68-1 4 ,9 6 5
ESPOSITO, Bruce John, 1941- THE COMINTERN AND THE CANTON COMMUNE.
The American University, Ph. D ., 1968 History, modern
University Microfilms, Inc., Ann Arbor. Michigan
f'' Copyright by BRUCE JOHN ESPOSITO 1968 THE COMINTERN AND THE CANTON COMMtWE
by Bruce John Esposito
Submitted to the
Faculty of the School of International Service
of The American University
in Partial Fulfillment of
the Requirements for the Degree
of
Doctor of Philosophy
in
Far East Area Studies
Signatures of Committee:
Chairman? JX uuce* ifr
Deanof the Semfol'
Date: 1 0
AMERICAN UN1VERSIT' 1968 LIBRARY School of International Service JUN 51968 The American University Washington, D.C. WASHINGTON. D. C TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. INTRODUCTION...... 1
I I . PRELUDE TO THE CANTON COMMUNE: CHINA 1911-1927 .... 5
I H . COMINTERN POLICY TOWARD CHINA 1 9 1 9 -1 9 2 9...... 19
IV. THE CRUCIAL TEARS: 1926-1927 55
V. THE POLITICAL SITUATION IN KWANGTUNG...... 88
VI. BTANGTUNG IN 1927: AN ECONOMIC S U R V E Y ...... 109
V H . DECISION FOR THE CANTON U P R I S I N G ...... 137
7 m . THE CANTON COMMONS ...... 199
IX. MILITARY APPRAISAL OF THE CANTON CO M M U N E...... 176
X. RAMIFICATIONS OF THE CANTON COMMUNE
OUTSIDE CHINA...... 196
XI. RAMIFICATIONS OF THE CANTON COMMUNE
INSIDE C H IN A ...... 219
X II. CONCLUSIONS...... 23U
SEU3CTED BIBLIOGRAPHY...... 237
APPENDIX A. Dramatis Personae: Communists in the Canton Soviet Government ...... 292
APPENDIX B. Map of K w angtung...... 266 CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
The Canton Commune of December, 1927 was a very abort, very violent, but hardly spontaneous mass uprising. For what this communist
fiasco lacked in duration and success, it more than compensated to the
extent that it helped to crystallize the development of communist revolutionary policy in China which remains to this day.
Infrequent references to the abortive u p r is in g do manage to fin d
their way into the contemporary press, indicating that the uprising
attem pt a t Canton re ta in s an honored place in the Chinese Communist
interpretation of history. A popular news magazine recently featured
photographs of dedicated Cantonese workers frolicking on their day off
in the "Memorial Park to the Martyrs of the Canton Commune Uprising."'*'
A Japanese news correspondent traveling in Canton noted among other
graffiti of the Cultural Revolution that the name of Teh Chlen-ying,
an activist in the 1927 Commune, had been erased on the gate leading to 2 the "Memorial Park" —an indication of the ephemeral nature of political
fortune in Communist China for those who find themselves out of step
with the current "line."
Those who planned and carried out the Canton Uprising were
~*Tlme, May 20, 1966, pp. 38-1*0. 2 Sankel Shimbun, October 8 , 1967. 9
2 d e fin ite ly in step w ith the tune being drummed out by Communist In te r national (Comintern) policy makers in Moscow in late 1927. Their only fault was that they failed. Partially as a result of this failure, the
Comintern changed the cadence of the revolutionary march.
The exact nature of the role the Comintern took in the event in
Canton is embroiled in historical controversy. Trotsky and others who formed the Russian Opposition against Stalin were vehement in their accusation that the Comintern under Stalin was directly Involved in
"staging" all facets of the Canton Commune. On the other hand, a recent claim has been made that the uprising was nothing more than an event undertaken by local communists without benefit of permission from either 3 the Chinese Communist Party or the Comintern.
This dissertation traces Comintern policy toward China to deter mine the doctrinal background of the Commune and its implications for policy both inside and outside of China. A search for newly-available sources, as well as a re-examination of other historical materials, strongly indicates that the Canton Commune was a direct outgrowth of specific Comintern involvement in China in 1927* This is not to claim th a t S ta lin e x p lic itly ordered the u p risin g fo r th a t December day. I t is the contention of this dissertation that the Commune was an attempt by communist lead ers in Kwangtung Province to comply w ith p o licy directives clearly set forth by the Comintern prior to December, 1927.
Hsiao Tso-liang, "Chinese Communism and the Canton Soviet of 1927," China Quarterly, No. 30 (April-June, 1967), pp. U9-78. Stalin's destruction of the Russian Opposition had already been accomplished by the time of the Canton Commune, and its occurrence at approximately the same time as the formal expulsion of Trotsky and other
Opposition members from the Russian Party was only coincidental.
The Commune itself is examined against the background of the domestic political and economic climate in China, and particularly in Canton, in 1927» The failure of the uprising is appraised in light of communist insurrection policy and uprising manuals current to the period, and by analysis of contemporary communist criticism of the u p risin g .
The ramifications of the Commune extended greatly beyond its three-day tenure. The reverberations of the uprising affected the
Nationalist Government's diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union, as well as renewing the vigor of anti-communist feeling in the Kuomintang ranks. It also had far-reaching effects on the Chinese Communist Party and ironically helped to stabilize Kuomintang internal politics.
The dissertation has benefited from the valuable documentary c o llec tio n s on the Communist In te rn a tio n a l and Chinese Communism a t the Hoover Institution and the New Tork Public Library. Some new u historical sources in Chinese and the unique Jay C. Huston collection
kjay c. Huston was Acting Consul in charge of the U.S. Consulate in Canton during the latter part of 1927* Consul Huston had a very active interest in communism and secured much material on this subject during his residence in China. This material includes photographs of the Canton Uprising, various personal effects of the Russian Vice-Consul Hassis killed during the revolt, and actual Hung-ch'i (Red Flag) handbills distributed during the insurrection. from the Hoover Institution are also utilized.
It is the intent of this dissertation to accept the challenge of V. Lominadze, a Comintern official assigned to China in 1927, that
"the Canton rising still awaits its historian."^
'’V. Lominadze, "The Anniversary of the Canton Rising," The Communist In te rn a tio n a l, Vol. VI, No. 5 (February 1, 1929), p . 135* CHAPTER I I
PRELUDE TO THE CANTOR COMMUNE: CHINA 1911-1927
The history of China in the period from the Revolution to the end of 1927 w ill be remembered as one in which rival factions struggled to catch the reins of power. This internecine warfare provided the backdrop for the events which led to the Canton Commune.
The October 10, 1911 Revolution dates the beginning of the
Min-kuo or Republican period of modern Chinese history. The attempt to establish and maintain a genuinely unified republican form of government was fraught with great difficulty. The President of the new Republic,
Yuan Shih-k'ai, almost immediately sought to bypass the Provisional
National Assembly established after the abdication of the last Manchu
Emperor. Yuan invested the provincial military leaders with posts as m ilitary governors or tu-tus. In exchange for their semi-autonomous positions, the various tu-tus were expected to maintain themselves without too stringent demands on the Central Government for either military or civilian expenses. The practical effect of this situation was the further deepening of regionalism in China, which had initially taken hold during the Taiping Rebellion . 1 With the death of Yuan in
^Fran* Michael, "State and Society in Nineteenth Century China," World Politics, Vol. VII, No. 3 (April, 1955), pp. Iil9-U33; Franz Michael, "Introduction: Regionalism in Nineteenth Century China," in Stanley Spector, Li Hung-chang and the Huai Army (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 196U), pp. xxi-xliii for a discussion of nineteenth century region alism. For a discussion of the Manchu military establishment on the eve of the Revolution, see Ralph L. Powell, Rise of toe Chinese Military Power 189^-1912 (P rinceton: Princeton U niversity P ress, i9l>8)« passim. 6
1916, the nation embarked on a civil war which would last a decade.
Worth China: 1916-1926
In 1916 Li Tuan-hung was elected President of the Republic, and
he attempted to help Parliament reassert its authority in the face of
the warlords. Li's atten|t failed, and in June of 1917 he was forced to
issue an edict dissolving the Parliament. In the decade following,
three different cliques of warlords struggled for control of Peking,
which remained the home of the Central Government, although its powers
scarcely extended beyond the walls of the city and the territory of the
clique which controlled Peking. The three military cliques were the
Anfu Clique headed by Tuan C h'i-jui, the Fengtien Clique of the warlord
of Manchuria Chang Tso-lin, and the Chihli Clique led by Ts'ao K'un.
Internecine warfare and endlessly changing alliances maintained
the political chaos in North China. From 1918 to 1920 Peking was
controlled by the Anfu Clique, which at the end of that time was ousted
by a temporary alliance of the other two factions. During the next two
years Chang T so -lin 's p arty tended to dominate Peking, but in 1922 i t
was driven out. In 1923 Ts'ao K'un's clique came in, but shared power
with yet another warlord, Wu Pei-fu. In the summer of 192li relative
peace in North China was broken when the Fengtien group joined the
Anfu Clique and seized the Capital. General Feng Yu-hsiang deserted
the Chihli Clique and joined the new political alignment. Tuan Ch'i-jui
was appointed P resid ent of the Republic in November of 192U, but was forced
out in April of 1926 as a result of a war of the Fengtien and Chihli factio n s against Feng Y u-hsiang's army, the Kuo-min chun. L ater, in the summer of 1927, Chang Tso-lin gained sufficient control of Peking to organize a military government with himself as Generalissimo. Chang left Peking in June of 1928 when the Nationalist forces reached the O city and at least nominally reunified China at last.
South China: 1916-1926
Provincial warfare characterized South China in the early years of this decade. It was only when the Kuomintang and its Party-army increased in power, forcing many of the local southern m ilitarists into alliances, that internecine warfare terminated. In the early years of the period, Sun Yat-sen's revolutionary party, the Kuomintang, slowly gained adherents and power in South China. Its political fortunes generally rested on the mercy of one or another particular warlord.
The Kuomintang was about to undergo momentous changes with the t appearance of the Communist International's agent Michael Borodin in
1923. Sun's previous contacts with Comintern agents Georgi Vo it insky in November, 1920 and Maring (Sneevliet) in December, 1921 had not been fruitful. Maring had offered three basic propositions to Sun:
(1) reorganization of the Kuomintang to include wide social elements;
Dorothv Bore. American Policv and the Chinese Revolution 192$ 1928 (N _ .... 13-1*?; Ch * ien Tuan-sheng, the Government and Politics of China (Cambridge: Harvard University P ress, I1950 , pp.&l-BO, U3l-b3U; Y.C. Tang, "China in 1925," The Chinese Social and Political Science Review, Vol. H , No. 2 (April, 1927), pp. 350 jbu; ana rramciln w. Houa, centra.T'Qovemment of China, 1912-1928 (Madison University of Wisconsin Press, 192V). (2 ) establishm ent of a m ilita ry academy to create revolutionary armed forces; and (3) cooperation with the Chinese Communist Party. However, the timing of these proposals had found Sun and the Kuomintang at the height of tbeir power. In effect Sun had ignored Maring1s proposals, but in August of 1922 his ally Ch'en Ch'iung-ming deserted the Kuomin tang, leaving Sun more favorable to agreement with the Russians. Later in August Sun was approached by Adolph Joffe to conclude an alliance with the U.S.S.R. By the end of the month an agreement had been made which perm itted Chinese Communist Party members to jo in the Kuomintang individually, but to retain membership in the Communist Party as well.
The Soviet Union also insisted that the Kuomintang be reorganized. The
Sun-Joffe Agreement of January 26, 1923 formalized what had been agreed upon informally before. To Sun the dominant reason for the alliance was the Party's desire to strengthen itself and then to capture power.^
The intention of the reorganization was to add discipline and central leadership to the Party. In August, 1923, with the arrival of Borodin at Canton, plans to reorganize the Kuomintang using the Russian Commu nist Party as a model were formulated. On January 20, 192U the First
Congress of the Kuomintang was held, and those assembled approved the whole reorganization scheme.
Borodin sot highest priority within the reorganization plan on
^George T. Tu, Party Politics in Republican China: The KMT 1912- 192U (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1966), p. 63.
**Ibld., p. 1 68 . 9
achieving party centrality and a politically disciplined party organi
zation* The Provisional Central Executive Committee (CEC) was charged with drafting plans on party reorganization* After three months the
Provisional CEC submitted a draft of a constitution and a political
program, both of which had actually been drafted by Borodin.^
In his opening speech to the First Congress of the Kuomintang,
Sun detailed the purposes behind the reorganizations strengthening the
effectiveness of the Kuomintang and capitalizing on the Party's strength
to rebuild the nation.^
Sun's decision to create an alliance with the Soviet Union was
virtually unopposed, at least publicly, by Kuomintang members. By
contrast, his decision to admit communists into the Party was challenged
from the very beginning. The opponents rallied at the First Kuomintang
Congress under Feng Tzu-yu and allegedly sponsored a resolution prohib
iting Kuomintang members from entering any other party. If this
resolution had been passed, the communists would have bad to give up
their communist party membership or withdraw from the Kuomintang. At
any rate this opposition, whose members later coalesced into the 'Western
H ills" cliq u e, was overcome. The Chinese Communists were perm itted to
enter the Kuomintang as individuals and s till retain membership in the
Martin Wilbur and Julie Lien-ying How, Editors. Documents on Communism, Nationalism, and Soviet Advisers in China 19l8-19%7 (New York: Columbia University Press, 19I>6)> pp. lUh-lli£. 6 Ibid., p. li*£. Chinese Communist Party. Hong with the political reorganization there was also a military reorganization. In January, Sun appointed Chiang
Kai-shek as Chairman of a preparatory committee charged with organizing the Party academy. Called Whampoa, the academy began to function in
May of 192U. 7 In 192U and 1925 the Kuomintang*s political power expanded through the capture of additional territory in Kwangtung and an alliance D with a powerful Kwangsi military clique. The revolutionary movement was inadvertantly aided by the so-called May 30th Movement of 1925• On that day twelve Chinese students were killed when the Shanghai Inter national Settlement Police, under command of a British officer, fired on a crowd of demonstrators. This resulted in a general boycott of
British trade in China, and a heightening of anti-foreignism. It is alleged that Borodin remarked, "We did not make May 30. It was made 9 for us." This incident also helped to swell the ranks of the Kuomin tang.
On July 1, 1925 the m ilitary government at Canton formally
claimed the title of the Nationalist Government of China. Its armed forces became the N ational Revolutionary Amy. In the new government,
?Ibid., pp. Ui8-150. ®Douglas Jenkins, "Kwangtung, Kwangsi and Kewichow," China Since the Revolution of 1911 (prepared by the Department of State, Division of Far Eastern Affairs) Series D, No. 8I1, China No. Ul (Washington, D.C. U.S. Government P rin tin g O ffice, 1926), pp. U5-U6. ^Owen Mortimer Green, The Story of China's Revolution (London: Hutchinson and Co., 19U5), p. 95. 11 the Nationalists and the communists vied for power and influence.
L eftist elements gained predominance in the Canton Government under
Wang Cbing-wei.
The leftward march of the Canton Government was given an abrupt
about face later. On March 20, 1926 Chiang Kai-shek imagined a real or
fictitious plot against himself, and without consulting Wang Ching-wei,
seized command of the gunboat Chung Shan and arrested a number of
communists and leftists. Chiang also placed several Russian advisers
under house arrest. The situation in Canton remained uneasy until
Borodin agreed to circumscribe the activities of the communists within
the Kuomintang; he also agreed to an early launching date for the
Northern Expedition. In return Chiang agreed to curtail the activities of
the Kuomintang rightists. The outcome, in terms of political polarity
of the Canton Government, was a turn toward the right in policy. Wang
Ching-wei, leader of the left faction of the Kuomintang, had been
discredited by the incident and decided to take one of his frequent
health trips to Europe.*® Thus, with Wang out of the way, Chiang
consolidated h is own p o sitio n , and on June £, 1926 he became Commander- in-chief of the National Revolutionary Army. In early July the
Nationalists finally launched their Northern Expedition to unify the
W ilbur and How, Documents on Communism, N ationalism and Soviet Advisers in China..., pp. £18-221. See also Harold Isaacs, The Tragedy" of the Chinese Revolution, Second Revised Edition (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1 9b2) , Chapter S ix , "Canton: The Coup of March 20, 1926," pp. 89-110 for a detailed study by a writer hostile to Chiang Kai-shek. 12 country. The left flank of the military expedition set its sights toward Wuhan. The goal of the right flank headed by Chiang Kai-shek was to capture Nanking and Shanghai.1^
The C rucial Year: 1927
As 1927 dawned, the civil war in China was. raging. The attempted reunification of the country by the Nationalists' Northern Expedition had carried the Kuomintang armies up the Tangtze Valley into Kiangsi and had begun to threaten Hangchow in Chekiang.
On January 1 the Nationalist Government officially began to function at Wuhan after moving from Canton. The new government at
Wuhan was almost completely dominated by members of the le ft Kuomintang.
Predominant were Sun Fo, Tan Yen-ta, Eugene Ch'en, Soong Ch'ing-ling, and the hidden power Borodin. The primary reason for this political situation was that Chiang was away fighting and was not very well represented. Chiang's rightw ard p o litic a l swing became more evident
in 1927. He developed close ties with such "rightists" as Tai Chi-t'ao,
Wu Chih-hui and Ch'en Kuo-fu. Several explanations are usually offered for this development, including Chiang's innately conservative upbringing, his fear of a social revolution, and most importantly, his increasing dissatisfaction with the communists.
C hiang Chung-cheng (Chiang Kai-shek), Soviet Russia in China: A Summing-up a t Seventy (New York: F a rra r, Straus and Cudahy, 19!>7), pp. U2-bu; and James E. Sheridan, Chinese Warlord: The Career of Feng Yu-hsiang (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 196&), pp. 263-2^9. 13
In March the le ft Kuomintang conference in session at Hankow adopted a series of motions reorganizing the Central Executive Committee
(CEC). This reorganization resulted in the dropping of Chiang and some of his associates from the CEC, which further deepened the split between the two groups. Chiang denounced the Hankow clique and Borodin's activities as attempts to wreck the Kuomintang. 1 2
By la te March Sun Chuan-fang and h is a lly Chang Tsung-chang
(warlords of Shantung and vicinity) were being hard pressed hy Chiang's army and began to withdraw their forces from Shanghai. In this rather vacuous situation there was looting of several foreign owned properties, as well as direct attacks on foreigners at Nanking. The perpetrators of these deeds were never really identified. Foreigners fearing for their lives, especially Americans and Britishers, assembled at the headquarters of the Standard Oil Company from which many were evacuated to foreign gunboats stationed in the nearby Yangtze River. With the appearance of nondescript soldiers who threatened to force their way in to the compound, American and B ritish warships lay down a barrage between "Socony Hill" and the threatening insurgents, and shortly eliminated the threat. The immediate outcome was a steep rise in anti-
British and American feeling in China.^
12 Grover Clark, China in 1927 (Pekingt Peking Leader Press, 1928), p. 1U7.
^Borg, American Policy and the Chinese Revolution 1925-1928, pp. 290-317; Clark, China in 1927, p. 1L7. Also by March Chiang had reached the outskirts of Shanghai and had then unexpectedly stopped his drive for the city. Meanwhile, the workers of Shanghai, expecting Chiang, had risen abortively in the middle of February to protest the excesses of the Garrison Commander
Li Pao-chang. After licking their wounds, the workers rose against
Commander Li again in mid-March and were successful. At this point,
Chiang elected to resume his drive on the city. Perhaps Chiang felt that the proletariat of Shanghai were too closely under the influence of Idle communists and that these uprisings against Li Pao-chang would drastically deplete the power of the workers. Shortly thereafter Chiang began a sanguinary attack on "leftists" and "suspected Communist workers” . lit in Shanghai and Nanking. More than 5,000 suspects were reported killed.
After almost a year abroad, Wang Ching-wei returned to Shanghai in early April; after a conference with Chiang, a new "reconciliation" was announced. However, relations between Chiang and Hankow worsened.
