Typeset by RedLibrary.info. Source retrieved from Foreign Languages Press, Beijing, Third Edition, 1967.
The original Wade-Giles romanization has been converted to Pinyin.
Long Live the Victory of People’s War! by Vice-Chairman Lin Biao, close comrade-in-arms of Chairman Mao Zedong, was first published in Renmin Ribao (People’s Daily) on September 3, 1965. Renmin Ribao republished this brilliant work on August 1, 1967, on the occasion of the fortieth anniversary of the founding of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army. The present English edition follows the Chinese text as republished in Renmin Ribao.
Full twenty years have elapsed since our victory in the great War of Resistance Against Japan.
After a long period of heroic struggle, the Chinese people, under the leadership of the Communist Party of China and Comrade Mao Zedong, won final victory two decades ago in their war against the Japanese imperialists who had attempted to subjugate China and swallow up the whole of Asia.
The Chinese people’s War of Resistance was an important part of the world war against German, Japanese and Italian fascism. The Chinese people received support from the people and the anti-fascist forces all over the world. And in their turn, the Chinese people made an important contribution to victory in the Anti-Fascist War as a whole.
Of the innumerable anti-imperialist wars waged by the Chinese people in the past hundred years, the War of Resistance Against Japan was the first to end in complete victory. It occupies an extremely important place in the annals of war, in the annals of both the revolutionary wars of the Chinese people and the wars of the oppressed nations of the world against imperialist aggression.
It was a war in which a weak semi-colonial and semi-feudal country triumphed over a strong imperialist country. For a long period after the invasion of China’s northeastern provinces by the Japanese imperialists, the Kuomintang followed a policy of non-resistance. In the early stage of the War of Resistance, the Japanese imperialists exploited their military superiority to drive deep into China and occupy half her territory. In the face of the massive attacks of the aggressors and the anti-Japanese upsurge of the people throughout the country, the Kuomintang was compelled to take part in the War of Resistance, but soon afterwards it adopted the policy of passive resistance to Japan and active opposition to the Communist Party. The heavy responsibility of combating Japanese imperialism thus fell on shoulders of the Eighth Route Army, the New Fourth Army and the people of the Liberated Areas, all led by the Communist Party. At the outbreak of the war, the Eighth Route and the New Fourth Armies had only a few tens of thousands of men and suffered from extreme inferiority in both arms and equipment, and for a long time they were under the crossfire of the Japanese imperialists on the one hand and the Kuomintang troops on the other. But they grew stronger and stronger in the course of the war and became the main force in defeating Japanese imperialism.
How was it possible for a weak country finally to defeat a strong country? How was it possible for a seemingly weak army to become the main force in the war?
The basic reasons were that the War of Resistance Against Japan was a genuine people’s war led by the Communist Party of China and Comrade Mao Zedong, a war in which the correct Marxist-Leninist political military lines were put into effect, and that the Eighth Route and the New Fourth Armies were genuine people’s armies which applied the whole range of strategy and tactics of people’s war as formulated by Comrade Mao Zedong.
Comrade Mao Zedong’s theory of and policies for people’s war have creatively enriched and developed Marxism-Leninism. The Chinese people’s victory in the anti-Japanese war was a victory for people’s war, for Marxism-Leninism and the thought of Mao Zedong.
Prior to the war against Japan, the Communist Party of China had gone through the first Revolutionary Civil War of 1924-27 and the Second Revolutionary Civil War of 1927-36 and summed up the experience and lessons of the successes and failures in those wars, and the leading role of Mao Zedong’s thought had become established within the Party. This was the fundamental guarantee of the Party’s ability to lead the Chinese people to victory in the War of Resistance.
The Chinese people’s victory in the War of Resistance paved the way for their seizure of state power throughout the country. When the Kuomintang reactionaries, backed by the U.S. imperialists, launched a nationwide civil war in 1946, the Communist Party of China and Comrade Mao Zedong further developed the theory of people’s war, led the Chinese people in waging a people’s war on a still larger scale, and in the space of a little over three years the great victory of the People’s Liberation War was won, the rule of imperialism, feudalism and bureaucrat-capitalism in our country ended and the People’s Republic of China founded.
The victory of the Chinese people’s revolutionary war breached the imperialist front in the East, wrought a great change in the world balance of forces, and accelerated the revolutionary movement among the people of all countries. From then on, the national liberation movement in Asia, Africa, and Latin America entered a new historical period.
Today, the U.S. imperialists are repeating on a worldwide scale the past actions of the Japanese imperialists in China and other parts of Asia. It has become an urgent necessity for the people in many countries to master and use people’s war as a weapon against U.S. imperialism and its lackeys. In every conceivable way U.S. imperialism and its lackeys are trying to extinguish the revolutionary flames of people’s war. The Khrushchev revisionists, fearing people’s war like the plague, are heaping abuse on it. The two are colluding to prevent and sabotage people’s war. In these circumstances, it is of vital practical importance to review the historical experience of the great victory of the people’s war in China and to recapitulate Comrade Mao Zedong’s theory of people’s war.
The Communist Party of China and Comrade Mao Zedong were able to lead the Chinese people to victory in the War of Resistance Against Japan primarily because they formulated and applied a Marxist-Leninist line.
Basing himself on the fundamental tenets of Marxism-Leninism and applying the method of class analysis, Comrade Mao Zedong analyzed, first, the mutual transformation of China’s principal and non-principal traditions following the invasion of China by Japanese imperialism, second, the consequent charges in class relations within China and in international relations, and, third, the balance of forces as between China and Japan. This analysis provided the scientific basis upon which the political and military lines of the War of Resistance were formulated.
There had long been two basic contradictions in China - the contradiction between imperialism and the Chinese nation, and the contradiction between feudalism and the masses of the people. For ten years before the outbreak of the War of Resistance, the Kuomintang reactionary clique, which represented the interests of imperialism, the big landlords and the big bourgeoisie, had waged civil war against the Communist Party of China and the Communist-led Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army, which represented the interests of the Chinese people. In 1931, Japanese imperialism invaded and occupied northeastern China. Subsequently, especially after 1935, it stepped up and expanded its aggression against China, penetrating deeper and deeper into our territory. As a result of its invasion Japanese imperialism sharpened its contradiction with the Chinese nation to an extreme degree and brought about changes in class relations within China. To end the civil war and to unite against Japanese aggression became the pressing nationwide demand of the people. Changes of varying degrees also occurred in the political attitude of the national bourgeoisie and the various factions within the Kuomintang. And the Sian Incident of 19361 was the best case in point.
How was one to assess the changes in China’s political situation, and what conclusion was to be drawn? This question had a direct bearing on the very survival of the Chinese nation.
For a period prior to the outbreak of the War of Resistance, the “Left” opportunists represented by Wang Ming within the Chinese Communist Party were blind to the important changes in China’s political situation caused by Japanese aggression since 1931 and denied the sharpening of the Sino-Japanese national contradiction and the demands of various social strata for a war of resistance; instead, they stressed that all the counterrevolutionary factions and intermediate forces in China and all the imperialist countries were a monolithic bloc. They persisted in their line of “closed-doorism” and continued to advocate: “Down with the whole lot.”
Comrade Mao Zedong resolutely fought the “Left” opportunist errors and penetratingly analyzed the new situation in the Chinese revolution.
He pointed out that the Japanese imperialist attempt to reduce China to a Japanese colony heightened the contradiction between China and Japan and made it the principal contradiction; that China’s internal class contradictions - such as those between the masses of the people and feudalism, between the peasantry and the landlord class, between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, and between the peasantry and urban petty bourgeoisie on the one hand and the bourgeoisie on the other - still remained, but that they had all been relegated to a secondary or subordinate position as a result of the war of aggression unleashed by Japan; and that throughout China opposition to Japanese imperialism had become the common demand of the people of all classes and strata, except for a handful of pro-Japanese traitors among the big landlords and the big bourgeoisie.
As the contradiction between China and Japan ascended and became the principal one, the contradiction between China and imperialist countries such as Britain and the United States descended to a secondary or subordinate position. The rift between Japan and the other imperialist countries had widened as a result of Japanese imperialism’s attempt to turn China into its own exclusive colony. This rendered it possible for China to make use of these contradictions to isolate and oppose Japanese imperialism.
In the face of Japanese imperialist aggression, was the Party to continue with the civil war and the Agrarian Revolution? Or was it to hold aloft the banner of national liberation, unite with all the forces that could be united to form a broad national united front and concentrate on fighting the Japanese aggressors? This was the problem sharply confronting our Party.
The Communist Party of China and Comrade Mao Zedong formulated the line of the Anti-Japanese National United Front on the basis of their analysis of the new situation. Holding aloft the banner of national liberation, our Party issued the call for national unity and united resistance to Japanese imperialism, a call which won fervent support from the people of the whole country. Thanks to the common efforts of our Party and of China’s patriotic armies and people, the Kuomintang ruling clique was eventually compelled to stop the civil war and a new situation with Kuomintang-Communist cooperation for joint resistance to Japan was brought about.
In the summer of 1937 Japanese imperialism unleashed its all-out war of aggression against China. The nationwide War of Resistance thus broke out.
Could the War of Resistance be victorious? And how was victorious to be won? These were the questions to which all the Chinese people demanded immediate answers.
The defeatists came forward with the assertion that China was no match for Japan and that the nation was bound to be subjugated. The blind optimists came forward with the assertion that China could win very quickly, without much effort.
Basing himself on a concrete analysis of the Chinese nation and of Japanese imperialism - the two aspects of the principal contradiction - Comrade Mao Zedong pointed out that while the “theory of national subjugation” was wrong, the “theory of quick victory” was untenable, and he concluded that the War of Resistance would be a protracted one in which China would finally be victorious. In his celebrated work On Protracted War, Comrade Mao Zedong pointed out the contrasting features of China and Japan, the two sides in the war. Japan was a powerful imperialist country. But Japanese imperialism was in its era of decline and doom. The war it had unleashed was a war of aggression, a war that was retrogressive and barbarous; it was deficient in manpower and material resources and could not stand a protracted war; it was engaged in an unjust cause and therefore had meager support internationally. China, on the other hand, was a weak semi-colonial and semi-feudal country. But she was in her era of progress. She was fighting a war against aggression, a war that was progressive and just; she had sufficient manpower and material resources to sustain a protracted war; internationally, China enjoyed extensive sympathy and support. These comprised all the basic factors in the Sino-Japanese war.
