by Edgar Snow
Doubtless this tome would not have suffered (and the reader would have profited) if I had omitted several whole chapters. Revision was not easy, and I daresay someone less connected with the subject could have done it with less pain to himself and with more grace for the reader.
And so, salutations and thanks to all persons mentioned in this book for their help and permission to use their remarks and photographs, especially Mao Tse-tung; to John Fairbank, for taking one more look at these ancient spoor, to Peter J. Seybolt for a reappraisal against a background of far wider perspective than we could know in the thirties; to Enrica Collotti Pischel, for painstaking scholarship in translating into Italian and bringing up to date the 1965 edition (Stella rossa sulla Cina) which inspired this effort; and to Mary Heathcote, Trudie Schafer, and Lois Wheeler for assistance and encouragement in general.
Edgar Snow
Geneva, February 14,1968
Chronology: 125 Years of Chinese Revolution
I. Last Days of the Monarchy
1840–42 The “Opium Wars,” during which Great Britain forcibly opens China to foreign trade. They are followed by the granting of territorial concessions and rights of inland navigation and missionary activity. The British take Hongkong.
1860 China accepts Russian annexation of eastern Siberia.
1864 Near-victorious T’ai-p’ing (Great Peace) Rebellion crushed by Sino-Manchu forces under General Tseng Kuo-fan, helped by British army regulars and mixed European and American mercenaries. Chinese revolution “postponed sixty years.” Following French penetration and seizure of Indochina (1862), encroachments increasingly reduce the Manchu-Chinese Empire to semicolonial status.
1866 Sun Yat-sen (founder of Kuomintang, or Nationalist Party, 1912) born in Kwangtung province.
1868 Czarist Russia annexes Bokhara and begins penetration toward Chinese Turkestan.
1869 Suez Canal completed.
1870 Lenin born. 1874 Churchill born.
1879 Ch’en Tu-hsiu (first general secretary, 1921–27, of Kungch’antang, or Chinese Communist Party) born in Anhui province. Rapid expansion of French and British colonial empires in Africa.
1883–85 Franco-Chinese War. Chinese troops in Indochina, defending Peking’s claim to suzerainty there, are defeated. France also acquires new territorial-political concessions in China. Britain ends China’s suzerainty in Burma.
1889 Cecil Rhodes establishes British South African Company.
1893 Mao Tse-tung born in Hunan province. France extends its Indo-chinese colonial power to Laos and Cambodia.
1894–95 Sino-Japanese War. China forced to cede Taiwan (Formosa) to Japan and abandon ancient claims to suzerainty over Korea.
1898 “Hundred Days Reform” under Emperor Kuang Hsu. Empress Dowager Tz’u Hsi imprisons Kuang Hsu and returns to power, to remain real ruler till her death (1909). United States defeats Spain, takes Philippines.
1899 “Open Door” doctrine proclaimed by U.S.A.; “equal opportunity” for foreign powers in the economic and commercial “development” of China.
1900 So-called Boxer Rebellion. Antiforeign uprising. Allied reprisals include mass executions, crushing indemnities, new concessions, legalized foreign garrisons between Tientsin and Peking, etc. Czarist Russia takes China’s port of Talien (Dairen), builds naval base (Port Arthur), acquires railway concessions across China’s three northeastern provinces (Manchuria). Mao Tse-tung works as laborer on his father’s farm.
1902 Anglo-Japanese alliance.
1901–05 Russo-Japanese War. Japan gets Port Arthur, Dairen, Russia’s concessions in South Manchuria (China), and additional “rights.” Dr. Sun Yat-sen forms revolutionary Alliance Society in Tokyo.
1905 First Russian Revolution.
1911 Republican revolution (the “First Revolution”) overthrows Manchu power in Central and South China. At Nanking, Sun Yat-sen declared president of provisional government, first Chinese Republic. Student Mao Tse-tung joins rebel army; resigns after six months, thinking “revolution over.”
II. The Republic and the Warlords (1912–27)
1912 Rulers of Manchu Dynasty formally abdicate. Sun Yat-sen resigns in favor of Yuan Shih-k’ai, as president of the Republic of China. Peking is its capital. Kuomintang (Nationalists) dominates first parliament, forms cabinet. Italy takes Libya.
1912–14 Provisional constitution and parliament suspended by militarist Yuan Shih-k’ai, who becomes dictator. Japan imposes “Twenty-one Demands,” their effect to reduce China to vassal state. Yuan Shih-k’ai accepts most of the demands. Cabinet resigns. European war begins. Japan seizes Tsingtao, German colony in China. Mao first studies books by Western scholars.