The Hankow Government dismissed Chiang formally from his position as
Commander-in-chief of the Nationalist Armies and expelled him from the various committee positions he held. Hankow relied on the warlord
T'ang Sheng-shih for any military support which might be needed to
Isaacs, The Tragedy of the Chinese Revolution, pp. 130-lbl, 175-185; H. Owen Chapman, The Chinese Revolution (London: Constable and Co., Ltd., 1928), pp. 109-116. 15 counter Chiang Kai-shek.1^
The p o sitio n of the l e f t Kuomintang a t Wuhan was fu rth e r weakened by the termination of the alliance between the le ft Kuomintang and th e Chinese Communist P a rty . On June 1 the Communist In te rn a tio n a l' s representative to the Wuhan Government showed a telegram from Stalin to
Wang Ching-wei which reportedly urged agrarian revolution and the building of a large Chinese Communist m ilitia, A reasonable interpre tation is that the telegram wa3 used as an excuse by Wang for breaking the alliance because the relationship between the Chinese Communist
Party and the l e f t Kuomintang was alread y strain ed and becoming more shaky each day. The Chinese Communist Party tr ie d to f o r e s ta ll th is rupture by agreeing to ease all communist agrarian activities; however, this was not satisfactory to the left Kuomintang and on July 15, the
Wuhan Government formally expelled the communists from the Kuomintang.^
In June both the Kuomintang factions had sought an alliance with
Feng Tu-hsiang, the man who held the balance of power. First, the
Wuhan Government had sent a delegation consisting of Wang Ching-wei,
^'Stenry W.C. Wei, China and the Soviet Onion (Princeton: Van Nostrand Company, Inc., 195b), p. 7 6 ; Wilbur and dow, Documents on Communism, Nationalism and Soviet Advisers in C hina..., pp. 381-^61; Clark, China In 1927,-P. lffi.
^M.N. Roy, Memoirs (Bombay: Allied Publishers PJrivate, Ltd., 196U), p. 176; Stuari Schram, Mao Tse-tung (Middlesex: Penguin Books, Inc., 1966), pp. llU-116; and Jerome Ch'en, Mao and the Chinese Revolution (New York: Oxford University Press, 1965), pp. 121-122. 16
Sun Fo, T'ang Sheng-chih and Chang Fa-kuei to meet with Feng at Cheng chow. The Wuhan leaders conceded to Feng the area in Honan which they had recently conquered. However, Feng conceded nothing in return and the delegates returned empty-handed. Shortly thereafter the forces of
Feng Yu-hsiang reached Hsuchow (the juncture between Feng's and Chiang
Kai-shek's armies). He met with Chiang and it was decided that Feng would send a telegram to Hankow demanding that "radicals" be expelled from the Kuomintang and that Borodin, who had already resigned, should 17 be asked to leave the country. 1
While the Kuomintang factions were squabbling, the northern warlords under Chang T so -lin (including Sun Ch'uan-fang, Ten H si-shen, and nominally Wu Pei-fu) joined to attack the Nationalist forces in 18 July. Partly as a result of some military defeats and policy differences, Chiang's top commanders Ho Ting-sh'en, Li Tsung-jen, and
Pai Chung-hsi refused to take further orders from him. Li and Pai demanded th a t Chiang allow a re c o n c ilia tio n w ith Wuhan. Confronted with the protest, Chiang resigned his various Nanking positions in
August and left for Japan.^
l^Sheridan, Chinese Warlord, pp. 22U-232; Henry Francis Misselwitz, The Dragon Stirs (New York: Harbinger House, l?Ul), pp. 123-12^• 10 Arnold J. Toynbee, Survey of International Affairs 1927 (London: Oxford University Press, 1?£?), pp. 3^7-$$0.
■^Sheridan, Chinese Warlord, p. 233. 17
The efforts to reach a reconciliation between Hankow and Nanking were aided by the "Western Hills" clique, which undertook to act as an intermediary. Joint conferences in Kiu-ling and Nanking resulted in a tripartite reunion of the Party in September at Nanking. A special committee, composed of an equal number-of representatives of the three groups was organized, and was to replace both the CEC elected by the
Congress of the Western H ills group and also the CEC elected by the
Second Congress of the Kuomintang.Temporarily at least, Wuhan was united with Nanking.
The special committee formed named Wang Ching-wei and Chiang
Kai-shek to its membership. Meanwhile, both men had resigned from public life, ostensibly to facilitate the reconciliation of the Party.
T'ang Sheng-chih refused to come to Nanking and reinforced the s till present "independent from Nanking" sentiment at Hankow. Thisreconcil- iation proved too fragile, and by the latter part of September, Wang
Ching-wei, Ku Meng-yu, and others had established a separate political committee at Wuhan in direot defiance of Nanking. By mid-November the advance guard of the Chang Chien - Li Tsung-jen expedition sent by
Nanking against Hankow, entered the city. T'ang Sheng-chih was driven from Hankow, and instead of maintaining himself in the northeast portion of Hunan, he decided to retire to Japan. Almost immediately Li Tsung-
20 Ch'ien Tuan-sheng, The Government and Politics of China, p. 95. 18
Jen and Chang Chien began to feud over political appointments in
Hankow.21
In l a te r November a se rie s of meetings was begun among the various factions at Shanghai. The meetings produced agreement for convening a Kuomintang Prelim inary Conference on December 3, 1927*
At the Preliminary Conference a reconciliation was effected between
Chiang Kai-shek and Wang Ching-wei) perhaps in recognition of the fact that Chiang Kai-shek was the only person who could maintain the unity of the Kuomintang. Wang agreed to support Chiang's nomination as 22 Commander-in-chief of all the Natidnalist military forces. With the election of Chiang and the reunification of the Kuomintang) the
Nationalists were able to continue their expedition north toward Peking.
The occupation of Peking in June of 1928 nominally unified the country.
However) internal political and military maneuvers were not the only determinants of events in China in 1927* Outside influence was felt in the form of foreign concession interests and the Bussian-dominated
Communist International was formulating the role China should take in the scheme of world rev o lu tio n .
2^ciark, China in 1927> pp. 17U-176, 185j Hollington K. Tong) Chiang Kai-shek CShanghai: China Publishing Company, 1937)> p. 19$.
22Tong, Chiang Kai-shek! pp. 196-197; J.B.P. (initials of John B. Pow ell), "Chiang Kai-shek Resumes P o litic a l A c tiv itie s — Canton Goes Red!" China Weekly Review, December 17, 1927, p* 82. CHAPTER I I I
COMINTERN FOLICT TOWARD CHINA 1919-192$
As a background to determination of what role the Communist
International played in the Canton Commune, a study of the evolution
of its policy in regard to China and the Far. East is essential.
Development of a policy toward China was not a burning issue when representatives of the modest number of communist parties of the world met in Moscow in 1919 to form the Communist International. At
the time when Lenin's dream of a world communist organization was being
fulfilled, China did not even have a communist party of its own. When
"the East" figured in early Communist International debates, it was
included under the general heading of "The National and Colonial
Question," and in the early years was more often than not passed over
in discussion in favor of more crucial European issues. It was only
later in the years preceding the Canton Commune (1926 and 1927) that
China became a very real question in its own right.
However, two threads of development of a policy regarding China were evident throughout the periodic sessions of the early Communist
International (Comintern). This chapter will trace the pertinent
discussions and resolutions in Comintern sessions on the development
of these two policies—the united front and the agrarian revolution—
from 1919 to the end of 192$. It w ill become apparent, with a review
of the Comintern sessions during the early years, that the maintenance 20 of a united front policy was always of primary importance, while the agrarian revolution played a subordinate role in the communist scheme of revolution in the East, specifically in China.
Related to these policy issues was a struggle between what may be called "right" and "left" factions, which began to manifest itself as early as the Second Comintern Congress of 1920. These groups were not organized factions in the sense that they had avowed policies and strict membership requirements; indeed those who can be identified as
"members" were probably not even aware of the d e lin ea tio n . N onetheless, an analysis of the period evidences a definite rivalry in the form of vigorous jostling for authorship of Comintern resolutions dealing with the Far East. The "right," whose proponents varied, tended to favor support far not only revolutionary bourgeois-democratic allies, but also f o r the bourgeois-dem ocratic movements in g en eral. In a d d itio n , the "right" generally favored the subordination of the agrarian revolution to the continuation of a united front policy. Advocates of the "left" also varied and veered only toward limited support of even revolutionary bourgeois-democratic movements. They tended to favor agrarian revolution at the risk of foreclosing on the united front strategy.
The work o f the Comintern was c arried out on two le v e ls . On the overt, public level, the Comintern communicated with its parties by means of official resolutions and statements. Communication was also carried out in a covert manner with the use of couriers and secret letters. Few covert documents are available for scholarly inspection, 21 although two such pieces of information are presented In this study.
Therefore, this chapter has been prepared in the main from official documents published by the Communist International or its constituent p a rtie s .
The F irst Comintern Congress
The F ir s t Congress of the Third Communist In te rn a tio n a l was modest in size for an organization with such wide scope and function.
Only fifty-two persons participated in the First Congress, and of these the majority were "non-voting" delegates.* The Congress met for a sh o rt time between March 2 and March 6 , 1919.
The First Congress, enraptured by the success of the October
Revolution, as well as other developments in Europe, believed that the spread of the proletarian revolution was imminent. Lenin, in his closing speech to the Congress, proclaimed:
The movement in favor of the Soviets is spreading wider and wider, not only in the Eastern European, but also in the West European countries, not only in the vanquished, but also in the victorious countries...and this movement...has for its object the creation of a new, proletarian democracy—it is the most important step towards the dictatorship of the proletariat, towards the complete victory of Communism.
^■Included in this "non-voting" group were two representatives of the "Chinese Socialist Workers Party," Lao Hsiu-ehao (Lo Halng-chao) and Chang Tung-kuei. Department of State, Far Easterners in the Comintern Structure (Mimeographed) (1990), pp. 6 -?.
2 V .I. Lenin, Selected Works Vol. Z (New York: In te rn a tio n a l Publishers, 1938)* p. 28. 22
The First Congress was almost exclusively Interested in Europe; It was felt that the world revolution would begin there. Trotsky explained the colonial world's relationship to Europe by saying: The emancipation of idle colonies is conceivable only in conjunction with the emancipation of the working class in the metropolises.3 in other words, the success of the colonial revolution (including that in China) was considered to be dependent upon success of the European revolution.
Between the F irst and Second Congresses of the Comintern there were some disappointments on the international scene for the communists.
Bela Kun's Red Regime in Hungary fa ile d ; the two leading German communists, Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht, were executed. However, this gloom was more than offset by the collapse of Polish armed forces before the Red Army, some m ilitary victories against the White Russian armies, the successful creation of communist or left socialist parties in a number of European countries, and the possibility of the end of
Allied military intervention in Russia.
During this period between the First and Second Congresses, there was much talk in the existant communist parties, e.g. KPD (Spartakist
League) in Germany, that communist participation in a parliamentary system would be unrevolutionary. In response to this tendency, Lenin in 1920 published "Left-Wing Communism: An Infantile Disorder," which
^Leon Trotsky, The F ir s t Five Years of th e Communist In te rn a tio n a l Vol. I (New Tork: Pioneer Publishers, l9h£), p. 25. 23 became the fundamental Bolshevik statement on the question of parlia ment arianism. Lenin stated that when it would be beneficial to the cause, it was an obligation of communists to participate in parliamentary activities.^ Lenin's demand was, in effect, a call for a united front type of policy.
Later, in his discourse on "parliaraentarianism" at the Second
Congress, Lenin urged communists to take part in the parliamentary systems of various nations so that they would increase their strength and the bourgeois character of parliament would be revealed to the masses.^ This tactic of participation in parliaments was an element of the united front, and can be seen as an adumbration of the impending united front policy. It should be noted here that a distinction should be made between the united front policy in the "backward" East and in the "industrialized" Vest, because the history of the application of united front policy would differ somewhat in each area.
In his "Preliminary Draft of Theses on the Agrarian Question" published in June, 1920, Lenin stated that in the non-capitalist countries, the majority of the population clustered in the rural areas; thus the proletariat must make a special effort to organize the revolutionary struggle among the agricultural toilers. Lenin also suggested that in some cases, the communist parties should help form
kLenin, Selected Works, Vol. X, pp. 5£-ll»7
'’I b id ., pp. 2U5-2U8. Soviets of Deputies In rural areas to assist the various types of
agricultural workers (peasants) to fulfill their functions in the 6 class struggle.
In June, a month before the Second Congress was to open, Lenin
asked for criticism and comments on his earlier draft of "Preliminary
Theses on the National and Colonial Question." This offer was accepted
by a recent convert to communism, an Indian named M.N. Boy.
In the Preliminary Theses, Lenin had argued that the central
issue of the world political situation was the struggle of the world
bourgeoisie against the Soviet Russian Republic (plus the advanced workers of the world and the national liberation movements). Thus
Lenin felt that the Comintern must pursue a policy that would effect
the closest possible alliance between the national liberation movements
and Soviet Russia. In order for this to take place, the communist
parties in the backward states must assist the bourgeois-democratic
liberation and render "special assistance" to the peasant movement
against the landlords and feudal manifestations. Lenin further 7 emphasized that the Comintern and its sections "must enter into a
temporary alliance with bourgeois democracy in colonial and backward
6 Ibld., pp. 218- 2 30.
^"Sections" was the Communist In te rn a tio n a l"s parlance f o r the various communist parties. countries, but must not merge with it...." In other words, the
\ communist party in a backward country must s till preserve its indepen dence and the independence of the p ro le ta ria n movement.
The Second Comintern Congress —
The Second Comintern Congress met in an atmosphere of sustained celebration and re g a l elegance. The Congress opened on July 19, 1920 in Petrograd where it held a one-day session and then adjourned to
Moscow where i t resumed work from July 23 to August 7. —More than two hundred delegates attended the Congress, representing approximately forty countries, including several in the Far East. Indian communists were represented by the young revolutionary and recently converted communist
M.N. Roy . 9
At this Congress there took place the famous debates on the
"National and Colonial Q uestion." The policy fin a lly o u tlin ed was to last until 1927. However, it should be noted that this question was only one among several Issues discussed. The other questions considered included Comintern tactics, conditions of affiliation with the International (Twenty-one Conditions), the agrarian question, parliamentarianlsm, and various problems associated with major European communist p a rtie s .
a Lenin, Selected Works, Vol. X, p. 237. £ Revolutionaries in China were represented by Lao Chi-tao (Tal Chi-tao?) and Liao An. Department of State, Far Easterners in the Comintern Structure, pp. 7-B. 10 . Jane Degras, e d ito r. The Communist In te rn a tio n a l 1919-19U3, Vol. I (1919-1922) (London: Oxford University Press, 1956), pp. 109-183« 26
The Second Congress formed a Commission to deal with the 'National and Colonial" question. Lenin delivered the Report of the Commission to the Congress on July 26, and stated that there was much debate on the national and colonial question in the Commission. One controversial question was whether it would be correct, in principle and in theory, to have the Comintern support the bourgeois-democratic movement in the backward countries. The Commission felt that all nationalistic move ments could only be bourgeois-democratic movements, for the bulk of the population were peasants who represented bourgeois-capitalist relations. However, Lenin agreed that a distinction should be made in the bourgeois-democratic movement between reformist and revolutionary groups in the backward countries. In other words, Lenin and the
Commission fe lt that the reformist-bourgeois-democratic movement would only betray the truly revolutionary bourgeois-democratic movement. The conclusion o f the Commission was th a t the only co rrect thing to do would be to make this distinction and to use the term "nationalist- revolutionary" for the term "bourgeois-democratic," eliminating reformist
elements from the definition altogether . 11
M.N. Roy was one of L enin's ch ief antagonists a t the Commission, basing much of what he had to say on the Indian situation. Hence a
"Supplementary Theses" by Roy was adopted by the Second Congress in 27
addition to the "Theses on the National and Colonial Question." Hoy's
"Theses," according to some scholars, differed greatly from the 12 Commission's Theses.
Roy saw in the "dependent countries" two d is tin c t movements which daily grew apart. One was the bourgeois-democratic nationalist
movement, which had a program of political independence under the
bourgeois order; the other was the mass action of the poor and ignorant
peasants and workers for liberation from all forms of exploitation.^
Thus, Roy actually perceived the basic struggle as one between
groups with a bourgeois-democratic character and the workers and poor peasant groups. However, Roy did qualify this analysis by saying:
"For the overthrow of foreign capitalism, which is the first step toward revolution in the colonies, the cooperation of the bourgeois nationalist revolutionary elements is useful.^
12 The editors of M.N. Roy's Mission to China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1963)* pp. 1-6, Robert C. North and Xenia J. Eudin, do not distinguish between the types of bourgeois-democratic movements and accordingly widen the real differences of opinion between Lenin (and the Second Congress) and Roy. Professor North and Mrs. Eudin speak of Lenin's concept as "revolution from above" and Roy's concept as "revolu tion from below" (see pages 12-15), statements which for the early Congresses, oversimplify the problem. Lenin's distinction on the bourgeois-democratic movement was first pointed out by Jane Degras in The Communist International Vol. I, p. 139, and later by John P. Haithcox, "The Roy-lienin Debate on Colonial Policy: A New Interpretation," Journal of Asian Studies XXIII, No. 1 (November, 1963)* PP* 99-101. ^"Supplem entary Theses," House Committee on Un-American A c tiv itie s , The Communist Conspiracy, Section C (Washington: Government P rin tin g O ffice, 1996), p. 72. 28
So in effect, Rpy was saying that in the early stages of revolutionary action, it would be useful to have the assistance of the revolutionary bourgeois-democratic elements, which is what Lenin and the Commission sa id .
Roy did qualify this "cooperation" with a time element, specifying that such cooperation would be applicable only during the period of overthrowing "foreign capitalism." Lenin and the Commission mentioned a specific time qualifier also, in that the Comintern should
"collaborate provisionally with the revolutionary movement of the... backward countries.*.."^ Thus, it seems that the difference between
Roy and Lenin on this point was perhaps one of emphasis, Roy desiring more limited cooperation with the revolutionary-bourgeois-democratic elements than Lenin. Lenin's Report on the Commission to the Congress contained two other points which were of later importance to the Chinese scene. Basing its opinion on the experiences of the Russian communists in the Central Asian Soviet Republics, the Comintern felt that peasants' soviets could and should be established in pre-capitalist countries such as China and India. Thus it was to be the duty of the communist party in these countries to carry on propaganda in favor of the concept of peasants' soviets. The other question was whether the capitalist stage of development of national economy was inevitable far the backward
15 Degras, The Communist International, Vol. I, p. ll»U. 29
countries. The answer of the Congress was in the negative, because
if the proletariat were to carry on "systematic propaganda" (about
socialism-communism), and if the soviet governments (e.g. Soviet Russia) were to render the backward nations all the assistance they could, it might be possible for these nations to skip the capitalist stage.^
The "Theses on the National and Colonial Question" promulgated by the Congress closely reflected the policies of the Commission's
Report. In addition, the Theses revised the First Congress's view
that the Eastern peoples must wait for the European Revolution before
their liberation could take place, and instead substituted the idea 17 that "a joint revolutionary struggle" would overthrow capitalism. iO The Third Comintern Congress was held in Moscow from June 22
to July 12, 1921, and was a gathering of approximately sixty delegates 19 from more than fifty countries.
^Lenin, Selected Works, Vol. I, pp. 2U1-2U3.
17"Theses on the National and Colonial Question," cited in The Communist Conspiracy, Section C, p. 67*
l®The F ir s t Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was held almost concurrently with the Third Congress of the Comintern. The First Congress declared that the CCP "should allow no relationships with other p a rtie s or groups." Thus the Chinese Communists were e ith e r unaware of the decision of the Comintern's Second Congress, which seems very unlikely because of the flow of Comintern visitors to China, or had simply disregarded the decision of the Second Congress, which seems more lik e ly . See C. Martin Wilbur and Ch'en Kung-po, The Communist Movement in China (New York: East Asian Institute of Columbia University, 1966), p. l69* l ? I t i s known th a t the Chinese Communist P arty se n t Chang T 'a i- le i as its (or one of its) representatives. Department of State, Far Easterners in the Comintern Structure, p. U. ' The immediacy of the world revolution had receded. Between the
Second and Third Congresses, the Comintern reported such sectional
defeats as the collapse of the Red Army offense near Warsaw in August,
1920, the failure of the movement of the Italian proletariat in
September, 1920, and the failure of the uprising of the German workers
in March of 1921. The Comintern now felt that the overthrow of
capitalism would require na prolonged period of revolutionary struggle."
At the Congress, the united front tactics fully explicated later
in the year, were adumbrated by the Comintern's calling upon all the
parties affiliated with it to:
enter the unions and from within overcome the reactionary trade union bureaucracy in order to transform the trade unions into revolutionary mass organisations of the prole t a r i a t .