He went on to show how these factors would influence the course of the war. Japan’s advantage was temporary and would gradually diminish as a result of our efforts. Her disadvantages were fundamental; they could not be overcome and would gradually grow in the course of the war. China’s disadvantage was temporary and could be gradually overcome. China’s advantages were fundamental and would play an increasingly positive role in the course of the war. Japan’s advantage and China’s disadvantage determined the impossibility of quick victory for China. China’s advantages and Japan’s disadvantages determined the inevitability of Japan’s defeat and China’s ultimate victory.
On the basis of this analysis Comrade Mao Zedong formulated the strategy for a protracted war. China’s War of Resistance would be protracted, and prolonged efforts would be needed gradually to weaken the enemy’s forces and expand our own, so that the enemy would change from being strong to going weak and we would change from being weak to being strong and accumulate sufficient strength finally to defeat him. Comrade Mao Zedong pointed out that with the change in the balance of forces between the enemy and ourselves the War of Resistance would pass through three stages, namely, the strategic defensive, the strategic stalemate and the strategic offensive. The protracted war was also a process of mobilizing, organizing and arming the people. It was only by mobilizing the entire people to fight a people’s war that the War of Resistance could be persevered in and the Japanese aggressors defeated.
In order to turn the anti-Japanese war into a genuine people’s war, our party firmly relied on the broadest masses of the people, united with all the anti-Japanese forces that could be united, and consolidated and expanded the Anti-Japanese National United Front. The basic line of our party was: boldly to arouse the masses of the people and expand the people’s forces so that, under the leadership of the Party, they could defeat the aggressors and build a new China.
The War of Resistance Against Japan constituted a historical stage in China’s new-democratic revolution. The line of our party during the War of Resistance aimed not only at winning victory in the war, but also at laying the foundations for the nationwide victory of the new-democratic revolution. Only the new democratic revolution makes it possible to carry out a socialist revolution. With respect to the relations between the democratic and the socialist revolutions, Comrade Mao Zedong said:
“In the writing of an article the second half can be written only after the first half is finished. Resolute leadership of the democratic revolution is the prerequisite for the victory of socialism.”2
The concrete analysis of concrete conditions and the concrete resolution of concrete contradictions is the living soul of Marxism-Leninism. Comrade Mao Zedong has invariably been able to single out the principal contradiction from among a complexity of contradictions, analyze the two aspects of this principal contradiction concretely and, “pressing on irresistibly from this commanding height,” successfully solve the problem of understanding and handling of the various contradictions.
It was precisely on the basis of such scientific analysis that Comrade Mao Zedong correctly formulated the political and military lines for the people’s war during the War of Resistance Against Japan, developed his thought on the establishment of rural base areas and the use of the countryside to encircle the cities and finally capture them, and formulated a whole range of principles and policies, strategies and tactics in the political, military, economic and cultural fields for the carrying out of the people’s war. It was this that ensured victory in the War of Resistance and created the conditions for the nationwide victory of the new-democratic revolution.
In order to win a people’s war, it is imperative to build the broadest possible united front and formulate a series of policies which will ensure the fullest mobilization of the basic masses as well as the unity of all the forces that can be united.
The Anti-Japanese National United Front embraced all the anti-Japanese classes and strata. These classes and strata shared a common interest in fighting Japan, an interest which formed the basis of their unity. But they differed in the degree of their firmness in resisting Japan, and there were class contradictions and conflicts of interest among them. Hence the inevitable class struggle within the united front.
In formulating the Party’s line of the Anti-Japanese National United Front, Comrade Mao Zedong made the following class analysis of Chinese society.
The workers, the peasants, and the urban petty bourgeoisie firmly demanded that the War of Resistance should be carried through to the end; they were the main force in the fight against Japanese aggression and constituted the basic masses who demanded unity and progress.
The bourgeoisie was divided into the national and the comprador bourgeoisie. The national bourgeoisie formed the majority of the bourgeoisie; it was rather flabby, often vacillated and had contradictions with the workers, but it also had a certain degree of readiness to oppose imperialism and was one of our allies in the War of Resistance. The comprador bourgeoisie was the bureaucratic-capitalist class, which was very small in number but occupied the ruling position in China. Its members attached themselves to different imperialist powers, some of them being pro-Japanese and others pro-British and pro-American. The pro-Japanese section of the comprador bourgeoisie were the capitulators, the overt and covert traitors. The pro-British and pro-American section of this class favoured resistance to Japan to a certain extent, but they were not firm in their resistance and very much wished to compromise with Japan, and by their nature they were opposed to the Communist Party and the people.
The landlords fell into different categories; there were the big, the middle and the small landlords. Some of the big landlords became traitors, while others favoured resistance but vacillated a great deal. Many of the middle and small landlords had the desire to resist, but there were contradictions between them and the peasants.
In the face of these complicated class relationships, our Party’s policy regarding work within the united front was one of both alliance and struggle. That is to say, its policy was to unite with all the anti-Japanese classes and strata, try to win over even those who could be only vacillating and temporary allies, and adopt appropriate policies to adjust the relations among these classes and strata so that they all served the general cause of resisting Japan. At the same time, we had to maintain our Party’s principle of independence and initiative, make the bold arousing of the masses and expansion of the people’s forces the centre of gravity in our work, and wage the necessary struggles against all activities harmful to resistance, unity and progress.
Our Party’s Anti-Japanese National United Front policy was different both from Chen Duxiu’s Right opportunist policy of all alliance and no struggle, and from Wang Ming’s “Left” opportunist policy of all struggle and no alliance. Our Party summed up the lessons of the Right and “Left” opportunist errors and formulated the policy of both alliance and struggle.
Our Party made a series of adjustments in its policies in order to unite all the anti-Japanese parties and groups, including the Kuomintang, and all the anti-Japanese strata in a joint fight against the foe. We pledged ourselves to fight for the complete realization of Dr. Sun Yat-sen’s revolutionary Three People’s Principles. The government of the Shensi-Kansu-Ningsia revolutionary base area was renamed the Government of the Shensi-Kansu-Ningsia Special Region of the Republic of China. Our Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army was redesignated the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army of the National Revolutionary Army. Our land policy, the policy of confiscating the land of the landlords, was changed to one of reducing rent and interest. In our own base areas we carried out the “three thirds system”3 in our organs of political power, drawing in those representatives of the petty bourgeoisie, the national bourgeoisie and the enlightened gentry and those members of the Kuomintang who stood for resistance to Japan and did not oppose the Communist Party. In accordance with the principles of the Anti-Japanese National United Front, we also made necessary and appropriate changes in our policies relating to the economy, taxation, labour and wages, anti-espionage, people’s rights, culture and education, etc.
While making these policy adjustments, we maintained the independence of the Communist Party, the people’s army and the base areas. We also insisted that the Kuomintang should institute a general mobilization, reform the government apparatus, introduce democracy, improve the people’s livelihood, arm the people, and carry out a total war of resistance. We waged a resolute struggle against the Kuomintang’s passive resistance to Japan and active opposition to the Communist Party, against its suppression of the people’s resistance movement and its treacherous activities for compromise and capitulation.
Past experience has taught us that “Left” errors were liable to crop up after our Party had corrected Right errors, and that Right errors were liable to crop up after it had corrected “Left” errors. “Left” errors were liable to occur when we broke with the Kuomintang ruling clique, and Right errors were liable to occur when we united with it.
After the overcoming of “Left” opportunism and the formation of the Anti-Japanese National United Front, the main danger in our Party was Right opportunism or capitulationism.
Wang Ming, the exponent of “Left” opportunism during the Second Revolutionary Civil War, went to the other extreme in the early days of the War of Resistance Against Japan and became the exponent of Right opportunism, i.e., capitulationism. He countered Comrade Mao Zedong’s correct line and policies with an out-and-out capitulationist line of his own and a series of ultra-Right policies. He voluntarily abandoned proletarian leadership in the Anti-Japanese National United Front and willingly handed leadership to the Kuomintang. By his advocacy of “everything through the united front” or “everything to be submitted to the united front,” he was in effect advocating that everything should go through or be submitted to Chiang Kai-shek and the Kuomintang. He opposed the bold mobilization of the masses, the carrying out of democratic reforms and the improvement of the livelihood of the workers and peasants, and wanted to undermine the worker-peasant alliance which was the foundation of the united front. He did not want the Communist-led base areas of the people’s revolutionary forces but wanted to cut off the people’s revolutionary forces from their roots. He rejected the people’s army led by the Communist Party and wanted to hand over the people’s armed forces to Chiang Kai-shek, which would have meant handing over everything the people had. He did not want the leadership of the Party and advocated an alliance between the youth of the Kuomintang and that of the Communist Party to suit Chiang Kai-shek’s design of corroding the Communist Party. He decked himself out and presented himself to Chiang Kai-shek, hoping to be given some official appointment. All this was revisionism, pure and simple. If we had acted on Wang Ming’s revisionist line and his set of policies, the Chinese people would have been unable to win the War of Resistance Against Japan, still less subsequent nationwide victory.
For a time during the War of Resistance, Wang Ming’s revisionist line caused harm to the Chinese people’s revolutionary cause. But the leading role of Comrade Mao Zedong had already been established in the Central Committee of our Party. Under his leadership, all the Marxist-Leninists in the Party carried out a resolute struggle against Wang Ming’s errors and rectified them in time. It was this struggle that prevented Wang Ming’s erroneous line from doing greater and more lasting damage to the cause of the Party.
Chiang Kai-shek, our teacher by negative example, helped us to correct Wang Ming’s mistakes. He repeatedly lectured us with cannons and machine-guns. The gravest lesson was the Southern Anhui Incident which took place in January 1941. Because some leaders of the New Fourth Army disobeyed the directives of the Central Committee of the Party and followed Wang Ming’s revisionist line, its units in southern Anhui suffered disastrous losses in the surprise attack launched by Chiang Kai-shek and many heroic revolutionary fighters were slaughtered by the Kuomintang revolutionaries. The lessons learned at the cost of blood helped to sober many of our comrades and increase their ability to distinguish the correct from the erroneous line.
Comrade Mao Zedong constantly summed up the experience gained by the whole Party in implementing the line of the Anti-Japanese National United Front and worked out a whole set of policies in good time. They were mainly as follows:
All people favouring resistance (that is, all the anti-Japanese workers, peasants, soldiers, students and intellectuals, and businessmen) were to unite and form the Anti-Japanese National United Front.