1915 New Youth (Hsin Ch’ing-nien) magazine, founded by Ch’en Tu-hsiu, becomes focus of revolutionary youth, and popularizes written vernacular (pai-hua) language; death knell of Confucian classicism. Mao Tse-tung becomes New Youth contributor, under pseudonym. Yuan Shih-k’ai attempts to re-establish monarchy, with himself as emperor.
1916 Second (Republican) Revolution: overthrow of “Emperor” Yuan Shih-k’ai by “revolt of the generals” led by Tsai O. Nullification of Yuan’s acceptance of Japan’s “Twenty-one Demands.” Era of warlords begins.
1917 Peking “shadow government” declares war on Germany. Generalissimo Sun Yat-sen, heading separate provisional regime in Canton, also declares war. In Hunan, Mao Tse-tung becomes co-founder of radical youth group, New People’s Study Society. The October Revolution occurs in Russia.
1918 End of First World War. Mao Tse-tung graduates from Hunan First Normal School, aged twenty-five. He visits Peking; becomes assistant to Li Ta-chao, librarian of Peking University. Li Ta-chao and Ch’en Tu-hsiu establish Marxist study society, which Mao joins. All three later become founders of Chinese Communist Party.
1918–19 175,000 laborers sent overseas to help allies; 400 “Work-Study” student interpreters include Chou En-lai. Mao Tse-tung accompanies students to Shanghai. Back in Hunan, Mao founds Hsiang Chiang Review, anti-imperialist, antimilitarist, pro-Russian Revolution.
1919 May Fourth Movement. Nationwide student demonstrations against Versailles Treaty award of Germany’s China concessions to Japan. Beginning of modern nationalist movement. Hungarian (Bela Kun) Communist-led social revolution suppressed.
1920 Mao Tse-tung organizes Hunan Branch of Socialist Youth Corps; among its members, Liu Shao-ch’i. Mao marries Yang K’ai-hui, daughter of his esteemed ethics professor at normal school. Mao helps found Cultural Book Study Society. League of Nations established.
1921 Chinese Communist Party formally organized at First Congress, Shanghai. Mao participates; is chosen secretary of CP of Hunan. Ts’ai Ho-sen, Chou En-lai, and others form Communist Youth League in Paris. Revolution in Mongolia.
1922 Sun Yat-sen agrees with Lenin’s representative to accept Soviet aid and form united front with CCP; Communists may now hold joint membership in Kuomintang, led by Sun. Washington Conference restores Germany’s colony to China.
III. Nationalist (or Great) Revolution: Kuomintang-Communist United Front (1923–27)
1923 Agreement between Sun Yat-sen and Adolf Joffe provides basis for KMT-CCP-CPSU alliance. At Third Congress of CCP, in Canton, Mao Tse-tung elected to Central Committee and chief of organization bureau.
1924 First Congress of Kuomintang approves admission of Communists. Mao Tse-tung elected an alternate member, Central Executive Committee, Kuomintang. Lenin dies.
1925 Mao returns to Hunan, organizes peasant support for Nationalist (Liberation) Expedition. Writes his first “classic,” Analysis of Classes in Chinese Society (published 1926). Sun Yat-sen dies. Russian advisers choose Chiang Kai-shek as commander-in-chief. “Universal suffrage” in Japan.
1926 Nationalist Revolutionary Expedition launched from Canton under supreme military command of Chiang Kai-shek. Mao, back in Canton, becomes deputy director Kuomintang Peasant Bureau and Peasant Movement Training Institute; he heads agit-prop department. Nationalist-Communist coalitio
n forces conquer most of South China. Communist-led Indonesian revolution suppressed by Dutch.
IV. First Communist-Nationalist Civil War (1927–37)
1927 Stalin victorious over Trotsky. In March, Mao Tse-tung publishes his Report of an Investigation into the Peasant Movement in Hunan; calls poor peasants “main force” of revolution, demands confiscation of landlords’ land. Thesis rejected by Communist Party Central Committee. In April, Chiang Kai-shek leads anti-Communist coup, “beheads Party”; Communist membership reduced, by four-fifths, to 10,000. Ch’en Tu-hsiu deposed as CCP secretary. Party driven underground. Mao leads peasant uprising in Hunan (August); defeated, he flees to mountain stronghold, Chingkangshan. Nanchang Uprising also defeated. Retreat to countryside. Canton (Commune) Uprising fails. P’eng P’ai leads survivors to Hailufeng and sets up Hailufeng Soviet (1927). Sukarno forms Indonesian Nationalist Party.