What the Comintern wanted was for the party men to enter the bourgeois-
democratic trade unions and attempt to subvert them into more revolu
tionary organizations. This process was a form of low-level—or as
the slogan of the Third Congress had it—"To the Masses" type of united
front tactic.
20 Theses and Resolutions Adopted a t the Third World Congress of the Communist international (New York: Contemporary Publishing Association, l& l), p. 3 5 . See also Quatre Premiers Congres Mondiaux de l 1 In tern atio n ale Communiste 1919-1923 (P a ris: IdJbraire du tr a v a il, 193W',"pp. ------^^Theses and Resolutions Adopted a t the Third World Congress of the Communist International, pp. 3d-39» 31
At the Congress the main discussion revolved around the tactics of the "March Action" in Germany. The "National and Colonial Question," so hotly debated the year before, was relegated to a few hurried sessions near the end of the Congress. The Comintern's President
Zinoviev's report on the Eastern activities of the Comintern during the year simply stated that:
In the Near East the Council of Propaganda created by the Baku Congress is working. From the point of view of organization, however, much remains to be done. In the Far East the situation is similar.
M.N. Roy, who was also present at this Congress, denounced the casual treatment of, and lack of interest in, the "Colonial Question" as being "pure opportunism" and "more suitable for a congress of the 23 Second International." The differences between Roy and Lenin concerning support for revolutionary bourgeois-democratic movements remained. However, this question was shelved at the Third Congress, with only limited debate on the colonial question being permitted.
The Third Congress adopted a new line stating that "without a revolution in Asia the proletarian world revolution cannot be victorious."^ This new line was evidently supported by Lenin and of course by Roy. However,
22 Edward H a lle tt Carr, The Bolshevik Revolution, Vol. I l l (New Tork: Macmillan Company, 19J>3), p. J#B. 23Ibid., p. 389.
^Demetrio Boersner, The Bolsheviks and the National and Colonial Question (Geneve: Librairle E. Droz, 195"/), p. 166. Roy's main challenger was Trotsky, who chided him for being too provincial. Trotsky declared:
the revolution flows along three channels and of one of them we were reminded by Comrade Roy. The first great channel of revolutionary development is dying Europe. ..£the second is} America.. .the third channel—the colonies.
Trotsky further stated that these channels must not be "counterpoised to one another, fo r the movement flows p a ra lle l among these three 25 channels, and they reciprocally influence one another aU the time."
In his new schema, Trotsky had assigned the underdeveloped areas a great deal more importance than he had during the First Congress.
However, he could not substantially agree with Roy and the official 26 resolution because Trotsky was too deeply European-oriented.
The First Congress of the Toilers of the Far East
The Western allies' invitation to the Washington Conference, scheduled for the spring of 1921, excluded Russia. This exclusion, in part, prompted the Soviet Union to convene its own gathering—the
25 "Summary speech," cited in Trotsky, The First Five Years of the Communist In te rn a tio n a l, Vol. I , pp. 236-237.
26m. n . Roy, Memoirs (Berkeley: A llied P u b lish ers, 196U), p . 515. 33 27 First Congress of the Toilers of the Far East.
This First Congress held a preliminary session at Irkutsk in
December, 1921 and then for some unexplained reason, reconvened the pO meeting in Moscow fo r a month beginning on January 2, 1922. This F ir s t
Congress was convened under the auspices of the Comintern and was chaired by its President, Zinoviev. Safarov, a Russian China specialist, and M.N. Roy were elected to the Presidium, as were three Chinese delegates, none of whom appeared to be prominent in the new Chinese
Communist Party (CCP). In addition 'fco Chinese delegates to the Congress, there were delegates from Japan, Korea, Mongolia, India, the Dutch East 29 Indies, and Central Asia.
The keynote speaker was Zinoviev, who condemned growing American
"imperialistic" influence in the Far East. Zinoviev explained that the revolution in the West, the proletarian revolution, must necessarily
27 By holding a Congress, the Soviet Union also fulfilled its promise made at the Congress of the Peoples of the East at Baku in September, 1920 when the Far Easterners present successfully petitioned for a Far Eastern Congress. The Baku Congress (as it is commonly called) paid scant attention to the Far East, but rather directed its attention toward the Middle East and attempted to stir up anti-British feeling there. E.H. Carr, The Bolshevik Revolution, Vol. 3 (Londons Pelican Books, 1966), pp. 262-2717 The Baku Congress echoed Lenin's peasant tactics of the Second Congress by suggesting that the peasants be viewed as the revolutionary "infantry" in the struggle to establish peasant soviets. Karl A. Wittfogel, "The Legend of Maoism," (Part I), China Quarterly, No. 1 (January-March, I960), p. 10. The support fo r revolutionary-bourgeols-dem ocratic movements was not strongly endorsed by the Baku Congress. Allen S. Whiting, Soviet Policies in China 1917^192U (New York: Columbia University Press, 195U), pp. 7L-75. 28 Carr, The Bolshevik Revolution, Vol. 3, P* 519.
29Whiting, Soviet Policies in China, p. 79. 3U 30 precede the national-democratic revolution in the East. This statement was in disregard of the recent Third Congress declaration but was indicative of the resiliency of the Russian European-oriented revolutionary elite.
During discussions at the Congress, Safarov declared that for
China the first objective must be the national-democratic revolution, hence the East need not wait for the proletarian-revolution in the
West. In this task, the Chinese bourgeois-democratic element, and also the peasantry, could be relied upon to support the national-democratic revolution. It would be the duty of the Chinese Communist Party to support a ll these "bourgeois-democrats11 and the Chinese should proceed to form a national united front against imperialism. However, Safarov warned th e Chinese Communist Party to be a le r t to signs of any compro mise on the part of the bourgeois leaders. Safarov's analysis followed 31 (and clarified) the then current Comintern line on China. The difference in views of Zinoviev and Safarov was lost on the delegates to the Congress who applauded both speakers with equal vigor. The struggle of the "right" against the "left" was in such an embryonic state that no open criticism was voiced by either side.
^Boersner, The Bolsheviks and the National and Colonial Question, p. llU.
31Ibid., p. 115. 3*
The F ir s t Plenum
The First Enlarged Executive of the Comintern met from February 21 to March U, 1922. The colonial question, which had been neglected at the Third Congress, was discussed and a general resolution was adopted.
The resolution called attention to "the great importance of the national revolutionary movements which are ste a d ily developing in the co lo n ial 32 countries...." This statement, in effect, was a minor victory for those who, like Roy, felt the European sections were too little interested in the revolution in the East.
The Fourth Comintern Congress
The Fourth Congress of the Communist International was first convened in Petrograd on November 5, and l a t e r resumed in Moscow to l a s t u n til December 5, 1922. I t was attended by approximately four hundred delegates from fifty nations. This was the last Congress that Lenin attended, as he had been ill previous to it, and he did not take a very active role in it.
The international situation had not improved since the last
Congress so the period of "stabilization of capitalism" was said to be s till in progress. Nollau argues in International Communism and World
32 "Resolution of the ECCI on the Eastern Question," cited in Degras, The Communist In te rn a tio n a l, Vol. I , p. 326.
33 Few of the Far Eastern representatives are known, but it is known that Liu Yen-chin(g) was the delegate from China. Department of State, Far Easterners in the Comintern Structure, p. 7. Revolution that the failure of world revolution, the admitted failure of war communism, and turn to the New Economic Policy in Russia produced a condition in which Soviet Russia needed external peace, and thus directed the Comintern toward more quiet and peaceful policies, i.e. the united front.^
Nollau's general reasoning that the European Revolution's lack of success created the conditions for a united front seem sound, but closer analysis of the evidence would place the appearance of a quasi united front policy earlier (at the Third World Congress). However, the united front policy was definitely the official policy of the
^Gunther Nollau, International Communism and World Revolution (New York: Praeger, 1961), p. 7U* 35 The concept of united front tactics was an implicit admission that the Communist International had been founded on a misconception. The Bolshevik leaders felt that the Revolution in Russia would quickly spread to other nations. When it became obvious that this revolution was not to take place, united front tactics resulted. With the adoption of the united front policy, the concept of deviation was introduced into the Comintern. The collaboration with the social democrats, implied in the concept, was one in which right and left wing were no longer actual positions, but errors in timing. For a party, the united front policy was difficult to follow because it eliminated any stable principle against which action and policy could be measured. The only criterion was the decision handed down from the leaders of the Comintern. Jane Degras summed this up hy saying: "Comintern and Communist Party policies could no longer be judged as orthodox or not by the criterion of content, or their compatibility with the doctrinal canon, but only to the degree to which they conformed with or deviated from Comintern decisions as interpreted at any given time." Jane Degras, "United Front Tactics in the Comintern 1921-1928," International Communism (David Footman, ed.) (London: Qhatto and Windus, I960), p. B. Fourth Congress. The "Resolution on Tactics of the Comintern" required
" a ll Communist p a rtie s and groups to carry out the united fro n t ta c tic strictly because in this present period that alone can give Communists 36 a sure road to winning a majority of the workers.
The colonial question was not the main subject of discussion at the Congress, but did receive a more extended debate than it had at the
Third Congress. The national and colonial "Theses" of the Second
Congress were viewed as a general guideline, but the Comintern recognized that a slightly new situation had arisen. It was believed that there had been a change in the social bases of the colonial revolutionary movement. This change would lead to an intensification of the anti imperialist struggle. The proletariat now had a strong hand in the stru ggle again st im perialism and no longer depended so le ly upon the
"feudal elements and the national bourgeoisie who are prepared to 37 compromise with imperialism."
A rationale for this was the new Eastern slant of Comintern policy as well as the presence of Roy and several other capable Eastern communists—Sultan Zadeh from the Middle East, Sen Katayama from Japan, and Tan Malaka from the Dutch East Indies~who were taking an active part in the debate.
Degras, The Communist International, Vol. I, p. U2l*. The central issue of discussion concerning the East was again
the problem of support for bourgeois-democratic movements. The debate produced two positions. Tan Malaka and Ravesteyn (Dutch delegate)
argued for communist support for bourgeois-democratic allies. Specifically,
Tan and Ravesteyn fe lt that the Javanese communists should be allowed
and even encouraged to cultivate support of the Islamic organization
Sarekat Islam, because such support would stimulate revolutionary 38 feeling among the peasants.
Roy countered that one should not view all semi-colonial countries
in the same manner. He argued that colonial and semi-colonial countries
could be divided into three categories: (1) countries with highly
developed native capitalism and a class-conscious bourgeoisie; (2) countries with only very flight capitalist development and feudal predominance; 39 and (3) primitive countries with feudal patriarchalism. In the first
type of country, Roy explained, the national bourgeoisie was already
counter-revolutionary and was allied with the imperialists. In the
second type, the feudal class was allied with imperialism and the
bourgeoisie wavered. In the third type, the feudal class, because of
^ Communist P arty of G reat B rita in , Fourth Congress of the Communist In te rn a tio n a l (London: n .p ., 192b), pp. 20U-20&; Boersner, The Bolsheviks and the National and Colonial Question, pp. 12U-126.
^Boersner, The Bolsheviks and the National and Colonial Question, p. 126. the very backward conditions, could play a revolutionary role.^0 Roy evidently placed China in category two, hence his reluctance to support any bourgeois-dem ocratic movements th e re . Roy concluded th a t what was needed were "political parties, not bourgeois political parties, but political parties which w ill express and reflect the demands, interests, Ul aspirations, of the masses of the people, peasants, and workers...."
Thus Roy in general was for only limited cooperation with bourgeois- democratic elements because of their basic incompatibility of interests with the proletariat and the peasantry.
The distinction between reformist and revolutionary bourgeois-
democratic movements made a t the Second Congress was b lu rred . The
Fourth Congress's "Theses on Tactics" declared:
The Communist p a rtie s of the colonial and sem i-colonial countries of the East, which are still in a more or less embryonic stage, must take part in every movement which gives them access to the masses.!**
Thus the new lin e , one of an a n ti-im p e ria lis t united fro n t, favored
the Malaka-Ravesteyn viewpoint and was to last until 1928. However,
the communist parties of the Eastern countries were warned to remain
politically independent, and were impressed wiih the fact that the U3 agreements with "bourgeois democracy" were only "temporary."
liO .Ibid
Congress of the Communist In te rn a tio n a l, p. 211
Degras, The Communist International, Vol. I, p. 390. The Third Plenum
The Third Plenum of the Communist In te rn a tio n a l was held in ltU Moscow from June 12 to June 23, 1923. The main interest of the Plenum
lay in the various problems with which several European communist
parties were faced. The tactics of the united front were debated and £ their correctness reaffirmed. It is possible that some short statements
about the East were made at this Plenum; however, to date documents which might contain these statements have not been located.
By the time the Fifth Comintern Congress was to take place, a
decision of the Second Congress of the Chinese Communist Party in the
summer of 1922 had dropped its earlier non-compromise policy in order U6 to cooperate w ith the Kuomintang. At the Third Chinese Communist
Party Congress, there was proclaimed the "Resolution on the National
Movement and the Kuomintang" which called for cooperation with the U7 Kuomintang, i.e. united front. Later the First Congress of the
reorganized Kuomintang in January, 192U adopted the slogan of "three
great policies," one of which was alliance with the Chinese Communist
P arty .
^The Second Enlarged Plenum (June 7-11, 1922) was mainly concerned with problems of the European parties. If the Plenum made any statements on the national and colonial question, it has not been located.
^Degras, The Communist International, Vol. II, p. 28.
^W ilbur and Ch'en, The Communist Movement in China, p. 128 U7 Warren Kuo, A nalytical H istory o f Chinese Communist Party (Taipei: Institute for International Relations, 1966), pp. 336-307 The Fifth Comintern Congress
The Fifth Congress was the first one to meet without the guidance of Lenin. It was held in Moscow from June 17 to July 8, 192b and was attended by more than five hundred delegates from approximately fifty countries. Most of the Far Eastern countries were represented, I p and Ching Rua (pseudonym?) was the Chinese Communist P a rty 's delegate.
The Fifth Congress again concerned itself mainly with events in Europe. Tet it reminded its sections that:
the Communist In te rn a tio n a l is an organization fo r world revolution. But as a result of a number of special circum stances the attention of the Comintern has been claimed in far too great a degree by the West. Far greater attention than before must be paid to work in the East....**9
Whether th e members who drew up th is reso lu tio n knew i t or n o t, th e ir words had a prophetic quality.
One of the most significant results of the Congress, tied in part to the Stalin-Opposition struggle, was the bolshevization of the various communist p a rtie s . Communist p a rtie s had to have several
"basic features of a genuine bolshevik party," such as "being a centralized party permitting no fraction, tendencies or groups..."; "the party must be a real mass party..."; "it must be capable of manoeuvre"; and "it must be revolutionary, Marxist in n ature...."^
Department of State, Far Easterners in the Comintern Structure, p. 17. U9 Degras, The Communist International, Vol. II, p. 153. SO Thus, in the future, the various communist parties must strictly use the Party in Russia as a model.
How had the united front worked in practice in the East during the period between the Fourth and the Fifth Congresses? In his report on the national and colonial question, Dimitri Manuilsky, a member of the Presidium of the Executive Committee of the Communist International 51 (ECCI), indicated various successes of the united front policy.
Manuilsky summarized three reasons for placing the colonial question on the agenda. The first reason cited was the accrual of a great deal 52 of "rich experience" of the "Russian Lenin-Stalin way of putting
(enunciating! the national question" since the Second Congress. Secondly, many mistakes had been made by the young communist parties in a number of colonial areas. The last reason offered was that since the 1520
Congress, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics had been established and thus offered new insights into the solution of the national .. 53 question.
^"Report on the National and Colonial Question," cited in The Communist Conspiracy, Section C, p. 16U. See also Ve Congres de l Tfrite r- nationale Comrounisue (Compte Rendu Analytique) (Paris: Liorairie de 1 'Humanite, p. 210. 52 The addition of Stalin's name in this connection was an indication of the degree of control he was attaining in the Comintern. Even though Trotsky was at the Congress, his opponents (Stalin, Bukharin, and Zinoviev) effectively checkmated his actions.
53 "Report on the National and Colonial Question," cited in The Communist Conspiracy, Section C, p. 166; Ve Congres de 1*Internationale Communiste, p. Sl2. Manuilsky went on to say that the Second Congress had dealt essentially with questions of the extent to which the national move ment of colonial peoples could aid the international proletariat, and the extent to which the colonial peoples, supported by the international proletariat, would be able to evade the phase of capitalist develop ment* However, the Second Congress, he sa id , was unable "to recommend concrete methods for the realisation [sicJ of a workers' united front between the proletariat and the colonies." According to Manuilsky, this deficiency had caused four problems^ of which only one was relevant to the Chinese situation.
This problem was the fact that in a number of countries, there had developed non-communist workers' and peasants' parties with a comparatively radical program for their fight against imperialism.
Manuilsky cited the examples of the worker and peasant parties in the
Dutch East Indies and the formation of the Kuomintang in China. In 55 his opinion, cooperation with such parties had been fruitful. However,
The other problems engendered were the Communist P a rty 's relationship to an established national liberation movement of the bourgeoisie in the Middle East, the principles surrounding the problem of self determination, and the question of irredentism between a workers' and peasants' state and a bourgeois state or between two bourgeois states and the position of the Communist Party. "Report on the National and Colonial Question," cited in The Communist Conspiracy, Section C, pp. 167-170' V6 Congres de 1 'In tern a tio n ale Communiste ,~pp. 212-215.
^"Report on the National and Colonial Question," cited in The Communist Conspiracy, Section C, p. 167J V6 Congres de 1 'In tern a tio n ale Communiste, pp. 212-213. uu he warned that the communist parties of the East were:
faced with a two-fold danger: the danger of ignoring the phenomena which are rev o lu tio n izin g the E ast, and the danger of losing their proletarian character by collaboration with the petty bourgeoisie....56
Hence the involved communist parties should exercise awareness of these 57 two equally destructive deviations.
The Fifth Congress adopted a "Theses on Tactics" which indicated that in general the united front tactics furthered the development of 58 communism. The tactics of a united front were defined as "a method of agitation and of revolutionary mobilization of the masses over a period..." implying their tactical nature. The "Theses" further stated:
The tactics of the united front from below are necessary always and everywhere. COne minor exception was noted3 Unity from belcw and at the same time negotiation with leaders (unity;from abovea — this method must frequently be employed in countries where social- democracy is still a significant force....
United front tactics only from above {ifere categorically re je c te d by the CominterrQ
^"Report on the National and Colonial Question," cited in The Communist Conspiracy, Section C, p. 167.
*7Ib id .
58 Degras, The Communist In te rn a tio n a l, Vol. I I , p. 151.
59 Ibid., pp. 151-152. The single exception is in "rare moments during decisive struggles when the revolutionary Communist workers w ill be compelled to turn their weapons against even groups of the proletariat who out of deficient class consciousness are on the enemy's side...." Ibid., p. 151* The communist parties were admonished that they must "maintain their couplete absolute independence" during this stageThus, what the Comintern directed the communist parties to do in countries where social democracy was strong (e.g. China) was to use the united front tactic to participate in trade unions as well as to engage in direct negotiation with social-bourgeois leaders for joint operation against mutual enemies.
In the debates at the Congress on Manuilsky's "Report on the
National and Colonial Question," Roy argued that the pending resolution was not consistent with the "Theses" of the Second Congress. Roy complained that the revolutionary movement in the East was hindered by "vague formula" which caused undue "theoretical confusion."61 He wanted the Comintern to undertake a detailed analysis of the social composition of all the different classes in the various Far Eastern countries. He felt that the colonial countries themselves could be divided into at least three groups: (1) countries where feudalism was s till the dominant form; (2) semi-colonial countries, having the semblance of national states but dominated financially and materially 62 by imperialist countries ; and (3) , . pure colonies completely dominated
^Ibid., p. 151.
6l F lfth Congress of the Communist In tern a tio n al (Abridged Report) (London: dommunist Party of Britain, p. 196. See also V6 Congres d e l1Internationale Communiste, p. 220. The French edition contains a fuller and clearer summary of what was said on this occasion. 62 Roy places China in this categoxy. by imperialism.^ Hoy concluded that "the direct contact of the
Comintern must be with the social class which is the most revolutionary..