Within the united front, our policy was to be one of independence and initiative, i.e., both unity and independence were necessary.
As far as military strategy was concerned, our policy was to be guerrilla warfare waged independently and with the initiative in our own hands, within the framework of a unified strategy; guerrilla warfare was to be basic, but no chance of waging mobile warfare was to be lost when the conditions were favourable.
In the struggle against the anti-Communist die-hards headed by Chiang Kai-shek, our policy was to make use of contradictions, win over the many, oppose the few and destroy our enemies one by one, and to wage struggles on just grounds, to our advantage, and with restraint.
In the Japanese-occupied with Kuomintang areas our policy was, on the one hand, to develop the united front to the greatest possible extent and, on the other, to have selected cadres working underground. With regard to the forms of organization and struggle, our policy was to assign selected cadres to work under cover for a long period, so as to accumulate strength and bide our time.
As regards the alignment of the various classes within the country, our basic policy was to develop the progressive forces, win over the middle forces and isolate the anti-Communist die-hard forces.
As for the anti-Communist die-hards, we followed a revolutionary dual policy of uniting with them, in so far as they were still capable of bringing themselves to resist Japan, and of struggling against and isolating them, in so far as they were determined to oppose the Communist Party.
With respect to the landlords and the bourgeoisie - even the big landlords and big bourgeoisie - it was necessary to analyse each case and draw distinctions. On the basis of these distinctions we were to formulate different policies so as to achieve our aim of uniting with all the forces that could be united.
The line and the various policies of the Anti-Japanese National United Front formulated by Comrade Mao Zedong stood the test of the War of Resistance and proved to be entirely correct.
History shows that when confronted by ruthless imperialist aggression, a Communist Party must hold aloft the national banner and, using the weapon of the united front, rally around itself the masses and the patriotic and anti-imperialist people who form more than 90 percent of a country’s population, so as to mobilize all positive factors, unite with all the forces that can be united and isolate to the maximum the common enemy of the whole nation. If we abandon the national banner, adopt a line of “closed-doorism” and thus isolate ourselves, it is out of the question to exercise leadership and develop the people’s revolutionary cause, and this in reality amounts to helping the enemy and bringing defeat on ourselves.
History shows that within the united front the Communist Party must maintain its ideological, political and organizational independence, adhere to the principle of independence and initiative, and insist on its leading role. Since there are class differences among the various classes in the united front, the Party must have a correct policy in order to develop the progressive forces, win over the middle forces and oppose the die-hard forces. The Party’s work must centre on developing the progressive forces and expanding the people’s revolutionary forces. This is the only way to maintain and strengthen the united front. “If unity is sought through struggle, it will live; if unity is sought through yielding, it will perish.”4 This is the chief experience gained in our struggle against the die-hard forces.
History shows that during the national-democratic revolution there must be two kinds of alliance within this united front, first, the worker-peasant alliance and, second, the alliance of the working people with the bourgeoisie and other non-working people. The worker-peasant alliance is an alliance of the working class with the peasants and all other working people in town and country. It is the foundation of the united front. Whether the working class can gain leadership of the national-democratic revolution depends on whether it can lead the broad masses of the peasants in struggle and rally them around itself. Only when the working class gains leadership of the peasants, and only on the basis of worker-peasant alliance, is it possible to establish the second alliance, form a broad united front and wage a people’s war victoriously. Otherwise, everything that is done is unreliable, like castles in the air or so much empty talk.
The peasantry constituted more than 80 percent of the entire population of semi-colonial and semi-feudal China. They were subjected to the threefold oppression and exploitation of imperialism, feudalism and bureaucrat-capitalism, and they were eager for resistance against Japan for revolution. It was essential to rely mainly on the peasants if the people’s war was to be won.
But at the outset not all comrades in our Party saw this point. The history of our Party shows that in the period of the First Revolutionary Civil War, one of the major errors of the Right opportunists, represented by Chen Tu-hsiu, was their failure to recognize the importance of the peasant question and their opposition to arousing and arming the peasants. In the period of the Second Revolutionary Civil War, one of the major errors of the “Left” opportunists, represented by Wang Ming, was likewise their failure to recognize the importance of the peasant question. They did not realize that it was essential to undertake long-term and painstaking work among the peasants and establish revolutionary base areas in the countryside; they were under the illusion that they could rapidly seize the big cities and quickly win nationwide victory in the revolution. The errors of both the Right and the “Left” opportunists brought serious setbacks and defeats to the Chinese revolution.
As far back as the period of the First Revolutionary Civil War, Comrade Mao Zedong had pointed out that the peasant question occupied an extremely important position in the Chinese revolution, that the bourgeois-democratic revolution against imperialism and feudalism as in essence a peasant revolution and that the basic task of the Chinese proletariat in the bourgeois-democratic revolution was to give leadership to the peasants’ struggle.
In the period of the War of Resistance Against Japan, Comrade Mao Zedong again stressed that the peasants were the most reliable and the most numerous ally of the proletariat and constituted the main force in the War of Resistance. The peasants were the main source of manpower for China’s armies. The funds and the supplies needed for a protracted war came chiefly from the peasants. In the anti-Japanese war it was imperative to rely mainly on the peasants and to arouse them to participate in the war on the broadest scale.
The War of Resistance Against Japan was in essence a peasant revolutionary war led by our Party. By arousing and organizing the peasant masses and integrating them with the proletariat, our Party created a powerful force capable of defeating the strongest enemy.
To rely on the peasants, build rural base areas and use the countryside to encircle and finally capture the cities - such was the way to victory in the Chinese revolution.
Basing himself on the characteristics of the Chinese revolution, Comrade Mao Zedong pointed out the importance of building rural revolutionary base areas.
Since China’s key cities have long been occupied by the powerful imperialists and their reactionary Chinese allies, it is imperative for the revolutionary ranks to turn the backward villages into advanced, consolidated base areas, into great military, political, economic and cultural bastions of the revolution from which to fight their vicious enemies who are using the cities for attacks on the rural districts, and in this way gradually to achieve the complete victory of the revolution through protracted fighting; it is imperative for them to do so if they do not wish to compromise with imperialism and its lackeys but are determined to fight on, and if they intend to build up and temper their forces, and avoid decisive battles with a powerful enemy while their own strength is inadequate.5
Experience in the period of the Second Revolutionary Civil War showed that, when this strategic concept of Comrade Mao Zedong’s was applied, there was an immense growth in the revolutionary forces and one Red base area after another was built. Conversely, when it was violated and the nonsense of the “Left” opportunists was applied, the revolutionary forces suffered severe damage, with losses of nearly 100 percent in the cities and 90 percent in the rural areas.
During the War of Resistance Against Japan, the Japanese imperialist forces occupied many of China’s big cities and the main lines of communication, but owing to the shortage of troops they were unable to occupy the vast countryside, which remained the vulnerable sector of the enemy’s rule. Consequently, the possibility of building rural base areas became even greater. Shortly after the beginning of the War of Resistance, when the Japanese forces surged into China’s hinterland and the Kuomintang forces crumbled and fled in one defeat after another, the Eighth Route and New Fourth Armies led by our Party followed the wise policy laid down by Comrade Mao Zedong and boldly drove into the areas behind the enemy lines in small contingents and established base areas throughout the countryside. During the eight years of the war, we established nineteen anti-Japanese base areas in northern, central and southern China. With the exception of the big cities and the main lines of communication, the vast territory in the enemy’s rear was in the hands of the people.
In the anti-Japanese base areas, we carried our democratic reforms, improved the livelihood of the people, and mobilized and organized the peasant masses. Organs of anti-Japanese democratic political power were established on an extensive scale and the masses of the people enjoyed the democratic right to run their own affairs; at the same time we carried out the policies of “a reasonable burden” and “the reduction of rent and interest,” which weakened the feudal system of exploitation and improved the people’s livelihood. As a result, the enthusiasm of the peasant masses was deeply aroused, while the various anti-Japanese strata were given due consideration and were thus united. In formulating our policies for the base areas, we also took care that these policies should facilitate our work in the enemy-occupied areas.
In the enemy-occupied cities and villages, we combined legal with illegal struggle, united the basic masses and all patriots, and divided and disintegrated the political power of the enemy and his puppets so as to prepare ourselves to attack the enemy from within in coordination with operations from without when conditions were ripe.
The base areas established by our Party became the centre of gravity in the Chinese people’s struggle to resist Japan and save the country. Relying on these bases, our Party expanded and strengthened the people’s revolutionary forces, persevered in the protracted war and eventually won the War or Resistance Against Japan.
Naturally, it was impossible for the development of the revolutionary base areas to be plain sailing all the time. They constituted a tremendous threat to the enemy and were bound to be attacked. Therefore, their development was a tortuous process of expansion, contraction and then renewed expansion. Between 1937 and 1940 the population in the anti-Japanese base areas grew to 100,000,000. But in 1941-42 the Japanese imperialists used the major part of their invading forces to launch frantic attacks on our base areas and wrought havoc. Meanwhile, the Kuomintang, too, encircled these base areas, blockaded them and went so far as to attack them. So by 1942, the anti-Japanese base areas had contracted and their population was less than 50,000,000. Placing complete reliance on the masses, our Party resolutely adopted a series of correct policies and measures, with the result that the base areas were able to hold out under extremely difficult circumstances. After this setback, the army and the people in the base areas were tempered and grew stronger. From 1943 onwards, our base areas were gradually restored and expanded, and by 1945 the population had grown to 160,000,000. Taking the entire course of the Chinese revolution into account, our revolutionary base areas went through even more ups and downs, and they weathered a great many tests before the small, separate base areas, expanding in a series of waves, gradually developed into extensive and contiguous base areas.
At the same time, the work of building the revolutionary base areas was a grand rehearsal in preparation for nationwide victory. In these base areas, we built the Party, ran the organs of state power, built the people’s armed forces and set up mass organizations; we engaged in industry and agriculture and operated cultural, educational and all other undertakings necessary for the independent existence of a separate region. Our base areas were in fact a state in miniature. And with the steady expansion of our work in the base areas, our Party established a powerful people’s army, trained cadres for various kinds of work, accumulated experience in many fields and build up both the material and the moral strength that provided favourable conditions for nationwide victory.
The revolutionary base areas established in the War of Resistance later became the springboards for the People’s War of Liberation, in which the Chinese people defeated the Kuomintang reactionaries. In the War of Liberation we continued the policy of first encircling the cities from the countryside and then capturing the cities, and thus won nationwide victory.
