified in 1941 and 1942, increase in production became the overriding goal of the Party. It is not an exaggeration to say that the political economy of New Democracy was based on an uneasy balancing of the CCP's ideological goal and its economic needs. This can be inferred from the Decision Concerning the Land Policy of the Anti-Japanese Bases , passed in January 1942, the first major document issued by the Party Center on the land question which is available. "We must recognize," it stated, "that the
peasants (including hired peasants) are the basic strength of the resistance and production."[66] It is significant that "production" was substituted for "democracy." The Party's goal was to reduce but not to eliminate "feudal exploitation." Therefore, civil and political rights of the landlords and rich peasants, e.g., property rights, were to be protected.[67] The decision also affirmed that the "bourgeoisie . . . is a relatively progressive social element and political force in China today."[68] It resolved to promote "bourgeois production method" because it was an "indispensable minimum" for the resistance.[69]
To achieve the twin goals, ideological and economic, the CCP devised a syndrome of measures having three major components which were mutually interdependent. The first two were reduction in rent and interest and the unified progressive tax system. These were a continuation of the policy in force since the beginning of the war. But excessive "democracy" was curbed, and for the first time, poor and middle peasants began to share a substantial portion of the financial burden of the bases. The third component consisted of measures such as the new tax system which sought to attract the landlord class from its rentier occupation into private industry and commerce. Altogether, they amounted to rigging together a structure of profit incentive which favored capitalist enterprises and penalized landlording. This was an ingenious policy. It made the liquidation of the landlord class compatible with regulated capitalism and economic prosperity. These three measures will be reviewed here.
Execution of these measures presupposed relative security from Japanese and Kuomintang interference as well as consolidation of the previous stage of land revolution. There was noticeable "unevenness" between different bases. Northwestern Shansi, Shantung, and north Kiangsu were very much behind. There were only two bases which carried out the most sophisticated form of unified progressive taxation: those parts of the Chin-Ch'a-Chi and the Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü Border Regions which were in the T'aihang range. For a while an attempt was made to set up the sophisticated tax system in central Hopei, but as Japanese pacification was stepped up, the tax system reverted to the cruder rational burden.[70] Eventually, tax payment stopped altogether.
A comparison of tax regulations adopted in the Chin-Ch'a-Chi and
[66] Chung-Kung chung-yang kuan-yü t'u-ti cheng-ts'e ti chüeh-ting [The CCP Central Committee's decision concerning the land policy], Kung-fei t'u-ti cheng-ts'e chung-yao wen-chien hui-pien [Collection of important documents on land policy of the Communist bandits] (Chung-lien ch'u-pan-she) (BI), p. 106.
[67] Ibid .
[68] Ibid. , pp. 106–107.
[69] Ibid. , p. 107.
[70] "Kahokusho[*] ichi noson[*] . . . ," p. 40.
Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü bases shows that Nieh Jung-chen was decidedly more egalitarian than P'eng Te-huai. The Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü regulation adopted direct personal income tax. It stated, "Various properties (including landed property) are without exception exempt from tax."[71] In contrast, in Chin-Ch'a-Chi, both property and income were liable to tax.[72] In addition, in Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü tax rate was only nominally progressive. Progression in tax rate stopped at 100 shih tou (the shih tou equals eight kilograms) of taxable income.[73] In Chin-Ch'a-Chi it went up to 810 shih tou .[74]
Taxable property in Chin-Ch'a-Chi excluded investments in industry and trade, shares in cooperative societies, investments in irrigation bonds, stored grain, jewelry, loans, cash deposits in banks, stores or cooperatives, animals, investments in subsidiary home industries, etc.[75] Thus the pressure on the landlords to get out of landlording and to invest their assets in industry and commerce was more intense in Chin-Ch'a-Chi.
Again, as in the case of rational burden, all taxpayers were put into different classes with respect to their taxable income (i.e., after personal or other exemptions were deducted). Then progressive tax rates were assigned to each class. Since the overriding purpose of taxation after 1941 was to maximize revenue for fiscal stability, it became necessary to spread the tax burden among 80 percent of the population of the bases.[76] To do this equitably, it was necessary to carry out very thorough assessment of the tax base, usually yield per a unit of land. Under-reporting of cultivated land was punished severely. Ability of a Communist government to eliminate the "black field" was impressive. In one village near Wujench'iao in central Hopei, Japanese researchers discovered that 1,393 mou were registered by the Communist government while only 810 mou by the puppet government.[77]
According to Michael Lindsay, actual rate of taxation in the Peiyüeh District in Chin-Ch'a-Chi for 1944 was: 52 percent of income for the landlords; 18 percent for rich peasants; 10 percent for middle peasants; and 4 to 5 percent for poor peasants.[78] Tax burden also fluctuated over time. In Chin-Ch'a-Chi the worth of a "point" (fen ) used for reckon-
[71] Kung-fei fan-tung wen-chien: Land policy , p. 211.
[72] Michael Lindsay, "The Taxation System of the Shansi–Chahar–Hopei Border Region, 1938–1945," The China Quarterly , April–June, 1970, pp. 5–6.
[73] Kung-fei fan-tung wen-chien: Land policy , p. 234.
[74] Lindsay, p. 7.
[75] Ibid. , p. 5.
[76] P'eng Te-huai, Kuan-yü hua-pei ken-chü-ti kung-tso ti pao-kao , p. 372.
[77] "Kahokusho[*] ichi noson[*] . . . ," p. 11. In this area, an under-reporting of more than ten mou was punished by confiscation.
[78] Lindsay, p. 9.
ing taxable income and property was: 1.5 shih tou in 1941; 1.25 shih tou in 1942; 0.9 shih tou in 1943; and 0.85 shih tou in 1944. Thus, tax was heaviest in 1941 and declined rapidly until 1944 when it was reduced by nearly one-half for everyone.[79] The severity of tax burden in 1941 and 1942 was related directly to Japanese pacification. The CCP lost control of Hopei Province, a major source of revenue, and the regular army sought refuge in the T'aihang mountains. The T'aihang range itself was subjected to mopping-up campaigns involving destruction of crops and cattle.
Efficacy of the tax system to accomplish its design depended on enforcement of rent and interest reduction, as previously. In the older bases the 25 percent reduction of existing rent or "30–70 division of return" had been already enforced. After 1941, emphasis was placed on uniform enforcement of standard rent and elimination of local irregularities. This went hand in hand with enforcement of the initial 25 percent reduction or even more modest reductions in new areas. According to a regulation of the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region,
A rent reduced in implementing the preceding article [25 percent reduction] or any rent contracted thereafter should not exceed 37.5 percent of the total yield of the chief produce of that cultivated land. If it is in excess, it must be reduced to 37.5 percent; if not, it can be left to [mutual] agreement. . . .[80]
The rate of 37.5 percent was derived from an old Kuomintang land law of 1927, which had been seldom enforced.
A whole constellation of measures was adopted in all bases to favor the tenants and to squeeze landlording out of existence. If a landlord wanted to sell his land, the tenant was given the priority to buy it. If the tenant could not afford it, he had the right to remain on the land purchased by a new owner. This prevented a landlord from threatening to sell the land in order to get higher rent. A tenant was at liberty to improve the land, but his landlord was forbidden to demand increased rent as a consequence of increased output. But when a tenancy contract legally expired or dissolved, the tenant could demand compensation for the cost of improvement. If a landlord wanted to switch from a fixed rent to a variable rent, viz., a fixed proportion of output, the substance of rent was not allowed to increase. If a tenant was too poor to pay his rent, his landlord could be "persuaded" to waive a part or all of the rent. If an excessive rent was
[79] Kung-fei fan-tung wen-chien: Land policy , p. 180.
[80] Kung-fei t'u-ti cheng-ts'e chung-yao wen-hsien hui-pien , p. 112. This was passed in January, 1943.
paid, the excess had to be refunded by a landlord. But in a guerrilla district or in cases where the tenant was better off than the landlord, refund was not necessary.[81]
Landlords tried desperately to keep from going under. They found loopholes in the existing regulations to defend their rights. These loopholes had to be closed. Some set up their tenants as dummy owners by transferring the land deed without relinquishing rent. Some deceived their tenants into paying for the property tax on land. A good many landlord families sent their sons to the Eighth Route Army in order to partake of the tax exemption privileges. Many preferred short term contracts in the hope that when a tenant proved to be too demanding he could be thrown out. That was forbidden. The definition of "use right" (shih-yung-ch'üan ) was very loose in some regulations. Under some circumstances, tenants were given perpetual lease. But then there were landlords who were taxed into bankruptcy. They had to get back the leased land for their own use. In such instances, border region governments provided "arbitration." If the landlord was still better off than the tenant, the tenant stayed. If a tenant was in hardship for reasons of sloth and laziness, a part or the whole of the leased land could be returned to the landlord for his own use.[82] The purpose of all these measures appeared to be to see to it that everyone became roughly equal in landholding.
These regulations and directives issued in 1942 and 1943 indicated that the rural areas under Communist control were going through rapid social change which bordered on an upheaval. The whole process was just barely contained behind the facade of rent reduction and progressive tax. At the grass roots, the change depended on "political power" growing out of the "barrel of a gun." Commission of excesses seemed inevitable. In Liaohsien in the T'aihang District, poor peasants marched to the landlords' houses to eat their fill as a part of rent reduction. Such a practice would lose social sympathy, warned P'eng Te-huai.[83] He regarded the fleecing of four landlords there, who together had owned 900 mou of land, until they had only 90 mou left, as excessive.[84] On the other hand, he maintained,
in general the large landlord class is positively die-hard, anti-Communist, and anti-democratic; naturally they oppose rent and interest reduction. But the majority of them have been rulers in the past and have rich experiences. Usually they do not come out front to oppose [us] but adopt devious postures to fool the peasants and exploit the backward elements. . . . Take the big
[81] Ibid. , p. 128.
[82] Ibid. , pp. 113–133, passim .
[83] Kuan-yü hua-pei ken-chü-ti kung-tso ti pao-kao , p. 386.
[84] Ibid. , p. 378.
landlord in Mat'ien for an example. Many cadres and hsien magistrates were treated to dinner at his house. Accommodation was attentive indeed. Our cadres previously never spoke ill of him. . . . After the Northern Bureau conducted a thorough investigation, we learned that he was an important man in charge of the Kuomintang in that area.[85]
As long as the big landlords were steadfast, the smaller landlords sided with them. "But when the peasants undertake an attack against the big landlords positively," said P'eng, "the middle and small landlords begin to waver without, however, falling apart." At this point, a demonstration by the Eighth Route Army and militia was suggested. The Party branch would mobilize public opinion in favor of rent reduction. While the landlords dispatched their "running dogs" to find out what was going on, rumors were floated: "Landlords violated the law, we should sue them"; "The Eighth Route Army has come, aren't they reducing [the rent] yet?"; "Peasants these days have swords and bags," etc.[86] "But this work is difficult in the extreme," said P'eng Te-huai. "After the masses rise up, their power is limitless and they can strike down the oppressors. But if they are dissatisfied with their leaders, they can also strike down the leadership." He warned against "dumping cold water" on the masses which might cost the leadership its prestige or dissipate the mass enthusiasm; against doing everything for the masses by orders; and against the principle of "the more Left the better."[87] He put the point differently again as follows:
Our tactics in struggling with the landlords are: one strike and one pull; to strike first and pull afterwards; to deliver a strike in the midst of pulling; and to pull while striking. Reduction in rent and interest is to weaken the feudal strength, this is strike. To guarantee landlords' civil rights, political rights, property rights, and to carry out the Three-thirds system . . . this is pull. When we mobilize the masses for struggle, we must pay attention to both sides. . . .[88]
Reduction in interest called for a little more finesse in handling. Though no data for the pre-1941 period is available, it seems that indiscriminate reduction in interest rates created an acute shortage of private credit. After 1942, one can discern three goals pursued by the CCP with respect to the interest rate. First, it continued to eliminate exploitative, high interest consumption loans. Second, it tried to revive rural credit at more reasonable rates. Third, it tried to induce
[85] Ibid. , pp. 403–404.
[86] Ibid. , p. 404. The "bags" here seem to mean ones in which to carry the loot.
[87] Ibid. , p. 371.
[88] Ibid. , p. 385.
private capital into more productive investments by depressing interest rates in one area and removing restraints in the others. In principle, only those interest rates on loans contracted before the war were affected by government action, though how well the principle was observed in practice was another matter. The Central directive of January, 1942, stated:
As for post-war interest rates, let the people dispose of them on their own in accordance with social and economic relations of the locality. The government ought not to decide on an excessively low interest rate to cause stagnation in lending and borrowing or disadvantages to the people's livelihood.[89]
When payment on a new loan was at default, the creditor was authorized to call in the collateral. But in cases where the payment of interest had already exceeded the principal, the interest was liquidated; where interest payment exceeded the principal by two times, the entire loan was liquidated.[90] Since the campaign to reduce rent and interest went hand in hand, it would be safe to assume that there was just as much abuse in the latter as in the former. Still the government's intention was clear. Moreover, it offered credit at reasonable rates. That was sufficient to drive out higher interest rates. The Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region, for instance, offered a credit of three million yuan in 1943.[91] Controlled rates on old loans varied from place to place. The Party's January, 1942 directive suggested 15 percent per annum.[92] In Chin-Ch'a-Chi 10 percent was enforced.[93] In the Fukien–Kiangsu–Kwantung area, it was 30 percent.[94] In Shantung it remained 30 percent until 1946.[95]
The squeeze on the landlords and rentiers forced many of them to become destitute very rapidly. A good many of them were presumably reduced to the status of an ordinary proprietor tilling his own soil. Yet others of them with enough acumen sold their property before they were taxed into bankruptcy and invested the assets in commerce and industry.[96] The former–landlords–turned–capitalists played an important entrepreneurial role even in semi-socialist cooperatives.[97] Not only did they have the capital, they also monopolized literacy and business competence. They were encouraged to invest in important industries which were entirely exempt from tax. In Chin-Ch'a-Chi these were
[89] Kung-fei t'u-ti cheng-ts'e chung-yao wen-hsien hui-pien , p. 111.
[90] Ibid. , p. 117.
[91] Kung-fei fan-tung wen-chien: Land policy , p. 180.
[92] Kung-fei t'u-ti cheng-ts'e chung-yao wen-hsien hui-pien , p. 111.
[93] Ibid. , p. 117.
[94] Ibid. , p. 263.
[95] Ibid. , p. 274.
[96] Kung-fei fan-tung wen-chien: Land policy , p. 186.
[97] Isabel and David Crook, Ten Mile Inn , pp. 50–51.
paper-making, mining, iron smelting and founding, manufacture of agricultural implements, oil pressing, manufacture of salt, alum and sulphur, leather and fur industry, hand spinning and weaving, dyeing, soap manufacture, match manufacture and pottery manufacture.[98] These former–landlords–turned–capitalists continued to contribute to the economy of the Communist areas through the civil war and the post-war period of recovery. Then in 1953, their "historic role" was ended with the Three-anti and Five-anti Campaigns. They were again liquidated as a class.
The rapidity with which both the peasants and the landlords changed their statuses in areas of Communist control was surprising. One cannot help suspecting that the social relationship in the rural areas had already begun to alter fundamentally before the Communist forces entered the scene as a catalyst. Social change was usually reflected first in the increased rate of mortgaging of land, then in transfer of land ownership. The impact of the first three years of the war, when two-thirds of the peasants went virtually tax free, and the continued squeeze on landlords thereafter is clearly indicated in statistics offered by Communist sources.
Foup'ing hsien was in the Peiyüeh District in the northern T'aihang range. It belonged to the Third Military Sub-district commanded by Huang Yung-sheng, and its hsien seat was the only one which remained in Communist control in the 1941–1942 period. In the eight months between January and August of 1942, eight districts in Foup'ing hsien reported 1,008 mou of land being mortgaged. Of this land, 922 mou were mortgaged to tenant farmers who were cultivating the land. These tenants evidently had enough cash to loan to the landowners. They acquired the use and produce of the land; and if the mortgager could not repay the loan, the ownership passed to the tenants. At the same time an outright sale of 620 mou was reported, of which 492 mou were purchased by tenants using the land. In twenty-four villages in the Peiyüeh District 814.57 mou were mortgaged, of which 599.04 mou or 71.8 percent were mortgaged by landlords and rich peasants.[90] These villages were rated as "consolidated." Table 9 shows total land sales in these twenty-four villages between 1937 and 1943. One sector of the rural population was buying more than it was selling, while the other sector was selling more than it was buying. The dividing line was between the middle peasants and the rich peasants.
Social mobility of peasants in these villages can be seen in the fluctu-
[98] Lindsay, p. 8.
[99] Kung-fei fan-tung wen-chien: Land policy , pp. 181–182.
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ation in the size of the rich peasant households. In 1937, 8.45 percent of the total households was rated as rich peasant. By 1941, the size of this group declined to 1.78 percent. Then it expanded again to 7.88 percent by 1942.[100] A good number of the rich peasants in 1942 were
[100] Ibid. , p. 184.
former middle or poor peasants who rose in status. i.e., the "new rich." Some former landlord families which had declined in status were also in the group. Effects of social mobility due to the land program of the CCP are always blunted in such a presentation because it includes downward mobility due to division of inheritance (fenchia ).
Effectiveness of the taxation and rent and interest reduction is documented dramatically in Table 10, showing "class relations" in the T'aihang District, taken from a post-war Communist source. In the winter of 1944 and early spring of 1945, the T'aihang District carried out "the most thorough campaign of rent and interest reduction" for a second or even a third time in many villages.[101] Rapid increase in the number of middle peasants and a steady decline in the number of the poor peasants are clearly noticeable.
A much slower rate of social change can be seen from the data taken from Anle hsiang in Laianhsien, some eighty kilometers northwest of Nanking in the Huainan Su-Wan Border Region. This investigation was made in late 1943. Anle was made up of five villages with a total population of 2,001 in 434 households. Its pre-war population was 1,379 in 297 households. According to the investigator, actual social change was much greater than is indicated by the table, since there were many divisions of inheritance and new migrants from Shantung after the war began. Still the continued survival of the "big landlord" is striking. Actual income of the poor peasants might have been larger than indicated as they worked on the property of landlords. (see Table 11.)
In the areas of Shen-Kan-Ning which had completed land revolution before the coming of the united front, social change was most conspicuous. According to Lin Po-ch'ü's report of November, 1941,
In the ruins of the war, the people have not only restored the destroyed houses and fields, they are slowly beginning to prosper. Two-thirds of the peasants have draft animals . . . the peasants are better off year after year. This is shown mainly in the rapid increase of middle and rich peasants. Moreover middle peasants have become the most important elements in the villages.[102]
In the four hsiang of Anting, the rich and middle peasants increased from 7 percent before the revolution to 61 percent. In the four hsiang of Anhsi, the middle peasants increased from ten to sixty-four house-
[101] Growth of one revolutionary base , pp. 126–127.
[102] Shen-Kan-Ning pien-ch'ü ts'an-i-hui wen-hsien hui-chi , p. 94.
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holds. In the five hsiang in Yenan, the class composition of peasants in late 1941 was as follows:
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Lin reported that the middle peasants and the poor peasants in 1941 were better off than the rich peasants and the middle peasants, respectively, of the past.[103]
There was one enterprising poor peasant who made the most of the opportunity provided by the new economic regime to raise himself to the status of rich peasant. His name was Wu Man-yu. He was destined to become the topic of an internal debate in the CCP concerning the direction of New Democracy. Before the land revolution came to Yenan in 1935, he was a landless bachelor working on rented land. By January of 1939, he and three other peasants rated a special mention as examples of the success of land revolution in Yenan in Lin Po-ch'ü's report. At that time, Wu Man-yu's family of five hired two agricultural laborers, and cultivated 20 shang (1 shang = 3 mou in northwest China) of land. By 1941, he owned three cows and one horse. He was well off by any standard in China.[104] The Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region government seems never to have left him alone. He and his farm were closely watched and no doubt visited by a horde of observers from other areas. By 1942, he had five cows, two horses, one donkey, and 200 sheep. He was overseeing one long-term contract laborer, one sheep herder, and a half-time cattle tender. His land had increased to 77 shang . By 1944, he opened up some new fields. Of 149 shang of land he owned, he rented out 30 shang .[105] He was an NEP man of China.
In January, 1943, the Liberation Daily in Yenan heralded the launching of the so-called "Wu Man-yu Campaign" with an editorial.[106] The editorial designated Wu Man-yu and several other successful peasants as "labor heroes" to be emulated in the large-scale production campaign which had been under way since 1942. Almost immediately a certain "comrade Chao Ch'ang-yüan" queried the editor of the Liberation Daily to clarify his stand. Chao maintained that
[103] Ibid. , pp. 94–95.
[104] Ibid. , pp. 22–23.
[105] Tsu-chih ch'i-lai [Let us get organized] (The CCP, Northern Shansi Subbureau, 1944), pp. 49–52.
[106] Chieh-fang jih-pao , January 11, 1943, p. 1.
Wu Man-yu was made a labor hero simply on the basis of his subjective attitude toward labor. But, Chao asked, could his objective economic condition as a rich peasant be ignored? Furthermore, "if the direction of peasants is determined by his economic nature, can we or can we not take the direction of rich peasants as the direction for the entire peasantry in the border region this year?"[107] The editor defended himself in an internal publication:
Unmistakably Wu Man-yu is at present a rich peasant. Wu Man-yu's recent economy is built on the foundation of his own labor and hired labor. The hired portion of labor derives from an exploitative relation. There is no question that the Wu Man-yu-style economic development is of capitalist nature, and what is strange or dreadful about that?[108]
The editor denied categorically that the support for "Wu Man-yu-style rich peasant policy" undermined the standing commitment of the CCP to the cause of hired peasants.
In the past not a few comrades have misundertsood the Party's proposal to oppose capitalist thought inside the Party. They took this . . . to mean that there is no need to develop capitalism in the society. This is completely mistaken. Our so-called opposition to capitalist thought only refers to intra-Party [affairs]. And it refers only to the political aspect. Development of capitalist thought outside of the Party is natural and desirable. . . .[109]
The editor rested his case for defense of "capitalism" in the border region on Mao's essay "On New Democracy" and the Party's directive of January, 1942 (concerning land policy).[110]
In November, a rally for labor heroes of Shen-Kan-Ning was held in Yenan. Mao Tse-tung personally launched a large campaign to promote mutual aid teams and other semi-socialist forms of cooperation. "To organize the forces of the masses is one policy," he declared. "Is there a contrary policy?," he asked, and answered himself affirmatively. He openly criticized the base areas of north and central China for not paying enough heed to the matter.[111] Wu Man-yu was given a definitely semi-socialist significance. Mao had triumphed over Wang Ming by May, 1941, and the Rectification Campaign had been initiated to tighten up discipline in the Party, army, and government. While the society and economy of the Communist bases were not im-
[107] Ken-chü-ti chien-she yü ch'ün-chung kung-tso , p. 65.
[108] Ibid. , p. 66.
[109] Ibid. , p. 67.
[110] Ibid. In early 1943, the Party Center issued a directive concerning "Wu Man-yu's direction" though I have no access to it. Fuhsiao , June, 1943, p. 41.