1928 Chiang Kai-shek establishes nominal centralized control over China under National Government (a Kuomintang, one-party dictator ship). Mao Tse-tung and Chu Teh join forces at Chingkangshan, Hunan, form first “Red Army” of China and local soviet. Paris Peace Pact signed by the great powers, renouncing war “as an instrument of national policy.”
1929 Mao Tse-tung and Chu Teh conquer rural territories around Juichin, Kiangsi, where a soviet government is proclaimed. Communist Politburo, dominated by Li Li-san, remains hidden in foreign-controlled Shanghai. Stock market crash in New York.
1930 Conflict between Mao’s “rural soviet movement” and Politburo leader Li Li-san, who favors urban insurrections. Red Army led by Mao and P’eng Teh-huai captures Changsha, capital of Hunan, then withdraws. Second assault on Changsha a costly failure. Li Li-san discredited by Moscow. Chiang Kai-shek launches first major offensive against the Reds. Mao Tse-tung’s wife and sister executed in Changsha. Gandhi leads nonviolent civil disobedience in India.
1931 Spain declares a Republic. Meeting underground in January, in Shanghai, Central Committee of CCP elects Wang Ming (Ch’en Shao-yu) general secretary and chief of Party. All-China Congress of Chinese Soviets, convened in deep hinterland at Juichin, elects Mao Tse-tung chairman of the first All-China Soviet Government, Chu Teh military commander. In September, Japan begins conquest of Manchuria; Chiang Kai-shek suspends his third “annihilation campaign” against Red Army. End of Great Famine (1929–31) in Northwest China; estimated dead, five to ten million. Wang Ming goes to Moscow. Po Ku heads Shanghai Politburo.
1932 Japan attacks Shanghai, defended by Nineteenth Route Army; unsupported by Chiang Kai-shek, it retreats to Fukien province. Chiang authorizes Tangku Truce, to end Sino-Japanese hostilities. He renews offensive against Kiangsi Soviet; Reds declare war on Japan. Police in Shanghai International Settlement help Chiang Kai-shek extirpate Red underground. Politburo chiefs Po Ku, Lo Fu, Liu Shao-ch’i, and Chou En-lai join Mao in Kiangsi Soviet. Roosevelt elected President of U.S.
1933 Nineteenth Route Army rebels and offers alliance to Reds, which is rejected. Chiang Kai-shek destroys Nineteenth R.A., begins a new campaign against Soviet China. Hitler becomes chancellor of Germany.
1934 Second All-China Soviet Congress re-elects Mao Tse-tung chairman, but Party leadership falls to “Twenty-eight Bolsheviks.” Red Army changes tactics and suffers decisive defeats. Main forces and party cadres retreat to West China.
1935 Politburo meets in Tsunyi, Kweichow, in January; elects Mao Tse-tung effective leader of the Party and army during Long March to Northwest China. In July, Kiangsi Red forces reach Szechuan and join troops under Politburo member and Party co-founder Chang Kuo-t’ao, driven from soviet areas north of Yangtze River. In enlarged meeting of Politburo, Chang Kuo-t’ao disputes Mao’s policy and leadership. Red forces divide; Mao leads southern forces into new base in Northwest China, after one year of almost continuous marching, totaling 6,000 miles. (Chang Kuo-t’ao follows him a year later.) Japan demands separation of two North China provinces, under “autonomous” regime. Japanese troops move into Chinese Inner Mongolia, set up bogus “independent” state. December 9 student rebellion in Peking touches off wave of anti-Japanese national patriotic activity. Italy seizes Ethiopa.
1936 Mao Tse-tung, interviewed by the author in Pao An, Shensi, tells his life story and his account of the revolution, and offers to end civil war to form a united front against Japan. Mao lectures to the Red Army University; his On the Tactics of Fighting Japanese Imperialism and Strategic Problems in Chind’s Revolutionary War become doctrinal basis of new stage of united front against Japan. Spurning Communists’ offer of a truce (first made on August 1, 1935), Chiang Kai-shek mobilizes for “final annihilation” of Reds in Northwest.
The Sian Incident, in December: Chiang Kai-shek “arrested” by his deputy commander-in-chief, Chang Hsueh-liang, exiled Man-churian leader. Marshal Chang insists that Chiang accept national united front against Japan. Following Chiang Kai-shek’s release, and undeclared truce in civil war, Kuomintang opens negotiations with CCP and its “anti-Japanese government” based in Yenan, Shensi.
V. “United Front” Against Japan: The Great Patriotic, or Anti-Japanese, War (1937–45)
1937 In July, Japan massively invades China. Agreement signed for joint Nationalist-Communist war of resistance against Japan. Chinese Soviet Government dissolved but continues as autonomous regional regime; Red Army becomes Eighth Route and New Fourth armies under Chiang’s nominal command. Mao writes theoretical works, On Contradiction and On Practice. Italy leaves the League of Nations.