“Without a people’s army the people have nothing.”6 This is the conclusion drawn by Comrade Mao Zedong from the Chinese people’s experience in their long years of revolutionary struggle, experience that was bought in blood. This is a universal truth of Marxism-Leninism.
The special feature of the Chinese revolution was armed revolution against armed counter-revolution. The main form of struggle was war and the main form of organization was the army which was under the absolute leadership of the Chinese Communist Party, while all the other forms of organization and struggle led by our Party were coordinated, directly or indirectly, with the war.
During the First Revolutionary Civil War, many fine Party comrades took an active part in the armed revolutionary struggle. But our Party was then still in its infancy and did not have a clear understanding of this special feature of the Chinese revolution. It was only after the First Revolutionary Civil War, only after the Kuomintang had betrayed the revolution, massacred large numbers of Communists and destroyed all the revolutionary mass organizations, that our Party reached a clearer understanding of the supreme importance of organizing revolutionary armed forces and of studying the strategy and tactics of revolutionary war, and created the Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army, the first people’s army under the leadership of the Communist Party of China.
During the Second Revolutionary Civil War, the Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army created by Comrade Mao Zedong grew considerably and at one time reached a total of 300,000 men. But it later lost nine-tenths of its forces as a result of the wrong political and military lines followed by the “Left” opportunist leadership.
At the start of the War of Resistance Against Japan, the people’s army led by the Chinese Communist Party had only a little over 40,000 men. The Kuomintang reactionaries attempted to restrict, weaken and destroy this people’s army in every conceivable way. Comrade Mao Zedong pointed out that, in these circumstances, in order to sustain the War of Resistance and defeat the Japanese aggressors, it was imperative greatly to expand and consolidate the Eighth Route and New Fourth Armies and all the guerrilla units led by our Party. The whole Party should give close attention to war and study military affairs. Every Party member should be ready at all times to take up arms and go to the front.
Comrade Mao Zedong also incisively stated that Communists do not fight for personal military power but must fight for military power for the Party and for the people.
Guided by the Party’s correct line of expanding the revolutionary armed forces, the Communist-led Eighth Route and New Fourth Armies and anti-Japanese guerrilla units promptly went to the forefront at the very beginning of the war. We spread the seeds of the people’s armed forces in the vast areas behind the enemy lines and kindled the flames of guerrilla warfare everywhere. Our people’s army steadily expanded in the struggle, so that by the end of the war it was already a million strong, and there was also a militia of over two million. That was why we were able to engage nearly two-thirds of the Japanese forces of aggression and 95 per cent of the puppet troops and to become the main force in the War of Resistance Against Japan. While resisting the Japanese invading forces, we repulsed three large-scale anti-Communist onslaughts launched by the Kuomintang reactionaries in 1939, 1941 and 1943, and smashed their countless “friction-mongering” activities.
Why were the Eighth Route and New Fourth Armies able to grow big and strong from being small and weak and to score such great victories in the War of Resistance Against Japan?
The fundamental reason was that the Eighth Route and New Fourth Armies were founded on Comrade Mao Zedong’s theory of army building. They were armies of a new type, a people’s army which whole-heartedly serves the interests of the people.
Guided by Comrade Mao Zedong’s theory on building a people’s army, our army was under the absolute leadership of the Chinese Communist Party and most loyally carried out the Party’s Marxist-Leninist line and policies. It had a high degree of conscious discipline and was heroically inspired to destroy all enemies and conquer all difficulties. Internally there was full unity between cadres and fighters, between those in higher and those in lower positions of responsibility, between the different departments and between the various fraternal army units. Externally, there was similarly full unity between the army and the people and between the army and the local government.
During the anti-Japanese war our army staunchly performed the three tasks set by Comrade Mao Zedong, namely, fighting, mass work, and production, and it was at the same time a fighting force, a political work force and a production corps. Everywhere it went, it did propaganda work among the masses, organized and armed them and helped them set up revolutionary political power. Our armymen strictly observed the Three Main Rules of Discipline and the Eight Points for Attention,7 carried out campaigns to “support the government and cherish the people,” and did good deeds for the people everywhere. They also made use of every possibility to engage in production themselves so as to overcome economic difficulties, better their own livelihood and lighten the people’s burden. By their exemplary conduct they won the whole-hearted support of the masses, who affectionately called them “our own boys.”
Our army consisted of local forces as well as of regular forces; moreover, it energetically built and developed the militia, thus practicing the system of combining the three military formations, i.e., the regular forces, the local forces and the militia.
Our army also pursued correct policies in winning over enemy officers and men in giving lenient treatment to prisoners of war. During the anti-Japanese war we not only brought about the revolt and surrender of large numbers of puppet troops, but succeeded in converting not a few Japanese prisoners, who had been badly poisoned by fascist ideology. After they were politically awakened, they organized themselves into anti-war organizations such as the League for the Liberation of the Japanese People, the Anti-War League of the Japanese in China and the League of Awakened Japanese, helped us to disintegrate the Japanese army and cooperated with us in opposing Japanese militarism. Comrade Sanzo Nosaka, the leader of the Japanese Communist Party, who was then in Yenan, gave us great help in this work.
The essence of Comrade Mao Zedong’s theory of army building is that in building a people’s army prominence must be given to politics, i.e., the army must first and foremost be built on a political basis. Politics is the commander, politics is the soul of everything. Political work is the lifeline of our army. True, a people’s army must pay attention to the constant improvement of its weapons and equipment and its military technique, but in its fighting it does not rely purely on weapons and technique, it relies mainly on politics, on the proletarian revolutionary consciousness and courage of the commanders and fighters, on the support and backing of the masses.
Owing to the application of Comrade Mao Zedong’s line on army building, there has prevailed in our army at all times a high level of proletarian political consciousness, an atmosphere of keenness to study the thought of Mao Zedong, an excellent morale, a solid unity and a deep hatred for the enemy, and thus a gigantic moral force has been brought into being. In battle it has feared neither hardships nor death, it has been able to charge or hold its ground as the conditions require. One man can play the role of several, dozens or even hundreds, and miracles can be performed.
All this makes the people’s army led by the Chinese Communist Party fundamentally different from any bourgeois army, and from all the armies of the old type which served the exploiting classes and were driven and utilized by a handful of people. The experience of the people’s war in China shows that a people’s army created in accordance with Comrade Mao Zedong’s theory of army building is incomparably strong and invincible.
Engels said, “The emancipation of the proletariat, in its turn, will have its specific expression in military affairs and create its specific, new military method.”8 Engels’ profound prediction has been fulfilled in the revolutionary wars waged by the Chinese people under the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party. In the course of protracted armed struggle, we have created a whole range of strategy and tactics of people’s war by which we have been able to utilize our strong points to attack the enemy at his weak points.
During the War of Resistance Against Japan, on the basis of his comprehensive analysis of the enemy and ourselves, Comrade Mao Zedong laid down the following strategic principle for the Communist-led Eighth Route and New Fourth Armies: “Guerrilla warfare is basic, but lose no chance for mobile warfare under favourable conditions.”9 He raised guerrilla warfare to the level of strategy, because, if they are to defeat a formidable enemy, revolutionary armed forces should not fight with a reckless disregard for the consequences when there is a great disparity between their own strength and their enemy’s. If they do, they will suffer serious losses and bring heavy setbacks to the revolution. Guerrilla warfare is the only way to mobilize and apply the whole strength of the people against the enemy, the only way to expand our forces in the course of the war, deplete and weaken the enemy, gradually change the balance of forces between the enemy and ourselves, switch from guerrilla to mobile warfare, and finally defeat the enemy.
In the initial period of the Second Revolutionary Civil War, Comrade Mao Zedong enumerated the basic tactics of guerrilla warfare as follows:
“The enemy advances, we retreat; the enemy camps, we harass; the enemy tires, we attack; the enemy retreats, we pursue.”10
Guerrilla war tactics were further developed during the War of Resistance Against Japan. In the base areas behind the enemy lines, everybody joined the fighting - the troops and the civilian population, men and women, old and young; every single village fought. Various ingenious methods of fighting were devised, including “sparrow warfare,”11 land-mine warfare, tunnel warfare, sabotage warfare, and guerrilla warfare on lakes and rivers.
In the later period of the War of Resistance Against Japan and during the Third Revolutionary Civil War, we switched our strategy from that of guerrilla warfare was the primary form of fighting to that of mobile warfare in the light of the changes in the balance of forces between the enemy and ourselves. By the middle, and especially the later, period of the Third Revolutionary Civil War, our operations had developed into large-scale mobile warfare, including the storming of big cities.
War of annihilation is the fundamental guiding principle of our military operations. This guiding principle should be put into effect regardless of whether mobile or guerrilla warfare is the primary form of fighting. It is true that in guerrilla warfare much should be done to disrupt and harass the enemy, but it is still necessary actively to advocate and fight battles of annihilation whenever conditions are favourable. In mobile warfare superior forces must be concentrated in every battle so that the enemy forces can be wiped out one by one. Comrade Mao Zedong has pointed out:
“A battle in which the enemy is routed is not basically decisive in a contest with a foe of great strength. A battle of annihilation, on the other hand, produces a great and immediate impact on any enemy. Injuring all of a man’s ten fingers is not as effective as chopping off one, and routing ten enemy divisions is not as effective as annihilating one of them.”12
Battles of annihilation are the most effective way of hitting the enemy; each time one of his brigades or regiments is wiped out, he will have one brigade or regiment less, and the enemy forces will be demoralized and will disintegrate. By fighting battles of annihilation, our army is able to take prisoners of war or capture weapons from the enemy in every battle, and the morale of our army rises, our army units get bigger, our weapons become better, and our combat effectiveness continually increases.
In his celebrated ten cardinal military principles Comrade Mao Zedong pointed out:
“In every battle, concentrate an absolutely superior force (two, three, four and sometimes even five or six times the enemy’s strength), encircle the enemy forces completely, strive to wipe them out thoroughly and do not let any escape from the net. In special circumstances, use the method of dealing crushing blows to the enemy, that is, concentrate all our strength to make a frontal attack and also to attack one or both of his flanks, with the aim of wiping out one part and routing another so that our army can swiftly move its troops to smash other enemy forces. Strive to avoid battles of attrition in which we lose more than we gain or only break even. In this way, although we are inferior as a whole (in terms of numbers), we are absolutely superior in every part and every specific campaign, and this ensures victory in the campaign. As time goes on, we shall become superior as a whole and eventually wipe out all the enemy.”13
At the same time, he said that we should first attack dispersed or isolated enemy forces and only attack concentrated and strong enemy forces later; that we should strive to wipe out the enemy through mobile warfare; that we should fight no battle unprepared and fight no battle we are not sure of winning; and that in any battle we fight we should develop our army’s strong points and its excellent style of fighting. These are the major principles of fighting a war of annihilation.