[111] Selected Works , III, 155.
mediately affected by Mao's internal victory, there was no doubt in which direction the CCP was committed to proceed.[112]
This direction is apparent quite independent of our hindsight. The origins of the concept of New Democracy and the New Democratic regime were separate and distinct. The former was Mao's declaration of war on the Republic of China. The substance of the latter was dictated by the contemporary tactical needs of the Communist bases. Those needs were: (1) to moderate the political impact of social change on Chungking and foreign observers; (2) to avert the danger of the Party's isolation from the intermediate groups such as the "enlightened gentry"; (3) to restore production and revive commerce; and (4) to hold the bases against harsh Japanese pacification.
New Democracy and the Chinese Revolution
I have so far held in abeyance the question, Did Mao take a more radical stand on the social and economic aspects of the New Democratic regime which paralleled his stand on larger political issues? No definite answer can be given. I can merely offer an interpretation which seems more plausible and place it in the context of the strategic dispute.
I have shown fragmentary evidence which suggests that the moderation of the New Democratic regime originated with Mao's opponents but was embraced by Mao. This seems to have been the case with the Three-thirds system, for instance. Even after acceding to the idea, he turned it into an instrument for a rather revolutionary election campaign. There are other hints. In the original version of the essay "On New Democracy," he approved "confiscation" of the "big landlords."[113] In revising it for later publication, Mao would have us believe that it was his intention to "confiscate the land of the landlords" in general.[114]
One of the reasons why New Democracy as a concept has been held to be moderate is that it envisioned a two-stage revolution for China, the New Democratic stage followed by full socialism. It is true that
[112] See, for instance, the resolution passed by the Central Secretariat on January 31, 1945, and addressed to the United States, in Amerasia Papers , p. 1264. It stated in part, "On account of the fact that we inherit the orthodoxy of Marx and Engels to launch a class revolution . . . we oppose all forms of imperialism. The policy of cooperation with the United States on the part of the Party is a temporary measure to obtain national interest and to achieve victory over Japan. . . . "
[113] Mao Tse-tung-chi , VII, 167.
[114] Selected Works , II, 353. I take this to mean that he could be more articulate about his intentions in the post-war edition because of his greater independence.
Mao stated that the stage of New Democracy would last for a long time. But it is seldom realized that the two-stage theory was radical precisely because it envisioned full socialism at the end of New Democracy. On this line of interpretation, Mao's postulation of a two-stage revolution could very well have been a critique of those who sought to postpone full socialism for a considerable period of time on the ground that China and the Communist party were not ready for it. A one-stage revolution would have been a gradual change which dispensed with an October Revolution.
Three out of the fifteen sections which made up the lengthy essay were devoted to the refutation of those who advocated one-stage revolution of one sort or another. Two were refutations of "bourgeois dictatorship" and "the die-hards."[115] A third was "Refutation of 'Left' Phrase-Mongering." Mao gives us to understand here that his two-stage theory was intended to restrain the radicals who wanted to move straightway into socialism. Actually the section consisted of an attack on the right such as Carsun Chang.[116] All of Mao's enemies were, therefore, to the right of him and criticized his two-stage theory. Writing in August, 1940, Chang Wen-t'ien supports our interpretation:
There are still not a few comrades in our Party who cling to these old formulas. They hold that the victory of the Chinese democratic revolution must necessarily pass through two stages, i.e., the stage of national united front and the stage of land revolution. Therefore they hold that the national united front stage of today must sooner or later turn into the land revolution stage. In fact, this necessity is very problematical. On the contrary, the new circumstances and new practices have demonstrated that the Chinese democratic revolution does not by any means have to pass through these two stages to triumph. The peasant and land questions do not necessarily have to be solved in the stage of land revolution; rather the solution should be sought in gradual reform methods which carry out the revolution through the stage of the national united front.[117]
According to this Internationalist, the radicals were precisely those who advocated a two-stage theory. I suggest that he was referring to Mao.
The term radical is misleading because it conveys the sense of fool-hardy. It is clear that, Mao's ideological banner notwithstanding, he was quite prepared to make tactical concessions from time to time. The dispute between Mao and his opponents in this context was not over the advisability of appeasing the "enlightened gentry" or the "regional power groups." The issue was, I infer, over the more distant
[115] Ibid. , pp. 354–358, 360–363.
[116] Ibid. , pp. 358–360.
[117] "K'ang-Jih min-tsu t'ung-i chan-hsien-chung ti tso-ch'ing wei-hsien," p. 453.
question of the direction of the revolution. Current tactical decisions had to be mediated by that question. Mao criticized P'eng Te-huai precisely on this point in 1943. P'eng Te-huai maintained that democracy and the Three-thirds system were to have permanent character.[118] Mao rebuked P'eng's "talk [which] proceeds from the definition of democracy, liberty, equality, and fraternity, rather than from the political needs of the current anti-Japanese struggle ."[119]
I must note that P'eng Te-huai was not alone in opposing the idea of a headlong leap into socialism. In fact, all of Mao's opponents since the Tsunyi Conference counseled slower speed for the revolution and were purged as "right opportunists." The list includes Wang Ming, Chang Kuo-t'ao, P'eng Te-huai (in 1959), and Liu Shao-ch'i. I have shown, however, that in the case of Wang Ming the so-called "right opportunist error" was a manifestation of his desire to restore the revolution to the cities. Hence, prior to the Seventh Comintern Congress which promised a return to the cities via a united front, he sought to return to the cities by direct assault on them. In this sense both the "second 'Left' line" of Li Li-san and the "third 'Left' line" of Wang Ming can be classed together with all of the "right opportunist errors" of the post-Tsunyi period. In other words, the underlying dimension common to all of Mao's opponents from Li Li-san to Liu Shao-ch'i is a desire to accommodate the cities in the Chinese revolution.
To do so after the defeat in Kiangsi meant to moderate, rather than to push to the extreme, the force generated by the frustration of the peasantry. In one way or another, the revolution would have been more congenial to the progressive but basically non-violent proclivities of the middle class. Mao's opponents were not alone in their inclination to accommodate the peasant's welfare with the orientation of the bourgeoisie. Just as there were "class capitulationists," "revisionists," and "running dogs of the Kuomintang" in the CCP, so there were pro-Soviet, pro-united front, and pro-peasant elements in the Kuomintang. One might say that the peculiar political circumstances of the war against Japan fulfilled their yearning to be reunited with one another.
Why then was it that the voice of those who were in the middle failed to prevail? For answer we need only note the sheer political absurdity of the platform of the Internationalists during the second
[118] "Lun min-chu chiao-yü" [On democratic education], Cheng-fu kung-tso t'ung-hsün , August 1, 1943, pp. 3–7; "Min-chu cheng-chih yü san-san cheng-ch'üan tsu-chih hsing-shih" [Democratic politics and organizational mode of three-thirds political power], Shen-Kan-Ning pien-ch'ü shih-cheng kang-ling (no date, no publisher listed) (BI), pp. 6–15; The Case of Peng Teh-huai , p. 193.
[119] Mao Tse-tung-chi , IX, 13. Emphasis added.
united front. Cooperation with the Kuomintang in an "independent, free, and happy China" after the victory over Japan was utterly unthinkable. The Communists had to push peasant insurrection as far as it would take them. After 1927, there could never be a repetition of the Wuhan government. There could only be a total victory for one side and a total defeat for the other. Preparations for the coming civil war took the highest priority in Yenan no less than in Chungking. New Democracy was no exception. In retrospect, the die was cast in 1927 when the town–country division came to be overlaid with an ideological division.
VIII—
The Gun and the Peasants
The Battle of One Hundred Regiments did not bring down a cabinet as did the fall of Dienbienphu, nor did it pave the way for withdrawal of the occupation army as did the Tet Offensive. Its impact on Chung-king was uncertain. Still less do we know of its effect on the relationship between Yenan and Moscow. But as far as the Japanese forces were concerned, the offensive produced results which were the opposite of those intended by the Communist high command. The most intense and brutal phase of pacification got under way in the winter of 1940, reached its peak in the first half of 1941, and lasted through the early part of 1943. This was therefore the most difficult period of the war for the CCP. However, the difficulty was tactical, not strategic as in the summer of 1940. The survival of Communist power as such was not at stake. On the contrary, the united front—based on the absence of peace between China and Japan—was rapidly fortified as the world powers realigned themselves along the Axis vs. anti-Axis line in 1941. Germany invaded Soviet Russia in June. The last round of talks between Washington and Tokyo to avoid a conflict ended in a deadlock. Between the Japanese scheme of "southward advance" into southeast Asia to capture the sources of oil, and the American demand that Japan restore the status quo, not of 1937, but virtually of 1931 in China (in the "Hull Note" of November), there was no room for compromise. The United States became an important element in the international scaffolding around the united front.
However, in the context of this study it must be stressed that the "China Incident" was not sufficient by itself to induce the United States to intervene.[1] America intervened only when it began to view
[1] See Iriye Akira, Across the Pacific: An Inner History of American-East Asian Re -lations (New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., 1967), pp. 216–222, for the best statement of this judgment.
the China war as a part of the global conflict. In Washington's war plans, Asia took second place to Europe. But that did not matter for the united front, because the Kuomintang came to lean more and more on American support, real or imagined. Then the attack on Pearl Harbor insured that Japan would be defeated by powers other than China sooner or later. Prospects for the protracted war—the precondition for Communist victory over both Japan and the Kuomintang—was excellent. Two major tasks remained for the CCP. One was to prevent the United States from using its new influence in China on behalf of the Kuomintang in the domestic strife. The other was to preserve its own forces and rural bases against the battering assault of the Japanese forces.
In this chapter, I will review the tactical aspects of the war between the Chinese Communist and the Japanese forces in 1941 and 1942. I will arrive at a conclusion about the nature of the Chinese Communist movement as a peasant guerrilla movement, its strength as well as its weakness. The rather diverse inquiry will be directed at the central question: was the support of peasant masses the most decisive factor behind Communist power? It will be shown that the conditions of strategic stalemate, in which the Kuomintang and the Japanese forces were tied down with each other, had important tactical consequences: the availability of wide space which the Japanese army could not hold. Of equal importance was the prowess and tactical excellence of the Communist regular forces which prevented Japanese penetration into the more mountainous bases. The importance of military power as a precondition for political power in China will be demonstrated through two negative examples: the difficulties encountered by the Communist forces in holding the bases in Hopei against the Japanese and in north Kiangsu against native opposition. The power of the peasant masses as such will be shown to be highly ambiguous in reality. At the end, I will re-evaluate the nature of "peasant power" by locating its source in the "semi-feudal" aspect of China.
Even before the strike on Pearl Harbor, the conflict with the United States began to take priority for Japan's military resources, and the China war was subordinated to it. Occupied China became a logistic and military base and a link to Southeast Asia. Japan acquired an interest in holding it quite independent of the original cause of the war. Its policy became openly predatory. An indefinite occupation for exploitation of natural resources and self-sufficiency of the occupation forces became Japan's goal.
In January, 1941, the Army General Staff decided that Japan should hold the then existing line in China with 500,000 troops after the fall of 1941.[2] The China Expeditionary Forces admitted that security in north China was by far the worst.[3] North China was singled out as the area to be consolidated in 1941. At that time, the distribution of Japanese forces in China was as follows:[4]
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The distribution of troops per unit of area was as follows:[5]
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Again it was decided to use the forces currently on hand to go all out against the major enemy concentration in north China before the reduction. The twenty-six divisions under Wei Li-huang's command were regarded as a major obstacle in the way of effective pacification in southern Shansi against the Communist forces. An offensive in the Changsha area was also planned. These moves were intended to stem the resurgence of optimism in Chungking as the Anglo–American powers increased their commitment to its side.[6]
When the central forces in southern Shansi were chosen as a target of attack in early 1941, the wisdom of the plan came under criticism in the North China Area Army's command. The intelligence division maintained that Wei Li-huang's forces were by and large stationary and did not represent a threat to the security of the area. Would it not be better to leave them intact so as to check the Communist forces? The advocates of the campaign conceded that the Communist forces were indeed the major problem. But even so, the Japanese forces could not entirely disregard the presence of twenty-six regular divisions and conduct dispersed anti-guerrilla operations in the adjacent area. Besides, it was maintained, the three Japanese divisions tied down in the holding action against the Kuomintang forces would be freed for anti-Communist war once the former was expelled from southern
[2] Imperial Army General Staff , No. 2, pp. 209–210; Pacification War , No. 1, pp. 453–454.
[3] Ibid. , p. 452.
[4] Ibid .
[5] Ibid. , p. 462.
[6] Ibid .
Shansi. This debate typified the recurrent tactical dilemma which faced the Japanese forces in China. The decision to go ahead with the campaign was upheld in part because of the intended psychological impact on Chungking.[7]
Preparations for the Chugen[*] Campaign (the Battle of Chungt'iaoshan) were started in March in extreme secrecy. The surprise was sprung on May 7 with a pincer attack from Honan and the western T'aihang range by six divisions and three brigades. When it was over in the middle of June, the campaign turned out to be one of the most successful in the entire war for the Japanese side. The central forces were annihilated from the area north of the Yellow River.[8] But the consequences of the campaign were problematical from the Japanese standpoint. On several occasions the Communist forces were seen attacking the fleeing Kuomintang forces or moving into the vacuum created by their retreat.[9] The most tangible disadvantage created by the campaign for the Communist side was that Yen Hsi-shan, who had shown little interest in active resistance for some time, finally decided that it was futile. In September, he entered into an armistice agreement with the North China Area Army.[10]
"Darkness before Dawn"
As the Battle of Chungt'iaoshan ended, an important staff conference was held by the North China Area Army to formulate a program for anti-Communist pacification. It was not for this conference to question the feasibility of the anti-Communist war. Its role was strictly instrumental to the over-all strategic design of Japan. Still, in the light of the experiences with the Communist forces in the first three years of the war, some fundamental questions were raised. Could an alien army win over the minds of the Chinese people? Could it enlist the natives in the task of eradicating the Communist forces which were born of China's soil? The intelligence division was impressed by the formidable staying power of the Communist forces. "Our mopping-up operations against the Battle of One Hundred Regiments only managed to scatter the Chinese Communist forces," it maintained, "without accomplishing their destruction. They came to nothing."[11] No solution was forthcoming. The Japanese forces had only one advantage: "Our superiority is in our military power, their [the Communists'] short-
[7] Ibid. , p. 473.
[8] Ibid. , p. 472.
[9] Ibid. , pp. 476–477. Chungking and Yenan engaged in a propaganda war at the time over the loss of southern Shansi.
[10] See below, pp. 287–288.
[11] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 529.
coming is that their military power is not yet fully built up."[12] The conference concluded that the Area Army should go all out with a program of long-range armed suppression. It was to be supplemented by mobilization of native cooperation and improved intelligence gathering.[13]
The staff conference ended formally with a highly optimistic Three Year Plan. This was based on statistical data concerning the degree of Japanese "penetration" into hsien governments. (See Table 12.) It was the judgment of the conference that as of July, 1941, both Japanese and Communist sides had firm control of 10 percent of the occupied area; of the remainder, 60 percent was considered to be a semi-pacified zone in which the Japanese had an upper hand.[14] The Three Year Plan envisaged that the degree of security attained in Manchuria would be reproduced in north China by the end of 1943. Security of pacified zones was entrusted to Chinese administration while the Japanese forces were to move into the semi-pacified zone in order to convert it into a pacified zone.
In March, 1941, General Hata Shunroku was appointed commander of the China Expeditionary Forces, and in July, General Okamura Yasuji assumed the command of the North China Area Army. The pacification war in north China entered its final stage. The North China Political Affairs Commission proclaimed the second of the so-called "security strengthening campaigns" for two months starting on July 7.[15] At the same time the so-called "Seigo" (ch'ing-hsiang or "clearing the village") program was initiated in the Shanghai–Nanking–Hangchow delta. One hundred twenty kilometers of high-tension wire was strung around four hsien around Soochow (Ch'angshu, T'aits'ang, Wu, and K'unshan), and a hunt for Communist- and Chungking-affiliated guerrillas was begun by ten battalions of Japanese forces and 18,000 of the Nanking government's forces. By the end of July, 11,000 defectors were reported.[16]
By far the greatest energy was expended in construction of blockading trenches, either empty or filled with water to make a navigable
[12] Ibid .
[13] Intelligence operations improved considerably after the Battle of One Hundred Regiments. Secret codes of both the Kuomintang and the CCP were broken. With better intelligence, military operations were refined. The so-called t'i-chüeh (pick and uproot) work became common. This meant that a specific target such as a headquarters unit would be pursued.
[14] Ibid. , p. 532.
[15] The first "security strengthening campaign" was in March–April, 1941; the third in November–December, 1941; the fourth in March–May, 1942; and the fifth in October–November, 1942.
[16] Joho[*] , No. 52, October 15, 1941, pp. 12–16.
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canal. The biggest one constructed after the Battle of One Hundred Regiments was the trench running for 500 kilometers along the western side of the Peiping–Hankow railway and separating the Central Hopei and Chi-Lu-Yü Districts from the Peiyüeh and the Chin-Chi-Yü Districts in the T'aihang range. It was guarded by watch towers and constant patrol. The belt of area immediately to the west of the blockade line was the "no man's land." The inhabitants were forcibly removed eastward, and everything that remained was destroyed. The main line was reinforced by shorter lines parallel to it on the western side. In one year, after May, 1941, the shorter line advanced twice by 50 to 100 li into the hills.[17] Dispersion of Japanese forces on the plain was very thorough. Central and southern Hopei were assigned to the experienced 110th Division. How intense the pacification efforts in Hopei were was indicated by the increase of Japanese outposts and roads connecting them, as reported by the Communist side. The total number of outposts manned by the Japanese side in southern Hopei, exclusive of sentry points on the railways, were:
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Also in southern Hopei, 32,000 li of walls and ditches were constructed, in addition to some 9,000 li of new highways, by April of 1942. On the average there was one outpost for every fourteen villages after April, 1942, and in some places one for every three. Construction of walled outposts, ditches, and roads depended on the use of enforced labor. The manning of a good number of outposts also depended on native security troops. Occupation in the plains of north China was clearly going beyond the "points and lines."[19]
Pacification by means of prolonged occupation was called ts'an-shih ("silk worm eating"), and it was distinguished from the so-called mopping-up. The Japanese maintained constant patrol and met the slightest disturbance with instant and tireless reaction, if only to reassure the informers that the Japanese Army was behind them even though many of these tip-offs were ruses. Otherwise, the Japanese troops observed the comings and goings of Communist agents from the
[17] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 63.
[18] Ibid .
[19] According to Japanese records, 11,860 kilometers of blockade line and 7,700 fortified posts were built by 1942. Pacification War , No. 2, p. 207.
outposts in the midst of rural areas. They patiently waited until a certain percentage of membership in an underground organization was uncovered before going out to arrest them.[20] Under such conditions, grain collection and recruitment into the Communist party and the army from three-fifths of southern Hopei came to an end.[21] The rest of the area paid taxes to both sides with the permission of the CCP. The CCP's membership declined from 40,000 to 21,000 in 1942, while the regular forces of 20,000 were reduced by half. The loss of Party–mass organization–government cadres of ch'ü level or above and military cadres of company level or above was 4,500.[22]
The Communist bases in the T'aihang range to the west of Hopei were the object of the largest Japanese assault of the "sweep and destroy" type. There lay the Peiyüeh District of the Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region (the First through the Fifth Military Sub-districts) and the Chin-Chi-Yü District (which included the T'aihang and the T'aiyüeh Districts) of the Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü Border Region. Contemporary Japanese news releases stated that the Chin-Ch'a-Chi base was "the cancer of north China's security."[23] The North China Area Army carried out large operations against the Peiyüeh District in the fall of 1939 and 1940. Under the new commander the third campaign was carried out in the fall of 1941.
Whereas the previous campaigns were conducted by one or two armies, the 1941 and 1942 campaigns were directly commanded by the Area Army and used all available forces in the command.[24] Careful planning based on improved intelligence and large-scale preparations preceded both operations. The 1941 campaign was activated by the order of July 9 and proceeded in two stages. The first stage was from August 14 to September 4, the second from September 4 to October 15. The Japanese forces were divided into blockading and assault units. The units of the First Army, the Mongolian Garrison Army, the 110th Division, and the 21st Division were used for blockading an area stretching for 300 kilometers from west of Peiping to Niangtzukuan and 100 kilometers wide, an area roughly equivalent to Taiwan. Combat units of the assault party consisted of one division, one brigade, one infantry regiment, and a battalion, all of which were outfitted with support units for prolonged independent operations. Since the blockading party advanced into the interior of the Peiyüeh District and engaged in aggressive pursuit, the distinction between
[20] Ibid. , No. 1, p. 527.
[21] Growth of one revolutionary base, p. 84.
[22] Ibid. , p. 85.
[23] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 556.
[24] See Ibid. , pp. 539–565, for the details of this campaign.
blockading and assault parties did not really exist. The Communist side reported that it was attacked by a force totalling 100,000.[25]
At this time, according to Japanese estimate, the Peiyüeh District under Nieh Jung-chen's command had 30,000 regulars in five military sub-districts.[26] Each 6,000-man group was a brigade, having graduated from the detachment status by early 1940. In central Hopei, Lü Cheng-ts'ao commanded 13,700 men (including the Hui People's Detachment) in five military sub-districts (the sixth through the tenth). The P'inghsi District of the Chi-Je-Liao (Hopei–Jehol–Liaoning) District had been built up after the initial attempt by Sung Shih-lun failed in the fall of 1938. Hsiao K'e, the vice commander of the 120th Division, had organized five regiments, presumably understrength.
As the campaign commenced the Japanese forces built two additional blockading lines on the northeastern and southwestern end of the Peiyüeh District. The former, a highway connecting Yihsien and Laiyüan through very treacherous mountains, was designed to cut off the Peiyüeh District from the P'inghsi District to the north. The second one, stretching east and west through Niangtzukuan along the Chengting–Taiyuan railway, cut off the Peiyüeh District from the T'aihang District. One of the three attack units secured the Yihsien–Laiyüan line and swept northward toward Peiping. The other two units carried out a pincer operation against the lower reaches of the Hut'uo River in central Hopei in order to drive Lü Cheng-ts'ao's forces westward into the Peiyüeh District. The assault on Hsiao K'e's P'inghsi District failed to produce any result. The assault on Lü Cheng-ts'ao's forces resulted in a reported kill of 570 and wounding of two regimental commanders.[27]
Then, in the second stage of the campaign, everything was brought to bear on the Peiyüeh District. Among the Communist commanders of military sub-districts here were Yang Ch'eng-wu (the First), who devastated the isolated Japanese outposts in the fall of 1940, and Huang Yung-sheng (the Third). The Japanese side reported contacts with both of their units. Nieh Jung-chen himself led his unit and engaged the Japanese in a battle at Ch'enchang thirty kilometers south of Foup'ing. Both Foup'ing and Ch'enchiayüan, the home of Nieh Jung-chen's headquarters, were taken. There is no comprehensive record of Japanese reports concerning casualties inflicted on the enemy. The 110th Division reported 5,616 bodies counted and 3,769 prisoners as of December 27.[28] But the Japanese forces failed to inflict a devastating blow on the Communist main force.
[25] Liberated Areas , p. 29.
[26] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 540.
[27] Ibid. , p. 548.
[28] Ibid. , p. 556.