He complained that the resolution only called for direct connection with 6U the national liberation movements. What Roy wanted was what North would call a "revolution from below," which meant to Roy very limited
cooperation with any sort of bourgeois-democratic group. Actually,
the Comintern sought a revolution from both below and above, i.e. a
united front as illustrated in its "Theses on Tactics.”
One explanation for the intriguing optimism of Manuilsky's and
Stalin's attitudes regarding the revolutionary character of the native
bourgeoisie was that the Russian leaders viewed the situation not
only as communists, but also as leaders of an increasingly powerful
state. Hence, many neighboring countries such as Turkey, Persia, and
Afghanistan maintained good relations with Russia, perhaps not because
she was communist, but because of the importance of the Russian state.
Manuilsky and Stalin tended to view friendship with the U.S.S.R. as
friendliness toward communism. Roy on the other hand, pointed out
that a bourgeois state leader might conclude a friendship treaty with
the U.S.S.R. and at the same time persecute communists in his own country
^ F i f t h Congress of the Communist In te rn a tio n a l, p . 196.
61tIbid., p. 198.
^Boersner, The Bolsheviks and the National and Colonial Question, p. l67.« "The Resolution on the Eastern Question," which Roy was criticising is evidently not available. However, Eudin and North quote part of the resolution, which stated that the victory of the
"revolutionary lib e ra tio n movement" required
not only the extension of the direct contact between the Executive Committee and the n atio n al lib e ra tio n movements of the East, but also a very close contact between ^communist} a c tiv itie s in the im p e ria list countries and the activities of the colonies of those countries.66
It would seem that, according to the above quotation cited by Roy, the "Resolution on the Eastern Question" was in direct agreement with the "Theses on Tactics" which signified a blurring of the distinction made at the Second Congress of communist support for "revolutionary" bourgeois democratic movements.
According to one account, Manuilsky reported that the Commission had drawn up several resolutions, two of which concerned the colonies and the Far E ast, and th a t he had recommended re fe rrin g them to the 67 Fourth Plenum. His suggestion was accepted.
The Fourth Plenum
The Fourth Enlarged Plenum met for one day on June 12, 192b, a
"Roy’s Insistence on a Better Understanding of the National Movements in the Colonial and Semi-Colonial Countries" (Statement at the Fifth Comintern Congress), cited in Xenia Eudin and Robert C. North, Soviet Russia and the East (Stanford University Press, 1957), p. 328.
Degras, The Communist International, Vol. II, p. 158. few days before the Fifth Congress was called to order, and met again for two days only, June 12 and 13, after the Fifth Congress had ended.
The Plenum discussed various questions related to the communist parties of Europe and the East. The Plenum decided to establish a permanent
Commission on n a tio n al and colonial problems. This Commission was to be composed of one representative of each colonial power in addition to the members of the ECCI. The Plenum issued a proclamation "to the proletarians of the whole world against the oppression of the Eastern peoples," Another proclamation made special reference to the importance 68 of the peasants in the Eastern national liberation movements.
However, the resolution on the colonies and the Far East, referred to the Plenum hy Manuilsky, was at his suggestion further referred to the Presidium of the ECCI for action. As a result no
specific resolution was published by the Plenum. Perhaps the reason
for this Inaction was the controversy and lack of unanimity on the
crucial question of support for bourgeois-democratic movements. However,
rarely had the Comintern dissuaded itself from publishing a resolution
because of a lack of consensus. A more likely explanation might be the
fact that much of the strategy and tactics for developing the revolution
in the East had already been incorporated in the resolutions on "Tactics" t and "Bolshevization of the Parties." In addition, the members of the
^^Boersner, The Bolsheviks and the National and Colonial Question, p. 178. 1 U9
Presidium^ were perhaps too involved in the Stalin-Trotsky struggle to divert attention to the resolutions.
The F ifth Plenum
The F ifth Enlarged Plenum met from March 21 to A pril 6, 1925 70 with thirty-four countries represented by 2ljli participants. This conference was the only one called for 1925; thereby the Comintern violated its own statutes, which provided that a World Congress must be held every year.
The Plenum was concerned primarily with the problems of the
European communist parties, particularly the deviationists in the
Italian Communist Party, and the Great Britain Trade Union question.
The Plenum pointed out that the present stage was still one of a 71 "slowing down phase in the development of world revolution...."
Again, the "right" position was affirmed~the united front tactics were labelled a correct "method of revolutionary agitation and organization 72 of the masses." According to Degras, the Plenum unanimously adopted a series of resolutions put forward by the Colonial Commission on
^%he Presidium of the Fifth Congress was composed of the following members: Zinoviev (Chairman), Clara Zetkin ("a titre personnel"), Bukharin, Stalin, and Trotsky (all of Russia), Thaelmann and Gelschke (Germany), Seller and Treint (France), Bordiga (Italy), Smeral and Mouna (Czeckoslovakia), Schefflo (Scandanavia), Kolarov (Balkans), Krajenski (Poland), Katayama (Japan), Roy (India), Stewart (England), and Dunne (United States). See Ve Congres de l 1Internationale Communiste, p. 3U3» 70 Department of State, Far Easterners in the Comintern Structure, p. 18. ^D egras, The Communist In te rn a tio n a l, Vol. I I , p . 189. 72Ib id . , p . 193. Dependent Countries; however, these resolutions do not appear to have been published .1J
However, the Plenum adopted "Theses on the Peasant Question," which had some relevance to the Far East. These "Theses" stated that the basic principle of agrarian policy was laid down at the
Second Congress, and the present "Theses" were elaborations on the principle. The "Theses" stated that countries where there were strong feudal remnants (e.g. China and India) the peasantry, who were basically opposed to the landowners, may at a certain stage in the revolution become " a llie s of the p r o le ta r ia t." The communist p a rtie s of these lands could form "a bloc withCthef] small peasant parties" but must propagandize the necessity of an alliance of workers and peasants for the eventual 7U victory against the exploiters. What the Comintern sought was the preparation of the peasants far their part in the revolution. The
Comintern was not calling for immediate agrarian revolution.
Covert Documents
Two documents representing examples of Comintern activities on the covert level have come to light and further clarify the Comintern policy in the Far East during late 1921* and 1925, specifically in China. The analysis of these papers is hindered by the fact that the classified documents that preceded and followed them are not available. 75 The first of these documents from the ECCI, evidently to
the Chinese Communist Party, is marked "absolutely secret" and dated
December 18, 1921*. It was obtained by I.S .2, which probably stands for Intelligence Security, unit 2, of the United States Army Intelligence
S ervice.
The authenticity of this document is difficult to judge. That
the document is genuine is credible because the contents are entirely
consistent with contemporary Comintern policy and the phraseology and
language of the document indicates Comintern authorship. In addition,
the document contains a slight reprimand to the Chinese Communist Party
and this might be one reason why it was considered secret. Perhaps
another reason why the document was secretly sent was the stress placed
uqpon the preparedness of "the fighting organizations" of the Chinese
Communist P arty.
The document indicated that "the immediate tasks of the moment
are to increase activity both of agitation-propaganda departments and
the fighting organizations" of the CCP. The CCP should also be prepared
to help seize the foreign concessions in the central and southern parts
Department of State, Internal Affairs, China, Roll 72, Microfilm (MS), N ational Archives (NA), B 893*00/139• of China "in order to compel revolutionary circles to join in the struggle against European-Araerican capitalists." Later in 1925 the CCP cooperated with the Kuomintang in seizing various foreign concessions in China.
The likelihood of this document's representing part of the i unpublished resolutions of the Fifth Plenum is doubtful. The relatively long span of time from the Fifth Plenum to the transmission date of the document would suggest other origins. The document would seem rather to be one of a series of recommendations that the CCP not neglect the propaganda and para-military aspects of party organization. Since the founding of the Comintern, Lenin had always stressed the need for illegal organizational activities while the party was legal, because the domestic situation might change. The parties were reminded of this aspect of p arty l i f e by the published F ifth Plenum "Theses on the
B olshevization of Communist P a rtie s ." 76 The second document,77 from the ECCI to Chang T 'ai-lei dated
76Ib id . 77pepartment of State, Internal Affairs, China, 72, MC, NA, B 893.00/205*
7 This document is probably also genuine for the same reasons as the first. This shorter document again called the attention of the Chinese Communist Party to the "necessity of placing on a m ilita ry footing...all organs and organizations of the Chinese Communist Party." The Comintern also insisted on "maintaining close contact with the revolutionary wing of the Kuomintang and the command of the national- revolutionary army." 79 One of the striking features of these documents is the emphasis on being m ilitarily prepared for any eventuality, which might stem from several of the basic tenets of communism. Perhaps the reason for the secrecy was that the communists in no way wished to alert the Kuomintang as to their military preparations. This militant aspect was not emphasized as much in the overt propaganda. Concluding Overview The policy of the united front was the guideline for Comintern strategy in the East, and specifically in China, from the Second Congress in 1920 to the end of 1925* The united front tactic was first envisioned as a joint communist and revolutionary nationalist venture. Later it changed character, so that by the Fourth Congress, all groups of an 79 Department of State, Internal Affairs, China, 72, MC, NA, B 893.00/205. anti-imperialist nature were viewed as a potential part of a united front. This was to last officially until the Sixth Congress in mid- 1928. Another common thread which tied the Comintern sessions together throughout was the discussion of policy toward the agrarian revolution and peasants' soviets. This was first an issue at the Second Congress, and together with the united front policy, remained a crucial item of discussion in regard to the Eastern Question. In official resolutions, the agrarian revolution received equal emphasis with the united front as a correct policy to be followed in China. The dominance of "right" wing thought and later in 1926 and 1927 the actual domination of the Comintern by Stalin enabled the passage of many doctrinal statements favorable to that position. This was manifested hy official resolution and by the fact that in actuality, the agrarian revolution always remained subservient to the united front policy. CHAPTER IV CRUCIAL TEARS: 1926-1927 The rivalry between the "left" and "right" coteries for direction of Communist International policy toward the Par East grew more intense in 1926 and 1927. The "right" emerged victorious, not because what it advocated was any more correct than what its opponents wanted, but because the "right" had politically eliminated the members of the "left" as a political force in the Comintern. It is ironic that the "right? which initially favored support for the Kuomintang, was forced by events in China in the summer of 1927 to withdraw its support first from the right-wing of the Kuomintang, headed by Chiang Kai-shek, and then later from the left-wing of the Kuomintang, headed by Wang Ching-wei. This is not to suggest that the "left" coterie's policies were wiser or would have been more successful. As w ill be seen, some members of the "left" coterie, most notably Trotsky, became aware of Comintern misdirection in China in March, 1927. At that point or shortly thereafter, it was probably obvious to Stalin that a shift from the position of support for revolutionary bourgeois-democratic movements, meaning the Kuomintang, was needed. But the Opposition in the Russian Party advocated immediate termination of support for Chiang Kai-shek and the Kuomintang, blocking an important option for Stalin. Initially Stalin would not allow himself or the Comintern to follow the Opposition's suggested policies, but instead in a devious and circuitous way befitting his character, adopted the policies of the Opposition and put into operation what the proponents of the "left" had advocated while he politically destroyed them. The Sixth Plenum The Sixth Enlarged Plenum met in Moscow between February 17 and March 1$, 1926, encompassing 130 representatives from thirty nations.^ Again the Plenum mainly discussed problems of the European communist parties^ however, a substantial amount of time was spent on the Eastern question. At this Plenum there was a major reorganization of the Comintern, which included the setting up of eleven national secretariats, one of which was to include the area bounded by China, Korea, Mongolia, Turkey, Persia, Egypt, Syria, and Palestine. Each secretariat was headed by a 2 member of the Executive Committee with a staff of representatives from the section. M.N. Roy was made the Chairman of the Eastern Secretariat, and was to be assisted by two secretaries, Brown and Grigorii Voitinsky.^ 1 Among the known Chinese who attended was Hsu Fan (of the CCP?). Department of State, Far Easterners In the Comintern Structure (Mimeo graphed) (1950), p. lFI Hu Han-min attended this Plenum for the Kuomintang, which had been admitted to the Comintern as a sympathizing party. See Jane Degras, editor. The Communist International, Vol. II (London: Oxford University Press, i960), p. 21*5• 2 "Theses on the Current Question of the International Communist Movement," cited in Degras, The Communist International, Vol. II, pp. 271-27U. International Press Correspondence (Inprecor), Vol. 6, No. 17 (March U, i?2 6 ), p.2$5- It appears that the primary reasons for the creation of these secretar iats were to improve communication ties and to strengthen discipline between the Comintern and its sections. Zinoviev, President of the Comintern, represented the "right" at the Sixth Plenum; in his opening speech to the assembled delegates, he briefly alluded to the success of the new Chinese Communist Party. Zinoviev cited the tripling of the CCP's membership during 1925 and commended it for its "full and friendly cooperation with the National Revolutionary Party, the Kuomintang. "^ He added that the "European Revolution is closely connected with the rise of the national-revolutionary movement in the East; both processes are closely interwoven and develop parallely. Then comes America."^ In other words, Zinoviev reiterated the Fifth Congress's statements on the relationship of the European revolution and the colonies. Zinoviev ended his report with an attack on the Trotskyite "left." The "left" maintained that only a united front from below had any chance of success because the social democratic or nationalist leaders had already become counter-revolutionary.^ The Trotskyite position was indirectly supported by the French delegate Seraard, who announced that Adb El Krim's movement in Morrocco was not **Ibid., p. 2£U. ^Inprecor, Vol. 6, No. 18 (March 10, 1926), p. 258. ^La Correspondence Internationale, Vol. 6, No. 30 (March 9, 1926), pp. 211-Z7T.------SB 7 revolutionary but feudal and therefore reactionary. Later in the Plenum, Zinoviev's concluding speech on the Political Report in regard to the Comintern tactics, stated emphatically that "all attenpts to reverse fundamental decisions of the Communist International at the Third or Fourth Congresses Care) rejected." Furthermore, "united front tactics are the only correct tactics dictated by the present state of affairs." However, a warning was issued saying, "These tactics Q have of course their perils." Zinoviev's view greatly influenced the "Theses on the Chinese Question" which w^s subsequently adopted. The Plenum's "Theses on the Chinese Question" inter alia noted the strengthening of the labor movement in the East as a new facto* of utmost significance. The Shanghai and Hong Kong summer strilees of 9 1925 were cited as examples of the new strength of the labor movement. Also, the "Theses" described the Kuomintang as a "revolutionary and democratic 'organization' whose principal group has entered into an alliance with the Chinese Communists." It "represents a revolutionary bloc of the workers, peasants, intelligentsia, and urban petty bourgeoisie by representing their interests in the struggle against the foreign 7Ibid., p. 300. ^Inprecor, Vol. 6 , No. 26 (A pril 8 , 1926), pp. U12-U13. 9 Degras, The Communist International, Vol. H , p. 277* 59 imperialists and the whole m ilitarist-feudal orderAccording to Marxist-Leninist theory, the Kuomintang was revolutionary and hence a valuable ally, because it had not yet collaborated with foreign imperialists or elements of domestic feudalism. Somewhat la te r in the "Theses” the Chinese Communist Party was warned to be careful about right-wing liquidationisra, which was the abandoning of the Chinese proletariat into a formless merging with general democratic movements, and to beware of extreme le ft moods, which was an attempt to skip over the revolutionary-democratic stage and go directly into a proletarian dictatorship, which in turn meant the exclusion of the peasantry Thus the Chinese Communist P arty was advised to follow the Qolden Mean—that is, to join in united front tactics so as to strengthen and expand the party; however, it would have to remain vigilant in maintaining the party's independence and freedom of maneuver. The "Theses" further stated that the "fundamental problem of the Chinese national liberation movement is the peasant movement," and said: The victory of the revolutionary movement depends on how many of the UOO million peasants are drawn, together with the Chinese workers and under their leadership, into a decisive revolutionary stru g g le. The main task o f the Chinese Communists and the Kuomintang is to explain to China's peasants that only by allying 10 Robert C. North and Xenia J. Eudin, M.N. Roy's Mission to China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1063), p. 3U7. 1 1 Ibid., p. 3U9. 6 0 themselves with the working class to form an Independent revolu tionary democratic government can they radically improve their material and political position .12 As in the Fifth Plenum, the Comintern again sought as a preparatory step to the agrarian revolution the concluding of an alliance between the peasants and the revolutionary forces. The Chinese Communist Party and the Kuomintang were supposed to convince the peasantry of the need for such an alliance and clarify the role they were supposed to play. The Comintern did not mean that the agrarian revolution should take place immediately. In its "Theses on the Current Question of the International Communist Movement," the Sixth Plenum again in d icated the Comintern's general desire for a united front stratgey. The Plenum called: imperatively on all its sections to act decisively, vigorously, and sincerely in meeting the wish of the social-democratic workers to establish a united front to fight the bourgeoisie....13 The Plenum closed on a prophetic note, although unrealized at the time, stating that: In future, questions concerning the Eastern peoples are to occupy a far greater place than heretofore in the Executive's work, corresponding with their new and greater importance. The events of 1927 in China would certainly occupy the thoughts of many in the Comintern. 12Ib id . ^ D eg ras, The Communist In te rn a tio n a l, Vol. I I , p. 2^3* ^Ibid., p. 273. 6 1 The Seventh Plenum L ater in 1926, from November 22 to December 16, the Seventh Enlarged Plenum met with 191 delegates in attendance. T'an Ping-shan of the Chinese Communist Party was th e re , as w ell as Shao L i-tzu of the Kuomintang.^ The Plenum addressed itself to many problems, only one of which was the Eastern question. The Chinese situation was discussed in some detail in the ll-13th sessions, and a detailed analysis was supplied in the adopted Theses. What developed at this Plenum was the reappearance of "right" and "left" positions on the crucial questions of the Chinese revolution— that is, the policies of united front and agrarian revolution. In China as in other countries, ultimately a united front policy would be basically incompatible with a policy of agrarian revolution. This posed the problem of deciding which was to come first—the national revolution (unification via a united front movement) or the social-economic revolution (agrarian revolution). The goal of the contending groups was authorship of the Comintern's "Theses on the Situation in China." Both "right" and "left" felt that the Chinese struggle, if properly led, could do inestimable damage to imperialism. Thus, the seriousness and weightiness of the question to the protagonists was apparent. In addition, there were overtones in ^Department of State, Far Easterners in the Comintern Structure, p. 18. 62 the debates of the immense power struggle which was occurring in Russia between Trotsky and Stalin. The "left" coterie counted among its members the Russian Opposition, notable among whom were Trotsky and Kamenev, and apparently Pavel Mif The "left" argued that the united front had served its necessazy and useful function; however, now the objective situation called for the immediate establishment of peasant soviets—meaning the agrarian revolution. Speaking before the Chinese Commission of the Comintern's Executive Committee in reference to Mif's line of reasoning, Stalin stated 17 that Mif was "mistaken" and was "running too far ahead." Stalin argued that "one cannot build Soviets in the countryside and around the industrial centers of China," and establish "soviets in the industrial centers" because it was too early. Moreover, Stalin mentioned that peasant soviets could only be "organised if China were at the peak period of a peasant 18 movement..." and China was clearly not at that point. The "right" coterie numbered among its proponents Stalin, Bukharin, T'an P'ing-shan, Roy, and evidently Rafes, a Comintern Far East specialist. "Prospects of the Revolution in China," cited in J.V. Stalin, Works, Vol. VIII (Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 19%h) , p . 