In order to annihilate the enemy, we must adopt the policy of luring him in deep and abandon some cities and districts of our own accord in a planned way, so as to let him in. It is only after letting the enemy in that the people can take part in the war in various ways and that the power of a people’s war can be fully exerted. It is only after letting the enemy in that we can be compelled to divide up his forces, take on heavy burdens and commit mistakes. In other words, we must let the enemy become elated, stretch out all his ten fingers and become hopelessly bogged down. Thus, we can concentrate superior forces to destroy the enemy forces one by one, to eat them up mouthful by mouthful. Only by wiping out the enemy’s effective strength can cities or localities be finally held or seized. We are firmly against dividing up our forces to defend all positions and putting up resistance at every place for fear that our territory might be lost and our pots and pans smashed, since this can neither wipe out the enemy forces nor hold cities or localities.
Comrade Mao Zedong has provided a masterly summary of the strategy and tactics of people’s war: You fight in your way and we fight in ours; we fight when we can win and move away when we can’t.
In other words, you rely on modern weapons and we rely on highly conscious revolutionary people; you give full play to your superiority and we give full play to ours; you have your way of fighting and we have ours. When you want to fight us, we don’t let you and you can’t even find us. But when we want to fight you, we make sure that you can’t get away and we hit you squarely on the chin and wipe you out. When we are able to wipe you out, we do so with a vengeance; when we can’t, we see to it that you don’t wipe us out. It is opportunism if one won’t fight when one can win. It is adventurism if one insists on fighting when one can’t win. Fighting is the pivot of al our strategy and tactics. It is because of the necessity of fighting that we admit the necessity of moving away. The sole purpose of moving away is to fight and bring about the final and complete destruction of the enemy. This strategy and these tactics can be applied only when one relies on the broad masses of the people, and such application brings the superiority of people’s war into full play. However superior he may be in technical equipment and whatever tricks he may resort to, the enemy will find himself in the passive position of having to receive blows, and the initiative will always be in our hands.
We grew from a small and weak to a large and strong force and finally defeated formidable enemies at home and abroad because we carried out the strategy and tactics of people’s war. During the eight years of War of Resistance Against Japan, the people’s army led by the Chinese Communist Party fought more than 125,000 engagements with the enemy and put out of action more than 1,700,000 Japanese and puppet troops. In the three years of the War of Liberation, we put eight million of the Kuomintang’s reactionary troops out of action and won the great victory of the people.
The Chinese people’s War of Resistance Against Japan was an important part of the Anti-Fascist World War. The victory of the Anti-Fascist War as a whole was the result of the common struggle of the people of the world. By its participation in the war against Japan at the final stage, the Soviet army under the leadership of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union headed by Stalin played a significant part in bringing about the defeat of Japanese imperialism. Great contributions were made by the peoples of Korea, Vietnam, Mongolia, Laos, Cambodia, Indonesia, Burma, India, Pakistan, Malaya, the Philippines, Thailand and certain other Asian countries. The people of the Americas, Oceania, Europe and Africa also made their contribution.
Under extremely difficult circumstances, the Communist Party of Japan and the revolutionary forces of the Japanese people kept up their valiant and staunch struggle, and played their part in the defeat of Japanese fascism.
The common victory was won by all the peoples, who gave one another support and encouragement. Yet each country was, above all, liberated as a result of its own people’s efforts.
The Chinese people enjoyed the support of other peoples in winning both the War of Resistance Against Japan and the People’s Liberation War, and yet victory was mainly the result of the Chinese people’s own efforts. Certain people assert that China’s victory in the War of Resistance was due entirely to foreign assistance. This absurd assertion is in tune with that of the Japanese militarists.
The liberation of the masses is accomplished by the masses themselves - this is a basic principle of Marxism-Leninism. Revolution or people’s war in any country is the business of the masses in that country and should be carried out primarily by their own efforts; there is no other way.
During the War of Resistance Against Japan, our Party maintained that China should rely mainly on her own strength while at the same time trying to get as much foreign assistance as possible. We firmly opposed the Kuomintang ruling clique’s policy of exclusive reliance on foreign aid. In the eyes of the Kuomintang and Chiang Kai-shek, China’s industry and agriculture were no good, her weapons and equipment were no good, nothing in China was any good, so that if she wanted to defeat Japan, she had to depend on other countries, and particularly on the U.S.-British imperialists. This was completely slavish thinking. Our policy was diametrically opposed to that of the Kuomintang. Our Party held that it was possible to exploit the contradictions between U.S.-British imperialism and Japanese imperialism, but that no reliance could be placed on the former. In fact, the U.S-British imperialists repeatedly plotted to bring about a “Far Eastern Munich” in order to arrive at a compromise with Japanese imperialism at China’s expense, and for a considerable period of time they provided the Japanese aggressors with war materiél. In helping China during that period, the U.S. imperialists harboured the sinister design of turning China into a colony of their own.
Comrade Mao Zedong said: “China has to rely mainly on her own efforts in the War of Resistance.”14 He added, “We hope for foreign aid but cannot be dependent on it; we depend on our own efforts, on the creative power of the whole army and the entire people.”15
Self-reliance was especially important for the people’s armed forces and the Liberated Areas led by our Party.
The Kuomintang government gave the Eighth Route and New Fourth Armies some small allowances in the initial stage of the anti-Japanese war, but gave them not a single penny later. The Liberated Areas faced great difficulties as a result of the Japanese imperialists’ savage attacks and brutal “mopping-up” campaigns, of the Kuomintang’s military encirclement and economic blockade and of natural calamities. The difficulties were particularly great in the years 1941 and 1942, when we were very short of food and clothing.
What were we to do? Comrade Mao Zedong asked: How has mankind managed to keep alive from time immemorial? Has it not been by men using their hands to provide for themselves? Why should we, their latter-day descendants, be devoid of this tiny bit of wisdom? Why can’t we use our own hands?
The Central Committee of the Party and Comrade Mao Zedong put forward the policies of “ample food and clothing through self-reliance” and “develop the economy and ensure supplies,” and he army and the people of the Liberated Areas accordingly launched an extensive production campaign, with the main emphasis on agriculture.
Difficulties are not invincible monsters. If everyone co-operates and fights them, they will be overcome. The Kuomintang reactionaries thought that it could starve us to death by cutting off allowances and imposing an economic blockade, but in fact it helped us by stimulating us to rely on our own efforts to surmount our difficulties. While launching the great campaign for production, we applied the policy of “better troops and simpler administration” and economized in the use of manpower and material resources; thus we not only surmounted the severe material difficulties and successfully met the crisis, but lightened the people’s burden, improved their livelihood and laid the material foundations for victory in the anti-Japanese war.
The problem of military equipment was solved mainly by relying on the capture of arms from the enemy, though we did turn out some weapons too. Chiang Kai-shek, the Japanese imperialists and the U.S. imperialists have all been our “chiefs of transportation corps.” The arsenals of the imperialists always provide the oppressed peoples and nations with arms.
The peoples armed forces led by our Party independently waged people’s war on a large scale and won great victories without any material aid from outside, both during the more than eight years of the anti-Japanese war and during the more than three years of the People’s War of Liberation.
Comrade Mao Zedong has said that our fundamental policy should rest on the foundation of our own strength. Only by relying on our own efforts can we in all circumstances remain invincible.
The peoples of the world invariably support each other in their struggles against imperialism and its lackeys. Those countries which have won victory are duty bound to support and aid the peoples who have not yet done so. Nevertheless, foreign aid can only play a supplementary role.
In order to fight a revolution and to fight a people’s war and be victorious, it is imperative to adhere to the policy of self-reliance, rely on the strength of the masses in one’s won country and prepare to carry on the fight independently even when all material aid from outside is cut off. If one does not operate by one’s own efforts, does not independently ponder and solve the problems of the revolution in one’s own country and does not rely on the strength of the masses, but leans wholly on foreign aid - even though this be aid from socialist countries which persist in revolution - no victory can be won, or be consolidated even if it is won.
The Chinese revolution is a continuation of the great October Revolution. The road of the October Revolution is the common road for all people’s revolutions. The Chinese revolution and the October Revolution have in common the following basic characteristics:
Both were led by the working class with a Marxist-Leninist party as its nucleus.
Both were based on the worker-peasant alliance.
In both cases state power was seized through violent revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat was established.
In both cases the socialist system was built after victory in the revolution.
Both were component parts of the proletarian world revolution.
Naturally, the Chinese revolution had its own peculiar characteristics. The October Revolution took place in imperialist Russia, but the Chinese revolution broke out in a semi-colonial and semi-feudal country. The former was a proletarian socialist revolution, while the latter developed into a socialist revolution after the complete victory of the new-democratic revolution. The October Revolution began with armed uprisings in the cities and then spread to the countryside, while the Chinese revolution won nationwide victory through the encirclement of the cities from the rural areas and the final capture of the cities.
Comrade Mao Zedong’s great merit lies in the fact that he has succeeded in integrating the universal truth of Marxism-Leninism with the concrete practice of the Chinese revolution and has enriched and developed Marxism-Leninism by his masterly generalization and summation of the experience gained during the Chinese people’s protracted revolutionary struggle.
Comrade Mao Zedong’s theory of people’s war has been proved by the long practice of the Chinese revolution to be in accord with the objective laws of such wars and to be invincible. It has not only been valid for China, it is a great contribution to the revolutionary struggles of the oppressed nations and peoples throughout the world.
The people’s war led by the Chinese Communist Party, comprising the War of Resistance and the Revolutionary Civil Wars, lasted for twenty-two years. It constitutes the most drawn-out and most complex people’s war led by the proletariat in modern history, and it has been the richest in experience.