The operations in 1941 and 1942 were distinguished not only by their large scale but also by the fact that the pacification units stayed in the heart of the Communist bases for several months and combed the area back and forth. Metaphors such as "iron wall encirclement" (t'ieh-pi ho-wei ) and "combing suppression" (shu-pi ch'ing-chiao ) began to appear in the Japanese Army's vocabulary to describe the new tactics. A contemporary Communist observer noted that the 1941 campaign was not simply a repetition of the mopping-up of the past in which the Japanese forces came and went in the manner of "butcher's knife."[29] A major secondary goal of the campaign was to destroy the Communist base facilities and stockpiles of war material. Communist propaganda parodied Okamura's "sanko seisaku" to read "burn all, violate all, kill all."[30] Actual conduct of the Japanese forces came closer to the parody than to the author's intent. There is no extant Japanese record of secondary destructions. One Communist source, no doubt exaggerated, reports destruction of 150,000 rooms, 58 million chin of grain, and 10,000 livestock in the 1941 operation.[31] The Communist main force had left the base for the exterior line, but the civilian population remained. In a well-consolidated base like the Peiyüeh District, "separation of bandits from the people" (fei-min fen-li in Chinese) was impossible. Four thousand five hundred perished, according to a Communist source.[32] The Japanese side reported that it carried out forced resettlement of civilian population from the central area to a camp in Taiyuan. These civilians were treated as "semi-prisoners of war."[33] The Japanese forces withdrew in three months, leaving behind battalion- or company-sized garrisons in some important positions.
The Communist forces always had an accurate grasp of the movement of the Japanese forces in and around their bases, and they tried to keep the Japanese in the dark as to their own whereabouts. The usual unit of tactical encirclement seemed to have been a military sub-district comprising half a dozen or so hsien . The sub-district commander took personal charge. Nieh Jung-chen's sub-district was covered by a network of field telephones which kept reporting Japanese movements.[34]
The CCP's victory in the intelligence war depended on organization
[29] Chieh-fang jih-pao , October 11, 1941, p. 3.
[30] It is widely believed that this was the avowed aim of Okamura Yasuji. Actually, his slogan was borrowed from the Manchu forces when they attacked the Ming forces: pu-fen, pu-fan, pu-sha or "don't burn, don't violate, don't kill." See Pacification War , No. 2, p. 117.
[31] Liberated Areas , p. 29.
[32] Ibid .
[33] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 555.
[34] Hsing-huo liao-yüan , VI, 150 ff.
and discipline of the peasant masses. Mobilization of the inhabitants of the central areas in Peiyüeh District was quite impressive. Japanese officers who had been transferred from central China were surprised by the sharp contrast between the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army in this respect.[35] It appeared to them that most peasants were cooperating with the Communist forces out of fear, but frequently there were courageous patriots. A company of Japanese troops hired a native as a guide in the 1941 campaign. He deliberately tried to lead the company into a trap. Two special service agents hired another guide to approach a Communist-controlled village. As they drew close to the village, the guide suddenly called out to his fellow villagers to arrest the "traitors."[36]
As soon as a base was surrounded, the main Communist forces on the interior would make an attempt to break out to the exterior temporarily. They observed Mao's dicta: "Running away is the chief means of getting out of passivity and regaining the initiative."[37] A ring of encirclement might consist of innumerable platoons placed five hundred meters apart. In mountains, this space was sufficient to let the main force get through while small rear guard units carried out daring diversionary moves. When necessary, they willingly perished in blocking Japanese pursuit. The retreating main unit was seldom trapped in the net. During the campaign of May, 1942 against the T'aihang District, however, a company of Japanese guerrillas disguised in Eighth Route Army uniforms succeeded in surprising the headquarters unit near Mat'ien. P'eng Te-huai was wounded while Tso Ch'üan, the chief of staff of the Eighth Route Army, was killed.[38]
Once the main unit had made an exit to the exterior line, it turned to harassing action. Whenever odds favored the Communist side, it would turn to aggressive action. Smaller Japanese units in the heart of the Communist bases were in constant fear of ambush. However, the Communist forces in north as well as in central China were evidently under orders in 1941 and 1942 to refrain from pitched battles and to return to guerrilla tactics. The overriding goal of the CCP was self-preservation. Costly contacts were forbidden.[39]
The catechism, "Enemy advances, we retreat," was not by itself a solution when the enemy was prepared to occupy the base. The evasive tactics of the Communist forces enabled the North China Area Army to stretch its manpower to extend the blockade line into the Peiyüeh
[35] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 559.
[36] Ibid .
[37] SW , II, 128.
[38] Pacification War , No. 2, pp. 190–191. See the description of this battle from the Communist side, in Hsing-huo liao-yüan , VII, 222–223.
[39] See, for instance, Ibid. , VI, 189–190.
and the Chin-Chi-Yü Districts. The Japanese forces also attempted to clear and hold relatively flat and populated areas in the mountains. In the T'aihang District, there were 700 outposts in 1941. In the relatively smaller T'aiyüeh Districts, there were 320.[40] The Chin-Chi-Yü base had shrunk by one-sixth in 1941 and kept shrinking. During the most critical phase, the T'aiyüeh District could claim no one hsien which was completely under Communist control. The twelve Communist hsien governments that remained were all bunched together in Hsinyüan, of which the hsien seat was in Japanese hands.[41] Hsinyüan itself was designated in November of 1942 as the "Mountain Communist Suppression Experimental District." In this barren mountainous area, the Communist forces needed the tax grain paid by peasants in the Taiyuan basin. But for nearly three years after 1939, tax was not collected. "How can we eat a decent meal? Grain, grain! This became the central topic of discussion," it was reported.[42]
Of all the Communist bases in the mountains of Shansi Province, the Chin-Sui Border Region seemed to have suffered the worst fate. This was in part attributable to the collaboration of Mongols in the north and Yen Hsi-shan in the south with the Japanese. The Chin-Sui base was swept by the Mongolian Garrison Army in December, 1940, after the Communist offensive. The Communist stronghold around Hsinghsien was taken, forcing Ho Lung's division to flee westward across the Yellow River into Shensi. In January, one company of regular Communist troops defected, a very rare occurrence.[43] In 1942, the Eighth Sub-district controlled only seventeen villages.[44] The 358th Brigade, a regular unit of the 120th Division, was so undernourished that 60 percent of its men were nightblind. They had to walk hand in hand with those who retained their sight.[45] It was reported that " . . . the linkage between the Party Center and the several anti-Japanese bases was seriously restricted; and the Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region was threatened."[46] In October, Mao dispatched Lin Fen to the Chin-Sui base and demanded a thoroughgoing "mass mobilization."[47]
The conditions in Shantung Province are difficult to assess for lack of information. An estimated force of some 30,000, made up of Hsü Hsiang-ch'ien's Shantung Column and Ch'en Kuang's 115th Division,
[40] Growth of one revolutionary base , pp. 62–63.
[41] Ibid. , p. 74.
[42] Hsing-huo liao-yüan , VI, 280. As a general rule, the Communist army scrupulously avoided sending armed soldiers into the villages to collect tax grain and recruits. But after 1941 it was not infrequent for the Communist forces to send an armed raiding party down on the plain. This article seems to describe one such incident.
[43] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 429.
[44] Hsing-huo liao-yüan , VI, 79–80.
[45] Ibid. , p. 87.
[46] Ibid. , pp. 79–80.
[47] Ibid .
occupied the mountainous triangular area bounded by Linyi, Yishui, and Mengyin which was in turn bounded by the Tientsin-Pukow, the Lunghai, and the Tsintao–Tsinan railways. A very large pacification campaign, comparable in size to the operations in 1941 and 1942 against Chin-Ch'a-Chi, was conducted against central Shantung at the end of 1941. The immediate military result was about as meager as in other operations.[48] Shantung and north Kiangsu as Communist base sites were characterized by a trait which was not shared by the bases in the T'aihang range. I will deal with them below in connection with puppet forces.
The situation was very difficult for the CCP. This was reflected in internal politics. In the spring of 1942, after the headquarters unit of the Eighth Route Army had been attacked, P'eng Te-huai went back to Yenan for a while. In December, he delivered a very lengthy report to a cadre conference in the T'aihang District.[49] Along with a report written by Liu Po-ch'eng, P'eng's close confidant in the T'aihang District, this amounted to a self-criticism by a proponent of the Battle of One Hundred Regiments offensive.[50]
P'eng Te-huai began his report by defining a "revolutionary base." It came into being when an area possessed its own army, political power, mass organizations, and the Party—all functioning openly and legally. It followed that a revolutionary base had to enjoy greater immunity from military interference by counter-revolutionary forces. But a healthy existence and operation of the four organizations was not enough, P'eng argued, to assure the consolidation of a base. "For instance, during the time of the Central Soviet the above-mentioned four organizations were all strong, but because of Li Te's [i.e., Albert List's] error in military leadership the Central Soviet could not be held, and we had to leave in the end."[51] P'eng was echoing the thesis of the Tsunyi Resolutions that the defeat in Kiangsi was due solely to tactical error of the leadership.[52] The reference to the events in Kiangsi was in fact an allusion to his own role as the architect of the 1940 offensive. He criticized "simple militarism" which ignored that "tactics is a part of strategy and must be subordinated to strategy."[53] P'eng's message to the audience was: the tactical victory of the Battle of One Hundred Regiments led to the difficulty of 1942.
Along with the series of liberalized programs which have been
[48] Pacification War , No. 1, pp. 589–591.
[49] Kuan-yü hua-pei ken-chü-ti kung-tso ti pao-kao (December 18, 1942), pp. 346–409.
[50] See above, p. 194.
[51] Kuan-yü hua-pei ken-chü-ti kung-tso ti pao-kao , p. 348.
[52] Ibid. , p. 349.
[53] Ibid .
described in the previous chapter, the CCP instituted several measures to stave off Japanese encroachment. In November, 1941, the Northern Bureau proposed an "increase in the guerrilla character of the north China bases."[54] In July, 1942, in addition, a "guerrilla base" was proposed.[55] These amounted to revisions of the three-fold classification of the war zone, as follows:
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The CCP was conceding the deterioration of the once-secure bases without abandoning them altogether. In such bases, according to P'eng Te-huai, "the regular army cannot but accelerate its dispersion even to the squad, platoon, and company level in order to carry on with guerrilla warfare . . . mobile warfare is objectively no longer possible."[56]
A program of decentralizing government organization had been under way since as early as the Lich'eng Conference of the Northern Bureau in April, 1940. It was decided at that time that the ratio of military to civilian personnel should be two–to–one and that the size of the full time personnel ("divorced from production") in army–government–mass organization should not exceed 3 percent of the base population.[57] As tax-paying areas shrank in size and production in mountainous bases were disrupted, the constraint became very stringent. In addition, the intensified Japanese pacification made it risky for the Communist regular forces to operate in large units. Decentralization or localization (ti-fang-hua ) was drastically stepped up in 1942. In a directive ordering the program of "picked troops and simplified administration" in September, Mao stated,
Our enormous war apparatus is suited to past conditions. It was then necessary. But things are different now, the base areas have shrunk and may continue to shrink for a period, and undoubtedly we cannot maintain the same enormous war apparatus as before.[58]
The main line units were reduced in size and absorbed into the infrastructure. A pyramid form of organization was pushed down into the ground, as it were, to make a squat shape concealed beneath the
[54] Ibid. , p. 348.
[55] Ibid. , p. 452.
[56] Ibid. , p. 352.
[57] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 151.
[58] Selected Works , III, 100.
surface. Full time personnel, civilian as well as military, were not to exceed 1 percent of the base population, and those in excess had to be self-supporting. Hence, the program of localization was accompanied by a large production campaign. The Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü Border Region carried out decentralization three times between early 1942 and January of 1943, with the result that the border region level personnel was reduced from 548 to a little over 100.[59] In central and southern Hopei, however, the regular units disappeared altogether; shortly after April, 1942, they departed for T'aihang mountain to seek refuge.[60]
In the second half of 1942, a new four-tier structure replaced the existing three-tier one in military organizations. Between the regional force (ti-fang-chün ) or guerrillas (yu-chi-tui ) and the self-defense corps (tzu-wei-tui ) was added the militia (min-ping ) as follows:
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This was based on a directive which demanded, "localize the regular army, mass-ify [ch'ün-chung-hua] the local force."[62] The intention behind the new organization was not to add an exra tier to the existing organizations. The intention was to substitute the regional force (or guerrillas) for regular forces in areas where the regulars could not operate. In Chin-Ch'a-Chi the following ratio was suggested between the regular and regional forces:[63]
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A suggested size of regional force was a guerrilla unit of 50 men and rifles at the ch'ü level; a guerrilla battalion of 200 men and weapons at the hsien level under the hsien Party organization; and an independent battalion of 2,000 men and weapons at the military sub-district level commanded by the sub-district political cadres.[64] Thus a sub-district with five hsien with eight ch'ü each would have 5,000 guerrillas. All guerrilla units were required to maintain a command structure
[59] Growth of one revolutionary base , pp. 97–98. The cost of maintaining one soldier for a year is said to be equal to sixteen shih of millet. Ibid. , p. 290.
[60] Hsing-huo liao-yüan , VI, 263; Ibid. , VII, 116.
[61] Amerasia Papers , p. 755; Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 194.
[62] Hsing-huo liao-yüan , VI, 457.
[63] Kung-jei huo-kuo , III, 194.
[64] Ibid. , p. 195.
strictly independent of the regular army, though they were subordinate to the regular army's command if one happened to be in the same area.
Militia and self-defense corps were called "people's arms" (jen-min wu-chuang ). They were both made up of full-time peasants who were not mobile. Militia was supposed to be based on volunteers. It is my impression that militia did not begin to expand until the worst phase of Japanese pacification was over. Militia was apparently intended to provide a self-supporting reservoir of manpower for the more mobile and professionalized military units. Members of militia took part in village defense with native weapons. Enrollment in the self-defense corps was compulsory for all inhabitants between the ages of 15 and 55. They acted as stretcher-bearers, messengers, and porters. They also took care of "hard wall and clean field" or concealment of perishable property and crop. Only the regular army was fully mobile. The rest remained in the native area when Japanese forces occupied it.
All regular units carried out screening of their troops to demobilize those who were found unfit and to send down others to regional forces. Thus one regiment was reduced to a company.[65] As the bulk of the regular troops withdrew from Hopei, some were left behind and planted as cadres in the regional forces. Some regular units completely disappeared underground to become regional forces. Such a drastic reduction of regular forces was carried out as early as July, 1941, in central China.[66] There was considerable reluctance among the regular army's officer corps to disband their units and go down among the peasants.[67] Such dispersion, the stock-in-trade of the Communist partisans in hard times, was called hua-cheng wei-ling ("turning a whole into nothing") or more colloquially, hua-hsia-ch'ü ("vanish below"). In its most extreme form, an army or a Party unit was required to reduce itself into a "local bandit-style armed organization" as happened in Kwangtung.[68] The purpose of hua-cheng wei-ling was to conceal the army behind the mass of peasantry. At the same time, the Communist army lost its preponderant leadership position within a Communist base to the Party. The so-called "September One Decision" reversed the existing relationship between the army and the Party–government–mass organization. Leadership was "one dimensionalized" under the Party's hegemony at each level all the way down to hsien and hsiang .[69]
[65] Hsing-huo liao-yüan , VI, 483.
[66] Ibid. , VII, 118.
[67] Ibid. , VI, 454, 457–458.
[68] Kung-fei huo-kuo , III, 192.
[69] Kuan-yü t'ung-i k'ang-Jih ken-chü-ti tang ti ling-tao chi tiao-cheng k'e-tsu-chih chien kuan-hsi ti chüeh-ting [The decision concerning the Party's leadership over the anti-Japanese bases and adjustment among several organizations], Ibid. , III, 157–164. It is probable that this was part of the Rectification Campaign to tighten up Party control.
As the regular forces disappeared altogether or visited a village only under the cover of the night, the peasants' confidence was shaken. They began to waver. The peasants were left alone to fend for themselves while they were expected to provide grain and recruits to the Communist forces. The relationship of the regular forces to the villages beyond the bases tended to become predatory. As attrition of manpower rose sharply, each force in the four tiers dipped into the tier below to replenish itself. Yet "the majority of the masses are reluctant to become soldiers," it was reported.[70] They did not have confidence to carry on guerrilla warfare by themselves. " . . . today's masses behind the enemy are enthusiastic about defending their homes and villages but are standoffish toward the slogan of defending the bases. . . . These two slogans are not yet linked up," one cadre complained.[71] Defense of homes and villages as such had no intrinsic connection with support for the Communist side.
On the contrary, when the puppet government was nearby, it was dangerous to provoke it. Yang Ch'eng-wu put the cruel dilemma this way:
If we only stress concealment, biding of our time . . . we are bound to be divorced from the masses. The morale of the masses cannot be sustained for long either. On the other hand, if we only seek fleeting gratification in careless fighting, we may also invite still more cruel enemy suppression. That will also alienate the masses. . . .[72]
In areas where the power of Communist and Japanese sides was evenly balanced, the peasants were hapless victims of both. In 1942, as the Communist bases reached their minimum size in north China, systematic use of terrorism could be observed. Village chiefs appointed by the puppet government became the target of assassination. After one or two officials were killed or abducted, no one would take their place.[73] Or at a mass meeting in a village, a few traitors were executed. Then "those who wavered in the past firmly rose up."[74]
But for the most part in such areas, the CCP settled for a policy of "white skin, red heart" (pai-p'i hung-hsin ). It allowed the peasants to collaborate with the Japanese. The CCP chose to regard this as infiltration of puppet organizations. Indeed, many puppet governments were infiltrated by Communist party members who even got elected to official posts under the Japanese auspices. They did as they were told
[70] T'ao Hsi-chin, "Mu-ch'ien chan-ch'ü yu-chi hsiao-tsu ti hsiao-neng chi ch'i ling-tao wen-t'i" [The efficacy of guerrilla groups in the current war zone and their leadership problem], Ibid. , p. 201.
[71] Ibid. , p. 199.
[72] Hsing-huo liao-yüan , VII, 119.
[73] Ibid. , p. 323.
[74] Ibid. , p. 211.
by the Japanese, but passed information on to the Communist side, offered concealment for Communist agents, and paid reduced tax to the Communist governments.[75] The "white skin, red heart" arrangement paralleled the practice of "national salvation by detour" or defection by Kuomintang regional forces. However, authorized open collaboration was confined solely to the civilian population. No Communist regular unit indulged in it.
The two most important elements of popular support for the Communist government were tax grain and enlistment of the peasants in the Communist army. The rate of enlistment and desertion, in particular, can be regarded as an index of mass support or indifference. Desertion afflicted the regional forces, and the Communist forces were no exception. Most of the troop losses during the Long March, for instance, resulted from desertion. According to a rather rare revelation in a Communist source, a regular army unit had lost 16.4 percent of its troops by desertion in one year ending in the fall of 1939—relatively good times for the CCP. The total attrition rate for this unit, according to my calculation, was 30 percent. (See Table 13.)
According to Mao, the tax-paying population, including both those paying tax to the Communist government alone and those paying taxes to both sides, decreased from 100 million in 1940 to 50 million in 1942. During the same period, the Communist army was reduced in size from 500,000 to 300,000.[76] These figures were revealed during the Rectification Campaign and in a context in which Mao criticized P'eng Te-huai and others for their "conceit" in launching the 1940 offensive.[77] Hence, the troop and population losses could have been exaggerated. Still, there is little doubt that the Communist side suffered very high attrition during this period. As I have repeatedly shown, the Japanese Army's pacification operations almost always failed in their immediate objective of fixing and annihilating the Communist forces. The number of those reported killed or captured was uniformly small. I am therefore led to conclude that the large loss of Communist troops resulted from desertion.
Why should the peasant soldiers, who rallied to the "defense of homes and villages" almost instinctively, desert their army in such large numbers? The answer seems to lie in the social structure of China's countryside. Recruitment of troops into Chinese armies—both Kuomintang and Communist—was localized. The Kuomintang's war zone was quite often but another name for the satrapy of warlords. Recruitment on the Communist side was even more localized as its
[75] Ibid. , VI, 236; Ibid. , VII, 120.
[76] Selected Works , III, 167–168.
[77] Ibid. , p. 169.
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forces de-escalated from mobile to guerrilla warfare. A brigade, the largest operational combat unit, remained in the military sub-district or hovered in its vicinity. Its troops were recruited from the regional force or from the peasants in the sub-district. A regular force unit thus partook of the traits which characterized its immediate social environment. A peasant soldier's daring in defending his native place was matched by his indifference to the fortunes of those in which he was a stranger. When a regular unit was transferred to a place far away from its home base, the new recruits deserted. They always headed home.
The CCP observed two kinds of anti-desertion measures. One was enforced by military units, the other by the border region where they were stationed. One was designed to prevent potential deserters from deserting, the other to turn back actual deserters. The Eighth Route Army placed the main responsibility for desertion-prevention on the political instructor, the company level political cadre.[78] During the resistance period, the so-called "group of ten" (shih-jen-tsu ) was formed among the soldiers to maintain mutual vigilance against desertion. Upon returning home, a deserter would find that he and
[78] Chungkuo ke-ming-chün ti-shih-pa chi-t'uan-chün cheng-chih kung-tso t'iao-lieh [Political work regulations of the 18th Group Army of the National Revolutionary Army], Military Affairs Journal , April, 1940, p. 128.
his family were objects of intense negative social pressure. All border region governments had a statute dealing with deserters. Penalties were usually light; more effective than penalties was the social pressure generated by "campaign to return to the post" (kui-tui yün-tung ). The deserter would be rounded up, given a pep talk, and escorted back to his unit with fanfare. If a unit was recruited from an area which had subsequently fallen to Japanese control, its troops were subjected to reverse pressure. A soldier's home might be marked by a slip of red paper on the door to show that it was the home of a "Communist bandit." His family and friends were pressured into writing him or otherwise conveying the message that he was wanted back home. It is quite probable that the increase in desertion after 1940 stemmed in good measure from the fact that social pressure which kept a soldier in the unit was reversed. Behind the high rate of desertion in the Communist forces was the parochial outlook of peasants. Mao called it pejoratively the "empiricism" of the petty bourgeoisie in "semifeudal" China,[79] and he sought to eliminate it through the Rectification Campaign.
The celebrated notion that the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army were made up entirely of volunteers was not true in the sense in which we understand the term. In most ordinary cases, these volunteers "consented" to serve under intense public pressure drummed up by mass organizations "charging" headlong to meet the quota imposed by the border region government. This method was intended to be different from press-ganging, but in practice it often came close to it. At the same time, it is not possible to equate desertion in Chinese armies with desertion as we know it either. In the household of a poor peasant, hired laborer, or even of a middle peasant with a relatively small nuclear family, loss of labor power of a male in his prime often made a critical difference in income.[80] For the poor, service in the Chinese army often meant destitution. Soldiers were given just enough food to live on and a little pittance besides. The CCP made concerted efforts in all the border regions to put the soldiers' minds at ease so far as their families were concerned. These measures came under the abbreviated heading of yu-k'ang or "special treatment for the families of resistance soldiers." They included granting of tax exemption status, cooperative or substitute ploughing and harvesting of
[79] The Resolution on Some Questions in the History of Our Party, SW , VI, 213. It is my inference that P'eng Te-huai was one of those who were criticized for "empiricist" errors. He had to sit through a forty-day-long criticism session just before the Seventh Party Congress. The Case of Peng Teh-huai , pp. 193–194.