1938 Mao outlines Communists’ wartime political and military ends and means in On the New Stage, On the Protracted War, and Strategic Problems in the Anti-Japanese Guerrilla War. Chang Kuo-t’ao, expelled from the CCP, enters Kuomintang areas. Mao becomes un disputed leader of Party. Japanese armies overwhelm North China. Nationalists retreat to west. Communists organize partisans far behind Japanese lines. Nazi Germany annexes Austria and Czechoslovakia.
1939 Mao’s On the New Democracy outlines class basis of united front, intimates future coalition government structure. Rapid expansion of Communist cadres and military forces. Hitler-Stalin pact. Germany attacks Poland. With outbreak of European war, China’s struggle begins to merge with the Second World War. Yenan blockaded by Nationalist troops.
1940–41 Breakdown of practical cooperation between Communists and Nationalists follows Chiang Kai-shek’s attack on New Fourth Army. Ch’en Yi becomes its commander. After Pearl Harbor, Kuomintang relies on American aid while Communists vigorously expand guerrilla areas.
1942 CCP “rectification” campaign centers on Wang Ming and Moscow-trained “dogmatists”; Mao’s “native” leadership enhanced.
1943 Mao Tse-tung credited (by Liu Shao-ch’i) with having “created a Chinese or Asiatic form of Marxism.” Attraction of “New Democracy” proves widespread among peasants and intellectuals; Kuomintang morale and fighting capacity rapidly decline. Chou En-lai claims 800,000 Party members, a half-million troops and trained militia, in “liberated areas” exceeding 100 million population. Fascism collapses in Italy. By decree, Stalin abolishes the Comintern.
1944 U.S. Army “observers” arrive in Yenan, Communist “guerrilla” capital. Allied landing in Normandy. President Roosevelt re-elected.
1945 Seventh National Congress of CCP (April) claims Party membership of 1,200,000, with armed forces of 900,000. Germany defeated. Russia enters Far Eastern war; signs alliance with Chiang Kai-shek’s government. Mao’s report On Coalition Government becomes formal basis of Communist demands to end Kuomintang dictatorship. After V-E Day, Communist-led forces flood North China and Manchuria, competing with American-armed Nationalists. U.S. Ambassador Hurley flies Mao Tse-tung to Chungking to negotiate with Chiang Kai-shek. Yalta Pact promises Taiwan to China. Death of Roosevelt. Truman uses atomic bomb on Hiroshima. End of Second World War.
VI. Second Communist-Nationalist Civil War (1946–49)
1946 Nationalists and Communists fail to agree on “coalition government”; in June the Secon
d Civil War, called by the Communists the War of Liberation, begins. Under Soviet Russian Occupation, Eastern Europe “goes Red.”
1947 Mao’s The Present Situation and Our Tasks outlines strategic and tactical plans, calling for general offensive against Nationalists. Truman Doctrine proclaimed in Greece.
1948 Despite U.S. aid to Nationalists, their defeat in Manchuria is overwhelming. Yugoslavia is expelled from Cominform, postwar successor to the Comintern.
1949 As his armies disintegrate, Chiang Kai-shek flees to Taiwan. Over the rest of China the People’s Liberation Army is victorious. In March, the Central Committee of the CCP, led by Mao, arrives in Peking. Atlantic Pact (NATO) proclaimed. U.S. “White Paper” blames Chiang’s “reactionaries” for “loss of China.”
VII. The Chinese People’s Republic (1949–)
1949 Based on Mao’s The People’s Democratic Dictatorship, a People’s Political Consultative Conference is convened, in form representing workers, peasants, intellectuals, national bourgeoisie. Chinese People’s Government organized, with Mao elected chairman. On October 1, Chinese People’s Republic formally proclaimed in Peking. Mao announces foreign policy of “leaning to one side” (toward U.S.S.R.). Great Britain, Soviet Russia, Norway, The Netherlands, Sweden, Finland, Switzerland recognize the new government; the United States withdraws its diplomats from China. Mao Tse-tung leaves for Moscow—his first trip abroad. U.S. Communist Party leaders convicted of advocating violent overthrow of the government.
1950 Mao concludes Sino-Soviet treaty of alliance; Stalin grants China $300,000,000 loan. Korean War breaks out (June) and Chinese “Volunteers” intervene (October). India proclaims independence.
1951–52 With Soviet aid, Chinese resistance in Korea continues. American forces, barred from carrying war into China by U.N. and Allied policies, hold positions at Thirty-eighth Parallel in Korea. First hydrogen bomb exploded (1952) by U.S.A.