In the last analysis, the Marxist-Leninist theory of proletarian revolution is the theory of the seizure of state power by revolutionary violence, the theory of countering war against the people by people’s war. As Marx so aptly put it, “Force is the midwife of every old society pregnant with a new one.”16
It was on the basis of the lessons derived from the people’s wars in China that Comrade Mao Zedong, using the simplest and the most vivid language, advanced the famous thesis that “political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.”17
He clearly pointed out:
“The seizure of power by armed force, the settlement of the issue by war, is the central task and the highest form of revolution. This Marxist-Leninist principle of revolution holds good universally, for China and for all other countries.”18
War is the product of imperialism and the system of exploitation of man by man. Lenin said that “war is always and everywhere begun by the exploiters themselves, by ruling and oppressing classes.”19 So long as imperialism and the system of exploitation of man by man exist, the imperialists and reactionaries will invariably rely on armed force to maintain their reactionary rule and impose war on the oppressed nations and peoples. This is an objective law independent of man’s will.
In the world today, all the imperialists headed by the United States and their lackeys, without exception, are strengthening their state machinery, and especially their armed forces. U.S. imperialism, in particular, is carrying out armed aggression and suppression everywhere.
What should the oppressed nations and the oppressed people do in the face of wars of aggression and armed suppression by the imperialists and their lackeys? Should they submit and remain slaves in perpetuity? Or should they rise in resistance and fight for their liberation?
Comrade Mao Zedong answered this question in vivid terms. He said that after long investigation and study the Chinese people discovered that all the imperialists and their lackeys “have swords in their hands and are out to kill. The people have come to understand this and so act after the same fashion.”20 This is called doing unto them what they do unto us.
In the last analysis, whether one dares to wage a tit-for-tat struggle against armed aggression and suppression by the imperialists and their lackeys, whether one dares to fight a people’s war against them, means whether one dares to embark on revolution. This is the most effective touchstone for distinguishing genuine from fake revolutionaries and Marxist-Leninists.
In view of the fact that some people were afflicted with the fear of the imperialists and reactionaries, Comrade Mao Zedong put forward his famous thesis that “the imperialists and all reactionaries are paper tigers.” He said,
“All reactionaries are paper tigers. In appearance, the reactionaries are terrifying, but in reality they are not so powerful. From a long-term point of view, it is not the reactionaries but the people who are really powerful.”21
The history of the peoples war in China and other countries provides conclusive evidence that the growth of the people’s revolutionary forces from weak and small beginnings into strong and large forces is a universal law of development of people’s war. A people’s war inevitably meets with many difficulties, with ups and downs and setbacks in the course of its development, but no force can alter its general trend towards inevitable triumph.
Comrade Mao Zedong points out that we must despise the enemy strategically and take full account of him tactically.
To despise the enemy strategically is an elementary requirement for a revolutionary. Without the courage to despise the enemy and without daring to win, it will be simply impossible to make revolution and wage a people’s war, let alone to achieve victory.
It is also very important for revolutionaries to take full account of the enemy tactically. It is likewise impossible to win victory in a people’s war without taking full account of the enemy tactically, and without examining the concrete conditions, without being prudent and giving great attention to the study of the art of struggle, and without adopting appropriate forms of struggle in the concrete practice of the revolution in each country and with regard to each concrete problem of struggle.
Dialectical and historical materialism teaches us that what is important is primarily is not that which at the given moment seems to be durable and yet is already beginning to die away, but that which is arising and developing, even though at the given moment it may not appear to be durable, for only that which is arising and developing is invincible.
Why can the apparently weak new-born forces always triumph over the decadent forces which appear so powerful? The reason is that truth is on their side and that the masses are on their side, while the reactionary classes are always divorced from the masses and set themselves against the masses.
This has been borne out by the victory of the Chinese revolution, by the history of all revolutions, the whole history of class struggle and the entire history of mankind.
The imperialists are extremely afraid of Comrade Mao Zedong’s thesis that “imperialism and all reactionaries are paper tigers,” and the revisionists are extremely hostile to it. They all oppose and attack this thesis and the philistines follow suit by ridiculing it. But all this cannot in the least diminish its importance. The light of truth cannot be dimmed by anybody.
Comrade Mao Zedong’s theory of people’s war solves not only the problem of daring to fight a people’s war, but also that of how to wage it.
Comrade Mao Zedong is a great statesman and military scientist, proficient at directing war in accordance with its laws. By the line and policies, the strategy and tactics be formulated for people’s war, he led the Chinese people in steering the ship of the people’s war past all hidden reefs to the shores of victory in most complicated and difficult conditions.
It must be emphasized that Comrade Mao Zedong’s theory of the establishment of rural revolutionary base areas and the encirclement of the cities from the countryside is of outstanding and universal practical importance for the present revolutionary struggles of all the oppressed nations and peoples, and particularly for the revolutionary struggles of the oppressed nations and peoples in Asia, Africa and Latin America against imperialism and its lackeys.
Many countries and peoples in Asia, Africa and Latin America are now being subjected to aggression and enslavement on a serious scale by the imperialists headed by the United States and their lackeys. The basic political and economic conditions in many of these countries have many similarities to those that prevailed in old China. As in China, the peasant question is extremely important in these regions. The peasants constitute the main force of the national-democratic revolution against the imperialists and their lackeys. In committing aggression against these countries, the imperialists usually begin by seizing the big cities and the main lines of communication, but they are unable to bring the vast countryside completely under their control. The countryside, and the countryside alone, can provide the broad areas in which the revolutionaries can manoeuvre freely. The countryside, and the countryside alone, can provide the revolutionary bases from which the revolutionaries can go forward to final victory. Precisely for this reason, Comrade Mao Zedong’s theory of establishing revolutionary base areas in the rural districts and encircling the cities from the countryside is attracting more and more attention among the people in these regions.
Taking the entire globe, if North America and Western Europe can be called “the cities of the world,” then Asia, Africa and Latin America constitute “the rural areas of the world.” Since World War II, the proletarian revolutionary movement has for various reasons been temporarily held back in the North American and West European capitalist countries, while the people’s revolutionary movement in Asia, Africa and Latin America has been growing vigorously. In a sense, the contemporary world revolution also presents a picture of the encirclement of cities by the rural areas. In the final analysis, the whole cause of world revolution hinges on the revolutionary struggles of the Asian, African and Latin American peoples who make up the overwhelming majority of the world’s population. The socialist countries should regard it as their internationalist duty to support the people’s revolutionary struggles in Asia, Africa and Latin America.
The October Revolution opened up a new era in the revolution of the oppressed nations. The victory of the October Revolution built a bridge between the socialist revolution of the proletariat of the West and the national-democratic revolution of the colonial and semi-colonial countries of the East. The Chinese revolution has successfully solved the problem of how to link up the national-democratic with the socialist revolution in the colonial and semi-colonial countries.
Comrade Mao Zedong has pointed out that, in the epoch since the October Revolution, anti-imperialist revolution in any colonial or semi-colonial country is no longer part of the old bourgeois, or capitalist world revolution, but is part of the new world revolution, the proletariat-socialist world revolution.
Comrade Mao Zedong has formulated a complete theory of the new-democratic revolution. He indicated that this revolution, which is different from all others, can only be, nay must be, a revolution against imperialism, feudalism and bureaucrat-capitalism waged by the broad masses of the people under the leadership of the proletariat.
This means that the revolution can only be, nay must be, led by the proletariat and the genuinely revolutionary party armed with Marxism-Leninism, and by no other class or party.
This means that the revolution embraces in its ranks not only the workers, peasants and the urban petty bourgeoisie, but also the national bourgeoisie and other patriotic and anti-imperialist democrats.
This means, finally, that the revolution is directed against imperialism, feudalism and bureaucrat-capitalism.
The new-democratic revolution leads to socialism, and not to capitalism.
Comrade Mao Zedong’s theory of the new-democratic revolution is the Marxist-Leninist theory of revolution by stages as well as the Marxist-Leninist theory of uninterrupted revolution.
Comrade Mao Zedong made a correct distinction between the two revolutionary stages, i.e., the national-democratic and the socialist revolutions; at the same time he correctly and closely linked the two. The national-democratic revolution is the necessary preparation for the socialist revolution, and the socialist revolution is the inevitable sequel to the national-democratic revolution. There is no Great Wall between the two revolutionary stages. But the socialist revolution is only possible after the completion of the national-democratic revolution. The more thorough the national-democratic revolution, the better the conditions for the socialist revolution.
The experience of the Chinese revolution shows that the tasks of the national-democratic revolution can be fulfilled only through long and tortuous struggles. In this stage of revolution, imperialism and its lackeys are the principal enemy. In the struggle against imperialism and its lackeys, it is necessary to rally all anti-imperialist patriotic forces, including the national bourgeoisie and all patriotic personages. All those patriotic personages from among the bourgeoisie and other exploiting classes who join the anti-imperialist struggle play a progressive historical role; they are not tolerated by imperialism but welcomed by the proletariat.
It is very harmful to confuse the two stages, that is, the national-democratic and the socialist revolutions. Comrade Mao Zedong criticized the wrong idea of “accomplishing both at one stroke,” and pointed out that this utopian idea could only weaken the struggle against imperialism and its lackeys, the most urgent task at that time. The Kuomintang reactionaries and the Trotskyites they hired during the War of Resistance deliberately confused these two stages of the Chinese revolution, proclaiming the “theory of a single revolution” and preaching so-called “socialism” without any Communist Party, wipe out any revolution and prevent the advance of the national-democratic revolution, and they used it as a pretext for their non-resistance and capitulation to imperialism. This reactionary theory was buried long ago by the history of the Chinese revolution.
The Khrushchev revisionists are now actively preaching that socialism can be built without the proletariat and without a genuinely revolutionary party armed with the advanced proletarian ideology, and they have cast the fundamental tenets of Marxism-Leninism to the four winds. The revisionists’ purpose is solely to divert the oppressed nations from their struggle against imperialism and sabotage their national-democratic revolution, all in the service of imperialism.
The Chinese revolution provides a successful lesson for making a thoroughgoing national-democratic revolution under the leadership of the proletariat; it likewise provides a successful lesson for the timely transition from the national-democratic revolution to the socialist revolution under the leadership of the proletariat.
Mao Zedong’s thought has been the guide to the victory of the Chinese revolution. It has integrated the universal truth of Marxism-Leninism with the concrete practice of the Chinese revolution and creatively developed Marxism-Leninism, thus adding new weapons to the arsenal of Marxism-Leninism.
Ours is the epoch in which world capitalism and imperialism are heading for their doom and socialism and communism are marching to victory. Comrade Mao Zedong’s theory of people’s war is not only a product of the Chinese revolution, but has also the characteristics of our epoch. The new experience gained in the people’s revolutionary struggles in various countries since World War II has provided continuous evidence that Mao Zedong’s thought is a common asset of the revolutionary people of the whole world. This is the great international significance of the thought of Mao Zedong.