[80] Tinghsien investigation report , p. 34.
fields belonging to the families of servicemen or bereaved families, etc.
In May, 1942, in the wake of the biggest assault on the T'aihang District, the shrinking of the Eighth Route Army headquarter's home base was reported to have stopped.[81] By then the North China Area Army's manpower was strained to its limit. The defenders and attackers edged each other in bloody and desperate combats. But the line was held on the Communist side. In September, Mao described the situation as "darkness before dawn," and exhorted his men to bear up under the pressure a while longer.[82] Shrinking of the Communist bases might have gone on longer in central China, but by the end of the year, Japan had suffered two major setbacks in the Pacific. It was defeated in the Battle of Midway in June and decided to withdraw from Guadalcanal late in the year. Operations in the China theater were scuttled to a holding action with a minimum of force. By the summer of 1943, the North China Area Army withdrew the garrisons in outlying areas and reverted to the sweep and destroy type of missions.[83] It seems that the most critical phase of the war of resistance for the Communist forces was over by the end of 1942, though the tactical situation did not improve immediately.
To ease the pressure on the central bases in north China, the CCP turned to attack on a limited scale by sending out armed work teams (wu-chuang kung-tso-tui or wu-kung-tui ), elite guerrilla units made up of sappers, saboteurs, and counter-intelligence agents into the Japanese-occupied areas.[84] The Party organizations that co-existed with the puppet and the Japanese forces under the "white skin, red heart" arrangement were ordered to shake off their "conservatism" and to regain the lost initiative.[85] It was at this time that the T'aihang and the T'aiyüeh Districts carried out the massive rent and interest reduction campaign, which I have described in the previous chapter. The tide was turning.
The force level in the North China Area Army's command hovered between 250,000 and 300,000 after 1940. Of this, units assigned to pacification duty numbered between 132 battalions (172,029 men) in
[81] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 74. P'eng Te-huai states that the worst phase was over by July, 1942, in Amerasia Papers , p. 814. I must note, however, that all important cadres were withdrawn to Shen-Kan-Ning partly for their safety and partly for the Rectification Campaign. The campaign was carried out at a rather leisurely pace in this sanctuary.
[82] Selected Works , III, 99.
[83] The order to withdraw from the forward areas and to regroup was issued to the China Expeditionary Forces on February 27. Pacification War , No. 2, p. 305. It was implemented in May, Ibid. , p. 345; and was noted by the Communist side, Hsing-huo liao-yüan , VII, 123.
[84] Ibid. , VII, 94.
[85] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 85.
December, 1941, and 125 battalions (194,483 men) in early 1945.[86] One can say that there was one battalion of Japanese pacification troops for every four hsien . Of this, a substantial part was devoted to the Kuomintang forces that remained in the occupied areas in force until 1943. One can divide the Chinese forces that assisted the Japanese forces into two groups, according to their equivalency to the Communist counterparts. The hsien security forces and police forces, in which there were 95,000 and 69,000 men respectively at the end of 1941, can be regarded as regional forces. I have already dealt with them in Chapter VI. As for regular armies, the China Expeditionary Forces sought to maintain a 110,000-man force directly under the Nanking government, a 100,000-man force under the North China Political Commission, and 10,000 Mongol troops.[87]
Actual size of the native regular force in north China, according to Japanese estimate, was 118,000.[88] This comes very close to a post-war Communist estimate of 117,000.[89] If one assumes that the size of the Japanese forces devoted solely to anti-Communist operations numbered 150,000, the total regular forces (Japanese and Chinese) would be 268,000. One Japanese estimate of the Communist regulars in early 1941 was 250,000 in north China and 40,000 in Shen-Kan-Ning.[90] In north China, therefore, there was a rough numerical balance of regular forces on the two sides in the 1941–1942 period.[91]
Of the total of 437 hsien seats behind the Japanese lines in north China, 10 were held by the Communist forces, the rest being in the hands of the Japanese. Of an estimated total population of a little over 80 million, 22 million or roughly one-fourth lived in the Communist-controlled areas, while 60 million were in the Japanese-occupied areas and guerrilla districts.[92] The large population size under Japanese control was accounted for by the fact that all urban areas were occupied. In terms of geographical expanse, the Communists controlled roughly six-tenths of north China, mostly in the mountains of Shansi, Shantung, and the Chiaotung Peninsula.[93]
In Kiangsu and Anhwei Provinces, a part of the 13th Army engaged in pacification efforts against the New Fourth Army and the pockets of the Chungking forces that remained through 1943. In cen-
[86] War History Office, The Defense Board, Daitoa[*] senso[*] kokan[*] senshi , Vol. XLII: Showa[*] 20-nen no Shina Hakengun [The China Expeditionary Forces in 1945], No. 1, p. 405.
[87] Pacification War , No. 2, pp. 70–71.
[88] Ibid. , p. 71.
[89] Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 80.
[90] Pacification War , No. 1, appendix V.
[91] Chi Wu also agrees on this point. Growth of one revolutionary base , p. 80.
[92] Ibid.
[93] Ibid.
tral China, however, it is impossible to say how much of the Japanese forces were tied down in anti-Communist operations. The New Fourth Army remained understrength until 1944 and had to co-exist with the Japanese forces by means which fell short of open collusion. The Japanese forces, for their part, were not as interested in local security as in strategic deterrence against Chungking's main forces. On the assumption that the Japanese pacification units in Kiangsu and Anhwei roughly matched the New Fourth Army's 40,000, the total Japanese troops engaged in anti-Communist pacification in all of China would have numbered 190,000. This would have amounted to one-quarter to one-third of the total force level of the China Expeditionary Forces of 650,000 to 750,000 after 1941. The rest faced the Kuomintang regular forces throughout the war. Such deployment of Japanese forces guaranteed the survival of Communist power.
Over-all security improved in 1941 and did not deteriorate until 1943. In several localities, mostly on the plains of Hopei and Shantung, the degree of security obtained in Manchuria was in fact reproduced—based on native support. Neither in Kiangsi, nor in north China, nor again in Vietnam did a superior force find it impossible to uproot a well-consolidated Communist base so long as it was willing to disperse itself down to the village level and remain there for several years. This was the precondition for first undoing and then rebuilding a permanent armed camp well integrated with the life of the peasants—as the Communist side had done. But this is only half of the problem. The tactical requirement to clear and hold the countryside for a decade, if need be, transforms the problem into a strategic one, as Mao was well aware, because concurrently anti-Communist forces must rig together an international environment—or a strategic blockade—which holds out politically bleak prospects for the Communists. The Kuomintang managed to do so until the Sian Incident. For Japan, subjugation of the Kuomintang was the necessary precondition for the anti-Communist war, even if the latter took priority. Japan's attempt to isolate China by means of the Tripartite Alliance may be, therefore, regarded as a strategic blockade of colonialist variety.[*] But it turned out to be as counter-productive as the Kuomintang's hope for realizing national unification by bringing the United States into the picture. In any event, the peasant revolution needed "allies" in quarters beyond the countryside.
[*] Henry Kissinger's trip to Peking to end the war in Vietnam may be regarded as an American counterpart.
The Last "Orthodox" Rural Self-Defense
As the Japanese forces turned inward to consolidate the occupied areas in 1941, the passive phase of the Kuomintang's resistance set in. Having borne the brunt of the invasion for more than three years while waging another war with the Communists, it was exhausted. It decided to hold the ring and pit the two adversaries against each other. The structural weakness of the Chinese polity was not altered by the coming of the war. But unlike its earlier manifestation, regionalism after 1941 worked temporarily to the advantage of Chungking. Following the defection of local armed organizations in 1940, the Kuomintang's regional forces began to enter into open or covert collusion with the Japanese forces in 1941. By the end of 1943, most Kuomintang forces in the occupied areas secretly colluded with the Japanese forces or formally submitted to the Nanking government. The CCP was alarmed and charged that this was "national salvation by detour" (ch'ü-hsien chiu-kuo ), i.e., a deliberate plot by Chungking to preserve its forces on the basis of temporary surrender. Actually the collusion seemed to be the result of fortuitous development. In most instances, according to Japanese records, cooperation was forcibly extracted from a regional force after repeated attacks by the Japanese and Communist forces threatened to decimate it.
About this time there were three pockets of Kuomintang influence in the Japanese-occupied area. In central Shantung, Yü Hsüeh-chung and his contingent remained until 1943.[94] Han Te-ch'in remained in the Tungt'ai–Hsinghua area east of Lake Kaoyu until he was forced out of Kiangsu altogether in 1943.[95] In Shansi Province, Yen Hsi-shan maintained a rather passive existence in the southwestern corner surrounded by the Japanese, the Communists, and the central army. As early as February, 1940, a personal letter from General Itagaki Seishiro[*] , the chief of staff of the China Expeditionary Forces, was delivered to Yen by Su T'i-jen, the Shansi governor, asking Yen to support the government in Nanking. The negotiation, code-named Taihaku kosaku[*] ("Yen Hsi-shan Operation"), made progress after Wei Li-huang, Yen's actual superior, was driven out of the province in early 1941.[96] In September Chao Ch'eng-shou, Yen's confidant, signed the Basic Agreement and the Truce Agreement while some Japanese units were making threatening maneuvers at a distance.
[94] Amerasia Papers , p. 398.
[95] Ibid. , pp. 349–350.
[96] Pacification War , No. 1, p. 585.
Yen agreed to join the Nanking government on the basis of the Basic Treaty for Adjusting the Relationship between Japan and China , signed earlier by Wang Ching-wei. With Wang's consent, Yen was to be the vice chairman of the Nanking government and the chairman of its Military Commission. He was to have a force of 300,000, of which 100,000 were to be recruited from Shantung and Hopei. The Shansi Army was to receive 100,000 rifles, some heavier weapons, and a monthly pay of 12 million yuan from the Nanking government. In addition, 50 million yuan was promised as a credit to restore the local currency. By a subsequent administrative agreement, the Shansi Army was assigned to the "occupation district" in Chishan, Hsinchiang, Hotsin, Fushan, Yüehyang (Antse), Hsinyüan, Chiehhsiu, and Hsiaoyi. In addition, it was allowed to collect tax from Fenyang, Wenshui, and Ch'i hsien .[97] It appears that the Japanese side reneged on some of its promises, which caused Yen Hsi-shan to refrain from formally declaring his allegiance to the Nanking government.
Yen Hsi-shan's collusion with the Japanese is the only case from which a formal agreement is extant, but more or less similar negotiations were carried out by other figures. They included P'ang Pinghsün, the commander of the Hopei–Chahar War Zone, and Generals Wu Hua-wen and Chang Lan-feng, commanders of sizable contingents in Shantung and Honan.[98] Naturally the CCP had an interest in making exaggerated charges of collaboration. Chu Te states, for instance, that 500,000 troops and sixty or seventy generals colluded with the Japanese.[99] But, because of its policy of "unification," the Kuomintang was relentless toward disloyal regional leaders. Thus Han Fuch'ü and Shih Yu-san, governors of Shantung and Chahar, were executed as traitors, and after 1943 it would have taken utter political insensitivity to hitch one's fortunes to the sinking ships of Japan and Wang Ching-wei. In most instances, therefore, collusion with the Japanese did not exceed an uneasy temporary truce involving an informal sphere-of-influence agreement.
Those pockets of Kuomintang influence that survived in the occupied area were regional powers in their own right rather than simply subordinate units of the central government. This seems to account for their ability to persist against Communist attacks—until 1943 under
[97] Ibid. , pp. 584–588.
[98] Lyman P. Van Slyke, ed., The Chinese Communist Movement: A Report of the United States War Department, July 1945 (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1968), pp. 90, 94.
[99] Lun chieh-fang-ch'ü chan-ch'ang , p. 16. See also Chung-Kung chung-yang wei k'ang-chan liu-chou-nien chi-nien hsüan-yen [The CCP Central Committee's manifesto on the sixth anniversary of the resistance] for a list of alleged collaborators.
the Kuomintang's banner and thereafter as Japan's nominal allies. The gradual "puppetization" of Kuomintang-affiliated units in Shantung is shown in the following figures reported in a Communist source.[100] The figures are not reliable, but the trend indicated is.
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The most interesting characteristic of these groups is not that they suffered from questionable political consciousness—as the Communists charged—but rather that they kept their total number relatively constant by taking on whatever color was most expedient. At bottom they seem to have enjoyed the support of the landlord class. As Chungking's fortune declined in the occupied area, the landlords' vested interest in the old order induced them to transcend the political differences between Chiang Kai-shek and Wang Ching-wei. In this sense, they were the last decayed manifestation of rural self-defense on the "orthodox" side.
In the revolutionary Peking opera "Taking Tiger Mountain by Strategy," a detachment of Red Army regulars finds it impossible to take a bandits' lair in a straight military attack. A resort is then made to political "strategy." Such an episode seems to be an integral part of the Communist army's experiences. It may be that the CCP's difficulties in Shantung stemmed from the presence of a series of native guerrilla leaders such as Liu Kuei-t'ang, described earlier. This hypothesis can be confirmed in a case study of north Kiangsu, of which there is sufficient documentary evidence. Here the Communist forces encountered regional and local forces organized along the lines very similar to themselves. The case also points up the special character of central China as the Kuomintang's home.
Liu Shao-ch'i, as I have shown, was dispatched to north Kiangsu to override Hsiang Ying's "line." He formally upheld Mao Tse-tung and condemned Hsiang Ying in connection with the struggle against Wang Ming. According to Liu, Hsiang Ying "refused the valuable lessons of north China, and opposed base construction in central China as altogether impossible."[101] Yet, in reality, Liu Shao-ch'i's manner of running the Central China Bureau and the New Fourth Army in-
[100] Liberated Areas , p. 90.
[101] Central China Bureau First Plenum , p. 43.
dicated that there were indeed some "special characters" to central China to which he had to accommodate himself. The peculiar traits of central China were summarized by Jao Shu-shih in November of 1942 at the Central China Anti-Traitor Conference:
If I may speak on the situation in central China from the narrow standpoint of anti-traitor work, then I would summarize it by the single phrase, "environment is complex, factional struggle is intense."
In complexity of the environment and intensity of factional struggle, central China exceeds the whole nation. Because central China is the hub of water and land transportation routes, both foreign and domestic, the biggest city of the nation, Shanghai, is located in central China. When we speak of factional organization and activities, then not only does our Party have a long history in Shanghai and the several provinces of central China, the Kuomintang and the Youth Party also have a very long history. The other groups like the Third Party, the National Socialist Party, the Trotskyites, Kuomintang-affiliated Fuhsingshe, the San-Min-Chu-I Youth Corps, the CC Clique—are all equally present. Again, if we speak of feudal organizations and their activities, then Sanpan, the Green and the Red Gangs, the Sword Society, Shenhsientao and other superstitious and sectarian organizations also abound in central China. Still again, if we speak of the spread of local bandits, then everyone knows that the areas around Lakes T'ai, Ch'ao, Kaoyu, and Hungtze and the coastal belt are notorious bandit areas in China. Even today many villages in north Kiangsu and eastern Anhwei have moats, stone fences, walls, and watch towers around them. Many are the houses with iron or wooden fences around them. These suffice to show how violent were the local bandits in these regions in the past. Finally the numerousness of turncoats is also characteristic of central China. As the result of more than ten years of rule by the anti-Communist elements, central China's situation is that secret service is strong everywhere. Since they adopted the "turncoat policy," a great many voluntary surrenders have resulted. For instance, in the Tungt'ai district of central Kiangsu alone, there have been more than 3,000. . . .[102]
North Kiangsu was not like, for instance, the mountains of Shansi Province with its homogeneous peasant outlook. The three-cornered struggle between the Kuomintang, Japan (plus the Wang Ching-wei faction), and the Communist party added to an already bewildering social and political relationship.
In 1941, the Sixth Detachment of the New Fourth Army, led by P'eng Hsüeh-fen, had been procrastinating near K'aifeng in northern Honan in spite of the directive from the Central China Bureau to move east across the Tientsin–Pukow railway. Finally, it was at-
[102] Hua-chung ch'u-chien pao-wei kung-tso ti chi-pen tsung-chi chi chin-hou ti jen-wu , pp. 21–22.
tacked by a cavalry unit of the Kwangsi Army (the Fifth War Zone) and lost 4,000 men and 2,000 rifles, a "serious loss" second only to the New Fourth Army Incident in the annals of this army.[103] The detachment moved east and rested briefly in the area of Lake Hungtze. It was designated as the Fourth Division while its commander—P'eng Te-huai's protégé—went on a half-time "study."[104] In July, one brigade of the division was completely "localized" and lost its brigade designation.[105]
In October, 1941, after six months of rest, the Fourth Division was ordered to move west again from the Lake Hungtze area to the center of the Huaipei District, still east of the Tientsin–Pukow railway. The division, which must have been no more than a few thousand strong, settled in the area of Ssuhsien, Lingpi, and Suiyü, where Anhwei meets Kiangsu. All three hsien seats and two outposts besides were occupied by the Japanese forces. There were fifteen companies of puppet forces of "extremely weak fighting power" as well. Recruited mostly from "bandits" and "drifters" (liu-min ), they numbered roughly one thousand.[106] The die-hards in the area, on both Kiangsu and Anhwei side, drew on the strength of the Kwangsi army pressing eastward from across the Tientsin–Pukow railway. The Anhwei governor, Li P'ing-hsien, commanded the forces of Wang Chung-lien; and they were linked up with the forces under Han Te-ch'in in Kiangsu. In 1941, Han's forces on the Kiangsu–Anhwei border area were directed by Wang Kuang-hsia, who headed the First Detachment of the Security Forces.[107] In the Ssuhsien–Lingpi–Suiyü area, there was one so-called independent regiment. It shared its habitat with the 33rd Division, so-called, of the Anhwei regional forces led by Tuan Hai-chou. Together they numbered little more than 4,000.[108]
Beneath the independent regiment and Tuan Hai-chou's 33rd Division were a peculiar breed of local leaders whom the Communists chose to call "native die-hards" (t'u-wan ). About one dozen names of "native die-hards" appeared frequently in the Fourth Division's internal documents as a major source of threat to the Communists in the three-hsien area. As late as mid-1943, Teng Tzu-hui, the Division's political commissar, was stating that "it is impossible to eliminate the
[103] Central China Bureau First Plenum , p. 95.
[104] Hung-ch'i p'iao-p'iao , V, 162.
[105] Hsing-huo liao-yüan , VI, 454.
[106] Li Jen-chih, "Ssu-Ling-Sui yu-chi ken-chü-ti shih tsen-yang chien-li ch'i-lai-ti" [How the Ssu-Ling-Sui guerrilla base was built], Fuhsiao , November, 1944, p. 20.
[107] Hung-ch'i p'iao-p'iao , XIII, 74.
[108] Li Jen-chih, "Ssu-Ling-Sui . . . ," p. 20.
native die-hards militarily."[109] The "native die-hards" turned out to be large landlords who had gathered soldiers around themselves for self-defense and offered their small domains as a sort of satrapy to Kwangsi-affiliated regional leaders.
I have shown in Chapter IV that the Fourth Division had to put to rest seventy or so groups of bandits in the Huaipei District by 1942.[110] Although what precisely constituted bandits was never defined, they were reported to be another problem for the Communists.
Ssu-Ling-Sui is a notorious bandit area . . . the larger groups number five or six hundred like Chu Shih-lin's while small ones are made up of three to five. Each controls an area, and blocks the road to rob. Each loots at night and tends the field in the day. Each refrains from robbing its own area but concentrates on robbing elsewhere.[111]
These bandits were natives of the Anhwei–Kiangsu border. The leaders among them possessed property and land. They were so deeply rooted in the locality that they refused to leave. In addition, there were half a dozen or so superstitious and sectarian organizations. It is not clear whether their membership was confined more or less to the poorer peasants. As in north China, these local organizations emerged spontaneously when the Japanese forces began moving up the Yangtze River after the Battle of Hsüchow.[112] It was an atavistic return to the conditions of the nineteenth century.
As described in the Fourth Division's internal documents, it is almost impossible to differentiate between the "native die-hards," the puppet forces, and bandits. In some sense, they were all of a piece.
Before the war, local bandits in Ssu-Ling-Sui were linked up with the landlords and bad bosses; since the war they have been used by the enemy. Those who did not turn into puppet army became the die-hard forces. Because of this, local bandits, the puppets, and the die-hards have connection with each other. They mutually protect each other. . . .[113]
Whether a local elite chose to be puppet or die-hard seems to have been decided by accidental factors such as kinship or political connections, local balance of power, etc. Several of them switched sides more than once. It was even discovered that the native die-hards' "political opinion is not necessarily opposed to communism," at least at this
[109] "Teng Tzu-hui t'ung-chih tsai Huaipei kao-kan-hui shang ti fa-yen" [The remarks of comrade Teng Tzu-hui at the Huaipei senior cadre conference], Fuhsiao , June, 1943, p. 9.
[110] See above, p. 133.
[111] Li Jen-chih, "Ssu-Ling-Sui . . . ," p. 31.
[112] Cheng Wei-san, K'ang-Jih chan-cheng yü nung-min yün-tung [The war against Japan and peasant movement] (Huainan District, 1942) (BI), p. 15.
[113] Li Jen-chih, "Ssu-Ling-Sui . . . ," p. 31.
stage when the Fourth Division was hardly in a position to carry out radical land reform.[114]
Die-hard or bandit, the local elites seem to have been landlords in the area which was noted for high concentration of land in the hands of the rich. "Class distinction was sharp," and there were several fortress-like private homes of big landlords.[115] The poor and the jobless no doubt made up the bulk of the soldiers in the private armies of the native die-hards and the puppet forces. In this sense, class division was overridden by local cohesion. The local elites terrorized peasant masses as the Fourth Division began to compete for the latter's loyalty. All local chiefs of pao (made up of several yen for the purpose of mutual responsibility) and yen , who controlled the pao-chia (the generic term that stands for the system of mutual responsibility and surveillance) system, were either landlords or related to landlords by blood.[116] These bosses said at mass meetings, "It's all right to become local bandits or puppets, but we'll make sure to kill the whole family of anyone who helps the Eighth Route."[117]
It was apparent that the Fourth Division was the stranger and nearly helpless against the concerted opposition of the natives:
The basic principle adopted by the die-hard force in military struggle against us is preservation of its strength, avoiding the powerful, but striking the weak. They do not clash with us in force. They deal with us by relying on the outposts of the enemy and the puppets. They use a high degree of guerrilla tactics and move about day and night. When the situation gets tense, they change place six times a day. The important cadres [kanpu ] move by themselves without escort of troops in order to avoid capture. In encampment of troops, they adopt dispersion and concealment. Their guns are entrusted to the civilians. They demand compensation when [the guns are] lost. When they face an attack, they take the principle of non-resistance and run away. When our forces carry out bandit suppression, they jump (to the exterior line), bore through (each has an olive drab uniform and can masquerade as puppet troop to enter the puppet outpost), or filter away. . . .[118]
The native die-hards were outwitting the Communists in their own game.