3BU. 17 Ib id . l 8Ibid. , pp. 38U-38S. The "right" argued for the objective necessity of maintaining the united front, and cautioned the Chinese Communist Party to maintain respectability and independence and satisfy "a number of the most urgent 19 demands of the p e a s a n ts ...." Bukharin, with somewhat d iffe re n t emphasis, f e l t th a t the Chinese Communist Party showed "an unnecessary fe a r as to the development of the peasant movement...and insufficient insistence on the necessity of 20 conducting agrarian reform s...." However, Bukharin concluded that given the proper appreciation of class forces, "the Communist Party, 21 at the present, supports this united national revolutionary front." Thus Bukharin essentially agreed with the "right's" position, and summarized it by stating that the Comintern should "support the national revolutionary front, and at the same time...exert efforts to solve 22 the agrarian peasant problem...." The Plenum adopted the "Theses on the Chinese Situation" reflecting the dominance of the "right" faction. The "Theses" outlined the develop ment of the Chinese revolution in the following manner: The successive stages of development of the revolutionary movement in China are marked by important regroupings of social forces. In the first stage, the driving force of the movement 19Ib id . , p. 385. ^North and Eudin, M.N. Roy's Mission to China, p. 35. 21 Inprecor, Vol. 6 , No. 85 (December 3, 1926), p. 1U72. 22 Ib id . was the national bourgeois intellectuals and students which sought support in the ranks of the proletariat and the petty bourgeoisie. In the second stage: the character of the movement changed—its social basis was shifted to a different class combination...the working class (particularly the industrial proletariat)appeared in the arena as a political factor of first class importance.... The proletariat is forming a bloc with the peasantry.. .with the petty urban bour geoisie and a section of the capitalist bourgeoisie. The new third stage was or would be the beginning of an even more revolutionary class combination: In this stage the driving forces of the movement will be a bloc of...the proletariat, peasantry, urban petty bourgeoisie, to the exclusion of a large section of the big capitalist bourgeoisi e . 3 The "Theses" emphasized that the whole bourgeoisie as a class should not be excluded from the revolution, because parts of the bourgeoisie (petty and middle) and even some big bourgeoisie, might 2U for a certain period "continue to march with the revolution." However, the "Theses" warned that if the big bourgeoisie were to see the anti imperialist struggle as damaging to their interests, they would attempt to destroy the revolution by substituting bourgeois nationalism in place of class struggle. The "Theses" stated that in the current transitional period, the "Theses on the Chinese S itu a tio n ," The Communist (A. Holland, editor; published in London), Vol. I, No. 2 (March, 19^7), p. 62. See Chung-kuo ko-mlng (China's Revolution) (Shanghai: Min-chih shu-tien, 1936), pp. 63-100 for a Chinese text. 2U "Theses on the Chinese S itu ation ," The Communist, p. 63. agrarian question assumed critical significance. It was said that "the class which will boldly tackle this basic question and be able to give a radical answer to it, will be the leader of the revolution." Of course, according to M arxist dogma, in China the p r e le ta ria t was the only class which could carry out this policy. It was felt that the peasantry was needed because Chinese society was allegedly character ized by the domination of the m ilitarists, who in turn exploited the peasantry as a basis for their power. Therefore, to overthrow the m ilitarists, the proletariat must aid the peasantry, who would in turn aid their proletarian brothers in the anti-imperialist struggle. Thus it seemed that the Comintern wanted an immediate agrarian revolution. Critics who voiced "the apprehension that a sharpening of the class struggle in the village" would "weaken the united anti-im perialist front" were told that their fears were "unfounded." The "Theses on the Chinese Situation," reviewed in a cursory way, might indicate a "left" victory. On the surface the "Theses" held that the agrarian question was of critical significance. However, this would be misleading because the v ic to rs were a c tu a lly S ta lin and company. What the "Theses" actually called for was the continuation of the united front policy, by introducing several qualifications to the demand for agrarian revolution. First the Comintern noted that the national revolutionary government would provide a very effective way to reach the peasants and 6 6 that "the Communist Party must use this way. " Also the communists and their revolutionary allies were "to penetrate Into the apparatus of the new KMT-dominated government to give practical expression to the 26 ag rarian programme of n atio n al rev o lu tio n ." Secondly, the Comintern realized that the Chinese Communist Party "should advance the demand for the nationalization of the land," but felt it was necessary at the present time "to differentiate in agrarian tactics in accordance with the peculiar economic and political conditions prevailing in the various districts in Chinese territory." Third, the agrarian program that the Comintern suggested should be applied to territories under the authority of the Kuomintang National Government were reformist proposals and not the radical ones communist ideology demanded. For example, the reduction of rents, abolition of numerous forms of taxes on peasants, and the peasant against the landlord were within the scope of Sun Tat-sen's economic thought. These various measures of the Comintern seemed to be designed to be acceptable to the Kuomintang and thus expedite the furtherance of the policy of united front. The "Theses" further stated 27 that it was "incorrect" far the Communist Party to leave the Kuomintang. 26 Ib id . , p. 6 8 . (Emphasis added.) ^Ibid., p. 6 8 . A copy of the Seventh Plenum "Theses" written in Russian was allegedly seized in the raid on the Soviet Military Attache Office in Peking in April, 1927. The copy found in the raid contained two theses not found in the officially published Comintern document. These additional theses do not contain any new or secret information. Briefly summarized, these two theses stated that the Chinese Communist Party should undertake propaganda activities among the national revolutionary army and explain to the peasants the beneficial 67 What the Comintern was calling for, in practice, was not an immediate agrarian rev o lu tio n , but fo r the Chinese Communist Party to encourage the Nationalists while moderating its policy in the face of local Kuomintang opposition. In other words, "don't rock the boat." The Comintern placed more significance on the maintenance of the united 28 front than on peasant revolution. function of that amor in the struggle against imperialism. Secondly, the workers of the imperialist countries should be made aware of the military intervention in China of their respective governments, and they should demand its cessation. In the Wilbur and How volume, the authors ask Professor David Dallin, a specialist in Russian-Chinese relations to give his opinion of these added theses. Dallin wrote: "It is hard to reach a definite conclusion. On the one hand they contain no revelations which could be expected to be found in a forged document. On the other hand they do not contain any information or note any decisions which were not known otherwise and which the Comintern had reason to conceal. Weighing the pros and cons, I tend to doubt the authenticity of the C hapters." It would seem, however, that Dallin's logic could be used to come to the opposite conclusion. It is the opinion of this writer that there would be little reason to forge a document containing already- known information which shed no light or new revelations. Thus there would seem to be no great objection to accepting the authenticity of these theses. C. Martin Wilbur and Julie L.T. How, editors. Documents on Communism, N ationalism , and Soviet Advisers in China 1918- 1^27 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1956)> p. 3U. See Conrad Brandt, S ta lin 's F ailure in China 192U-1927 (Cambridge: Harvard Dniversi^nPress7~T^577~PP^- ^77D5I-7or additional discussion of the Seventh Plenum. 6 8 THE CHINA QUESTION: ON THE SCENE AND IN THE RUSSIAN COMMUNIST DEBATES: JANUARY TO APRIL, 1927 The China Setting The successes of the Northern Expedition aided the widening fissu re s between the Chinese Communist Party and Right and L eft Kuomintang factions. In addition, since January 1, the Nationalist Government a t Wuhan, dominated by the L eft Kuomintang, had become Increasingly estranged from Chiang Kai-shek, who had established himself at Nanking In March. Chiang, who was the acknowledged leader of the right wing of the Kuomintang, had become increasingly suspicious of the communists. The rupture between the communists and the Right Kuomintang - (KMT) became complete when on April 12, 1927 Chiang launched an anti communist drive, forcibly disbanding left-wing organizations in Shanghai and Nanking, while executing many thousands of workers and leftists. The Fifth Congress of the Chinese Communist Party convened in Wuhan on April 27 on the heels of the disasters in Nanking and Shanghai. Present at the Congress were Borodin, Roy, and members of the Left KMT, 29 which was s t i l l an a lly . The F ifth Congress condemned Chiang Kai-shek 2^Wang Chien-min, Chung-kuo kung-chan-tang shlJh kao, Vol. I (Draft History of the Chinese Communist Party) (Taipei: Wang Chien-min, 1965), pp. 359-362; North and Eudin, M.N. Roy *3 Mission to China, pp. 65-83. and the "Right-wing." The defection of Chiang was attributed to his capitulation to feudal elements and the large scale bourgeoisie. The Congress explained that the social base of the revolution now consisted of the proletariat, peasantry, and urban petty-bourgeoisie. Further, the withdrawal of Chiang and other "reactionary" elements had strengthened the revolution. The communists and the Left KMT should now foster 30 closer collaboration. According to the Fifth Congress resolutions, the most pressing problem of the revolution was the solution of the agrarian problem. The "Resolution on the Agrarian Question" called for a "fundamental redistribution of land based on the principle of equalization..." which could only be accomplished by "nationalization of land." The lands of small owners and officers of the revolutionary army were to be exempt however. The Chinese communists were to achieve their aims through the 31 structure of the Left KMT government at Wuhan. The View From Russia In the Soviet Union, the Opposition, after one year's silence, had attacked the Stalin-Bukharin China policy in a letter dated March 31, 30 "Theses on the Political Situation and the Tasks of the Chinese Communist Party," North and Eudin, M.N. Roy's Mission to China, pp. 65-83. 31 "Resolution on the Agrarian Question," Ibid., pp. 25U-263. 70 192? to the P olitburo and the C entral Committee of the Communist Party 32 of the Soviet Union (CPSU). They immediately seized upon the A pril events and began a more general attack on the Stalin-Bukharin China policy, which coincided in general with the Comintern policy. The Opposition charged Stalin and his associates with personal responsibility for the serious blow to communist prospects in China. Trotsky wrote, "The April defeat of the Chinese Revolution is not only a defeat for the opportunist line but also a defeat for the bureaucratic methods of the leadership."^ Trotsky and Stalin both based their interpretations of the situation in China on the same Leninist scripture, the "National and Colonial Theses" of the Second Congress. Stalin justified his policy on the basis that the "Theses" had supported assistance to nationalist parties; he disregarded the "Theses'" demand for soviets, because he felt they might precipitate an unwanted showdown. On the other hand T rotsky's policy demanded so v ie ts, and refused to take in to account the need for nationalist support. Stalin was aware that in China's case the two demands were incom patible; i t seems th a t Trotsky refused to be bothered by th is f a c t .^ 32 Isaac Deutscher, The Prophet Unarmed (New York: Vintage Books, 1965), p. 327. 33 Robert V. Daniels, The Conscience of the Revolution (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, I960), p. 283. 3U Brandt, Stalin's Failure in China 192U-1927, p. 11. 71 The Opposition began a campaign of petitions, pamphleteering and speechmaking against the policies of Stalin. However, they over estimated the strength of their own support and as a result were further disgraced and weakened by this outburst. I t was ag ain st th is background th a t the Eighth Plenum met in May of 1927. It must be emphasized that the Chinese Question was now tied up with internal political debates, because Trotsky made the policy of Stalin and Bukharin (these latter two by now predominant in the Comintern) IS the object of his criticisms. The Eighth Plenum The Eighth Plenum of the Comintern's Executive Committee was not 36 an enlarged one—the first in the Comintern's history which was not. There were 71 delegates, of whom fewer than half had voting powers. 37 According to Albert Treint, a noted French communist, plenary sessions were held in a small room which was usually used for meetings of the •^Benjamin Qitlow, I Confess (New York: E.P. Dutton and Company, 19U0), p. 1*37- 36 It is evident that Stalin was attempting by this action to lim it knowledge of the acute failures suffered by the Comintern policies w ith which he was associated. ^The accuracy of Treint's account is highly regarded by the writer. First, much of what is said can be checked against other sources (e.g. Qitlow); second, the bulk of the account was written immediately after the event, and thus the distortion (anti-Stalin bias) is kept to a minimum; third, the basic contention of Treint (restriction on the agrarian revolution) was found by this writer to have existed at the preceding Plenum. 72 Presidium: and this under the pretext that in Moscow, capital of the world revolution and the proletarian state, there was no other room available for the discussions of the Executive {of the Comintern^ In reality it was a question of preventing the Russian comrades... from taking part in debates.... Treint also asserted that: Political documents having no secret character were given to the delegates on the eve of the opening of the Executive, then the mee.tings of the Executive and of the commissions followed without interruption.... It had been forbidden to the delegates to take a shorthand copy of their own speeches or communicate the text of it (siq) to idiom they wanted. As soon as the Executive ended, it was necessary to return these documents immediately under the threat of not receiving authorization to l e a v e . 38 There were only two questions on the agenda—China and the danger of war. The question of the danger of war revolved around the rupture of diplomatic relations between Britain and the U.S.S.R., which stemmed from the fact that Britain had charged the Soviet government with violation of the "no propaganda" clause of the 1921 Trade Agreement, and the raid on May 12 by British police on the premises of the Soviet Trade Delegation in London . ^ Of all the plenums, the Eighth was the least documented. Normally, a complete or nearly complete verbatim report of each plenum was published ■SQ Albert Treint, "Declaration of Comrade Treint addressed to the Executive Committee of the Cl on July 22, 1927 > on the Chinese Question," Les documents de l 1Opposition francaise et la reponse du Parti (Paris: n.p., 1927), p. 65 . 39 Degras, The Communist International, Vol. II, p. 365* in Russian. Also the plenums were generally reviewed extensively in International Press Correspondence (Inprecor). For the Eighth Plenum, no verbatim report was issued, nor were proceedings reported in the communist press. A year after it ended, the Comintern issued a short report on the work of the plenum in response to the publication of 1*0 Trotsky’s plenum speeches by the Russian Opposition. At the Eighth Plenum, the two coteries had again appeared. The ’’right-wing" of Stalin and Bukharin, dominant at the Seventh Plenum had been little more than inconvenienced by Chiang Kai-shek's April 12 action in Shanghai, for Stalin had already gained control of the Comintern. The "left" faction headed by Trotsky voiced strong objections to the current Comintern policy, but it was obvious to all that there was no chance for its position on the immediate need for soviets in China to win approval.^ A Chinese subcommittee of the Executive Committee, comprised of Bukharin, Treint, and Ercoli (a pseudonym for Togliatti of Italy), was established to discuss the Chinese Question. After his break with S ta lin and the S ta lin is t-d ire c te d French Communist P arty , T reint gave several accounts of this subcommittee. He claimed that Bukharin argued bo Ib id . k^-Leon Trotsky, Problems of the Chinese Revolution, Second Edition (New Yorks Paragon Book G allery, 19^2), p. 93. 7h in the following manner (Stalin was later to declare his agreement with Bukharin): The peasants are forcibly beginning to seize the land. This is frightening the Wuhan Government (left, bourgeoisie government, ed.). I f we do not crush the agrarian movement, we w ill lose our l e f t allies, and it w ill become impossible to win a majority in the Kuomintang. On the other hand, by crushing it, we w ill enlarge our influence in it, and w ill have become more powerful, we w ill go beyond opr present allies and we w ill also have much more than we d esired . **2 Treint argued against this point of view by saying that the problem: is not whether to sacrifice all the allies of the proletariat but of knowing which ones to sacrifice: the insurgent peasants or the left National bourgeoisie. 53 Treint felt that the left national bourgeoisie should be dropped, because the revolution in China should not be decided by "constitutional decisions adopted by the Kuom intang."^ When the time came for the vote, Treint was outvoted, and so the policy was to keep the left bourgeoisie as allies. The Theses which wa3 adopted at the Eighth Plenum (see below) advocated agrarian revolution with the communists in the lead, but in reality, as Treint summarized in another account: ...the Stalin-Bukharin group not only dispatched to China directives for the limitation of the agrarian revolution...but, a more serious fact, the Stalin-Bukharin group refused, in spite of my intervention, ^A lbert Treint, "The Peoples Front as Applied in China—1927," New M ilitant (February 8 , 1936), p. 3* W*Ibid. to Indicate in its telegraphic directives to the Chinese Communists, that it was uniquely a question of maneuver to gain time, and equally refused to advise the Chinese Communists to oppose all attem pts on the p a rt of the Ouhan (Wuhan3 Government and the left Kuomintang to make these limitations respected... .1*5 In the regular plenary sessions, the Chinese Question was also debated. During a speech at the Plenum, Stalin argued against the establishment of a soviet of workers' and peasants' deputies, because "the present government in Wuhan is a revolutionary government...."^ Trotsky attacked Stalin's theory of the bloc of four classes "as not p a rt of Marxism" and he contended th a t the Chinese Communist Party was subordinated in this relationship. Trotsky also presented "Theses on the Chinese Situation" formally to the Plenum. These "Theses" recalled the distinction Lenin had made at the Second Congress between revolutionary and reformist elements of bourgeois democracy. The "Theses" stated that the Chinese bourgeoisie was now being transformed into a counter-revolutionary force, and thus it became "immediately necessary 1*7 to raise the slogan of Soviets for China." Trotsky made four demands t (1) The political independence of the Chinese Communist Party must be maintained even if it were to mean a break with the Kuomintang; ^T reint, Les documents de 1'Opposition francaise et la reponse du Parti, p. 61*. 1(6 Xenia J. Eudin and Robert C. North, Soviet Russia and the East (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1957), p. 369. 1*7 Leon Trotsky, Problems of the Chinese Revolution, pp. 313-381. (2) There must be no postponement of the agrarian revolution; (3) The postponement of the reorganization of the government should not be delayed because the bloc of Hankow leaders is not yet a revolutionary government. "Only the workers', peasants', petty bourgeois' and soldiers' soviets can serve as the base for the revolutionary government." (U) The alliance between the Chinese Communist Party and the real revolutionary Kuomintang should not only be maintained, but extended on the b asis of mass soviets.U o The Eighth Plenum adopted the "Resolution on the Chinese Question." The "Resolution" began by observing "that the course of the Chinese Revolution has confirmed the evaluation of its moving forces given at 1,0 the last...enlarged Plenum ."^7 According to the "Resolution," a new political situation then existed in China because of Chiang's coup, and the Comintern must proceed accordingly. The Comintern declared that any compromise with Chiang or with the right KMT would be outright treachery to the interests of the Chinese revolution. The reason why the bourgeoisie and Chiang had deserted the revolution was said to be the unfolding of the mass movement and the successes of the Chinese Communist P arty. F earful of this, they had made a deal with the imperialists and the m ilitarists. However, despite the partial defeats and betrayals, the revolution had U8 Ibid. , p. 100. (Paraphrased) U9 Degras, The Communist In te rn a tio n a l, Vol. I I , p. 38U; see Chung-kuo ko-mlng, pp. lol-13o for a Chinese text of the "Resolution." moved to a higher stage, the "Resolution" continued. The bloc of bourgeoisie, peasantry and proletariat, and petty bourgeoisie had broken down and had begun to change into a bloc of peasantry, proletariat, and petty bourgeoisie in which the leadership role of the proletariat was steadily growing.-’0 The "Resolution" stated that "the Wuhan government and the left KMT express in their basic tendencies, the revolutionary bloc of the urban and rural petty bourgeois masses with the proletariat...."^" The basic task of the CCP was now to be the agrarian revolution, including confiscation and nationalization of the land. At the same time, the CCP must attempt to transform the Wuhan government into one that would to be the center of a workers' and peasants' revolutionary government. Thus the Executive Committee of the Comintern re je c te d the demands of some for the Chinese Communist Party to leave the Kuomintang. The KMT in China was designated as "the specific form of the organization in which the proletariat works together with the petty bourgeoisie and the 53 peasantry." The "Resolution" explicitly stated that "the EOCI does not consider it appropriate at the present time to advance the slogan 78 of soviets...which is equivalent to the slogan of proclaiming Soviet power. In short, the "right" triumphed at the Eighth Plenum, which declared the continuation of the united front with the Left Kuomintang correct. The task of agrarian revolution was doctrinally declared proper, but judging from Treint's statement, this was evidently treated cavalierly. The Comintern's Executive Committee subordinated the agrarian revolution to the maintenance of the united front. The China Scene: May to July, 1927 Events in China moved rapidly after the Eighth Plenum in May. The unsteady edifice which held the CCP and the Left KMT together began to weaken when in mid-May General Hsia Tou-yin, Commander of the Fourteenth Independent Division stationed at I Ch'ang in western Hupei, deserted the Wuhan government and began to march on Wuhan. General Hsia's army was stopped only a few miles from the city by a hastily organized force of military cadets under General Teh T'ing. Left Kuomintang dissatisfaction with the communists and their agrarian program erupted on May 21 when Colonel Hsu K'e-hsiang, commander of the regiment stationed at Changsha, acting on direct orders from Wuhan General Ho Chien, suddenly turned on the communists, killing several hundred. In the face of this attack, the communists were able to secure only Ibid., p. 381. 