Since World War II, U.S. imperialism has stepped into the shoes of German, Japanese and Italian fascism and has been trying to build a great American empire by dominating and enslaving the whole world. It is actively fostering Japanese and West German militarism as its chief accomplices in unleashing a world war. Like a vicious world, it is bullying and enslaving various peoples, plundering their wealth, encroaching upon their countries’ sovereignty and interfering in their internal affairs. It is the most rabid aggressor in human history and the most ferocious common enemy of the people of the world. Every people or country in the world that wants revolution, independence and peace cannot but direct the spearhead of its struggle against U.S. imperialism.
Just as the Japanese imperialists’ policy of subjugating China made it possible for the Chinese people to form the broadest possible united front against them, so the U.S. imperialists’ policy of seeking world domination makes it possible for the people throughout the world to unite all the forces that can be united and form the broadest possible united front for a converging attack on U.S. imperialism.
At present, the main battlefield of the fierce struggle between the people of the world on one side and U.S. imperialism and its lackeys on the other is the vast area of Asia, Africa and Latin America. In the world as a whole, this is the area where the people suffer worst from imperialist oppression and where imperialist rule is most vulnerable. Since World War II, revolutionary storms have been rising in this area, and today they have become the most important force directly pounding U.S. imperialism. The contradiction between the revolutionary peoples of Asia, Africa and Latin America and the imperialists headed by the United States is the principal contradiction in the contemporary world. The development of this contradiction is promoting the struggle of the people of the whole world against U.S. imperialism and its lackeys.
Since World War II, people’s war has increasingly demonstrated its power in Asia, Africa and Latin America. The peoples of China, Korea, Vietnam, Laos, Cuba, Indonesia, Algeria and other countries have waged people’s wars against the imperialists and their lackeys and won great victories. The classes leading these people’s wars may vary, and so may the breadth and depth of mass mobilization and the extent of victory, but the victories in these people’s wars have very much weakened and pinned down the forces of imperialism, upset the U.S. imperialist plan to launch a world war, and become mighty factors defending world peace.
Today, the conditions are more favourable than ever before the waging of people’s wars by the revolutionary peoples of Asia, Africa and Latin America against U.S. imperialism and its lackeys.
Since World War II and the succeeding years of revolutionary upsurge, there has been a great rise in the level of political consciousness and the degree of organization of the people in all countries, and the resources available to them for mutual support and aid have greatly increased. The whole capitalist-imperialist system has become drastically weaker and is in the process of increasing convulsion and disintegration. After World War I, the imperialists lacked the power to destroy the new-born socialist Soviet state, but they were still able to suppress the people’s revolutionary movements in some countries in the parts of the world under their own rule and so maintain a short period of comparative stability. Since World War II, however, not only have they been unable to stop a number of countries from taking the socialist road, but they are no longer capable of holding back the surging tide of the people’s revolutionary movements in the areas under their own rule.
U.S. imperialism is stronger, but also more vulnerable, than any imperialism of the past. It sets itself against the people of the whole world, including the people of the United States. Its human, military, material and financial resources are far from sufficient for the realization of its ambition of dominating the whole world. U.S. imperialism has further weakened itself by occupying so many places in the world, over-reaching itself, stretching its fingers out wide and dispersing its strength, with its rear so far away and its supply lines so long. As Comrade Mao Zedong has said, “Wherever it commits aggression, it puts a new noose around its neck. It is besieged ring upon ring by the people of the whole world.”22
When committing aggression in a foreign country, U.S. imperialism can only employ part of its forces, which are sent to fight an unjust war far from their native land and therefore have a low morale, and so U.S. imperialism is beset with great difficulties. The people subjected to its aggression are having a trial of strength with U.S. imperialism neither in Washington or New York, neither in Honolulu nor Florida, but are fighting for independence and freedom on their own soil. Once they are mobilized on a broad scale, they will have inexhaustible strength. Thus superiority will belong not to the United States but to the people subjected to its aggression. The latter, though apparently weak and small, are really more powerful than U.S. imperialism.
The struggles waged by the different peoples against U.S. imperialism reinforce each other and merge into a torrential world-wide tide of opposition to U.S. imperialism. The more successful the development of people’s war in a given region, the larger the number of U.S. imperialist forces that can be pinned down and depleted there. When the U.S. aggressors are hard pressed in one place, they have no alternative but to loosen their grip on others. Therefore, the conditions become more favourable for the people elsewhere to wage struggles against U.S. imperialism and its lackeys.
Everything is divisible. And so is this colossus of U.S. imperialism. It can be split up and defeated. The peoples of Asia, Africa and Latin America and other regions can destroy it piece by piece, some striking at its head and others at its feet. That is why the greatest fear of U.S. imperialism is that people’s wars will be launched in different parts of the world, and particularly in Asia, Africa and Latin America, and why it regards people’s war as a mortal danger.
U.S. imperialism relies solely on its nuclear weapons to intimidate people. But these weapons cannot save U.S. imperialism from its doom. Nuclear weapons cannot be used lightly. U.S. imperialism has been condemned by the people of the world for its towering crime of dropping two atom bombs on Japan. If it uses nuclear weapons again, it will become isolated in the extreme. Moreover, the U.S. monopoly of nuclear weapons has long been broken; U.S. imperialism has these weapons, but others have them too. If it threatens other countries with nuclear weapons, U.S. imperialism will expose its own country to the same threat. For this reason, it will meet with strong opposition not only from the people elsewhere but also inevitably from the people in its own country. Even if U.S. imperialism brazenly uses nuclear weapons, it cannot conquer the people, who are indomitable.
However highly developed modern weapons and technical equipment may be and however complicated the methods of modern warfare, in the final analysis the outcome of a war will be decided by the sustained fighting of the ground forces, by the fighting at close quarters on battlefields, by the political consciousness of the men, by their courage and spirit of sacrifice. Here the weak points of U.S. imperialism will be completely laid bare, while the superiority of the revolutionary people will be brought into full play. The reactionary troops of U.S. imperialism cannot possibly be endowed with the courage and the spirit of sacrifice possessed by the revolutionary people. The spiritual atom bomb which the revolutionary people possess is a far more powerful and useful weapon than the physical atom bomb.
Vietnam is the most convincing current example of a victim of aggression defeating U.S. imperialism by a people’s war. The United States has made South Vietnam a testing ground for the suppression of people’s war. It has carried on this experiment for many years, and everybody can now see that the U.S. aggressors are unable to find a way of coping with people’s war. On the other hand, the Vietnamese people have brought the power of people’s war into full play in their struggle against the U.S. aggressors. The U.S. aggressors are in danger of being swamped in the people’s war in Vietnam. They are deeply worried that their defeat in Vietnam will lead to a chain reaction. They are expanding the war in an attempt to save themselves from defeat. But the more they expand the war, the greater will be the chain reaction. The more they escalate the war, the heavier will be their fall and the more disastrous their defeat. The people in other parts of the world will see still more clearly that U.S. imperialism can be defeated, and that what the Vietnamese people can do, they can do too.
History has proved and will go on proving that people’s war is the most effective weapon against U.S imperialism and its lackeys. All revolutionary people will learn to wage people’s war against U.S. imperialism and its lackeys. They will take up arms, learn to fight battles and become skilled in waging people’s war, though they have not done so before. U.S. imperialism like a mad bull dashing from place to place, will finally be burned to ashes in the blazing fires of the people’s wars it has provoked by its own actions.
The Khrushchev revisionists have come to the rescue of U.S. imperialism just when it is most panic-stricken and helpless in its efforts to cope with people’s war. Working hand in glove with the U.S. imperialists, they are doing their utmost to spread all kinds of arguments against people’s war and, wherever they can, they are scheming to undermine it by overt or covert means.
The fundamental reason why the Khrushchev revisionists are opposed to people’s war is that they have no faith in the masses and are afraid of U.S. imperialism, of war and of revolution. Like all other opportunists, they are blind to the power of the masses and do not believe that the revolutionary people are capable of defeating imperialism. They submit to the nuclear blackmail of the U.S. imperialists and are afraid that, if the oppressed peoples and nations rise up to fight people’s wars of the people of socialist countries repulse U.S. imperialist aggression, U.S. imperialism will become incensed, they themselves will become involved and their fond dream of Soviet-U.S. co-operation to dominate the world will be spoiled.
Ever since Lenin led the great October Revolution to victory, the experience of innumerable revolutionary wars has borne out the truth that a revolutionary people who rise up with only their bare hands at the outset finally succeed in defeating the ruling classes who are armed to the teeth. The poorly armed have defeated the better armed. People’s armed forces, beginning with only primitive swords, spears, rifles and hand-grenades, have in the end defeated the imperialist forces armed with modern aeroplanes, tanks, heavy artillery and atom bombs. Guerrilla forces have ultimately defeated regular armies. “Amateurs” who were never trained in any military schools have eventually defeated “professionals” graduated from military academies. And so on and so forth. Things stubbornly develop in a way that runs counter to the assertions of the revisionists, and facts are slapping them in the face.
The Khrushchev revisionists insist that a nation without nuclear weapons is incapable of defeating an enemy with nuclear weapons, whatever methods of fighting it may adopt. This is tantamount to saying that anyone without nuclear weapons is destined to come to grief, destined to be bullied and annihilated, and must either capitulate to the enemy when confronted with his nuclear weapons or some under the “protection” of some other nuclear power and submit to its beck and call. Isn’t this the jungle law of survival par excellence? Isn’t this helping the imperialists in their nuclear blackmail? Isn’t this openly forbidding people to make revolution?
The Khrushchev revisionists assert that nuclear weapons and strategic rocket units are decisive while conventional forces are insignificant, and that a militia is just a heap of human flesh. For ridiculous reasons such as these, they oppose the mobilization of and reliance on the masses in socialist countries to get prepared to use people’s war against imperialist aggression. They have staked the whole future of their country on nuclear weapons and are engaged in a nuclear gamble with U.S. imperialism, with which they are trying to strike a political deal. Their theory of military strategy is the theory that nuclear weapons decide everything. Their line in army building is the bourgeois line which ignores the human factor and sees only the material factor and which regards technique as everything and politics as nothing.