The Fourth Division conducted a careful survey and "investigation" of native opposition. Information as to the background and family connections of puppet officers, for instance, was collected; then political bargains were struck. The puppet forces would be asked to join a "white skin, red heart" arrangement. "Contradictions" between the die-hards, between the die-hards and the puppets, between the bandits
[114] Ibid. , p. 31.
[115] Ibid. , p. 20.
[116] Ibid. , p. 38.
[117] Ibid. , p. 39.
[118] Ibid. , p. 41.
and the die-hards, etc., were studied and exploited. In 1942, the division captured two native die-hards but released them unharmed with a public pronouncement which lectured the need for united resistance. Subsequently, the two returned small favors.[119]
Our Party and army are yet to attain complete superiority in power in this district. When the object of the united front—the puppets and bandits that surround us—are often aligned against us, we should not dissolve the contradictions among them. If we do, we may accelerate the confrontation between the enemy and ourselves, thus leading us to isolation.[120]
There was a scale for designating political loyalty of an organization ranging from pro-Japanese "one-face" to pro-Communist "one-face." Most of the CCP's mass organizations at this stage were mild affairs with "two-faces," having some sort of understanding with both the puppet and the die-hard forces.[121] The Lienchuanghui, a landlord organization, as well as pao-chia , were used on such basis. Teng Tzu-hui warned against the kind of intolerance displayed by the Communists in the early phase of the war, and he counseled that "[we] must use native Communists [t'u-kung ] to deal with native die-hards."[122]
Mao has stated that it takes three or four years to build a good Communist base.[123] Indeed, the Fourth Division spent three years, until mid–1944, to gain the upper hand in the area against native opposition. In the meantime, one sees little evidence that the division engaged in the kind of aggressive action undertaken in Chin-Ch'a-Chi against the Japanese forces. Most of the energy of the division was absorbed in the political task of peasant mobilization. With determination and care, it took the old social order apart piece by piece and rebuilt it. At bottom the task was coeval with the making of new men out of often unwilling peasants. Until that was accomplished, the division's military prowess, organizational discipline, and political leadership gave it only a slight edge over native opposition.
The persistence of local opposition to the Communists in the Huaipei area as late as 1943 is quite surprising. This was based on a loose ad hoc coalition of armed landlords under a rather inferior regional leadership. One wonders whether the CCP could have penetrated the area at all had the Kuomintang been in a position to exercise direct leadership over it. This case also confirms my earlier finding that the
[119] "Teng Tzu-hui t'ung-chih . . . ," p. 9.
[120] Li Jen-chih, "Ssu-Ling-Sui . . . ," p. 24.
[121] "Teng Tzu-hui t'ung-chih . . . ," p. 8.
[122] Ibid. , p. 9.
[123] SW , V, 81.
choice of Communist bases was made on strategic grounds.[124] If social support for Communist rule was absent, that was disregarded. Social support was something to be created by first destroying the old social order.
"Peculiar Revolutionary Character of the Peasants"
The profile of China's peasant masses as revealed in this inquiry is quite baffling. As a psycho-cultural type, they do not seem to be the stuff of which a revolution could be made. Their collective traits were such as to convince the liberals in the May Fourth Movement that slow cultural and educational reforms should precede political changes. As a matter of fact, among the complex of issues which divided Mao Tse-tung and Wang Ming was one that concerned the revolutionary potential of China's peasantry. The Resolution on Some Questions in the History of Our Party , which provided theoretical justification for Mao's political triumph, charges that Wang Ming "erroneously opposed the so-called 'peculiar revolutionary character of the peasants.'"[125] Unfortunately neither Mao nor Wang Ming has written any discourse specifically on this question. However, what little they revealed of their differing views can be a useful starting point for an independent assessment of the nature of Chinese peasants.
One may recall Wang Ming's charge of 1935 that the revolution in Kiangsi was one-sidedly anti-feudal in orientation. By this criticism he was indicating his dissatisfaction not only with the policy of the Party but also with the nature of the constituency which affected that policy. In his view, the peasants of "half-feudal" China suffered from a very narrow vision. They were extremely susceptible to bribery and blackmail by the counter-revolutionaries and to "economism" and "commandism" by the Communists—to use the current vocabulary. Compelled by circumstances to fall back on the support of the poorer
[124] An interesting attempt was made by Roy Hofheinz, Jr., to see whether there was any correlation between background social factors and geographical location of the Communist bases, in "The Ecology of Chinese Communist Success: Rural Influence Patterns, 1923–45," Doak Barnett, ed., Chinese Communist Politics in Action (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1969), pp. 3–77. Among other things, he has noted that land ownership was more equitable in north China—as Ramon Myers noted later. He concludes that there is no discernible correlation between the two factors. My study should corroborate his to this extent: the Communist bases were chosen by reference to politico-strategic factors which had nothing to do with social indicators. To exaggerate a bit, one might say that "political power grows out of the barrel of a gun" rather than in reaction to "deprivation." See Samuel Huntington's refutation of the "poverty thesis" in Political Order in Changing Societies , pp. 40–41.
[125] SW , IV, 192.
majority in the hinterland, the Party had adjusted its programs to the immediate subjective needs and proclivities of the masses. To pry them loose from the hold of its opponent, the CCP had to resort to the "rule of the gun"[126] and to land confiscation and redistribution. Struggle against landlordism was a necessary part of the revolution, but Wang Ming seems to have doubted whether it was appreciated by the masses as a means to end "class exploitation" or to gratify "peasant capitalism." Hence, he directed his fight against "localism and conservatism of peasant ideology"[127] and maintained at the same time that "an anti-imperialist revolutionary movement has much broader motive force than a land revolutionary movement."[128]
At first sight, Mao's position on the revolutionary potential of the peasants appears to be the exact opposite of Wang Ming's. However, there were significant variations in his stated views over time. He wrote in the style of a radical populist when he was leading the Autumn Harvest Uprising in 1927. In his "Report on An Investigation of The Peasant Movement in Hunan," Mao attributed to the peasants a will to rise up spontaneously "like a mighty storm, like a hurricane" against "all the trammels that bind them."[129] He gave three points of credit to the urban dwellers and the military while giving seven to the peasants.[130] In 1930 Mao emphasized the same point by citing an old saying: "A single spark can start a prairie fire." Yet both Li Li-san and Wang Ming were critical of Mao for his excessive trust in the efficacy of the Red Army. By 1945 it seems as though the role of the army had overshadowed that of the peasants in Mao's mind, for he said, "Without a people's army the people have nothing."[131]
Politics polarizes men, and it would be imprudent to read the stated view of one side in isolation from that of the other. Mao's radical stand on peasant power, for instance, may be better appreciated when one takes into account the fact that those in power in the Party at the time downgraded the peasant movement and therewith its chief spokesman, Mao. A similar internal political situation prevailed during the second united front. It was Wang Ming's contention then that, in an anti-imperialist struggle of the bourgeois–democratic stage, the proletarian leadership must cooperate with the bourgeoisie. It was against this thesis that Mao maintained that the war against Japan was a "peasant war." The Resolution on History formalized this thesis:
[126] Ibid. , p. 195.
[127] Ibid.
[128] Wang Ming hsüan-chi , I, 76.
[129] Selected Works , I, 23–24.
[130] Stuart R. Schram, ed., The Political Thought of Mao Tse-tung (New York: Praeger, 1963), pp. 181–182.
[131] Selected Works , III, 246–247.
"The peasants' fight for land is the basic feature of the anti-imperialist and anti-feudal struggle in China."[132] Mao never denied the role of the proletarian leadership. The Resolution quotes Mao from "The Single Spark" stating that the revolution in semi-colonial China "will never suffer just because the peasants, through their struggle, become more powerful than the workers."[133]
Seeing the Chinese revolution from the perspective of the Maoists in the past, we have also accepted their assessment of the revolutionary potential of the peasants. But the Communist cadres in the field who had to maintain daily contacts with the peasants had their own view, free from the considerations of internal politics. Such a view is available in a report made by Cheng Wei-san, the political commissar of the New Fourth Army's Second Division stationed in the Huainan District, at a conference of mass movement cadres some time in 1942.[134] He was an old veteran who took part in the Autumn Harvest Uprising. His credentials and the content of his report testify to his insight into the strength and weakness of China's peasant masses. Because of its importance, I will quote from the report extensively.
"They love to follow a leader," Cheng Wei-san remarked in noting the "characteristics of the peasants," and went on,
This is quite all right if they are following the Communist Party, but it is bad if they are following a bad leader or a die-hard element. That's why the leadership question for the peasant is very important.
They love to follow a large crowd. If a unit [of the army] has just been founded, it is often like a hive of bees. Dividing up grain during the soviet period was like that. Because of this, when the peasants hold a big meeting it has a great impact on struggle. Similarly, if a mass meeting is held in connection with struggle, they will see what everybody else is doing and put together enough courage to rise up.[135]
Peasants are prone to magnify to the size of heaven a very trifling matter such as a mouthful [of food] or one egg. That is to say, personal benefit is of utmost importance to the peasants. We must take it seriously.[136]
To conduct a peasant movement, we must start from economic struggle because it benefits the peasants and can be cashed [tui-hsien ]. Political struggle is next, cultural movement is the most difficult and is a long-range enterprise. . . .
The peasants' consciousness must be gradually raised through struggle. Their consciousness must be experienced through the struggle in their lives. The peasants, who were taught in classes and not through a struggle, are not very effective. . . .[137]
[132] SW , IV, 190. Emphasis added.
[133] Ibid. , p. 191.
[134] K'ang-Jih chan-cheng yü nung-min yün-tung .
[135] Ibid. , p. 11.
[136] Ibid. , p. 12.
[137] Ibid. , p. 11.
The peasants want cash [tui-hsien ], but they are also easily deceived. The rise of a good many Red Spears and the Big Sword Societies are due to this easy credulity. But once they put their trust in a situation, that trust goes a long way and can turn into a great power.
The peasants not only lack organization and an ability to lead other classes but they are unable to lead themselves. . . . Therefore, if a spontaneous [tzu-fa ch'i-lai ti ] peasant movement is not united with the proletariat and the Communist party, it will either suffer a serious loss or it will be exploited by others.[138]
Cheng Wei-san's report is valuable not only because of its frankness about the peasants' weaknesses but because it points to a duality in their collective traits. He said.
These good points and their weak points cannot be separated. We must never, never take these characteristics in isolation. The weak points and the progressive nature are closely connected. Whatever progressive nature they may have is also connected with their backwardness. For instance, the peasants' localism (backwardness) is connected with their daring spirit in defending their homes and villages. Their view of private property is also shown in their tenacious and relentless revolutionary character in land revolution. Relying on these traits, what have we created?[139]
Cheng Wei-san indicates the basis of the differences between Mao and Wang Ming. It seems that each capitalized on different facets of the Chinese peasant. Wang Ming took note of the backward character of the peasants to advance his urban-oriented line, while Mao professed to believe that that was precisely the source of strength for the revolution in the rural areas.
Mao put his trust in what the peasants were capable of becoming in his hands. The stress on the peasants' capacity for growth rather than their fixed being can be seen clearly in the following passage from Kao Kang's report, Examination of Questions Concerning the History of the Party in the Border Region , delivered in November of 1942. Since this report can be regarded as a dress rehearsal of the Party's criticisms of Wang Ming at the Seventh Plenum in 1945, one may assume that the point was made vis-à-vis Wang Ming:
The experiences of armed struggle in China similarly prove that the establishment of revolutionary arms is inseparable from the mutiny of the White army and bandit movement. We always begin with such forces. Then we build the framework of the Party and unite it with the peasants to make
[138] Ibid. , p. 12.
[139] Ibid. , p. 11.
the revolutionary forces. We start from small guerrilla units and turn them into large regular forces. However, the "Left deviation" opportunists still do not understand this point. . . .[140]
The Japanese Army's contempt for the "Communist bandits" early in the war and its respect for the Eighth Route Army toward the end of it accord with this message.
The strength of Chinese communism as a peasant movement seems to rest on a refinement of some decisively pre-modern traits of China's peasantry. Max Weber made much of this point in his study. He noted the absence of what he called "complete disenchantment of the world" in the Chinese mentality.[141] By this he meant that magic and superstition had not been exorcised, a condition which he held necessary for development of universalistic rationalism. He traced the continued dominance of traditional and particularistic orientations in the Chinese world view to the magical elements in "Chinese religion." In this way, he explained why modern entrepreneurship did not develop in China. The Chinese Communist movement seems to draw on traditional human relationships, which Weber regarded as China's curse, so to speak, and to turn them to its account. It found the source of organizational cohesion in the intense personal relationship that bound traditional rural self-defense groups, on both "orthodox" and "heterodox" sides, together.
General Ho Lung, the commander of the 120th Division, had an occasion to reminisce about his youthful days to a reporter in 1939. He had raised himself from bandit origin in Hunan. He was apparently an incorrigible ruffian in his boyhood. He found his calling in soldiering for landlords' private armies, and he took part in many a bloody fight. These fights took place between villages based on distinct lineages and were called inter-lineage feuds (hsieh-tou ). Villages organized in para-military formations clashed with one another, inflicting atrocities. Ho Lung said of his soldier-comrades,
Though they were barbarous all right, they also had their merits: they were sincere, spirited, and hard-nosed. If they don't want to talk and fraternize, they'll never talk and fraternize. Once they trust you, then neither death nor earthquake can change [them]. No matter what you bring, an official or
[140] Pien-ch'ü li-shih wen-t'i chien-t'ao (Report to the senior cadre conference, November, 1942) (The Northwestern Bureau) (BI), p. 42. As this report purports to be a review of the Party's history in northern Shensi up to 1935, the target of attack is 'Left' rather than right deviation.
[141] The Religion of China: Confucianism and Taoism (Glencoe, Ill.: The Free Press, 1951), pp. 226–227.
money, you cannot buy them off. And they were so brave—many people sacrificed themselves by following me alone.[142]
Local self-defense based entirely on lineage was peculiar to southern and central China. Still, it seems that basically identical interpersonal bonds bound a local self-defense group at its best everywhere. When such a bond tied a group of peasants together, they were no longer a sheet of loose sand. They followed their leader in whatever he commanded. Moreover, this relationship could be cultivated and reproduced among otherwise atomized peasant masses. Stilwell noted this fact among the Chinese troops under his command in the China–Burma–India Theater. They were peasants press-ganged and shipped in box cars to his command from the Chungking-controlled areas. He was surprised to see how much they would endure in return for simply decent treatment.[143]
Chinese communism as a peasant guerrilla movement sought to cultivate this relationship and to institutionalize it at the mass level. It had to be built within the confines of a limited space such as a village or a company, the most important unit of troop indoctrination in the Communist forces. To quote Cheng Wei-san again:
Because the peasants lack organization, they are especially in need of it. We must use old forms, start from small local ones to reach a large district, from near to far, from one home and one village to reach one hsiang , one district. This is inevitable for the initial mobilization of the peasants. . . . From the beginning of the war, our Party in north China mobilized from above to below. This is completely correct.[144]
The largest operational unit for the regular army was co-extensive with the military sub-district—comprising a few hsien and corresponding in size to what Philip Kuhn calls the "extended multiplex t'uan ." The decentralized organization was suited to prolonged guerrilla warfare, because it was a long-standing tradition.
Similarly the relationship cultivated between individuals rested largely on personal or pre-political attachments. The well-publicized efficacy of "ideological indoctrination" in creating discipline and cohesion among the Communist troops is highly misleading if it is thought to consist entirely of a political message. The message may be "ideological," but the medium is not. It is difficult to find anything overtly political in the injunctions laid down in the resolutions of the
[142] Hung-ch'i p'iao-p'iao , VI, 107.
[143] Stilwell and the American Experience in China , pp. 3, 26, 161–163, 172–173, 416.
[144] K'ang-Jih chan-cheng yü nung-min yün-tung , pp. 11–12.
Kut'ien Conference—the bible of "political training" in the Chu-Mao Group.[145] The ban against beating of soldiers, care for their daily needs, and the like, were simple requirements of decency between one man and another, though they were sorely lacking in the traditional coolie armies. The catechisms contained in the "Three main rules of discipline and the eight points for attention"—which Mao seemed to have copied from the Taiping Rebels—were designed to create close human bonds between officers and soldiers, and between soldiers and civilians.[146] The absence of privacy in the social structure in the rural areas also facilitated collective unity based on face-to-face relationships. Amazing effectiveness of anti-traitor work and information control at the village level resulted from the absence of secrets in a peasant collectivity.
The infrastructure of guerrilla warfare had its root in the "feudal" part of China. At the bottom, it was indistinguishable from traditional rural self-defense, "localism," "local banditry," and "warlordism." The accomplishment of the Chinese Communists was in refining this native source of power and combining it with a thoroughly modern organization imposed from above. Thousands upon thousands of separate, isolated, and cellular units were tied to a frame of steel. It seems as though the cells would have gone wherever the frame would take them, e.g., the resistance, the civil war, the Great Leap Forward, etc. This was because of the basically apolitical nature of the cells at the bottom. Their unity presupposed local interest in "defending homes and villages."
Unity of a home is based on an apolitical relationship. The paradigm of the relationship that governs a home is the relationship between the father and the son or between the author and his issue. This relationship is therefore called "authoritarian." It is apolitical because it is based on command rather than on "reason." Its root is in tradition. As such, its parameter is a particular home or a particular village. This sets limits to the unity of one village with another. But patriarchy, ties of blood, and love for one's village are precisely the foundation of nationhood. Thousands of Chinese villages are capable of becoming a nation if they are tied together under one giant father figure who would stress the particularity of the whole collectivity in its relation to other collectivities.
To simplify the picture, one might say that the Chinese Communist movement consists of Mao, the father figure, at the apex and millions of Corporal Lei Fengs, the Chinese Stakhanovite, at the bottom. How
[145] See "On Correcting Mistaken Ideas in the Party," Selected Works , I, 105–106.
[146] Ibid. , IV, 155–156.
far the movement can go is in part a function of its leader. It is also the function of the led. The followers are not after all completely malleable. The Communist movement created its power by cultivating the strength of the tradition. But that strength is connected with weaknesses. The leader is charged with the task of husbanding this energy while trying to change it. This was the reason that Mao demanded "guerrilla warfare" while criticizing "guerrillaism," and demanded "regularization" while criticizing "regular warfare." The contradiction in his position was the reflection of the contradiction between himself and Wang Ming.
IX—
Conclusion
After Pearl Harbor, Yenan had relatively little to fear about the stability of the united front. The Kuomintang evidently decided to shift the major share of war efforts to the Allied powers. Since unification was inseparable from resistance, this had the effect of depriving Chungking of its initiative against the Communists as well. There were, however, two possible turns in the war which remained Yenan's concern after Pearl Harbor. One was the possibility of a war between Japan and the Soviet Union. The likelihood of such a conflict was relatively remote as both countries were engaged with major enemies, Japan with the United States and the Soviet Union with Germany. Nevertheless, the possibility existed and increased after the German defeat in Stalingrad in early 1943. Up through 1941, every border war between Japan and the Soviet Union had the effect of encouraging the Kuomintang to simply maintain the stalemate. After 1941, however, Japan's priority was no longer in China. In the event of a war with the Soviet Union, it would have been in a three-front war. If China turned to the offensive, Japan would have been compelled to withdraw its forces toward Manchuria or abandon China altogether. That would have exposed the Communist bases to the Kuomintang. Speaking in December, 1942, Liu Shao-sh'i expressed the hope that the Soviet Union would delay a decisive operation against Japan to make possible a protracted war in China, or that it would advance into China in pursuit of the Japanese forces there.[1]
[1] Central China Bureau First Plenum , pp. 34–35. See also Japanese intelligence to this effect, in Intelligence Division, Embassy of Japan, Jukei[*] seiken no gaiko[*] [Diplomacy of the Chungking government] (Nanking, 1943) (Toyobunko[*] ), p. 23. The CCP's public stance after Pearl Harbor was to defer the priority of world war to Europe, and to welcome the rapprochement between Japan and the Soviet Union.See Chieh-fang jih-pao , December 16, 1941, p. 1. In this sense it was opposed to Chungking's demand on Washington for "Asia before Europe."
The other threat to the Chinese Communists was posed by the United States, which was single-mindedly pursuing the goal of destroying Japan as speedily as possible. It sought to marshal whatever force could be enlisted for this purpose and opposed a split in China's resistance. When the so-called "third anti-Communist high tide" began with the tightening of blockade around Shen-Kan-Ning in March of 1943, the United States exerted pressure on Chungking to avert a civil war.[2] Insofar as American assistance to China had the effect of maintaining the protracted stalemate, it was welcome from the CCP's standpoint.[3] But in order to prosecute the war against Japan, the United States had been equipping and training the Kuomintang forces in India and Yünan.[*] In 1943, the debate in Washington concerning the strategy of counter-offensive against Japan was taking final shape.
At the Quebec Conference (August), Chungking again made a strong representation for the adoption of its long-standing demand, "Asia before Europe," by the United States.[4] The Kuomintang wanted a landing of American forces in China to drive back the Japanese forces. Its intention was to re-establish itself in north and central China against the Communists with the help of U.S. forces. The proposed American landing, therefore, posed a grave threat to the CCP.
After the "third anti-Communist high tide" was overcome with American help, and the Kuomintang had suffered considerable damage to its prestige, the CCP's public stance visibly stiffened. Restraints on its pronouncements were removed; it began to attack the Kuomintang openly, first with an editorial in the Liberation Daily of October 5 written by Mao.[5] Internally this editorial was understood as a signal to get ready for a general armed insurrection.[6] The CCP began a pro-
[*] To this date some friends of the CCP complain that both Moscow and Washington "neglected" to aid the Communists. This charge is based on ignorance of the role played by the united front. Suppose the United States or the Soviet Union had chosen to disregard the Kuomintang's blockade to send in large scale aid to the Communist bases. The result would have been to force Chungking to reconsider the wisdom of remaining in the war. The optimal external aid from the CCP's standpoint would have been one which aided Chungking just enough to keep it in the war but not large enough to build it up in its own right.
[2] Selected Works , III, 139.
[3] See comments by Chou En-lai and Mao Tse-tung in Amerasia Papers , pp. 703, 790.
[4] Selected Works , III, 138.
[5] Mao Tse-tung-chi , IX, 59–74.