79 a commission of inquiry which whitewashed the whole affair.'*'* The C entral Committee of the Chinese Communist Party sought to lessen the tension in the Hunan countryside hy warning against "encroachments" on land belonging to soldiers' fam ilies.^ Meanwhile, the Left KMT was seeking ways to maintain its own position at Wuhan without the aid of the communists* Wang Ching-wei, leader of the Left KMT, sought Feng Tu-hsiang to act as an intermediary for a reconcile d7 iation with Chiang Kai-shek at Nanking. The final split in the alliance between the CCP and the Left KMT came in June when M.N. Roy (who had been sent by the Seventh Plenum to the Wuhan Government as the Comintern representative) showed Wang Ching-wei a telegram from Stalin which urged an ambitious agrarian revolution and the building of a large Chinese revolutionary m ilitia. The telegram was used as an excuse cjp by Wang to sever the alliance. The CCP tried to forestall this rupture by such actions as T'an P'ing-shan's resigning as Minister of Agriculture for failure to "put the peasants on the right track," and by attempting withdrawal from the Wuhan Government (and not from the KMT) in order to ^Stuart Schram, Mao Tse-tung (Middlesex: Penguin Books Ltd., 1966 ) , pp. 1 1 2 -1 1 3 . * 6 I b id ., p. 111*. 57 Brandt, Stalin's Failure in China, p. 139. 58 M.N. Roy, Memoirs (London: A llied P ublishers, 1965), p. 176. See also Jerome Ch'en, ffao and the Chinese Revolution (London: Oxford University Press, 1965), p. 121. 80 "make it clear that the Wuhan Government is a national, not a communist, government." However, these proposals were termed unsatisfactory to the Left KMT, and on July 15, the Wuhan government formally expelled 59 the communists and terminated their affiliation with the Left KMT. The View from Russia: May to July, 1927 During the period from the end of the Eighth Plenum to the break in July, the eventful Chinese scene was discussed throughout the Comintern and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), p a rtic u larly by the Moscow Committee Branch. In a report to the Moscow Committee of the CPSU, immediately after the Eighth Plenum, Bukharin rebuked T'an P'ing-shan, then Minister of Agriculture in the Wuhan government, for his speech which "did not contain one word on the necessity of the actual confiscation of the land." Bukharin also cited disapprovingly a contemporaneous statement by Ch'en Tu-hsiu that the agrarian revolution must wait until the Chinese revolutionary troops reached Peking. Repeating the essence of the recent May Plenum "Resolution," Bukharin stated that "the fundamental premise for the victorious solution of problems dictated by the Chinese Revolution today is the development of the agrarian revolution." To Bukharin, the agrarian revolution comprised the 59 Schram, Mao Tse-tung, p. 1 1 5 ; Ch'en, Mao and the Chinese Revolution, p. 12J>. —— ——— — 60 Inprecor, Vol. 7, No. 39 (July, 1927), p. 880. 8 1 confiscation of land by the peasants, abolition of ground rents, the institution of peasant communities to rule over the peasants, and the arming of the masses of the peasantry.^" How was the agrarian revolution to take place? Bukharin stated that the KMT was the party to carry it out. However, in order to accomplish this, the proletarian and peasant elements must widen their influence in the KMT, for if these elements did not gain greater influence in the KMT, the agrarian revolution would 62 stag n ate. A few days before the official "break” between the CCP and the Left KMT, Bukharin, in an article in International Press Correspondence, adumbrated the July lit Comintern resolution. He found that Wuhan 1 s "revolutionary role is at an end," and that the CCP must not "remain a single moment longer in the 'government 1 of Wuhan." The withdrawal must be effected in a "demonstrative" manner and must be accompanied by a political declaration of the CCP. Bukharin also foreshadowed the July resolution hy stating that the CCP should not withdraw from the 63 KMT—only from the Wuhan government. 61 Ib id . 62 Ib id . 63 Inprecor, Vol. 7, No. It (July lit, 1927), p. 8?8 . The July Comintern Resolution on China The Comintern’s Executive Committee issued a "Resolution on the Present Stage of the Chinese Revolution" on July lit, 1927. The 61* "Resolution" spoke of "the feverish pace of events in China...." The Executive Committee now declared that the Wuhan government had already become a counter-revolutionary force; thus, for the CCP to continue to support the Wuhan government would be fatal as well as opportunistic.^ The "Resolution" found that the CCP leadership was wanting on two counts* (1) The CCP did not proclaim the agrarian revolution and refused to obey the orders of the Comintern sen t on th is m atter. The C entral Committee of the CCP, in a number of instances, even acted as a brake on the agrarian revolution; (2) The CCP did not expose the "half-hearted" and "timorous" position of the "radical" leaders of 66 Wuhan and the KMT. The Comintern, according to the "Resolution," now considered it essential that: (1) The Chinese Communists should "dem onstratively" leave the Wuhan Government; Degras, The Communist International, Vol. II, p. 393* 83 (2) The hostility of the Wuhan Government should be exposed to the masses; (3) The communists should not leave the KMT, but remain despite the campaign to expel communists hy the leadership, and establish closer contact with the KMT rank and file; (U) The CCP should in te n sify i t s work w ith the p ro le ta ria n masses; {$) The CCP should press for the agrarian revolution; (6 ) The CCP, in view of the repression, should build an illegal fighting party apparatus; and (7) The Comintern should urge the members of the CCP to fight 67 against the Central Committee's opportunism. This new Comintern policy (July statement) was in blatant disregard of reality. How could a group which had just been read out of the KMT expect that organization to allow a revamping hy old members in whom it had become disenchanted! Also, how was the CCP, consistently under attack, to intensify its work among the proletarians or the peasants? The statement in major disregard of the truth lay the blame for failure to proclaim the agrarian revolution on the CCP, when it was the Comintern itself which had held back the agrarian revolution. It is 67 Ibid., pp. 395-396. also known that the Central Committee of the CCP sought to expose, and withdraw from, the alliance with the Left KMT, but this action had been denied by the Comintern. With this July "Resolution," the Comintern ceased its public directives (resolutions) to the CCP until the Ninth Plenum in February of the following year. The pace of events in China, making analysis difficult, was perhaps reflected in the reticence on the part of the Comintern to issue public Statements. EPIIDGUE August to December, 1927 from the Russian View As mentioned before, the July lU Comintern "Resolution" served as a basis for discussion of the China Question in the CPSU. At a joint plenum of the Central Committee and the Central Control Commission of the CPSU from July 29 to August 7, Stalin delivered a speech on August 1, part of which discussed China. Stalin felt that the revolution in China had suffered a defeat and what was now called for was the popularization 68 of the idea of soviets. The "Resolution" of the joint plenum on the international situation maintained that the CCP must make every effort to develop the agrarian movement and arm the workers and peasants and thus lay the foundation for 6 8 Stalin, Works Vol. X, p. 15* a genuine revolutionary workers' and peasants' army. Stalin noted that if the CCP failed to transform the KMT and if the revolution should make a fresh advance, then it would become necessary to change the propagation of the slogan of soviets into the actual organization 70 of soviets. In late September, Stalin spoke before a joint meeting of the Comintern's Executive Committee and the International Control Commission and said he felt that "the base of the revolution in China" was still "the agrarian peasant revolution." Stalin conjectured that if there were to be an uprising in China, it would be led by soviets of workers and peasants. Stalin felt that the chances for an uprising were increasing because the members of the KMT had "disgraced and discredited themselves by their connections with the counter-revolutionaries. The slogan of soviets had been raised to a call for their actual establishment by the September 19 meeting of the CCP. However, this policy change was not evident in public media of the CPSU or the 70 Stalin, Works Vol. X, pp. 27-39. Similar views were expressed in a front page editorial in Pravda on July 26, 1927 (Stuart R. Schram, "On the Nature of Mao Tse-tung*s 'Deviation' in 1927," China Quarterly No. 18 (April-June, 196U), pp. 96-58) and was further elaborated two days later by Stalin (Stalin, Works Vol. IX, p. 366.) Stalin, Works Vol. X, p. 162. 8 6 Comintern, not because these organs opposed the policy. Quite the contrary, Stalin had stated that the revolutionary elan in China was rising and thus directly hinted for the establishment of soviets. The probable reason for the call for establishment of soviets' not being made in public in the Soviet Union would seem to revolve around the campaign to eliminate the Opposition, which was at its height. The Stalin leadership most likely felt it prudent not to publicly admit to following a policy which the Opposition had demanded for some time and which S ta lin and company had only recen tly condemned. The debate on China continued into the latter part of 1927* The topic of China was interjected into the Fifteenth Congress of the CPSU in early December. The tenor of the various speeches on the topic, particularly Bukharin's, Stalin's, and Lominadze's, were not pessimistic about the Chinese revolution, and Stalin concluded a speech by observing that: "Only the blind and the faint-hearted can doubt that the Chinese workers and peasants are moving toward a new revolu- 72 tionary upsurge While the Fifteenth CPSU Congress was in progress, the Canton Commune arose in accordance with Comintern-approved policies. With 72Ibid., p. 290. the defeat of the Commune and other uprisings in China in the latter half of 1927, and the growing "right-wing” tendency in European states, particularly in Austria and France, the Comintern felt it was necessary to convene another plenum. Concluding Overview Even though events in China and criticisms voiced by the Opposition under Trotsky pointed to the futility of united front tactics, the united front remained a guideline of official Comintern policy in 1926 and 1927. The policy was subjected to sharp setbacks in March and April, 1927 by Chiang Kai-shek's anti-communist actions, which seemingly only slightly jarred, but did not alter, the policy. The increasing f r a g ility of the KMT-CCP a llia n c e in the e a rly and mid-summer forcefully pointed up the dilemma of the Comintern policymakers. The inability of the CCP to maintain the united front and at the same time conduct "agrarian revolution" became acute. The July Hi Comintern statement seemed to recognize some of the reality of the situation and ordered the CCP to remain primarily concerned with maintaining the alliance with the Left KMT, but more strongly than before urged the party to undertake agrarian revolution. The agrarian revolution was to supersede the united front policy later in 1927, but united front policy still played a not insignificant role in Comintern strategy at the Sixth Comintern Congress in mid-1928. CHAPTER V THE POLITICAL SITUATION IN KWANGTTWG The p o litic a l p a tte rn s of Kwangtung in the interim between the Revolution and the end of 1927 could well be viewed as a microcosm of the whole nation's political history during that period. The time was characterized by vigorous internecine struggle among warlords. This background, and the specific warlord clashes in Kwangtung, may explain in part why the communists felt they could succeed at Canton in December, 1927. The Revolution against the Imperial Government became effective in Kwangtung in November, 1911 when Chang M ing-chi, the Viceroy of the "two Kwangs" (Kwangtung and Kwangsi Provinces), fle d and the provincial assembly assumed nominal control. General Chiang Tsun-kuei was chosen provisional president, Hu Han-min was elected tu tu or military governor, and the provincial assembly announced that the province would be subject to the authority of the new Republic.^- Hu Han-min's increasing friendliness with Sun Yat-sen eventually led to his downfall. In mid-June of 1913 he was replaced as tu tu by Douglas Jenkins, "Kwangtung, Kwangsi, and Kweichow," China Since the Revolution of 1911 (prepared by the Department of State, Division of Far Eastern Affairs), Series D, No. 8li» China No. Ul (Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1926), p. 33. vice tu tu Ch'en Ch'iung-ming, who had gained in influence with the 2 Central Government at Peking. In July of 1913 Ch'en Ch'iung-ming suddenly declared Kwangtung Province independent of Peking and proposed to lead a Canton expeditionary force against Tuan Shih-k'ai. Failing to receive support from other m ilita ry commanders in the South, Ch'en was farced to resig n and leave Canton the following month. With Ch'en's departure the various military leaders in Kwangtung cancelled the so-called independence of the province. General Lung Chih-kuang became Governor with the obvious approval of Tuan, and Lung's regime proceeded to persecute the Kuomintang Party members in the province. This persecution coincided with Tuan's national campaign against the Kuomintang. In 1915 and early 1916, •a General Lung supported Tuan's monarchical ambitions. In March, 1916 the province of Kwangsi declared itself indepen dent of the Central Government. Then in a surprise move during the next month, General Lung Chih-kuang declared Kwangtung independent, and act which probably resulted from pressure brought by some pro revolutionary lower-echelon Army o ffic e rs and by the Kwangtung Navy, 2Ib id . ^Jenkins, "Kwangtung, Kwangsi and Kweichow," p. 3lu See Li Chien-nung's The P o litic a l H istory o f China 18U0-1928 T ranslated by S.T. Teng and Jeremy Ingalls (Princeton: t>. Van Nostrand Co., Inc., 1956), pp. 30U-350, and Jerome Ch'en, Tuan Shih-k'ai (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1961), pp. 196-^lb for detailed analyses of Tuan Shih-k'ai's monarchical attempt. 90 which was then in sympathy w ith the revolutionary movement. The s itu a tio n in Kwangtung grew tense over th is s p l i t , and lim ited fig h tin g resulted among the various factions. The death of Tuan Shih-k'ai in June, 1916 ended the monarchical movement, but did not alleviate the tense situation.^ Serious fighting resulted in September with General Lung relinquishing his command as tuchun,5 and General Chu Ching-lan assuming charge instead. General Chu had been appointed by the Central Govern ment, and he brought the province back to Peking's control. At this point Peking no longer trusted Lung.^ By mid-1917 Kwangtung was growing in tra n sig e n t to C entral Government authority, and particularly resented the Central Government's decision to sever diplomatic relations with Germany. In the face of this, the Central Government named the acting tuchun of Kwangsi, Lu 7 Tung-ting, as Military Governor of Kwangtung. This marked the beginning of a ctu al Kwangsi co n tro l in Kwangtung which was to l a s t intermittently over the next decade. The appointment of General Lu did not prevent the province from joining other southern provinces in ^Jenkins, "Kwangtung, Kwangsi and Kweichow," pp. 3U-35* The increasing independence of m ilitary governors prompted the Peking Government in early 1916 to change the title of provincial military governors from tu tu to tuchun. 6 Jenkins, "Kwangtung, Kwangsi and Kweichow," p. 35* *7 Jenkins, "Kwangtung, Kwangsi and Kweichow," pp. 35-36. opposition to the Central Government. In July, 1917 Sun Tat-sen returned to Canton and sought assistance in overthrowing the Peking Government. On August 29, 1917 the "Military Government of the Republic of China" was formally established with Sun Tat-sen as Commander-in-chief. General Lu Yung-ting was chosen as Inspector General. Friction quickly surfaced between Sun's revolutionary faction and the military leaders. The situation was further compli cated by the fact that the Central Government had replaced General Lu with General Lung Chih-kuang (the former M ilitary Governor of Kwangtung) as Inspector General of the "two Kwangs." General Lung immediately started to move toward Canton from Hainan Island, but his forces were g defeated by the Kwangtung Navy. The friction among the Canton factions continued into 1918. Sun even attempted to negotiate an alliance against Peking with General Lu Yung-ting, but this did not succeed. In May, 1918 the "National Assembly" at Canton elected an "administrative council" which o nominally represented the southern and western provinces. 8Ibid., p. 37 9 The "administrative council" had the following members: T'ang Shao-yi, General T'ang Chi-yao, Wu Ting-fang, Sun Yat-sen, Admiral Lin Pao-yih (formerly Captain of the cruiser Haichi, who succeeded Admiral Cheng Pi-kwang, assassinated on February 26, 1918, as Commander of the Kwangtung Navy), General Lu Yung-ting and General Ts'en Chun-hsun. Ibid., p. 38. 92 In early 1920, allegedly angered by the failure of the ‘'administrative council" to permit the election of Wu Ting-fang as Governor of Kwangtung and by persecution of the student movement, Sun resigned from the council and left Canton. Shortly thereafter, in March, Vu also le ft Canton and this marked the real end of the council."^ In the summer of 1920 General Ch'en Ch1 iung-ming, who had been quietly building up his strength over the previous year, began an a ttac k on Kwangtung w ith Canton as h is o b jectiv e. The c ity was taken in late October and thereby the Kwangsi military occupation of Canton was temporarily ended. Ch'en again declared the province independent of Peking and affirmed his allegiance to the southern government and Sun Tat-sen. Sun, Wu, and T'ang Shao-yi immediately returned to Canton to assume their duties as members of the administrative council. In the meantime, General Ch'en, who was now in control of the whole of Kwangtung Province, assumed the office of tuchun of Kwangtung.^ In April, 1921 the resurrected Parliament of 1913 dubiously re-elected Sun "President of the Republic of China.At th is time 1QIbid., p. 39. 11Ib id . , p. U0. 12I t was reported th a t 222 of the 22£ members present voted for Sun. However, as the Parliament originally had nearly one thousand members, the legality of the election is open to serious doubt. Ibid. hostilities resumed between Ch'en and the Kwangsi m ilitary which resulted in Ch'en's making considerable territorial conquests in Kwangsi. Also at this time Sun proposed a formal military expedition against General Wu P'ei-fu and the North. Despite General Ch'en's objections. Sun persisted, but he managed to gather the support of only T'ang Ghi-yao and Li Lieh-chun, minor Kwangtung warlords. The proposed Northern Expedition exacerbated the friction between Sun and Ch'en, which finally resulted in Ch'en's forcing Sun to leave Canton in June of 1922. Ch'en's return to dominance in Canton was generally acclaimed by the merchants and Chinese upper class and had the sympathy of most of the foreigners. The labor element was bitterly opposed to him, and various terrorist incidents occurred.^ General Hsu Ch'ung-chih, a Cantonese who remained loyal to Sun, occupied Foochow and began the organization of an army to invade Kwangtung and drive out Ch'en Ch-iung-ming. Meanwhile, a combined force of Yunnanese and Kwangsi troops, commanded by Generals Tang Hsi- min and Shun Hung-ying, reportedly supporters of Sun, captured Wu-chow on the West River in late 1922. Early in 1923 these farces renewed their drive toward Canton, which resulted in Ch'en's withdrawal to Waichow in the e aste rn p a rt of Kwangtung. The jo in t occupation of Canton by the Yunnan and Kwangsi forces soon resulted in open friction. Sun sided with the Yunnanese commander General Yang Hsi-min and in May, 1923 there were open clashes between these two forces. By the summer of 1923 the Yunnanese and the reorganized pro-Sun Cantonese troops scattered and defeated the remaining Kwangsi troops. However, the b a ttle ag ain st C h'en's forces in eastern Kwangtung was unsuccessful and Ch'en advanced toward Canton only to retreat la te r.^ The arrival of Borodin in Canton in August, 1923 and the subsequent Russian aid greatly strengthened the Kuomintang. In September, 192U Sun announced an expedition to the north. Troops were withdrawn from the Waichow front against Ch'en Ch'iung-ming for the expedition, which resulted in complete failure and never got beyond Shui chow in the northern p a rt of Kwangtung. In November Sun l e f t Canton for Shanghai and Peking for an attempted political reconciliation of the North and South. The m ilita ry s itu a tio n in la te 192U showed the Sun regime nominally in control of Canton and the western half of Kwangtung. Sun's primary fig h tin g u n it was the Yunnanese contingent 15 which at times disregarded his commands. During the latter part of 192U a rising Kwangsi clique headed by Li Tsung-jen, Pai Ch'ung-hsi and Huang Shao-hsiung, began to move closer to Canton. Sun appointed Li to the p o st of Kwangsi P a c ifica tio n 95 Commissioner—a position which acknowledged L i's power base. Sun's main enemy in Kwangtung, Ch'en Ch'iung-ming, controlled the entire eastern p o rtio n of Kwangtung and was reported ly on frie n d ly terms with the military authorities holding Hainan Island.^ The positions of Sun, the Kuomintang, and the Canton Government were significantly strengthened in 192$. When he died in Peking in March, 1925, Sun was quickly elevated to immortal and omniscient status and served, perhaps more in death than in life, as a unifying force for the Kuomintang. On July 1, 1925 the military government at Canton formally became the N a tio n a list Government o f China. I t s armed forces became the National Revolutionary Army. The chief claim to Sun's role as leader of the Party fell to Hu Han-min, Wang Ching-wei, Liao Chung-k'ai and Hsu Ch'ung-chih, leading to yet another struggle for power. On August 20, Liao was assassinated. Hu's younger brother was implicated and Hu felt impelled to resign and travel abroad. A committee of three— Hsu, Wang, and Chiang Kai-shek—were chosen to handle the m ilitary affairs of the government. However, Hsu was soon forced out and retired to Shanghai. By this action, the Canton government took a more radical slant under Wang Ching-wei. With the departure of Hu and Hsu, many conservative members of the Party left Canton and in November, some met at Sun's final resting ^Ibid., p. U6 . 