The Khrushchev revisionists maintain that a single spark in any part of the world may touch off a world nuclear conflagration and bring destruction to mankind. If this were true, our planet would have been destroyed time and time again. There have been wars of national liberation throughout the twenty years since World War II. But has any single one of them developed into a world war? Isn’t it true that the U.S. imperialists’ plans for a world war have been upset precisely thanks to the wars in Asia, Africa, and Latin America? By contrast, those who have done their utmost to stamp out the “sparks” of people’s war have in fact encouraged U.S. imperialism in its aggression and wars.
The Khrushchev revisionists claim that if their general line of “peaceful coexistence, peaceful transition and peaceful competition” is followed, the oppressed will be liberated and “a world without weapons, without armed forces and without wars” will come into being. But the inexorable fact is that imperialism and reaction headed by the United States are zealously priming their war machine and are daily engaged in sanguinary suppression of the revolutionary peoples and in the threat and use of armed force against independent forces. The kind of rubbish peddled by the Khrushchev revisionists has already taken a great toll of lives in a number of countries. Are these painful lessons, paid for in blood, still insufficient? The essence of the general line of the Khrushchev revisionists is nothing other than the demand that all the oppressed peoples and nations and all the countries which have won independence should lay down their arms and place themselves at the mercy of the U.S. imperialists and their lackeys who are armed to the teeth.
“While magistrates are allowed to burn down houses, the common people are forbidden even to light lamps.” Such is the way of the imperialists and reactionaries. Subscribing to this imperialist philosophy, the Khrushchev revisionists shout at the Chinese people standing in the forefront of the fight for world peace: “You are bellicose!” Gentlemen, your abuse adds to our credit. It is this very “bellicosity” of ours that helps to prevent imperialism from unleashing a world war. The people are “bellicose” because they have to defend themselves and because the imperialists and reactionaries force them to be so. It is also the imperialists and reactionaries who have taught the people the arts of war. We are simply using revolutionary “bellicosity” to cope with counter-revolutionary bellicosity. How can it be argued that the imperialists and their lackeys may kill people everywhere, while the people must not strike back in self-defence or help one another? What kind of logic is this? The Khrushchev revisionists regard the imperialists like Kennedy and Johnson as “sensible” and describe us together with all those who dare to carry out armed defence against imperialist aggression as “bellicose.” This has revealed the Khrushchev revisionists in their true colours as the accomplices of imperialist gangsters.
We know that war brings destruction, sacrifice and suffering on the people. But the destruction, sacrifice and suffering will be much greater if no resistance is offered to imperialist armed aggression and the people become willing slaves. The sacrifice of a small number of people in revolutionary wars is repaid by security for whole nations, whole countries and even the whole of mankind; temporary suffering is repaid by lasting of even perpetual peace and happiness. War can temper the people and push history forward. In this sense, war is a great school.
When discussing World War I, Lenin said,
“The war has brought hunger to the most civilized countries, to those most culturally developed. On the other hand, the war, as a tremendous historical process, has accelerated social development to an unheard-of degree.”23
He added,
“War has shaken up the masses, its untold horrors and suffering have awakened them. War has given history momentum and it is now flying with locomotive speed.”24
If the arguments of the Khrushchev revisionists are to be believed, would not that make Lenin the worst of all “bellicose elements”?
In diametrical opposition to the Khrushchev revisionists, the Marxist-Leninists and revolutionary people never take a gloomy view of war. Our attitude towards imperialist wars of aggression has always been clear-cut. First, we are against them, and secondly, and secondly, we are not afraid of them. We will destroy whoever attacks us. As for revolutionary wars waged by the oppressed nations and peoples, so far from opposing them, we invariably give them firm support and active aid. It has been so in the past, it remains so in the present and, when we grow in strength as time goes on, we will give them still more support and aid in the future. It is sheer day-dreaming for anyone to think that, since our revolution has been victorious, our national construction is forging ahead, our national wealth is increasing and our living conditions are improving, we too will lose our revolutionary fighting will, abandon the cause of world revolution and discard Marxism-Leninism and proletarian internationalism. Of course, every revolution in a country stems from the demands of its own people. Only when the people in a country are awakened, mobilized, organized and armed can they overthrow the reactionary rule of imperialism and its lackeys through struggle; their role cannot be replaced or taken over by any people from outside. In this sense, revolution cannot be imported. But this does not exclude mutual sympathy and support on the part of revolutionary peoples in their struggles against the imperialists and their lackeys. Our support and aid to other revolutionary peoples serves precisely to help their self-reliant struggle.
The propaganda of the Khrushchev revisionists against people’s war and the publicity they give to defeatism and capitulationism tend to demoralize and spiritually disarm revolutionary people everywhere. These revisionists are doing what the U.S. imperialists are unable to do themselves and are rendering them great service. They have greatly - encouraged U.S. imperialism in its war adventures. They have completely betrayed the Marxist-Leninist revolutionary theory of war and have become betrayers of people’s war.
To win the struggle against U.S. imperialism and carry people’s wars to victory, the Marxist-Leninists and revolutionary people throughout the world must resolutely oppose Khrushchev revisionism.
Today, Khrushchev revisionism has a dwindling audience among the revolutionary people of the world. Wherever there is armed aggression and suppression by imperialism and its lackeys, there are bound to be people’s wars against aggression and oppression. It is certain that such wars will develop vigorously. This is an objective law independent of the will of either the U.S. imperialists or the Khrushchev revisionists. The revolutionary people of the world will sweep away everything that stands in the way of their advance. Khrushchev is finished. And the successors to Khrushchev revisionism will fare no better. The imperialists, the reactionaries and the Khrushchev revisionists, who have all set themselves against people’s war, will be swept like dust from the stage of history by the mighty broom of the revolutionary people.
Great changes have taken place in China and the world in the twenty years since the victory of the War of Resistance Against Japan, changes that have made the situation more favourable than ever for the revolutionary people of the world and more unfavourable than ever for imperialism and its lackeys.
When Japanese imperialism launched its war of aggression against China, the Chinese people had only a very small people’s army and a very small revolutionary base area, and they were up against the biggest military despot of the East. Yet even then, Comrade Mao Zedong said that the Chinese people’s war could be won and that Japanese imperialism could be defeated. Today, the revolutionary base areas of the peoples of the world have grown to unprecedented proportions, their revolutionary movement is surging as never before, imperialism is weaker than ever, and U.S. imperialism, the chieftain of world imperialism, is suffering one defeat after another. We can say with even greater confidence that the people’s wars can be won and U.S. imperialism can be defeated in all countries.
The peoples of the world now have the lessons of the October Revolution, the Anti-Fascist War, the Chinese people’s War of Resistance and War of Liberation, the Korean people’s War of Resistance to U.S. Aggression, the Vietnamese people’s War of Liberation and their War of Resistance to U.S. Aggression, and the people’s revolutionary armed struggles in many other countries. Provided each people studies these lessons well and creatively integrates them with the concrete practice of revolution in their own country, there is no doubt that the revolutionary peoples of the world will stage still more powerful and splendid dramas in the theatre of people’s war in their countries and that they will wipe off the earth once and for all the common enemy of all the people’s, U.S. imperialism and its lackeys.
The struggle of the Vietnamese people against U.S. aggression and for natural salvation is now the focus of the struggle of the people of the world against U.S. aggression. The determination of the Chinese people to support and aid the Vietnamese people in their struggle against U.S. aggression and for natural salvation is unshakable. No matter what U.S. imperialism may do to expand its war adventure, the Chinese people will do everything in their power to support the Vietnamese people until every single one of the U.S. aggressors is driven out of Vietnam.
The U.S. imperialists are now clamouring for another trial of strength with the Chinese people, for another large-scale ground war on the Asian mainland. If they insist on following in the footsteps of the Japanese fascists, well then, they may do so, if they please. The Chinese people definitely have ways of their own for coping with a U.S. imperialist war of aggression. Our methods are no secret. The most important one is still mobilization of the people, reliance on the people, making every one a soldier and waging a people’s war.
We want to tell the U.S. imperialists once again that the vast ocean of several hundred million Chinese people in arms will be more than enough to submerge your few million aggressor troops. If you dare to impose war on us, we shall gain freedom of action. It will then not be up to you to decide how the war will be fought. We shall fight in the ways most advantageous to us to destroy the enemy and wherever the enemy can be most easily destroyed. Since the Chinese people were able to destroy the Japanese aggressors twenty years ago, they are certainly still more capable finishing off the U.S. aggressors today. The naval and air superiority you boast about cannot intimidate the Chinese people, and neither can the atom bomb you brandish at us. If you want to send troops, go ahead, the more the better. The will annihilate as many as you can send, and can even give you receipts. The Chinese people are a great, valiant people. We have the courage to shoulder the heavy burden of combating U.S. imperialism and to contribute our share in the struggle for final victory over this most ferocious enemy of the people of the world.
It must be pointed out in all seriousness that after the victory of the War of Resistance Taiwan was returned to China. The occupation of Taiwan by U.S. imperialism is absolutely unjustified. Taiwan province is an inalienable part of Chinese territory. The U.S. imperialists must get out of Taiwan. The Chinese people are determined to liberate Taiwan.
In commemorating the 20th anniversary of victory in the War of Resistance Against Japan, we must also point out in all solemnity that the Japanese militarists fostered by U.S. imperialism will certainly receive still severer punishment if they ignore the firm opposition of the Japanese people and the people of Asia, again indulge in their pipe-dreams and resume their old road of aggression in Asia.
U.S. imperialism is preparing a world war. But can this save it from its doom? World War I was followed by the birth of the socialist Soviet Union. World War II was followed by the emergence of a series of socialist countries and many nationally independent countries. If the U.S. imperialists should insist on launching a third world war, it can be stated categorically that many more hundreds of millions of people will turn to socialism; the imperialists will then have little room left on the globe; and it is possible that the whole structure of imperialism will collapse.
We are optimistic about the future of the world. We are confident that the people will bring to an end the epoch of wars in human history. Comrade Mao Zedong pointed out long ago that war, this monster, “will be finally be eliminated by the progress of human society, and in the not too distant future too. But there is only one way to eliminate it, and that is to oppose war with war, to oppose counter-revolutionary war with revolutionary war.”25
All people’s suffering from U.S. imperialist aggression, oppression and plunder, unite! Hold aloft the just banner of people’s war and fight for the cause of world peace, national liberation, people’s democracy and socialism! Victory will certainly go to the people of the world!
Long live the victory of people’s war!