[6] Teng Tzu-hui, Cheng-feng lun-hsün-tui shih-shih t'ao-lun tsung-chi pao-kao [Report of the sum-up of current affairs discussion in the Rectification rotation–indoctrination unit], Part II, Fuhsiao , February, 1944, p. 14. Teng Tzu-hui's words were: "[if] an internal war and capitulation occurs, our policy in the great rearwill change from the clandestine method of the past to armed insurrection, guerrilla warfare, mutiny and uprisings of troops in order to overthrow the rule of the capitulationists. The editorial in the Chieh-fang jih-pao of October 5 concerning fulfilling our pledge should be understood to mean such a policy . . . ." The pledge he referred to was the CCP's united front pledge of September, 1937 which, according to Mao in the editorial above, was already fulfilled. Mao Tse-tung-chi , IX, 70.
gram to indoctrinate its members with the slogan, "Without the Communist party, there is no China" (Mei-yu Kung-ch'an-tang, mei-yu Chungkuo ). This theme was designed to refute Chiang Kai-shek's book China's Destiny , published in March. The indoctrination program stressed that the Communist party was the "orthodox" heir of Sun Yat-sen and that it was to decide "China's Destiny."[7] There were some in the army who doubted the wisdom of actively seeking a collision with the Kuomintang. They said, "The reason why the reactionary faction wants to capitulate is that our Party has grown strong and threatens it. It is because class contradiction exceeds the international contradiction."[8] There were also skeptics who doubted that the CCP was ready to take on the three million troops with which the Kuomintang had armed itself by this time. "Some people say that if a civil war breaks out we will again leave our bases to go on a long march."[9] The Party assured them that the CCP would hold on to most of its bases this time.[10]
The CCP's efforts were stepped up as the U. S. Army Observer Section arrived in Yenan in the spring of 1944. One can discern three goals that were pursued by the Communist leaders in their extensive conversations with the Americans. They stressed that the CCP was interested primarily in speedy defeat of Japan and hence shared an identical goal with the United States.[11] They sought to undermine Washington's confidence in the Kuomintang by describing it as a dictatorship interested only in suppressing internal opposition but not in the resistance.[12] Lastly, they sought to influence the choice of sites for American landing in China, and the relationship of U. S. and Chinese forces. In connection with the last point, the Communist leaders repeatedly asked that all Chinese forces, Kuomintang as well as Communist, be subordinated directly to American command and that the two Chinese forces be assigned to "separate sectors" for operation against the Japanese forces.[13] This would have enabled the Communist forces to acquire American arms and supplies directly, while
[7] Teng Tzu-hui, Cheng-feng lun-hsün-tui . . . , Part I, Fuhsiao , January, 1944, pp. 41–42.
[8] Ibid. , Part II, p. 26.
[9] Ibid. , p. 14.
[10] Ibid.
[11] See Chou En-lai in Amerasia Papers , p. 703.
[12] See Mao in Ibid. , p. 789.
[13] Ibid. , pp. 707, 795, 902, 903.
using the United States forces to segregate themselves from the Kuomintang forces. John S. Service of the U. S. Army Observer Section came away with an impression that the Communist leaders were more interested in joint action against the Japanese than the officials in Chungking.[14]
This reflected not the attitudes of the two parties toward a joint action against Japan as such but their confidence in using it to their respective advantages. "If the Americans do not land in China, it will be most unfortunate for China," Mao told Service, and added, "The Kuomintang will continue as the government—without being able to be the government."[15]
In reality, Yenan had very little choice when American landing in China became imminent. It could not oppose the proposal. The only way out was to take the initiative in offering its cooperation in order to exert its influence on the manner of execution. In the fall of 1943, the Communist regular forces numbered 400,000 at most.[16] This was less than half of the force level which Mao regarded as necessary for the final challenge against the Kuomintang. But in other ways, the war was going very well from the CCP's standpoint. The front was completely stalemated and the Kuomintang forces were deteriorating rapidly, while the Japanese forces in north China were withdrawing to the model peace zones. But the prospect of Allied operation on the mainland, I surmise, forced the Communists to step up their schedule of revolution by using the American intervention as a leverage to displace the Kuomintang.
On May 4, 1944, the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the United States decided to carry out landing operations in the Philippines, Taiwan, and on the China coast.[17] Some time in 1944, the CCP's Center had issued a directive to its forces stating in part that "China's counter-offensive must rely on us as the main [force] coordinated with the Allied counter-offensive."[18] The Communist forces everywhere were ordered to expand rapidly. The New Fourth Army, for instance, was setting the goal of expansion by three to five times.[19]
The United States then reversed its decision concerning landing in
[14] Ibid. , p. 798.
[15] Ibid. , p. 794. Emphasis original.
[16] Teng Tzu-hui mentioned the figure of "less than 500,000" in Cheng-feng lun-hsün-tui . . . , Part I, p. 38. Lin Tsu-han made public the figure of 475,000 Communist troops in September, 1944. Amerasia Papers , p. 1049.
[17] Stilwell and the American Experience in China , pp. 446–447.
[18] Teng Tzu-hui, "Kuan-yü chin-nien k'uo-ta ti-fang-chün chi-ke chi-pen wen-t'i" [Concerning several basic problems in expanding the regional forces this year], Fuhsiao, November , 1944, pp. 2–3.
[19] Ibid. , p. 2.
China. It decided to proceed with island-hopping toward Japan.[*] Most surprisingly, it reversed its basic position vis-à-vis the Kuomintang and the CCP shortly afterward. The CCP's plan to claim the Mandate of Heaven was delayed by several years. This belongs to another chapter in the history of the Communist movement in China. It must be noted, however, that by the fall of 1943 the highest Communist leadership was willing to challenge the Kuomintang—with some external help. Mao Tse-tung seems to have tried to "Seize the hour." It is my judgment that, with or without United States intervention, the fate of the Kuomintang was seriously compromised by this time. Foreign intervention could still accelerate or delay the revolution born in China's countryside, but it was no longer capable of thwarting that revolution completely. The power of the Communist military machine had grown to the point where it could disregard the forces generated in the cities of China and of the world. The second united front which neutralized the cities toward the revolution in the rural areas could be dispensed with.
In the spring of 1945, the Seventh Plenum of the Sixth Central Committee was convened in Yenan. The Resolution on Some Questions in the History of Our Party , passed on this occasion, formalized Mao's victory over Wang Ming by rewriting the Party's history. The Resolution on History stated that the Party's line laid down at the Sixth Congress in 1928 was "basically correct."[20] Formally, the Resolution chose not to deal with the period of the war against Japan on the ground that it was not yet over.[21] But the war was all but over, and the Resolution in fact made many references to the topics of internal dispute during the second united front period, such as the one concerning guerrilla vs . mobile warfare.[22] By this means, the Resolution clearly suggests that the Party's line of the Sixth Congress was valid for the resistance period as well. The line of the Sixth Congress had guided the CCP through the civil war period. It had stressed the rural area work, the Red Army, the soviets, and severe land revolution; it had made no provisions for a "united front from above." The Resolution and the Maoist version of history which accompanied it had the effect of creating an impression that Mao's rural strategy was chiefly instru-
[*] The Japanese forces waited nervously for the strategic counter-offensive promised by Mao, but it never came. The war ended in stalemate.
[20] SW , IV, 176. While The Resolution on History and the Seventh Congress stood for Mao's victory, I am not certain how complete a victory it was. Evidently Mao needed Liu Shao-ch'i's support to muster a majority against Wang Ming.
[21] Ibid. , p. 189.
[22] Ibid. , p. 204. The resolution makes a specific reference to guerrilla warfare during the "Anti-Japanese War" here.
mental in leading the Communist revolution to its success in 1945. It is to this fact that we owe the distortion in our view of the Chinese revolution.
In this book I have tried to correct this distortion by bringing to light the role played by the cities in China's revolution, and the manner in which Communist power was created in the rural areas under the protective umbrella of the cities. Let us take a final look at the way in which that power was constituted by the time Japan surrendered. In August, 1945, Mao described it with obvious pride:
Are there places which are sure to fall into the hands of the people? Yes, there are. They are the vast rural areas and the numerous towns in the provinces of Hopei, Chahar and Jehol, most of Shansi, Shantung and the northern part of Kiangsu, with villages linked together and with about a hundred towns in one area, seventy to eighty in another, forty to fifty in a third—altogether three, four, five or six such areas, big and small. What sort of towns? Medium and small towns. We are sure of them, we have the strength to pick these fruits of victory. In the history of the Chinese revolution this will be the first time that we have got such a bunch of fruit. Historically, it was only . . . in the latter half of 1931 that we had altogether as many as twenty-one county towns in the Central Base Area in Kiangsi Province. . . .[23]
This was what Mao had been trying to build since the Kiangsi days. Now it was in his hands. The area mentioned by Mao contained 95 million in population and supported a regular army of 910,000 and 2.2 million militia.[24] The tiger was out of the cage. It could no longer be contained.
For Mao the revolution in China meant a steady increase of such bases:
From now on, the area taken by our army will daily expand, and the Kuomintang's sources of troops and food supplies will daily contract; we estimate that by next spring, after another full year's fighting, our army and the Kuomintang army will be roughly equal in numbers. Our policy is to go ahead steadily and strike sure blows, not to seek quick results; all we are trying to do is to wipe out, on the average, about 8 brigades of the Kuomintang regular army each month, or about 100 brigades a year. . . . It should be possible to wipe out the entire Kuomintang army in about five years. . . .[25]
The revolution was strictly a matter of depriving the enemy of his source of grain and recruits by steady attrition. It was above all a mechanical matter of wiping out the enemy forces by small install-
[23] Selected Works , IV, 17–18.
[24] As of April, 1945. Ibid. , III, 202.
[25] Ibid. , IV, 225. See also Ibid. , p. 261.
ments. Hence, Mao predicted with audacity that it would take five years from March, 1946, to topple the Kuomintang. He placed no reliance on snowballing or the "prairie fire" effect of political disintegration in the cities. He showed little awareness that at some point the cities would read in the Communists' success a new "Mandate of Heaven" and suddenly change their allegiance.[26]
I have shown that Mao envisioned Communist power on such a basis in Kiangsi. He was confident that this power could be made to grow indefinitely. The trouble for the Communists was that the peasant revolution provoked reaction primarily in the cities. The cities of modernizing China turned out to be more powerful than the countryside. The defeat of peasant revolution in Kiangsi showed that it had to co-exist with the dominant power for a long time (Wang Ming) or it could grow only by neutralizing the cities against itself. The war with Japan was the providential opportunity that made the latter course possible. Whether the Kuomintang was forced into the war by the Chinese Communists is an important question, but it cannot be settled until the Kuomintang's records are open to us. In any event, it was the urban middle class and intellectuals that demanded resistance on the basis of internal unity. Mao opposed it at first and for very good reasons: mobilization of the peasants on which the Communists depended could not be anything but revolutionary.
Without redistribution of land in some form and the attendant reshuffling of the entire social fabric in the rural areas, Communist power could not be built. The precious two years between 1937 and 1939, when the Japanese forces left the countryside of north China virtually empty, gave the Communists a head start. Thereafter the strategic stalemate between Japan and the Kuomintang enabled their continued existence and expansion. The resistance qua resistance was not simply a "peasant war" fought by "encircling the cities from the countryside." It was at best a joint effort of the cities and the countryside. The CCP had eventually acquired enough military power of its own to make it risky for the Kuomintang to enter into a separate peace with Japan. In my judgment that point was reached some time between Pearl Harbor and 1943. After that, the CCP was in fact forcing the Kuomintang to stay in the resistance.
Chinese Communists' revolutionary strategy was an uneasy juxtapo-
[26] An interesting debate took place between H. G. Creel and Ho Ping-ti as to whether the founding of a new dynasty in China depended primarily on military prowess and army of the founder or on the Mandate of Heaven bestowed by the literati. See Ho Ping-ti and Tang Tsou, eds., China in Crisis , Vol. I, Bk. 1, pp. 59–92. The import of my finding would be that they are both correct. The CCP drew on military power based on territory, grain, and peasants and on the support of the modern literati.
sition of two distinct lines, urban and rural. Neither alone was sufficient to account for the CCP's ultimate victory. The differences between Mao and Wang Ming were reflections of the CCP's own predicament in 1935. There was no way of getting out of that predicament except to combine resistance and revolution into a unique blend called jen-min chieh-fang chan-cheng or "war of people's liberation." The "people" stands for both the Chinese nation and the "oppressed" part of the nation.
As late as July, 1940, one may recall, the CCP had acknowledged that "the rise and fall of the Chinese nation is the responsibility of the Koumintang."[27] For six years until 1943, the modern sector of China bore the major burden of the resistance. What sustained this effort was the spontaneous outburst of modern nationalism. With enormous force, it propelled China forward into an enterprise whose destiny was unforeseen. On the Communist side, credit must be given the strategic genius of its leadership. But for the collective genius of this leadership, the CCP would not have been able to harness urban nationalism to its purpose. Next in importance was the combat worthiness of the seasoned Communist forces. We must agree with Mao that "Without a people's army, the people have nothing." The reverse was not true tactically speaking. When the going became difficult in one area, the army could move elsewhere and create a new source of popular support.[*] What made the revolutionary potential of the peasants strategically relevant was the tremendous expanse of China's countryside.
There is little evidence to support the view that chronic poverty among the peasantry—usually traced back to the population increase in early modern times—had predisposed and "preconditioned" them to rise up in response to some "precipitating" event. Poverty produced the explosive result only when it interacted with the CCP's land program. But then this was no longer a question of poverty per se. "The social question" (Hannah Arendt[28] ) had to be politicized into the question of "class exploitation" before mass mobilization could occur, and therefore the CCP's land program remained basically unchanged from the Kiangsi to the Yenan period. Thus, chronic rural poverty was indeed a factor in the Communist revolution, but it played a passive role. The most massive poverty and deprivation, on the other hand, was inflicted on the peasants of north China as a consequence of the war and revolution rather than as their precondition.
[*] The metaphor of "fish" and "water" for guerrilla and peasants, incidentally, was authored by Chou En-lai, not Mao Tse-tung. Mao would have said, "fish can swim without water" at least for a while as happened on the Long March.
[27] Mao Tse-tung-chi , VII, 259.
[28] On Revolution (New York: The Viking Press, 1963), Chapter I.
More directly relevant to Communist expansion was the peculiar social and political organization of modern China's vast hinterland. This category denotes a complex of phenomena and can be stated in many ways. At bottom was the parochial outlook of the peasants and the fierceness with which they defended their existence. Mobilization into para-military formations was almost a natural reflex by tradition, almost a way of life. While the villages were articulated with regional and national political leadership on the "orthodox" side as during the Taiping Rebellion, it was possible to mobilize the peasants for the defense of status quo. It is quite evident that the successors of the gentry leaders who put down that rebellion had gone through a profound transformation by the 1930s. Social and political ties that bound the countryside to the cities were tenuous during the interm between the disintegration of the old order and the establishment of the new. Warlordism was a concomitant of this disorder and reflected the parochial character of the infrastructure on which it rested. The Communist peasant movement also drew its strength from this foundation. As one subsystem among several regional powers, it relied on internecine warfare as the major precondition of its existence. Regionalism found a new lease on life in the anti-Japanese national salvation movement which originated in the constituencies of the Kuomintang and some regional powers. This tended to widen the "semi-feudal" fissure in the Chinese polity while magnifying the pressure on the government for war. Communist power survived and resumed its growth beyond the critical threshold because of the unique alliance and interaction between the cities and the countryside.
The chronic and ubiquitous propensity of China's peasants to take local power into their hands in modern times, rather than their poverty, should be regarded as an element of necessity in the revolution. But this was not sufficient for the victory of the revolution. The peasants had to be acted upon under particular international and domestic circumstances. These circumstances were political in nature. The most important condition, the war itself, was a discretionary and contingent event. In the sense that the revolution in China could not succeed without the war, one can conclude that the revolution itself was a contingent event.[29]
[29] See Chalmers Johnson, Revolutionary Change (Boston: Little Brown and Co., 1966), chap. I, for a theoretical statement of this point.
Index
A
Administrative director's office, 137
Administrative programs:
prior to 1940, 80 , 122 ;
after 1940, 214 , 237 –238;
liberal character of after 1940, 238 –239;
motive for liberalization, 260 ,
See also Chinese Communist Party, Land revolution, Three-thirds system
Agricultural production, sharp decline of after war, 234 –235
Arendt, Hannah, 310
Asia before Europe, slogan of:
opposed by CCP, 303 –304;
supported by Kuomintang, 304
August First Declaration, 21 –22
B
Black field, 118 , 235
Bolshevization of CCP, slogan of:
supported by Internationalists, 161
Boyle, John Hunter, 150
Britain:
inclined to side with Japan against China, 164 ;
impact of Soviet-German pact and World War on, 165 –166;
closed Burma Road, July 1940, 208 ;
reopened Burma Road, October, 223
Bunker, Gerald, 150
C
Central Plains Bureau, CCP:
decision to establish, 82 , 160 ;
established, 195 ;
renamed Central China Bureau in winter, 1940, 82 ;
vied with Hsiang Ying and Kuomintang for control of north Kiangsu, 160 , 195
Chang Ch'ün:
September, 1936 talks (as foreign minister) with Japanese ambassador Kawagoe, 41 ;
vowed to eradicate CCP, 169
Chang Chung:
negotiated with Chou En-lai, 53 ;
in liaison function in Yenan, 213
Chang Fa-k'uei:
appointed 4th War Zone commander, 1939, 153
Chang Hsüeh-liang:
target of CCP's regional united front (against Kuomintang) tactics, 33 –34;
negotiated with Chou En-lai, 40 –41
Chang Kuo-t'ao:
became doubtful of CCP's rural revolution, 13 ;
mutual recrimination with Mao at Meoerhkai, 20 –21;
criticized Mao's radicalism at Loch'uan Conference, 59 ;
defected from CCP, 1938, 71
Chang Lan-feng, 288
Chang Nai-ch'i:
opposed Mao's land confiscation policy, 39 ;
regarded as CCP's "ally," 222
Chang Tsung-ch'ang, 203
Chang Wen-ang, 91
Chang Wen-t'ien:
appointed General Secretary of CCP at Tsunyi, 20 ;
warned against Left deviation, 1940, 198 , 234 ;
criticized Mao, 261
Chang Yin-wu, Kuomintang regional commander:
accused by Mao as friction monger, 167 ;
forces of, attacked by Communists, 169 ;
forces of, liquidated, 192
Chang Yün-i, 227
Chang Yu-san:
negotiated with Japanese in Kiri Operation, 190
Changkufeng Incident:
border skirmish between Soviet Union and Japan, 1938, 155
Ch'en Ch'ao-lin:
negotiated with Japanese in Kiri Operation, 190
Ch'en Ch'eng:
appointed 9th War Zone commander, 153 ;
reorganized San-Min-Chu-I Youth Corps, 153 ;
accused Communists of not fighting Japanese, 191
Ch'en Chi-t'ang:
revolted against Kuomintang in Southwestern War, 38
Ch'en I:
crossed Yangtze into north Kiangsu, 211 ;
on CCP's decision for Battle of 100 Regiments, 215 ;
appointed commander of New Fourth Army, 227
Ch'en Kuan:
commanded 115th Division after Lin Piao wounded, 99
Ch'en Yün, 163
Cheng Wei-san:
views of, on China's peasants, 297 –298, 300
Ch'eng Ch'ien:
accused Communists of subverting war, 191
Chi-Je-Liao (Hopei-Jehol-Liaoning) District (of Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region), 94
Chi-Lu-Yü (Hopei-Shantung-Honan) District (of Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü Border Region):
established, 192 .