96 place in the Western Hills outside of Peking (hence their derived title —"Western Hills group"). They passed resolutions denouncing Wang Ching-wei and demanding the expulsion of the communists from the Kuomintang, as well as the ouster of Borodin, and the abandoning of the policy of alliance with the Soviet U n i o n . The territorial extent of the Canton regime grew in 192$. In January and October-Noveraber, the regime launched the two "Eastern Expeditions" (the predecessors of the Northern Expedition) which expelled Ch'en 18 Ch'iung-ming from eastern Kwangtung. The political fortunes of the Kuomintang-dominated Canton Government further increased in 1926. In January the Kwangsi forces under Li Tsung-jen, Pai Ch'ung-hs i and Huang Shao-hung accepted the Nationalist flag and became the Seventh Army of the National Revolu tionary Army. Severe fighting continued in that province for the rest of the year, but by the end of 1926, Kwangsi was in the Kuomintang f o ld .19 The situ a tio n in Kwangtung was undergoing change. General Li Chi-shen, allied with the Kwangsi clique and a supporter of 17 Owen Mortimer Green, The Story of China's Revolution (London: Hutchinson and Co., 19kf>), pp. 12£-130. 18 C. Martin Wilbur and J u lia L.T. How, e d ito rs . Documents on Communism, Nationalism, and Soviet Advisers in China, 1918-1927 (New fork: Columbia University i’ress, l9$6), pp. 160-170. 19 Li Chien-nung, The Political History of China 18UO-1928 (Princeton: D. Van Nostrand a!nd Co., 1956), pp. li£6-l*9b• Chiang Kai-shek) succeeded gradually by April in completely establishing his dominance in Canton. Li's coup was related to the widening split between Nanking and Hankow. In addition to establishing his own power center) Li sought to use the Canton area as a source of support for Chiang Kai-shek's cause. When he seized power, a new anti-communist purge (hu tang yun-tung) was begun. More than two thousand suspected communists were arrested and probably one hundred and fifty were 20 executed. These policies evidently incurred the wrath of some of 21 th Cantonese workers, and brief, abortive strikes were initiated. After attaining his position as Military Commander of Kwangtung, General Li further reinforced his control by assuming the chairmanship of the Political Council of Canton and the Kuomintang Provincial Committee. Moreover, his immediate military supporters assumed strategic positions in the political hierarchy. After Li had consolidated his power, Chiang wanted him to march north with his troops to assist in the Northern Expedition; however, Li refused, claiming that his troops 22 were needed in Canton. He was shortly proved correct. With the 20 J.C. Huston, A Review of the Political Conditions in the Canton Consular D istrict during 1927 with Special Reference to the General Economic and Commercial Situation (n.p., 192B), p. 25. See also liozovskii (pseudonym of Solomon Abramovich Dridzo) and o th ers, Kuang-chou kung-shi (n.p., Wu ch'an chieh-chi, 1930), p. 68. 21 Huston, A Review of the Political Conditions..., p. 3» 98 defeat of the August 1 Nanchang Uprising, the forces of the two rebellious communist generals Teh T'ing and Ho Lung headed southward toward Chao-chow and Swatow in n ortheast Kwangtung. The possession of these towns was only b rie fly re a liz e d before the two forces were defeated by Kuomintang armies. After this defeat the communist forces split and one group went to join P'eng P'ai in the Sovietized districts of Hai-feng and Lu-feng. The other group under Chu Teh eventually 23 joined forces with Mao Tse-tung's guerilla forces in Ching-kang Shan. General Li sent a major portion of his army to eastern Kwangtung to 2k prevent the communists from further encroachment in that province. The situation in Canton had begun to grow even more tense with the September arrival of the Cantonese General Chang Fa-kuei who was ostensibly pursuing the retreating Yeh-Ho forces. Rumors were rampant of a conspiracy between Wang Ching-wei and Chang fa-kuei for the over throw of Li Chi-shen and the establishment of a Wang Ching-wei power . 25 c en ter. With the a rr iv a l of Chang F a-k u ei's troops in Canton, a number of Li Chi-shen1 s political appointees were forced to resign and Chang appointed 23 J. Guillermas, "The Nanchang Uprising," China Quarterly, No. 11 (July-September, 1962), pp. 166-167• 2k . Huston, A Review of the Political Conditions..., p. 3U« 25 J.C. Huston, Political Conditions in Canton Consular District during October, 1927 (n.p., October 31* 1927), p. 1; Hua Kang, 1-chiu erb-wu-nien--I-chiu-erh-chli nien ti Chung-kuo ta ko mine shih (A History of China's Great Revolution, 1925-1927) Second Edition (Shanghait Ch'un king, 1932), pp. 218, 220-221. 99 some of his own followers to these positions—most notably the Commissioner of Finance. In addition radical labor leaders driven out of Canton in April by Li began to reappear and to reassert their authority in their former unions. In September, Li had sent General 26 Wang Shao-hung to aid in defeating the Teh-Ho band a t Swatow, further limiting his available troops in Canton. Perhaps bolstered by the easy defeat of the Teh-Ho forces and the prospect of the return of his troops to Canton, Li struck back at Chang in October by staging a ra id on th e headquarters of the Seamen's Union, where he arrested many leaders who had returned to Canton since April. One of the crucial aspects of the arrest was that it was carried out by Chu Fei-jih, Chief of Police of Canton and one of Chang Fa-kuei's commanders. The U.S. Consul, J.C. Huston, reported in a confidential dispatch that Li had succeeded in bribing Chu Fei-jih and another of Chang Fa-kuei1s subordinates, Cheng Pai-nan, for $300,000 U.S. 27 Huston remarked that "the fact that the 'Ironsides' were not strong enough to overthrow Li Chai-sum [Li Chi-sherQ may have contributed to 28 the ready acceptance of such offers...." Huston, Political Conditions in Canton Consular D istrict during October, 1927» pp. 6-7. 27 "Ironsides" was the popular designation for Chang Fa-kuei1s Fourth Army. 28 Huston, Political Conditions in Canton Consular D istrict during October, 1927, pp. 8-9. 100 With the return of Chang to Canton, Li and his lieutenant Wang Shao-hung, through the agency of the Canton branch of the Political Council, proposed the formation of a military council. This council would co n tro l a l l m ilita ry a f f a ir s in the province of Kwangtung and Kwangsi. Chang readily agreed to the concept and resigned his command of the "Ironsides” in order to obtain a seat on the new council. Thus the "Ironsides" were technically under the new military council in 29 which Li Chi-shen held the majority of votes. The effectiveness of the military council as a restraint on Chang was evidently negligible— w itness h is November coup. Li evidently either felt it would be unwise to attempt to remove Chang's political appointees from office, or he felt unable to do so. However, Li did attempt to strengthen his alignment with Li Tsung-jen, 30 Pai Chung-hsi and other Kwangsi lea d ers. Meanwhile, a call was made at Nanking for a preliminary conference in November (prelim inary to th e Fourth Plenary Conference of the Kuomintang, which was to meet in early 1928). Chiang Kai-shek had recently returned from Japan and wired Li Chi-shen, Chang Fa-kuei, and 29 The names of the "Commissioners of the M ilitary Commission were: Li Chi-shen (Chairman), Huang Shao-hung (Li's general), Chang Fa-kuei, Chen Kung-po (Chang Fa-kuei*s supporter), Li Fu-lin ( a Li Chi-shen supporter), and Chen K'o-yu (Li's general)." Huston, Political Conditions in Canton Consular D istrict during October, 1927i p. 9 and Enclosure 2. 30 Ibid., p. 10. 101 Wang Ching-wei to attend. Wang Ching-wei, acknowledged leader of the Left Kuomintang, was now allied with Chang Fa-kuei. These three men all decided to attend the conference, but according to one source, Chang Fa-kuei in Hong Kong "accidentally" missed the boat which would take Li and himself to Shanghai for the meeting. Within twelve hours of Li's departure from Canton, the city was in the hands of General Chang and h is chief lie u te n a n t Huang C hi-hsiang. On the morning of November 17, Chang and Huang took possession of L i's m ilita ry head quarters and compelled his chief subordinate Wang Shao-hung to flee. Both Chang and Huang were Cantonese and were thus able to justify their 31 action under the slogan "Canton for the Cantonese." On November 2U, the f i r s t of a se rie s of Kuomintang meetings took place among the various factions at Nanking. Li Chi-shen, angered by Chang F a-k u ei's recen t coup, demanded a punitive expedition ag ain st Chang and punishment of Wang Ching-wei. Under the domination of the Kwangsi fa c tio n , th e Nanking Committee issued a formal order on December 2 against Chang Fa-kuei. Chiang Kai-shek's role throughout these meetings seemed to be th a t of m ediator, fo r on December 7 he c irc u la te d a l e t t e r strongly urging the various factions to subordinate their differences fo r the sake of the Kuomintang. At the same time he condemned m ilita ry ^■J.C. Huston, Peasants', Workers', and Soldiers' Revolt of December 11-13. 1927 a t Canton, China (n .p ., 1927), Enclosure b, Frederick W Hinke, "Communist Coup d'Etat at Canton," pp. 1A-2. See also Huston, A Review of Political Conditions in the Canton Consular D is tric t during 1927 with Special Reference"to the General Economic and Commercial Situation, pp. bo-til. 102 activities not authorized by the Kuomlntang-dominated Government.^ During the e arly p a rt of December, Chang Fa-kuei was mainly concerned with military movements; specifically, he attempted to impose a decisive m ilitary defeat on Wang Shao-hung. However, Wang evaded this attempt by slowly retreating from Sam-sui westward toward Shiu-hing 33 and Ta-ch'ing on the West River in western Kwangtung. Wang's tactics were simple. He reasoned that the further he retreated up the West River toward his allies in Kwangsi, the greater support difficulties Chang would have. The dissipation of troops over a wider area would tend to weaken Chang's position. At Wai-chow Chang d e ta ile d a force of some 1,£00 men to guard his flank. In that vicinity Chang and his chief subordinate Huang unsuccessfully sought allies among the bandit chiefs of the region (formerly allied with Ch'en Ch'iung-ming). 3U On December 7, Li Fu-lin, allied with Li Chi-shen, entered Kongmoon and forced Chang's troops eastward. In the northwest the forces of Fan Shek-sheng and Fang Ting-ying, minor Hunan warlords, remained on the Hunan-Kwangtung border demanding food and money fo r the price of their allegiance. Evidently they did receive some support ^Grover Clark, China in 1927 (Peking: Peking Leader Press, 1928), p . 11*7. 33 Huston, Political Conditions in Canton Consular D istrict during December, 1927, pp. i-2# ■ ^Cantonese pronunciation and romanization of his name is Li Fuk-lum. Consul Huston always used the Cantonese spelling in his reports. 103 from Chang but throughout the subsequent struggle they continued to maintain their headquarters at Shluchow without taking part. In the northeast of Kwangtung the forces of Chen Ming-shu, Chen Chai-tong and Chien Ta-chun, allies of Li Chi-shen, began to close in on Canton from the e a st.^ With this imposing force encircling Canton, the Chang Fa-kuei/ Wang Ching-wei clique put out rumors of a proposed armistice in Canton, Shanghai, and Nanking. Kan Nai-kwang, Mayor of Canton, was sent to Shanghai to set forth the views of Chang. Mrs. Wang Ching-wei went to Canton from Shanghai with certain proposals. In Shanghai, Wang Ching-wei proposed th a t m ilita ry operations in Kwangtung might be temporarily suspended by both sides pending a solution to the problem. Chang Fa-kuei was in favor of the armistice, but the opposing forces 36 continued to march on Canton. On December 6 the P rovincial Government of Kwangtung was reorganized by Chang. Among the newly appointed commissioners were Mrs. Liao Chung-kai (Ho Hsiang-ying) and Ch'en Kung-po, giving the 37 government a definite "left" slant. However, there is no available ^Huston, Political Conditions in Canton Consular District during December, 1927, p. 2. ^Ibld., pp. 2-li. 37 Huston, Peasants1, Workers1. and Soldiers * Revolt of December 11-13, 1927 at Canton'China, p. 3. The newly appointed commissioners were: Mrs. Liao Chung-kai (Ho Huang-ying), Chu Chao-hsin, Li Lang-yu, Ch’en Kung-po, Li Ching-ta, Hsu Chung-ching, Chen Shu-yen, Hsieh Ying- pai, Tsiu Min-chu, Chu Fei-yet, and Yu Kai-chan. Ibid. ioU evidence which indicates that any of the commissioners aided the forthcoming uprising. This background was the setting for the Canton Commune of December 11. The re v o lt la s te d only three days before Chang F a-kuei's and Li Fu-lin's troops suppresed it. It is evident that the communist planners of the uprising believed that the absence of Chang's and Li's troops from the city would significantly increase their chances of success. Furthermore, it seems clear that preparation for the possibility that Chang's and Li's feuding troops would unite to suppress the uprising was not in the thinking of the communist coordinators. A detailed account of the insurrection will be found in Chapter VUI. CHAPTER VI KWANGTUNG IN 1927: AN ECONOMIC SURVEY Presumably revolts occur in times of dissatisfaction. Not only was Kwangtung enveloped in p o litic a l turm oil in 1927*^ but the communists viewed living conditions in Canton itself as so intolerable as to be ripe for mass uprising against oppression. Apparently those who planned the December uprising in Canton misinterpreted economic signals. The theoretical backbone of insurrection, the workers and peasants, were unresponsive to the insurgents' call to arms even after fighting had begun and there seemed to be a good chance of the Commune's success if the insurgents received substantial aid from them. An economic survey of Kwangtung sheds some lig h t on why the m ajority o f Canton workers refused to cooperate with the communist insurrectionists, who were ostensibly fighting to improve the conditions of the working masses. Such a survey also gives some indication as to why the surrounding peasantry remained aloof, even though communist policy directed that In the recent literature on the warlord era in China, the reader is treated to intriguing and detailed studies of the political machina tions of the tuchuns. The unending process of alliance and feud is clarified and made comprehensible. See James E. Sheridan, The Chinese Warlord: The Career of Feng Yu-hsiang (Stanford: Stanford University !Press, 1966) and Gorge T. Yu, Party Politics in Republican China, the KMT 1912-192U (Berkeley: U niversity of C alifornia P ress, I 966 J. However, the economic background upon which this political-m ilitary account unfolds has largely been ignored. It is the writer's contention that a clearer understanding of the national and provincial economics of this era would help place the overall picture in clearer perspective. 106 they should and would aid their proletarian brothers in overthrowing the oppressors. I t would seem th a t while the s itu a tio n in Kwangtung was not the brightest, the workers and peasants evidently felt it was not unbearable enough to fight against. In attem pting an economic survey of Kwangtung in 1927, a search for extensive data is repeatedly frustrated. China in 1927 was in many respects an underdeveloped country and in general, there is a lack of reliable statistical data for this period. For example, only in 192U in Canton was a Bureau of Agriculture and Industry established, which undertook studies and compilations of statistics, prices, working 2 conditions, salaries, and similar types of pertinent data. In addition to a lack of statistical data of high reliability, the researcher is confronted with the Chinese penchant for estimation or approximation. It seems that the urgency of exactitude thought so desirable in the West was and s till has not been emulated by the Chinese. Moreover, the various types of measurements for money, volume, and weight differed from vicinity to vicinity, adding to the problems of economic research. In viewing Chinese statistics, all these limitations must never be far from mind. 2 Franklin L. Ho, "Prices and Price Indexes in China," Chinese Economic Journal Vol. I , No. S> (May, 1927)* p. U30. Note: The situ a tio n in North China was somewhat b e tte r documented by s t a t i s t i c a l m aterials because a Bureau of Markets had been established in 1919 and conducted extensive economic studies there. Ibid. 107 A complete economic survey of Kwangtung would probably, a t least initially, entail an estimation of the National Income for China in per capita terms with a comparison of Kvrangtung's* p er cap ita income. This comparison would roughly indicate Kwangtung's relative position with the national level. Indexes of industrial production would aid in estimating Kwangtung's economic situation. In addition, knowledge of the money supply, note issuance and wage index, as well as the ra te s of in te re s t in Kwangtung would aid in any assessm ent of the s itu a tio n . Lastly, a wholesale price index for Canton, a provincial budget, and foreign trade statistics would assure a balanced economic picture. The fact of the matter is that most of these economic indicators fo r 1927 in Kwangtung are simply not a v aila b le. Those which are available include the provincial budget for Kwangtung, a wholesale price index, a retail price index, and foreign trade statistics for Canton and other ports in Kwangtung for 1927. These available indicators present a gross indicatio n as to the s ta te of the economy of Kwangtung fo r th a t year. To clarify further the economic condition of Kwangtung, a review can be made of the economic conditions of union members, as well as a review of peasant conditions as seen through the activities of the Kwangtung Provincial Farmers' Union. It was thought that the combination of the available general economic indicators and analysis of the personal conditions of the workers and peasants would present a more accurate picture than one or the other. 108 The p ictu re of the economy in Kwangtung which emerges fo r 1927 is of course less than complete, but comprehensive enough to discern patterns. The economic atmosphere was pervaded with serious inflation, a slack trade, and a provincial budget which generally supported an unproductive military machine to the neglect of other necessities. In addition, there was suppression of union activity, taxation, and political problems in the countryside, but these and the other factors just mentioned did not seem to negate a certain economic well-being of workers and peasants. What economic dislocation was evident could for the most part be attributed to the disruptive warlord activity in the province. J.C. Huston, U.S. Consul in Canton at the time, painted perhaps a too-bleak p ictu re of Kwangtung a t th a t tim e: 1927 was one of the worst economic years fo r Kwangtung. The ordinary type of p o litic a l in s ta b ility was compounded by fin a n c ia l troubles, labor eruptions, and peasant risings accompanied by an . unusual amount of activities on the part of pirates and bandits.... The effect of chaotic military and political conditions on the econony of Kwangtung were apparent. These effects could be seen in trade, in the provincial budget, in union activity and in the increasing 3 J.C . Huston, A Review of P o litic a l Conditions in the Canton Consular District during l927 with Special Reference to the General Economic and Commercial Situation Hoover Institution Library (n.p., W 28);-p.'l. ------impoverishment of the countryside. However, these destructive forces were structurally balanced, in part by the same forces, which sought to maintain a productive society. For example, the military authorities were aware that if trade and production were disrupted beyond a certain point, the econony could not support their military establishment. In like manner, the landlords and gentry sought to maintain some sort of equilibrium in the system, for the system was the principal means of their livelihood. On balance, in 1927 the constructive forces within society had tipped the scales in their own favor. This is not to say that poverty and chaos were not present, but that these elements were moderated by the common desire of almost all elements in society to maintain as high as possible production in Kwangtung. Kwangtung, particularly Canton, was the chief distribution point for both imports of foreign goods and Chinese exports, usually in the form of raw materials or food products. Usually the inports were shipped from Hong Kong and would have to be unloaded several miles south of Canton to shallow bottom boats for the final journey. In addition to Canton, nearby Kingmoon and Sanshiu were distribution points. Once the goods were in Canton, an extensive native system of river and land transportation distributed them over the interior of south and southwest China.^ kJulian Arnold, China: A Commercial and In d u stria l Handbook (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1926), p. U07. 1 1 0 The political chaos engendered by the civil war had, of course, a detrimental effect on Chinese trade. The value of imports into China continuously declined during the decade from 1920 to 1930. A similar decline was evident in Chinese exports. The nadir of imports into China occurred when imports declined approximately eighteen percent from 1926 to 1927* This decline was probably directly attributable to a flaring up of the civil war. On the export side, the value of exports from China reached a peak in 1919. One of the poorest years for exports in the 1920's was 1927, which ranked fifth from the bottom over that ten year period.'* Kwangtung*s proportion of value of to ta l imports and exports for 1927 is unavailable. The statistics for 1928 are available, and perhaps if adjusted back to 1927, can serve as a guide. However, the percentages for 1928, because of increasing stability in China, probably tend to be on the high side for Kwangtung in 1927* This is essentially because in 1927, due to the civil war, there was a noticeable shift in trade patterns, whereby the southern ports (Canton, Hankow, and Shanghai) declined in value and volume of trade while the northern ports 6 7 made substantial increases. Given these limitations, Kwangtung ^Chien Tsai and Kwan-wai Chan, Trend and Character of China's warForeign jrjr. Trade ------1912-1931 (Shanghai: China Institute of Pacific Relations, 6 H.H. Fox, Report on Commercial, In d u s tria l, and Economic Situation in China to September 1, 1^8 (London: His Majesty's Stationery TO ice, "1928)7 pp. SI-22. ----- ^Kwangtung's provincial imports and exports were based on reports from Canton, Kingmoon, Samshiu and Swatow. I l l might have received as high as six percent of the total value of imports coming into China, and possibly as much as nine percent of the total value of exports. Canton alone accounted for approximately three percent of the value of total imports and approximately 1.3 O percent of the value of total exports. Some of the tragedy and economic wastefulness of the civil war in Kwangtung was reflected in the provincial budget. The U.S. Consular official in Canton, in a classified report to his superiors, cited a confidential statement of the provincial budget for Fiscal Tear 1926/1927. The Kwangtung budget covered the l a s t s ix months of 1926 and the f i r s t 9 s ix months of 1927* However, any budget in China since 1912, as one source remarked, was nothing more than "a pious expression of hope that actual revenues and expenditures would correspond with the estimates."10 The 1926A927 Kwangtung budget c a rrie d on th is tra d itio n . I t is known that the Provincial Treasury supplied Chiang Kai-shek with the equivalent of four and one-half million dollars a month from January to July, 1927 O H.G.W. Woodhead, E d ito r. The China Year Book, 1931 (Shanghais North China Daily News and Herald, Ltd., 1931)) pp. 292-293. The cited percentages are derived from the table on the above pages entitled, "Value of the Direct Foreign Trade of Each Port, 1928-1929*" 9 Huston, A Review of P o litic a l C onditions. . . , p. 11. ^James Allen DeForce, "Budget of Far Eastern Countries," Trade Information Bulletin No. 297 (December, 192U) (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 192U), p. 10. for the Northern Expedition. This expenditure is seemingly not listed in the provincial budget.