See also Large Hopei-Shantung-Honan, Small Hopei-Shantung-Honan Districts
Chiang Kai-shek:
forced by China's disunity to appease Japan, 14 –15, 52 , 77 ;
demanded total surrender by CCP, 37 ;
responded to Soviet overture for alliance, 41 ;
made no public promise at Sian, 44 ;
in Suiyuan Incident, 86 –87;
spurned local settlement of Lukouchiao Incident, 52 ;
agreed to German mediation, 68 ;
warlordism increased pressure for war on, 86 –87;
announced stage of counter-offensive, 155 ;
repeatedly warned Communists against unauthorized expansion, 157 , 163 , 169 ;
reportedly able to end war peaceably, 164 ;
appealed to and threatened Britain, 164 –165;
approved of constitutionalism, 168 ;
reaction to Japan's peace terms, 180 ;
wooed by Japan in Kiri Operation, 191 ;
suspected Soviet-Japanese agreement at China's expense, 208 ;
peace terms with Japan, 244 ;
ultimatum to CCP over north Kiangsu question, 225 –226;
authored China's Destiny
Chiang Kai-shek, Madame:
asserted Chiang Kai-shek could end war, 164
Chiang Ting-wen:
appointed 10th War Zone commander, 153
Chiaotung District:
established, 99 –100
Ch'ien Yung-ming:
in peace contact, 223
Chin-Ch'a-Chi (Shansi-Chahar-Hopei) Border Region:
founded, 92 –93;
administrative program, 237 ;
tax rate higher in, 247 –248;
attack on, by Japanese forces, 271 –274
Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü (Shansi-Hopei-Shantung-Honan) Border Region: shaped up only in 1940
Chin-Chi-Yü (Shansi-Hopei-Honan) District (of Chin-Chi-Lu-Yü Border Region);
founded 92 ;
administrative program, 238
Chin-Sui (Shansi-Suiyuan) Border Region:
location of, 92 ;
founded 100 ;
underwent hardships under pacification, 275
Ch'in Ch'i-yuang:
accused by Mao as friction monger, 167
China Expeditionary Forces:
established, 116
Ch'in Pang-hsien:
disputed Mao at Tsunyi Conference, 18 –20;
replaced by Chang Wen-t'ien as General Secretary, 20 ;
supported Wang Ming in defense of Wuhan, 74
China Youth Party:
cooperated with Japanese, 98
Chinese Communist Party:
strategy in war summarized, 9 ;
declared war on Japan, 1932, 9 ;
origin of Long March myth, 12 –13;
lost O-Yü-Wan (Hupeh-Honan-Anhwei) Soviet, 13 ;
Fourth Front Army's Program Upon Entering Szechuan, 14 ;
Fifth Plenum of 6th Central Committee ordered defense of Kiangsi Soviet, 16 ;
July, 1935 signal to evacuate Kiangsi, 16 ;
Internationalists' view of Kiangsi Soviet's fall, 1934, 16 –17;
error in handling Fukien Rebellion, 17 ;
radio contact with Moscow during Long March, 18 , 23 ;
at Tsunyi Conference, 18 –19;
Internationalists' view of fall of Kiangsi Soviet at Tsunyi, 18 –19;
strange realignment of power at Tsunyi, 19 –20;
at Moukung and Maoerhkai, 20 –22;
August First Declaration, 21 –22;
decided to move into northern Shensi, 21 ;
November 13; 1935 declaration, anti-Chiang Kaishek, 27 ;
issued two declarations on
November 28, 1935, one anti-Chiang, the other proposing ceasefire to him, 27 ;
requested by Manchurian Communists to enter into ceasefire with Chiang Kai-shek, 27 ;
directed by Comintern to propose ceasefire to Chiang Kai-shek, 27 ;
relaxed treatment of rich peasants, 29 , 39 ;
proclaimed Soviet People's Republic, 31 ;
proposed anti-Chiang "united front from below and above" at Wayaopao, 32 ;
decided on regional united front of warlords to force Kuomintang into war, 33 –34;
encouraged Southwestern War against Chiang Kai-shek, 34 , 38 ;
raided Shansi to provoke war, 35 –37;
March, 1936 declaration on Shansi raid, 35 –36;
April, 1936 declaration on Shansi raid, 36 ;
April 25, 1936 declaration, 37 ;
second ceasefire proposal to Kuomintang, May 5, 1936, 37 ;
directive of July, 1936 confirmed expropriation of landlord class as part of united front, 38 –39;
kept landlord class out of united front throughout, 40 ;
Northern Bureau demanded party Center to adopt non-sectarian policy, 40 ;
first united front proposal to Kuomintang, August, 1936, 40 ;
proclaimed Democratic Republic, 40 ;
admitted national bourgeoisie to united front, 40 ;
ordered unilateral restraint toward Kuomintang army, October, 1936, 40 ;
resolution of September, 1936, 42 –43;
Sian Incident, 42 –44;
ordered by Stalin to save Chiang Kaishek's life, 43 ;
alarmed by Japan's retreat from north China in spring, 1937, 44 ;
terms of united front, 53 , 55 ;
anticipated war in May, 1937, 54 , 91 ;
sabotage of local ceasefire at Lukouchiao, 55 ;
telegram of July 8, 1937, 55 ;
declaration of united front, September 22, 1937, 55 ;
proposed common program but rejected by Kuomintang, 56 ;
Wang Ming demanded 7th party congress, 56 ;
Loch'uan Conference, August, 1937, 57 –61;
Ten Point National Salvation Program adopted, 58 ;
resolution on CCP participation in government, 58 –59;
adopted Mao's military line, 60 ;
military dispute, 60 , 65 –68, 69 –71, 75 –79;
Battle of P'inghsingkuan, 61 –65;
commenced base construction, 65 –66;
Politburo conference, December, 1937 disturbed by Chungking-Tokyo peace talk, 68 –69;
disputes over defense of Wuhan, 71 –75, 78 ;
Southeastern Bureau created, 73 ;
Yangtze Bureau created, 73 ;
Politburo conference, March, 1938, demanded defense of Wuhan, 73 –74;
Sixth Plenum of 6th Central Committee, 79 –82;
7th party congress postponed, 80 ;
pledged to cooperate with Kuomintang after war, 80 ;
adopted 15-point administrative program, 80 ;
demanded "bloc within" of Kuomintang, 81 –82;
adopted anti-traitor program, 81 ;
resolution on party organization in Communist bases, 81 ;
military expansion program, 82 ;
decided to establish Central Plains Bureau to take north Kiangsu, 82 ;
failed to take southwestern Shansi and turn to Shantung, 82 , 92 , 99 ;
expanded into south and central Hopei, 82 , 94 –95;
war plans in Shansi, 91 –92;
friction with Kuomintang regional forces, 95 , 154 , 157 , 168 , 192 , 198 –199, 222 , 233 ;
policy toward bandits, 106 –107;
incorporated rural self-defense organizations into base infrastructure, 113 –114;
built local governments, 114 –116;
Kuomintang's provision for Eighth Route Army, 122 ;
liquidation of traitors, 133 –135;
ordered New 4th Army to leave south bank of Yangtze and take north Kiangsu, 159 ;
Party consolidation directive, August, 1939, 162 –163;
decision on penetrating masses, November, 1939, 163 ;
Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region blockade began, 164 ;
Kuomintang's restriction of Communism intensified, November, 1939, 168 ;
Kuomintang's supply of ammunition to Eighth Route Army stopped, 169 ;
demand on Kuomintang to approve Communist occupation of Hopei, 169 ;
contingency plan for Chinese defeat discussed, 172 ;
resolution of October, 1939 warned against split in united front, 172 ;
December Incident, 174 –179;
control of 23 hsien in Shen-Kan-Ning secured, 177 ;
took December Incident to be beginning of civil war, 178 ;
refused to accuse Chiang Kai-shek, Yen Hsi-shan for attack, 178 –179;
New 4th Army and Eighth Route Army link up in north Kiangsu, 180 , 195 ;
directive of January, 1940 assured friction is "local,"
Chinese Communist Party
180 ;
rebuttal of Kuomintang accusations, 192 ;
secured control of Hopei by early 1940, 192 ;
Northern Bureau Lich'eng Conference restrained Left deviation, 193 ;
pushed by Kuomintang army out of southern Shansi, northern Honan, entered boundary accord, 193 ;
decision of February, 1940 warned of Kuomintang's capitulation, 193 ;
urged Hsiang Ying to speed up occupation of north Kiangsu, 194 ;
divided New 4th Army into two commands, 195 ;
Eighth Route Army main unit reached north Kiangsu to subdue Kuomintang opposition, 195 , 198 ;
Communist armies' total force level, 206 ;
concerned with defection of regional Kuomintang forces to Japanese, 200 –207;
June proposal to Kuomintang, 207 ;
July 7, 1940 manifesto, 210 ;
July 1 decision, 210 ;
rejected Kuomintang's first counter-proposal, 211 ;
August counter-proposal to Kuomintang, 212 –213;
August 15 directive on united front work, 213 ;
November directive on united front work, 214 ;
Double Ten Program of liberal reform adopted by Northern Bureau, 214 ;
motive for waging Battle of One Hundred Regiments, 214 ;
Central Committee's decision for offensive, 215 ;
Communist forces' casualty in offensive, 220 ;
September, 1940 proposal to Kuomintang, 221 ;
New 4th Army won decisive battle against Kuomintang in north Kiangsu, 222 ;
directive to anticipate Kuomintang attack, 222 ;
September, 1940 directive and war contingency plans, 222 ;
November, 1940 directive to win sympathy from public, 224 ;
message to Kuomintang refusing to give up north Kiangsu but agreeing to vacate south Kiangsu, 225 ;
December, 1940 directive noting end of capitulation crisis in Chungking, 225 ;
New 4th Army Incident, 226 ;
taken aback by stern Kuomintang action, 226 ;
disparity between Communist account and facts in New 4th Army Incident, 226 ;
reorganized New 4th Army, 227 ;
Twelve Item Demand on government, 227 ;
united front stabilized after Pearl Harbor until U.S. landing in China, 227 –228, 264 –265;
March, 1940 directive warning against radicalism, 233 ;
instituted Three-thirds system, 233 ;
warned against atrocity, 234 ;
blockade war with Japanese, 235 –236;
post-1940 administrative programs, 237 –238;
demanded constitutionalism, 241 ;
October, 1940 directive on artists, 242 ;
directive on intermediate groups, 242 ;
December, 1940 directive on united front policy, 244 ;
decision on land policy, January, 1942, 246 –247;
directive on labor hero Wu Man-yu, 259 ;
destruction of Communist organizations by Japanese, 271 ;
New 4th Army's consolidation of north Kiangsu came late in war, 274 , 286 , 291 –292, 294 ;
Japanese penetration of Communist bases, 275 ;
erosion of Communist bases, 277 ;
picked troops and simplified administration, 277 , 279 ;
reorganization of military, 278 ;
September 1, 1942 decision reverses party-army relationship, 279 ;
rate of desertion from army, 281 ;
loss of bases stopped, 284 ;
comparison of force levels between Communist and Japanese armies, 285 –286;
reason for survival of Communist bases, 286 , 310 ;
Resolution on History, 295 ;
Kao Kang's report on Shen-Kan-Ning, 298 ;
feared premature Soviet-Japanese war, 303 ;
third anti-Communist high tide against Shen-Kan-Ning, 304 ;
preparation for general insurrection against Kuomintang, 304 ;
requested U.S. to take command of all Chinese forces, 305 ;
7th party congress rewrites party history, 307 –308;
origin of Maoist myth, 308 .
See also Land revolution, Three-thirds system
Chou En-lai:
on ceasefire missions, 27 , 28 , 37 ;
letter to Ch'en Li-fu, 41 ;
negotiated terms of united front, 53 ;
on Eighth Route Army's reorganization, 60 ;
supported Internationalists' demand for defense of Wuhan, 74 ;
dispatched to persuade Hsiang Ying, 159 ;
on Chiang Kai-shek, 182 ;
negotiated terms of united front, 211 , 221 ;
on guerrillas, 310
Chu Huai-p'ing:
attacked Communists in December Incident, 178
Chu Shao-liang:
appointed 8th War Zone commander, 153 ;
in December Incident, 177
Chu Te:
opposed Mao's military line, 70 ;
transferred to Shen-Kan-Ning, 173 ;
letter to Kuomintang, 244
Ch'ü party committee, 139
Chugen[*] Campaign, 267
Chuk'ou Incident, 233
Chungking negotiation:
CCP's insistence on keeping north Kiangsu in, 158
Chungt'iaoshan, Battle of, 267
Clark-Kerr:
British ambassador to China, 164
Clear and hold tactics:
intensity of, 270
Comintern. See Soviet Union
Communist base:
organization of, 136 –141
Communist forces:
force level in 1937, 145 ;
in 1940, 206 ;
in 1943 281 , 306 ;
in 1945, 308
Communist power:
conditions of, 8 –9, 14 –15, 86 –87, 304 , 308 –309
Constitutionalism:
CCP demand for, 56 , 241 ;
Kuomintang's support for, 168 ;
Kuomintang's postponement of, 241
Craigie, Sir Robert:
British ambassador to Japan, 165
Creel, H. G., 309
Crowley, James B., 49 , 52
Cultural Revolution:
on Battle of One Hundred Regiments, 216
D
Dare-to-die column, 177 –178
Date Junnosuke, 204
December Incident:
in Shen-Kan-Ning, 174 –176;
in Shansi, 177 –178
December 9th Movement:
Internationalists' approval of, 38 ;
Mao's approval of, 38 ;
Liu Shao-ch'i on, 86
Democratic centralism:
in Three-thirds system, 240
Democratic Republic:
proclaimed by Chinese Communist Party, 44 –46
Desertion:
cause of, 281 –283
Detachment:
size of, 136 –137
Doihara-Ch'in Te-ch'un Agreement, 36 , 52 . See also Umezu-Ho Ying-ch'in Agreement
E
Eighteenth Group Army:
formal designation of Communist army in north China by Kuomintang government, 55 .
See Eighth Route Army
Eighth Route Army:
autonomy of Red Army being major issue in united front negotiations, 28 , 53 , 55 , 59 –60;
initial Kuomintang order of battle, 55 ;
authorized combat zone, 55 , 209 –210, 212 ;
aversion of officer corps toward guerrilla warfare, 71 ;
combat tactics of, 64 –65, 220 , 213 –274;
regularization dependent on external source of supply, 71 , 160 , 305 ;
Kuomintang provisions for, 122 , 166 ;
Chin-Ch'a-Chi Military District ahead in mass mobilization, anti-traitor work, aggressive military operation, 134 , 274 ;
army-party relationship, 139 , 279 ;
authorized force level, 145 , 212 ;
combat report of Battle of One Hundred Regiments, 219 ;
headquarters attacked, 274 ;
localization of, 276 –279;
desertion from, 281 –283;
expanded again at end of war, 306
Eighth Route Army: 115th Division:
in Battle of P'inghsingkuan, 61 –65;
failed to take southwestern Shansi, 92 ;
redeployed to Shantung, 99 ;
did not take part in offensive initially, 217 ;
committed atrocities, 233
Eighth Route Army: 120th Division:
transferred to central Hopei to reorganize warlord army, 82 , 93 –94;
returned to northern Shansi, 173 ;
transferred unit to Shen-Kan-Ning, 173
Eighth Route Army: 129th Division:
expanded into south Hopei, 94 –95;
close cooperation with Sacrifice League, 90 ;
in 1940 offensive, 218 –219
F
Fan Chu-hsien, 98 –99
Far Eastern Munich, 164 –166
Feng Chih-an:
division commander under Sung Che-yüan, 34
Feng Shou-p'eng, 203
Fifth Encirclement and Suppression Campaign:
Kuomintang's strategy in, 15 ;
Wang Ming's appraisal of, 16 –17;
Jerome Ch'en on, 144
First Changsha Campaign:
fierceness of, 171 ;
CCP's concern over, 172
France:
inclined to appease Japan, 164 , 166 ;
surrendered to Germany, 208 ;
closed Indochina route to Chungking, 208 ,
occupation of French Indochina, 208
Friction between Kuomintang and Communist forces, 95 , 154 , 157 , 167 , 168 , 192 , 197 –198, 222 , 233 . See also December Incident, New 4th Army Incident
Fukien Rebellion:
Mao blamed for handling of, 17 ;
Mao's reluctance to speak of, 47
G
Germany:
trained Kuomintang army, 17 , 53 ;
proposed anti-Soviet defense alliance to Tokyo, October, 1935, 29 ;
Germany
anti-Comintern pact with Japan, November, 1936, 29 ;
mediation in war, 68 , 71 , 208 , 223 ;
pact with Soviet Union, 165 ;
overture for alliance with Japan, 165 ;
Axis alliance completed, 222 ;
invaded Soviet Union, 264
Grain ticket, 128
Guerrillas:
total number in north China in Communist estimate, 114 ;
in Japanese estimate, 203 ;
irregular security forces formally enlisted by Japanese, 205 –206;
total Communist irregular forces, 206 , 308 ;
convergence of Chinese tradition with Communist infrastructure, 297 –302.
See also Chinese Communist Party, Rural self-defense
H
Han Chün, 177
Han Fu-ch'ü, Shantung governor:
fled from Japanese, 98 ;
executed by Kuomintang, 288
Han Te-ch'in, Kiangsu governor:
attacked New 4th Army, 197 ;
forces of, routed, 222 ;
fled province, 287 ;
forces of, on Kiangsu-Anhwei border, 291
Hard wall and clean field, 279
Hata Shunroku:
commander of China Expeditionary Forces, 268
Hinton, William, 116 , 118
Ho Kan-chih:
cited, 37 , 45 , 215 ;
on Soviet intervention in united front, 227
Ho Lung:
in Battle of One Hundred Regiments, 218 ;
on rural self-defense, 299
Ho Ping-ti, 309
Ho Ying-ch'in:
in Umezu-Ho Ying-ch'in Agreement, 36 , 52 ;
in Sian Incident, 43 ;
military report to Kuomintang's 5th Plenum, 155 ;
report of illegal Communist activities to U.S., 173 ;
message to CCP, October, 1940, 222 –223;
second message to CCP, December, 1940, 225 ;
denounced by CCP for New 4th Army Incident, 227
Hofheinz, Roy, Jr., 295
Hou Ju-yung, 178
Hsi-k'uan , 123
Hsi-liang , 123
Hsiang Ying:
advocated mobile warfare, 70 –71;
supported Internationalists and objected to CCP's order to move north, 159 ;
defended united front with Kuomintang, 160 ;
November, 1940 letter to Kuomintang, 224 ;
killed in New 4th Army Incident; some mystery surrounding his death, 226
Hsiao Ching-kuang, 176
Hsiao K'e, 94 , 272
Hsieh-tou , 299
Hsü Fan-t'ing:
organized Shansi New Army, 100 , 177 ;
strange reaction to December Incident, 179
Hsü Hsiang-ch'ien:
moved into south Hopei, 95 ;
on difficulty of penetrating Shantung, 99 ;
attacked Shantung government, 211
Hsü Yung-ch'ang, 68
Hu Tsung-nan:
in December Incident, 178
Hu Yü-chih, 23
Hua-cheng wei-ling , 279
Hua Fu (Otto Braun), 20
Hua hsia-ch'ü , 279
Huai River Valley:
in Mao's plans for last challenge agaisnt Chiang Kai-shek, 157 –158, 308
Huaipei Su-Wan (North Huai Kiangsu-Anhwei) base:
founded, 196 ;
administrative program of, 238
Huang Yung-sheng, 272
Huangch'iao:
first battle of, 211 ;
second battle of, 222
Hui Peiple's Detachment, 272
Hull Note:
impact of, on united front, 264
Huntington, Samuel P., 104 –105, 295
Hut'uo River, 272
I
I'chang Campaign, 199
Imai Takeo, 190
Indochina. See France
Intellectuals:
"reliable ally" of CCP, 31 ;
subverted warlord forces, 34 ;
sabotaged local ceasefire at Lukouchiao, 55 ;
pre-war agitation of, 85 –86;
Liu Shao-ch'i on, 86 ;
as cadres in Communist bases, 86 –91, 139 , 230 –231;
Li Wei-han on, 231 ;
tension with old army cadres, 231 .
See also Sacrifice League
Internationalist:
controlled CCP during Fifth Encirclement Campaign, 16 ;
views of, on CCP's defeat, 16 –17, 18 –20;
view of, on Fukien Rebellion, 17 ;
connection between urban line and softness toward Kuomintang, 26 –27, 72 –73, 262 –263;
accused Mao of Left deviation, 45 , 78 , 261 ;
struggle for power with Mao, 73 , 160 , 161 –163;
tried to retain foothold in Wuhan
and Shanghai-Nanking-Hangchow delta, 74 , 159 ;
undermined by Kuomintang, 79 , 210 ;
in Shansi Province, 90 ;
demanded bolshevization of CCP, 161 ;
final defeat of, 227 –228.
See also Chang Wen-t'ien, Ch'in Pang-hsien, Soviet Union, Wang Ming
Iriye Akira:
on U.S. intervention in China war, 265 –266
Ishikawa Tadao, 40
Ishiwara Kanji, 68
Itagaki Seishiro, 61 , 191
J
Jao Shu-shih:
on political complexity of central China, 290
Japan:
feared China's unification under Kuomintang, 9 ;
Stalin wanted neutrality pact with, in 1931, 29 ;
in anti-Comintern pact with Germany, 29 ;
sought to readjust relation with China in 1936, 41 –42;
retreated from north China in 1937, 44 , 52 ;
origin of second Sino-Japanese war, 48 –49, 52 –53;
Army General Staff opposed China war, 52 , 68 ;
proclaimed "New Order," 71 –72;
set up Temporary and Restoration Governments in China, 149 –150;
Imperial conference decision of November, 1938, 150 ;
invited China to take part in "New Order," 150 ;
negotiated with Wang Ching-wei, 150 –151;
Japan-Wang Ching-wei agreement, 151 ;
new war policy, November, 1938, 151 ;
new war policy, December, 1938, 151 ;
border wars with Soviet Union, 155 , 165 , 171 ;
sought British cooperation against China, 164 –166, 208 ;
hesitated between alliance with Britain and Germany, 165 ;
impact of Soviet-German pact on, 165 –166;
explored sphere of influence agreement with Hitler and Stalin, 165 ;
neutrality pact with Soviet Union, 1941, 165 ;
established China Expeditionary Forces in 1939, 166 ;
campaigns in 1939, 171 ;
came close to defeat in Kuomintang's winter offensive, 171 ;
landing in Kwangsi coast, 171 , 199 ;
peace exploration through Kiri Operation, 189 –191;
Ich'ang Campaign, 199 ;
sought to withdraw troops from China, 199 , 266 ;
began to pursue Communist troops primarily in late 1939 in north China, 200 ;
extended blockade line into Shansi, 206 –207;
"southward advance" advocated, 208 , 264 ;
plans to take Indochina to encircle China, 208 ;
impact of Battle of One Hundred Regiments on, 219 , 264 ;
joined Axis, 222 ;
last peace exploration before recognizing Wang Ching-wei regime, 223 –224;
accepted Kuomintang's peace terms, 224 ;
troop level in China in 1941, 266 ;
motive for attacking Kuomintang forces in Shansi in 1941, 266 –267;
began most intense phase of pacification in north China, 268 ;
penetration of Communist bases, 268 –276;
passim; setback in Pacific, 284 ;
began to reduce pacification zone in north China, 284 ;
force level in pacification campaigns, 284 –286;
parallel between China war and Vietnam war, 286 ;
cooperation with Yen Hsi-shan, 287 –288.
Jen Pi-shih, 60 , 244
Johnson, Chalmers, 4 –5, 311
Jung Wu-sheng 91 , 177
Justice Force, 87
K
Kagesa Sada'aki, 150
Kao Ching-t'ing, 159 , 195
Kao Kang:
review of Shen-Kan-Ning Border Region's history, 298 ;
on connection between Communist movement and bandit movement, 298
Kao Shu-hsün, 192
Kataoka, 240
Kao Tsung-wu:
visited Japan as Kuomintang's emissary, 150 ;
defected back to Chungking, 179
Kenkoku dainigun, 203 –204
Kiri Operation, 189 –191, 223
Kolaohui, 107 –108
Konoe, Fumimaro, prime minister:
first peace exploration, 68 ;
refused to deal with Kuomintang, 71 ;
proclaimed "New Order," 150 ;
explored "pan-region" arrangement with Germany and Soviet Union, 165 ;
in Kiri Operation (in second cabinet), 191 ;
last peace exploration, 223 –224;
recognized Wang Ching-wei government, 224
Ku Chu-t'ung:
in decision to accept German mediation, 68 ;
appointed 3rd War Zone commander, 153 ;
in New 4th Army Incident, 226 , 227
Kuan Hsiang-ying, 218
Kuan Wen-wei, 211
Kuhn, Philip A., 6 , 84 , 300
K'ung Hsiang-hsi:
threatened Britain with prospect of Sino-Japanese alliance, 164
Kuomintang:
traditional, rather than fascist, dictatorship, 7 ;
force level in 4th and 5th encirclement campaigns, 13 , 15 ;
debilitated by warlordism, 15 , 86 –87;
compelled to appease imperialist powers before national unification, 15 , 77 ;
new tactics in 5th encirclement campaign, 15 ;
refused ceasefire with CCP, May, 1936, 37 ;
moved toward alliance with Soviet Union, 41 ;
abandoned appeasement of Japan, 41 –42;
abandoned armed struggle with Communists at 3rd Plenum of 4th CEC, 44 , 54 ;
hoped to check Japan with Anglo-American intervention, 53 , 265 , 304 ;
shift of anti-Communist strategy, 54 ;
order of battle for 8th Route Army, 55 ;
accepted united front, September, 1937, 55 –56;
assigned CCP in northern Shensi, 55 ;
in southern Kiangsu, 159 ;
in Shen-Kan-Ning, 174 ;
in northern Shantung, 212 ;
Program of Resistance and Reconstruction , 58 ;
provisions for Communist army in early stage, 122 ;
total force level, 145 , 305 ;
strategic options against Japan and CCP, 148 –149;
rebuffed "New Order," 150 ;
5th Plenum, 152 –155;
military reorganization and centralization, 153 , 154 ;
new order of battle, 153 ;
rejected "block within," 153 ;
War Area Party and Political Affairs Commission, 154 ;
anti-Communist measures, 154 ;
expelled Wang Ching-wei, 155 ;
stage of counter-offensive, 155 ;
commenced Shen-Kan-Ning blockade, 164 ;
new stage in anti-Communism, November, 1939, 168 ;
decided to convene national assembly, 168 ;
stopped supply of ammunition to CCP, 169 ;
First Changsha Campaign, 171 ;
nearly defeated Japanese 11th Army in winter offensive, 171 ;
plotted December Incident, 174 ;
T'ienshui Headquarters, 175 ;
penalized Yen Hsi-shan, 177 ;
terms of peace with Japan in Kiri Operation, 190 ;
warning to CCP against unauthorized expansion, 191 ;
regional forces in Hopei liquidated by Communists, 192 ;
Wei Li-huang pushed back Communist forces, 192 ;
7th Plenum, 208 ;
in critical international situation, 208 ;
first counter-proposal to CCP, 208 –210;
ordered New 4th Army out of central China in final decision, 211 –212;
anticipated Communist insurrection in August, 1940, 214 ;
second deadline for Communist compliance, 223 ;
peace terms with Japan, November, 1940; 224 ;
third deadline for Communist compliance, 225 ;
attacked New 4th Army, 226 ;
disbanded New 4th Army, 226 ;
plans to attack New 4th Army in north Kiangsu, 226 –227;
subsequent negotiations with CCP in war, 228 ;
hoped for Russian intervention, 303 ;
hoped for U.S. landing in China, 304 ;
changed mind after U.S. intervention in Shen-Kan-Ning crisis of 1943, 306
L
Lai Ch'uan-chu, 227
Land revolution:
July, 1936 directive of CCP reconfirmed expropriation of landlord class, 38 ;
land confiscation indispensable for peasant mobilization, 40 , 309 ;
landlord class kept out of united front, 40 , 119 ;
standard sequence in Communist land revolution in Kiangsi, 117 –118;
land investigation, 118 , 245 ;
development of land program from 1935 to 1937, 118 –119, 122 ;
unified progressive tax, 122 , 248 ;
land confiscation during war, 122 –123, 128 , 132 ;
national salvation public grain, 123 ;
hsi-liang , 123 ;
hsi-k'uang , 123 ;
rent and interest reduction early in war, 124 ;
rational burden, 124 –127;
village class rational burden, 125 –127;
hsien class rational burden, 125 ;
tax rates in Shansi 128 –129;
tax rate on poor, 129 ;
handling of traitors, 132 –135;
landlord class forced to become traitors, 134 ;
CCP's ban on free market, 236 ;
CCP removed ban on free market, 237 ;
CCP decision on land policy, January, 1942, 246 –247;
tax rate after 1941, 248 –249;
tax exemption of properties after 1941, 248 ;
squeeze on landlord class after 1941, 249 –250;
rent reduction after 1941, 249 ;
tactics adopted in rent and interest reduction, 251 ;
CCP policy on interest rate after 1941, 251 –252;
tax exemption of industries, 252 –253;
transformation of landlord class, 252 –253;
social mobility of peasants, 253 –258;
continuity of CCP land program from Kiangsi to Yenan periods, 310
Large Hopei-Shantung-Honan District:
definition of, 95 , 98
Lei Feng, Corporal, 301
Li P'in-hsien, 197 –291
Li Shou-wei, 222
Li Te (Albert List), Comintern agent, 276
Li Tsung-jen:
revolt against Chiang Kaishek, 1936, 38 ;
appointed 5th War Zone commander, 153
Li Wei-han:
critical of rural orientation, 231
Liang Hua-chih, 90
Liang Tun-hou, 90
Lich'eng Conference:
CCP Northern Bureau curbed radical excess, 193 –194, 234
Lin Hsi-min, 106
Lin Piao:
report on Battle of P'ingh-singkuan, 64 –65;
supported Mao on base construction, 66 –67;
failed to take southwest Shansi, 92
Lin Po-ch'ü, 243 , 256
Lindsay, Michael, 248
Liu Chih-tan, 36 , 108
Liu Kuei-t'ang, 203 –205
Liu Po-ch'eng, 193 –194, 218
Liu Shao-ch'i:
on intellectuals, 86 ;
on Yen Hsi-shan, 87 ;
report on guerrilla war in north China, 104 ff.;
as chief of Central Plains Bureau, 160 , 195 ;
on cultivation of a Communist, 163 ;
political commissar of New 4th Army, 227 ;
on conditions in central China, 289 ;
feared premature Russo-Japanese war, 303
Lo Jui-ch'ing, 232
Long March: See Chinese Communist Party, Maoist history, Mao Tse-tung
Lü Cheng-ts'ao:
recruited by CCP before Sian Incident, 93 –94;
in action in central Hopei, 272
Lu Chung-lin:
appointed Hopei governor, 95 , 157 ;
appointed Hopei-Chahar War Zone commander, 153 ;
suffered setbacks in friction, 168 ;
fled Hopei, 192
Luntung Incident: See December Incident
M
Mao Tse-tung:
resistance as "peasant war," 3 ;
China as "semi-colonial," "semi-feudal" country, 5 ;
on preconditions of "Red political power," 8 ;
originated myth of Long March, 13 ;
advice of, ignored by CCP leadership, 16 ;
began to criticize his opponents, 16 ;
blamed defeat on personal tactical error of opponents, 17 , 19 ;
monopolized radio communication on Long March, 18 ;
on validity of rural strategy at Tsunyi, 18 –19, 20 ;
Tsunyi Conference as military coup, 20 ;
blamed Chang Kuo-t'ao at Meoerhkai, 21 ;
insisted on Shensi as destination of Long March, 21 ;
conceded Wang Ming's authorship of August First Declaration, 22 ;
ended Long March with 4,000 troops, 26 ;
objected to ceasefire proposal, 27 ;
objected to united front from above, 28 –30;
sought to combine revolution and war, 32 –34;
attitude of, toward landlord class, 38 –40;
revealed ways to force China into war, 3 ;
on contradiction, 47 ;
Eight Point Program of, 58 ;
ordered Communist forces to disengage from enemy and concentrate on base construction, 66 ;
strategic analysis of, 66 –71;
controlled preparation for 7th CCP congress, 73 ;
strategic analysis of, 75 –79;
opposed defense of Wuhan, 78 ;
military policy of, prevailed at 6th Plenum, 79 –80;
postponed 7th CCP congress, 80 ;
had his way on substantive decisions of 6th Plenum, 80 ;
ordered expansion into Hopei, Shantung, north Kiangsu, 82 ;
upheld Chin-Ch'a-Chi Border Region as model to be emulated, 92 , 157 ;
on difficulty of subduing armed peasants, 101 –102, 104 ;
on typical land revolution sequence in Kiangsi, 117 –118;
on tax rates, 129 ;
predicted troop level necessary to defeat Kuomintang, 143 –144;
on Far Eastern Munich, 164 ;
on second stage of world war, 166 –167;
announced stage of stalemate, September, 1939, 167 ;
laid down tactics for piecemeal expansion, 180 –182;
conception of revolutionary united front, 182 ;
view of, on Kuomintang government, 182 ;
on New Democracy as post-bourgeois-democratic stage, 187 ;
close resemblance of, to Heinz Neumann, Besso Lominadze, Ch'ü Ch'iu-pai, 187 –188;
on China as Asiatic society, 188 ;
birthday greeting to Stalin, 188 –189;
objected to Battle of One Hundred Regiments, 216 –217;
power of, consolidated after New 4th Army Incident, 227 –228;
against ostracism of intellectuals, 231 ;
opposition to parliamentarism, 240 ;
attitude toward enlightened gentry, 241 ;
republished Rural Survey,
Mao Tse-tung
244 –245;
criticized capitalism in bases, 259 ;
on dispensing with October Revolution in China, 261 ;
criticized P'eng Te-huai's liberalism, 262 ;
picked troops and simplified administration program of, 277 ;
on loss of troops and population in war, 281 ;
views of, shifted between primacy of army and peasantry, 296 ;
on Chinese revolution as armed struggle, 308
Maoist history:
"Maoist strategy," 3 –4;
on validity of rural strategy, 4 ;
on Long March, 12 –13;
on defeat in Kiangsi as purely tactical subjective error of incumbent leaders, 18 –20;
common denominator of Mao's critics, 262 –263;
birth of Maoist myth on peasant revolution, 307 –308
Maoerhkai Conference, 20 –22
Matsuoka Yosuke[*] :
discussed "pan-region" arrangement with Hitler and Stalin, 165 ;
in search of peace with China, 223 –224
Military district, 137 , 139
Militia:
established, 279
Mobilization Committee:
hostile to Yen Hsi-shan in Communist areas, 90 ;
organization of, 116
Moore, Barrington, Jr., 7
Mou Ch'eng-liu, 203
Moukung: See Maoerhkai Conference
Myers, Ramon, 234
N
National Assembly:
Kuomintang's agreement to convene, 168 ;
postponed, 241
National Political Council:
demanded defense of Wuhan, 75 ;
pressed for national assembly and constitutionalism, 168
National salvation by detour, 287 . See also White skin, red heart
New Democracy:
economic components of, 247 ;
political intentions behind, 260 –263.
See also Chinese Communist Party, Land Revolution, Three-thirds system
New 4th Army: See Chinese Communist Party, Hsiang Ying
New 4th Army Incident, 226
Newly organized village, 126 , 141
Nieh Jung-chen:
upheld by Mao as model in base construction, 92 , 157 ;
in Battle of One Hundred Regiments, 217 ;
number of troops under, 272
Nishio Chuzo[*] :
first commander of China Expeditionary Forces, 166
Nomonhan Incident, 165 , 171
North China Area Army:
established, 61 ;
jurisdiction in north Kiangsu, 197
North Kiangsu:
Communist penetration of, came late in war, 274 , 286 , 294
North Yangtze Command, 195
Northeastern Anti-Japanese Army:
proposed Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Tsetung unite against Japan, October, 1935, 27
Northwest Route, 173
O
Okamura Yasuji:
appointed commander of North China Area Army, 268 ;
sanko[*] seisaku of, parodied by Communists, 273
One-half system:
precursor of Three-thirds system, 240
O-Yü-Wan (Hupeh-Honan-Anhwei) Soviet:
loss of, 13
P
Pacification:
zone of, 152 ;
degree of, in Japanese statistics, 268 –269
Pai Chien-wu, 204
Pai Ch'ung-hsi:
revolted against Chiang Kai-shek, 34 ;
in Kuomintang decision for peace discussion, 68 ;
messages to Communists, 222 –223, 225
P'an Han-nien:
dispatched to Moscow from Maoerhkai, 23 ;
in ceasefire negotiation with Kuomintang, 37
P'ang P'ing-hsün:
attacked Communists in December Incident, 178 ;
succeeded Lu Chung-lin as Hopei governor, 209 ;
defected to Japanese, 288
Panyushkin, A. S., 170
Peasants:
tradition of militarization, 6 , 84 , 300 ;
conditions for supporting Communists, 14 –15, 265 , 286 ;
land expropriation and redistribution indispensable for mobilization of, 40 , 309 ;
"semi-feudal" traits of, and their linkage to Communist infrastructure, 101 –116, 136 –142, 298 –299;
Lo Jui-ch'ing's view of, 232 ;
revolutionary potential of, 295 –297;
Cheng Weisan's view of, 297 –298, 300 ;
Max Weber on, 299
Pearl Harbor:
impact of, on united front, 265
Peiyüeh District, 271 –272
P'eng Chen, 238
P'eng Hsüeh-fen:
organized guerrillas in northern Honan, 95 ;
disagreed with
Liu Shao-ch'i's order to move behind Japanese line, 196 ;
attacked by Kuomintang, 290
P'eng Te-huai:
appointed vise-commander of 18th Group Army by Kuomintang, 55 ;
opposed Mao at Loch'uan Conference, 61 ;
belittled Lin Piao's achievement, 63 ;
protested Lin Piao for taking away Yen Hsi-shan's credit, 65 ;
accused by Mao of warlordism, 66 ;
demanded mobile war against Japanese, 67 , 70 –71;
patronized Sacrifice League, 90 ;
transferred Lin Piao out of Shansi for fear of Yen Hsi-shan, 92 ;
sought to save Chungking's face after December Incident, 178 –179;
protest message to Ch'en Ch'eng, 191 ;
at Lich'eng Conference, 193 –194, 233 –234;
motive for launching Battle of One Hundred Regiments, 214 –216;
1959 self-criticism on offensive, 216 ;
message to Kuomintang, November, 1940, 224 ;
presumptive author of prototype of Three-thirds system, 240 ;
lenient on tax policy toward rich, 247 –248;
on rent and interest reduction, 250 –251;
demanded permanent democracy, 262 ;
wounded by Japanese, 274 ;
1942 self-criticism on offensive, 276 ;
criticized during 7th Plenum of 6th Central Committee, 283
P'inchiang Incident, 233
P'inghsingkuan, Battle of, 61 –64
Po I-po:
organized Sacrifice League, 87 ;
organized Dare-to-Die Columns, 177
Puppetization:
Kuomintang troops in Shantung, 288 –289
Q
Quebec Conference, 304
R
Refugee students from Peiping and Tientsin, 86 , 94 . See also Intellectuals, Sacrifice League
Regional force:
on CCP side, 139 –140, 278 –279;
on Japanese side, 205 –206
Rural self-defense:
tradition of militarization, 6 , 84 ;
in northern Honan, 98 ;
in Shantung, 99 ;
Mao on difficulty of subduing armed landlords, 101 –102, 104 ;
in northern Shensi, 104 ;
bandits in north China, 106 ;
Kolaohui, 107 –108;
secret societies in Hopei, 107 ;
Lienchuanghui, 108 –109;
organization of, 109 , 112 ;
total number of armed peasants estimated, 114 , 203 ;
liquidation of bandits, 133 ;
landlord insurrection against Communists, 197 ;
defection of irregular Chinese forces, 201 –203;
puppet forces, 205 –206;
revolutionary Peking opera Tiger Mountain relates the tale of, 289 ;
"native diehards," 291 –293;
in Huaipei District, 291 –295;
bandits in Huaipei, 292 ;
"native Communists," 294 ;
Ho Lung's views on, 299 –300;
connection of, with Communist movement, 300 –301
S
Sacrifice League:
original organization of, 86 –91;
as regional force of Communist army, 177 –178.
See also Hsü Fant'ing, Yen Hsi-shan
Sanko[*] seisaku, 273
Schwartz, Benjamin:
on Maoist strategy, 3 –4
Security Strengthening Campaigns, 268
Seigo[*] (Clearing the village) Program, 268
Selden, Mark, 122 , 174 , 240
Self-defense corps, 140 , 278 –279
Service, John S., 182 , 306
Shangkuan Yünhsiang, 227
Shangtang, 125
Shansi New Army, 177 –178
Shantung Column, 99 , 275 –276
Shantung District:
conditions of, early in war, 95 –100;
not assigned to CCP except northern part, 212 ;
administrative program of, 238 ;
conditions of, in 1941–42, 275 –276, 288 –289;
suffered from collaboration of Kuomintang troops, 288 –289; 203 –205
Shantung tzu-chih lien-chün, 204
Shen Hung-lieh:
appointed Shantung governor, 98 ;
attacked Fan Chu-hsien, 98 –99;
attacked by Communist forces, 211
Shen-Kan-Ning order Region:
administrative program of (1939), 122 , (1941) 238 ;
Kuomintang blockade tightened, 164 , 223 , 304 ;
Kuomintang-CCP dispute over, 174 –176;
Kuomintang-CCP proposals on, in boundary dispute, 207 –212
Sheng Shih-ts'ai, 170 , 175
Shih Yu-san:
in friction with Communist forces, 192 ;
requested defection, 203 ;
appointed Chahar governor, 209 ;
executed, 288
Shippe, Heinz, 2
Sian Incident:
CCP's part in, 33 –34, 40 –41;
Mao's stand on, 43 ;
Moscow's reaction to, 43 ;
settlement of, 44
Sino-Soviet nonaggression pact, 41 , 55
Small Hopei-Shantung-Honan District, 95 , 98
Snow, Edgar, 2 , 43
Soong, T. V., 221
South Hopei District:
established, 95
South Yangtze Command, 195
Southeastern Bureau:
creation of, 73 ;
reduced in significance by Central Plains Bureau, 160 –161
Southwestern War:
anti-Chiang anti-Japanese character of, 34 , 38 ;
Moscow and Wang Ming dismayed by, 38
Soviet-German pact, 165 –166
Soviet People's Republic, 31
Soviet Union and Comintern:
Comintern radio contact with CCP on Long March, 18 ;
Comintern instruction on Kiangsi evacuation, 21 ;
Comintern directed CCP and Manchurian Communists to propose ceasefire, 27 ;
Soviet interest in maintaining Sino-Japanese tension, 29 ;
Soviet proposed neutrality pact to Japan, 29 ;
Soviet attempt to improve relations with China, 29 ;
Soviet disapproval of warlord revolt against Chiang Kai-shek, 38 ;
Soviet overture for anti-Japanese alliance, 41 ;
Soviet ordered to save Chiang Kai-shek's life at Sian, 43 ;
Soviet assistance to China in war, 55 , 75 , 169 –170, 225 ;
Comintern satisfied by CCP 6th Plenum, 80 ;
Soviet-Japanese border wars, 155 , 165 , 171 ;
Soviet-Japanese nonaggression pact forecast by CCP, 165 ;
Soviet expansion in northwest China, 169 –170;
Soviet intervention in united front during crisis, 169 –170, 225 , 227 ;
Comintern Tschita Conference ordered building Northwest Route, 173 ;
Comintern Tschita Conference ordered Communist offensive against Japan, 199 ;
Soviet impact on second united front assessed, 303 –304
Special administrative commissioner's office, 139
Special district, 139
Stilwell, Joseph, 300
Su T'i-jen, 205
Suiyuan Incident, 41 –42, 86
Sun Fo:
regarded as CCP's ally, 222
Sun T'ien-ying, 203
Sung Che-yüan, 33 –34, 175
Sung Jen-ch'iung, 95
Sung Liang-ch'eng, 192
Sung Shao-wen, 90 , 140
Sung Shih-lun, 94
Sung Tzu-liang, 190 –191
Suzuki Takuji, 189
T
Tada Shun, 150
Taihaku kosaku[*] (Yen Hsi-shan operation), 287 –288
T'aihang District:
as second class military district, 139
T'aiyüeh District, 207
T'ang En-po, 227
T'ang heng-chih, 68
T'ang Yang-tu, 205
T'angku Agreement, 49
T'ao Hsi-sheng, 179
Teng Hsiao-p'ing, 95
Teng Tzu-hui:
on rationale for taking north Kiangsu, 158 ;
in Battle of One Hundred Regiments, 218 ;
appointed director, political department, New 4th Army, 227 ;
in struggle against native opposition in Huaipei, 291
Terauchi Hisaichi, 61
Thornton, Richard C., 4 , 5 , 188
Three-thirds system:
announced, 233 ;
Mao's opposition to similar institution, 240 ;
prototype of, devised by Mao's critics, 240 ;
and constitutionalism, 241 ;
intermediate groups in, 241 –242;
dispute in CCP over, 243 –244;
turnover of officials in, 245 –246;
as means of political change, 245 ;
P'eng Te-huai's views on, 262
Tiger Mountain, revolutionary Peking opera:
as episode on armed landlord, 289
Ting Shu-pen, 192
Traitor:
program for handling, at 6th Plenum, 81 ;
liquidation of, 133 –134;
reason why landlords became traitors, 134
Trautmann, O. P., 68 , 71
Trotskyite, struggle against, 233
Tsap'ai, 203 , 224
Tseng Yang-fu, 27
Tso Ch'üan:
concern for security of Sinkiang Route, 215 ;
killed in action, 274
Tsunyi Conference, 17 –20
Tuan Hai-chou, 291
T'uan , extended multiplex, 300
Tuchman, Barbara, 2
Tung Tao-ning, 150
Tungya t'ung-meng tzu-chih-chün, 204
U
Umezu-Ho Ying-ch'in Agreement, 36 , 52
United front: See Chinese Communist Party, Kuomintang, Mao Tse-tung
United front from below and above, 32
United States:
post-Vietnam view of Chinese revolution in, 2 ;
critical role in Chinese revolution by, 10 , 264 , 304 ;
merely reiterated Open Door until 1940, 164 ;
began to commit itself to Chinese side in September, 1940, 221 ;
impact of Export-Import Bank loan on united front, 221 ;
began to enforce Open Door after Axis pact signed, 223 ;
intervention in China not inevitable, 264 –265;
demanded status quo of 1931, 264 ;
Army Observer Section in Yenan, 305 ;
decided on landing in China, 306
Usui Shigeki, 190
V
Van Slyke, Lyman P., 5
Von Seeckt, 17
W
Wakeman, Frederick, 6
Wang Ching-wei:
concerned with survival or Republic in War, 69 ;
negotiation with Japan, 150 –151;
expelled from Kuomintang, 155 ;
futile efforts to mediate between Japan and Kuomintang, 155 –156;
Internationalists chose to be upset by, 156 –157;
subordinates of, defected back to Chung-king, 179 –180;
questions of, figured in Sino-Japanese peace talks, 189 –191, 223 –224;
established Kuomin government in Nanking, 191 ;
formal recognition of, by Japan, 224 ;
impact on united front of formal recognition of, 225
Wang Chung-lien, 291
Wang Kuang-hsia, 291
Wang Ming (alias for Ch'en Shao-yü):
view of, on 5th Campaign as of 1934, 16 –17;
as possible author of August First Declaration, 22 ;
report to 7th Comintern Congress, 23 –24;
criticized rural revolution, 25 –26;
stated August 1st Declaration proposed ceasefire to Chiang Kai-shek, 27 ;
proposed lenient policy toward rich peasants, 29 ;
united front policy of, 34 –35;
disapproved of revolt against Chiang Kai-shek, 38 ;
returned to China, 56 ;
demanded defense of Wuhan, 72 –73;
two stage theory of war, 73 ;
defended Kuomintang as Chinese government, 74 ;
on national defense divisions, 74 –75;
slogan of, for united front, 80 ;
disturbed by Wang Ching-wei defection, 156 –157;
sought bolshevization of CCP, 161 ; 244 –245;
disturbed by December Incident, 180 ;
possible role of, in Battle of One Hundred Regiments, 199 ;
possible role in Kuomintang-CCP negotiations of 1940, 220 –221;
self-criticism of, 228 ;
skeptical of peasants' revolutionary potential, 296
Warlordism:
as precondition of Communist power, 8 –9, 14 –15, 86 –87, 308 –309;
charge of, in CCP, 141
Weber, Max, 299
Wei Li-huang:
appointed 1st War Zone commander, 153 ;
forced Eighth Route Army to withdrew from northern Honan and southern Shansi, 192 –193;
actually supervised Yen Hsi-shen, 192 ;
expelled from Shansi, 266
White skin, red heart, 280 –284, 293 . See also National salvation by detour
Wilson, Dick, 13
Winter offensive of 1940, 171
Wu chih-p'u, 95
Wuhan, fall of, 79
Wu Hua-wen, 288
Wujench'iao, 235
Wu-kung-tui, 284
Wu Man-yu, 258 –260
Wu P'ei-fu, 98
Wu Tsan-chou, 205
Y
Yang Ch'eng-wu:
as sub-district commander, 272 ;
on peasants' morale under pacification, 280 ;
combat report of, 219
Yang Hsiu-feng, 94 –95
Yang Hu-ch'eng, 33
Yang Shang-k'un:
supported Internationalists, 163 ;
review of party organization by, 230 –231;
deplored ban on free market in bases, 237
Yangtze Bureau, 73
Yeh T'ing, 224 , 226
Yen , 126
Yen Hsi-shan:
relationship with Sacrifice League, 86 –91;
authorized Communist base, 90 –91;
authored rational burden, 125 ;
penalized by Kuomintang for early support of united front, 177 ;
struggle with Shansi New Army,
Yen Hsi-shan
177 ;
liaison with Japanese, 203 ;
defection to Japanese, 287 –288
Yin Ju-keng:
abandoned by Japanese, 52
Yu Hsüeh-chung:
in Shantung, 99 ;
appointed Shantung-Kiangsu War Zone commander, 153 ;
penalized by Kuomintang, 154 ;
troop size under, 197 ;
liaison with Japanese, 203 ;
fled from Shantung-Kiangsu zone, 287
Yu-k'ang, 283
Yü-Wan-Su Border Region:
liquidation of, 95 , 196
Yüan Kuo-p'ing, 226
Preferred Citation: Kataoka, Tetsuya. Resistance and Revolution in China: The Communists and the Second United Front. Berkeley: University of California Press, [1974] 1974. http://ark.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/ft6v19p16j/