^ In terms of tax receipts, the Provincial Government drew the majority of its revenue from (l) tax raised (not defined in the source, but obviously important because it was the single largest source of revenue); (2) salt tax; and (3) likin (an internal transportation tax on goods). Evidently the ta x burden of the people of Kwangtung was qu ite heavy. Huston remarked th a t because Kwangtung was so n a tu ra lly rich (two or three rice crops could be grown in a year) warlords were continuously vying for control of the city and adjacent regions. Once a warlord was in control, the inhabitants were steeply taxed. The f i r s t h a lf of 1927 showed a moderate decline in the revenues from 12 "likin11 and "tax raised," and a sharp decline in the salt tax. The budget expenditures of the Kwangtung Provincial Committee reflected a disregard for the social services and public health. The bulk of the revenue raised went for the support of the military establishment. Education received one percent of the total budget during this period, although it should be noted that extra-budgetary items such as fees aided the maintenance of education. Agriculture , A Review of Political Conditions..., p. 1 and communications development, although listed in the budget, received no actual support. For these, no extra-budgetary items were mentioned in any of the sources consulted. The largest item on the expenditure side of the budget was the military, which accounted for close to sixty-five percent of the total. The payment of obligations due was the second highest item in the budget at close to thirteen percent of the total. Administration, diplomatic activities, interest, financial, judicial, and miscellaneous expendi- 1*5 tures accounted for less than twenty-two percent of the total. In short, the heavy taxes and the relatively nonproductive ejqpenditures of the m ilitary imposed an economic burden on the people of Kwang tung. A price index of any sort, if properly collected, presents a reasonably accurate reflection of inflation if it is present. The available wholesale and retail price indexes for Canton in 1927 are open to doubt for several reasons. First, as was noted earlier, the Bureau of Agriculture and Industry in Canton, which compiled the statistics for one source, was established only in 1921* and thus its techniques both of compilation and statistical analysis in all probability were low in level. In ill* addition, the sources^* do not adequately describe the various components of the charts or indexes presented. Thus the price indexes are probably inaccurate, but it has been assumed that the figures presented are approximate estimations of the actual state of affairs. This assumption seems to be validated in part by descriptive information presented later in the Chapter. The sources of wholesale prices used 1913 as the base year and gave it the designation of 100. The year 1 9 1 5 represented a twelve percent increase over the base year; 1920 had a thirty-five percent increase; and 192U was characterized by a sixty-nine percent increase over the base year. In 1925 the increase over 192U was five percent; the 1926 increase was double the previous year, and stood at eleven percent.^ If an average is taken of the percentage over the thirteen- year period, an average of seven percent per annum increase is obtained. ^tfang Ch'ing-ben, et. al., editors. Chung-kuo lao-tung nien- chien (Chinese Labor Yearbook)"TPekings Institute of Social Research, 19^8), Part I, p. Ili6. See also Y.P. Huang, et. al., editors. Kwang- chou p 1 i-fa wu-chia chih shu-so-yin, 1927-1933~(The Wholesale Prices and Price Indexes in Canton, 19^7-1933) (Canton: Bureau of Economic Research of Sim Yat-sen University, 193U), pp. 19, 28-31, 56-62, 112- 115, lii0-lU3, 168-175 and 22U-227; H.Q.W. Woodhead, e d ito r. China Year Book 1929-1930 (Tientsin: Tientsin Press, Ltd., 1930), pp. 5h7- 5U6;' and iFranklin L. Ho, "Prices and Price Indexes in China," Chinese Economic Journal Vol. I , No. 5, p. Ui3« Note: A "price index numbers in Canton l^lS-1925" chart was available but could not be used because there was no reference as to whether or not the price index numbers were retail or wholesale or perhaps something else. U.K. Lieu, China1s Industries and Finance (Shanghai: Bureau of Economic Information, 1927), p. 108. Chung-kuo lao-tung nien-chlen, Part I, p. lU6. 115 For 1927 another source indicated a general wholesale price average increase of approximately five percent. The same source cites the meaning of this rise in terms of a decrease of 1.8 percent in the purchasing power of the d o l l a r .^ S t i l l another source using 1926 as the base year, indicates a 2.2 percent rise in the general wholesale 17 price index for 1927. The available retail price index for Canton uses 1926 as the base year. In terms of food products (including grains, meats, and vegetables) there was a 6.5 percent average in 1927* However, clothing and fuel decreased in price, leaving the overall general retail price index with 18 a rise of 3.8 percent. If the price indexes have any reliability, then it seems that inflation was a fact of life for the Cantonese over a considerable period. Inflationary rates are relative and depend in large measure for meaning on real wage rates and other factors. This ancillary information is not available for Canton, and it would seem that the only ■*Afoodhead, China Year Book 1929-1930. pp. 5U7-5U8. The general average in this index is derived from an investigation of rice, other food products, textiles, fuel and lights, metals, building materials, and miscellaneous items. 17 Huang, Kwang-chou p 'i-fa wu-chia chih shu-so-yin, p. 19. •*-®Ma Pi-hsin, et. a l., editors. Chung-kuo lao-tung nien-chien (Peking: Institute of Social Research, 1932;, Part I, p. 222. 116 reasonable statement that could be made is that inflation existed and, given what is known about the rest of the economy and the political situation, that the inflation was not debilitating but was serious enough to warrant concern among the general population. The Labor Situation in Canton Important to a clearer understanding of the economic panorama of Kwangtung in 1927 is an inquiry into the labor movement in Canton and its economic well-being. The history of unionism in China was, in its early years, largely the story of labor in South China, especially Canton and Hong Kong. 19 At the First National Labor Conference in 1922, one hundred and sixty delegates met representing more than 300,000 workers in some two hundred unions in twelve important cities. By20 the Second National Labor Conference in May, 1925 there were two hundred 21 and thirty delegates representing 570,000 workers. Exactly one year later at the Third National Labor Conference held in Canton, four hundred delegates were assembled representing a reported 1,21*0,000 S.K. Sheldon Tso, The Labor Movement in China (Shanghai: n.p., 1928), pp. 79-81. 20 Ibid., p. 82. See also Fu-an Fang, Chinese Labour (Shanghai: Kelly and Walsh, 1931), p. 69* 2 1 Tso, The Labor Movement in China, p. 83. See also Fang, Chinese Labour, p. 69. 117 22 workers belonging to four hundred unions throughout China. The rapid growth of unions and union members is visibly demonstrated in these conference figures. In Canton, the number of unions organized since the Revolution blossomed so that by 192U there were more than three hundred in Canton alone.^ In general, during 1925 and 1926 the unions grew in power. An early investigator of the Chinese labor movement outlined five main reasons why "trade unionism in Kwangtung (grew} fa s te r than anywhere e lse ": (1) The Southern Government had been sympathetic toward the laboring classes; (2) The Cantonese had always had more intimate contact with the West; (3) The Cantonese possessed more of a fighting spirit and were more contentious than the people of other provinces; (U) The purchasing power of the Cantonese was on the average higher than that of other people in China, hence economic conditions favored labor organizations by enabling people to pay the necessary dues; and 22 Tso, The Labor Movement in China, pp. 83—Bit- See also Fang, Chinese Labour, p. 70 and Lin Tung-hai, The Labor Movement and labor Legislation in China (Shanghai: China United Press, 1$33J, pp. 10U- To5i 23 Tso, The Labor Movement in China, p. 86. (£) The people of Kwangtung had climatic conditions which permitted the land to be under cultivation practically the whole year. Consequently, the striking laborer could, through his family connections, often return to the land when necessity forced him to find sustenance 2k from sources other than his work. The path of union development, it should be noted, was at times uneven. The Kwangtung Provincial authorities at times attempted to restrict their development. Perhaps because of the Canton- Hong Kong strikes of 192£ and 1926 and because of general union agitation, the P rovincial Government sought to lim it the actions o f union men and rationalized in the following manner: I t i s the d esire of the Government to p rotect the in te r e sts of the workers, but of late, laborers of bad character, taking advantage of com plications among th e ir members, are committing p* arbitrary a c ts, which w ill be detrim ental to the labor movement. Early in January, 1927 the Kuomintang, as distinct from the Provincial Government, perhaps to enhance its revolutionary image, promulgated labor regulations which tended to favor the workers. In a labor dispute the employer was obligated not to hire others to replace the strik in g workers, and employees returning to work a fte r a strik e 119 were to be entitled to wages lost during the strike period according to the new wage scale. In addition, merchants were prohibited from forming their own unions, forming workers’ unions, or undermining the 26 workers’ unions. On the other hand, labor was expected not to arrest any merchants or appropriate their goods. In addition, the labor organizations were required to register with the government and 27 could not force any person to become a union member. However, the Kuomintang's strike regulations were little more than unenforced "official" policy and did not prevent the suppression of union activities by the Provincial Government in 1927. Unfortunately the details of the labor activity and strikes in Canton for 1927 are not included in available sources. However, in April when Li Chi-shen seized power in Canton, he inaugurated a new anti-communist purge and more than two thousand suspected communists 28 were arrested; probably one hundred and fifty were executed. This policy incurred the wrath of many of the unions in Canton which were communist-oriented, and strikes were undertaken which were quickly and 29 brutally terminated. 26 Unsigned, "Strike Regulations in Canton," Chinese Economic Journal Vol. I, No. 3 (March, 1927),p. 276. 27I b id ., pp. 276-277. 28 Huston, A Review of P o litic a l C o n d itio n s..., p. 23. 29 Ibid., p. 3. 120 Later in November, after Chang Fa-kuei stated a coup in Canton, the anti-communist persecutions were given new vigor. Chang decreed that the workers had lost their right to strike, and some of the workers 30 who protested were shot. In general, one can reasonably conclude that because of the large number of communists and sympathizers in the labor movement, the general purging of these people by the Canton authorities severely weakened the affected unions and decreased general union bargaining power in 1927. In August, 1926 during the Canton-Hong Kong s tr ik e , a "Commission on Social Survey" was appointed by the Mayor of Canton to investigate labor conditions. T.L. Lee, Vice President of Lingnan University and Acting General Secretary of the Canton YMCA, was appointed Director. The survey itself touched on the fields of education, religion, insurance, 31 and urban population, but concentrated primarily on labor. The 3%ua Kang, I-chiu-erh-wu nlen— -1-chiu-erh-ch1 i-nlen tl Chung- kuo ta ko-mlng shih (A History oi China's Great Revolution I92j>-1 Second Edition (Shanghai: Ch'un-king, 1932), p. 221. ■^^Tung Lam Lee, Some Aspects of the Labor Situation in Canton: A Report (Canton, n .p ., 1928), p . 1. A somewhat le s s d e ta ile d version 0? this report is available in China Weekly Review (January 28, 1928), pp. 212- 21^. The questionnaire which the unions were asked to fill out by the special investigators who interviewed labor leaders required the following information: "(l) The Name of the Union, (2) The Location of the Head quarters of the Union, (3) The Organization of the Union, (U) The Consti tution of the Union, (5) What Government Office was the Union Registered with, (6) When the Union was Registered, (7) When the Union was Organized, (8) The Number of Workmen in the Same Trade as the Union, (9) The Number of the Members of the Union, (10) Union Fees, (ll) The Average Monthly Wages of the Workers, (12) The Minimum Working Hours, (13) The Number of Union Members who were able to Read Newspapers, (lU)The Number of Union Members who ware a lso Members of the Kuomintang, (l£ ) The Number of Unemployed Members, and (16) The Reasons fo r Unemployment." Ib id ., pp. 2-3. 121 Commission took up the problem of labor first because of its current importance in Canton. The data for the report was primarily obtained directly from labor union leaders and employers. The difficulty of obtaining accurate data motivated Lee to state that: It was very difficult to secure first the information that we wanted as both foreign and Chinese employers objected to giving us the facts. Both groups were suspicious of us fjthe Commission}. Some labor unions thought we were allied with their political opponents and so did not want to tell us any thing about their unions.32 At the time of the survey there were about two hundred and fifty labor unions in Canton, but the Commission was able to obtain reports from only one hundred and eighty of them. The Commission found th a t the unions were divided under two labor fed eratio n s—the Kwangtung P rovincial Federation of Labor Unions and the Labor Congress, with the former generally classified as "right" and the latter "left." Of the one hundred and eighty unions surveyed, one hundred and thirty belonged to the leftist-dominated Labor Congress, and twenty-one were under the Kwangtung P ro v in cial Federation. 33 The most powerful union in the Labor Congress was the Chinese Seamen's Union, one of the few national labor organizations in China in 1927. It originated with Chinese sailors who fought discrimination by 32 Ibid., p. 1. 33 Ibid., p. 3. It was also found that eleven unions were independent and two belonged to both federations; four refused to say with what larger organization they were affiliated. See also Chung-kuo lao-tung nien-chien. Part II, p. 72, and for a list of unions in Kwangtung in 1^2t see pp. 73- 79; see Jean Chesneaux, Les Svndicats Chinois 1919-1927 (Paris: Houton, 1969), pp. 27-39 for another lis t of unions in Kwangtung. 122 B ritish seamen and i t began to organize in the second decade of the 3k Twentieth Century. In 1920 the previously organized groups of Chinese seamen were given the official title of "Chinese Seamen's Union" by Sun Yat-sen. In early 1922 the union presented its demand for a wage increase to the shipping companies in Hong Kong and upon their refusal to agree to the demand, the union declared a strike which lasted fifty days. British shipping lines directly lost five million dollars, while the indirect losses must have been much greater. The workers lost 200,000 Mexican dollars in wages, but during the strike period they were provided with government sustenance grants of from forty-five cents to one dollar a day. On March 6, the strike was settled in the seamen's favor and they returned to work, although they never secured compliance with one strike settlement condition providing for an indemnity to the strikers for lost wages.39 The union supported the N a tio n a list movement ag ain st the B ritish in South China by demonstrating against the May 30th Incident in Shanghai. The June 23 Incident at Shamen caused the union to declare its second general strike in Hong Kong and join with Canton in a vigorous boycott ag ain st Hong Kong. The s trik e was led by Su Chao-jen, Teng Chung-hsia, 3U , Chuan-hua Lowe, Facing Labor Issues in China (Shanghai: China Institute of Pacific Relations, 1933), pp. 91-92. 3*Ibid., p. 93. Hsiang Pin and Tang Ting, a ll known communists and powerful leaders 36 in the union. The strike lasted more than a year, during which time the union moved its headquarters to Canton. The strike was declared ended by the Nationalist Government in October, 1926 without any of the substantive issues being settled. The communist domination of this union was repeatedly shaken by the purges of 1927 in which many union men were imprisoned; even so, many of its members took an active part in the Canton Commune. The Seamen's Union a fte r 1927 became in creasing ly 37 subservient to the Nationalist Government and the Kuomintang. The Kwangtung Mechanics' Union, one of the b e st organized groups of skilled workers in China, was comprised of mechanics engaged in the various Kwangtung industries. The union had its origin in a series of secret societies and associations dating to 1910, which finally , 38 adopted the name of the Kwangtung Mechanics' Union in January, 1926. The platform of the union in 1926 showed a strong bias against the communists: We have from the very beginning of our existence opposed the Communist Party, and we believe that the Kuomintang is the only political party which is really interested in the emancipation of the worker in China. ^Nym Wales (pseudonym of Helen Snow), The Chinese Labor Movement (New Tork: John Day Company, 19U5), p . 211. 37 Lowe, Facing Labor Issues in China, pp. 5U-56. 12U This Kuomintang bias of the union did not affect its strike policy. In April, 1927 the union felt it was necessary to improve the working conditions in machine shops in Honan and presented its demands. These demands were refused and a s trik e was c a lle d which la s te d u n til A pril, 1928 when a settlement was finally reached.^ During the Canton Uprising in December, 1927, the Kwangtung Mechanics' Union tenaciously fought the insurrectionists. Harold Isaacs, in his classic study of China in the 1920's, cited that the Mechanics' Union had "1,000 armed gangsters" who were heavily armed, and implied that they severely hindered the communists.^ The Lee Commission's report found that of the one hundred and eighty labor unions surveyed, one hundred and six of them were newly organized, with the remaining having guild origins. These one hundred and eighty unions reportedly had 290,620 members of whom 77,932 were members of the Kuomintang. The Commission could not a sc e rta in the number U2 of union members who belonged to the Chinese Communist P arty. One source placed the total number of workers in Canton at this time at Lowe, Facing labor Issues in China, pp. 61-62. k^arold R. Isaacs, The Tragedy of the Chinese Revolution, Second Revised Edition (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1961), p. 28U. U2 Lee, Some Aspects of the Labor Situation in Canton, p. 3* I A U00,000, indicating that at least sixty percent of the workers of Canton were "unionized.” There is some reason to believe that the non union workers tended to receive lower wages than union men and this pay differential was probably another determinant of the rapid unionization of Canton. The numbers of workers who were reportedly able to read the daily newspapers were 108,686. This surprisingly large number of literates, given the general level of illiteracy among the people, was attributed to the political parties1 activity among the workers in the previous two years. The parties had done much propaganda-educational work among the workers, and as a result, a good number had learned how to read and write. The sizes of the labor unions varied greatly. Statistically, the majority of union members were in small unions with total memberships of less than 1,000, indicating that most of them were either company unions or specialized unions probably having limited economic bargaining power US because of a small strike potential. The question of working hours per day is difficult to answer, for Canton was s till largely in the home industry stage. Workmen might stop any number of times a day for smoking, drinking of tea, or telling of stories. This was in contrast to those who worked with U3s .K. Sheldon Tso, "Labor Organization in 1928," Prank Rawlinson, editor. China Christian Yearbook, 1929 (Shanghais Christian Literature Society, i9^)j p. 321. k^Lee, Some Aspects of the Labor Situation in Canton, p. 3. 126 machinery in factories. The hours varied from six a day to sixteen or eighteen hours a day.^ The wages of union workers were also difficult to ascertain, according to the Commission's report. For example, some workers such as rickshaw coolies and ordinary coolies received payment for the number of hours they worked. Some workers were furnished with board and room in lieu of part of their wages. The average of the minimum wages was $7.50 and the maximum was $39.00 a month. The general average was $23.00 to $2^.00 a month.1*7 The report found that 60,7Ui of the total number of 290,628 union members surveyed were unemployed, which represents twenty percent of the total union membership. The report judged this to be a small number of unemployed and commented th a t unemployment was much g rea ter with non-union men than with union men. This probably reflects the k6Ibid., p. U. 1*7Ibid. , p. $, Note: The labor conditions in Chekiang, as compared with Canton,are difficult to assess. However, it is interesting to note the obvious inflation and its effect on Chekiang labor in 1926. In a 1926 report on Chekiang it was noted that strike agitation was brought about by the high cost of necessities and depreciation of the copper currency. In 1926 Chekiang experienced a phenomenal rise in the price of the basic staple of the diet—rice. In the harvest season (about October and November) of 1925, common ric e was sold a t $6 to $9 a p ic u l on the Hangchow market. One year later the same picul of rice was selling for $lU to $15• Similarly a dollar exchanged for 190 coppers in 1925, but in 1926 it exchanged for 280 coppers. In addition rent had gone up by seventy to one hundred percent over the period from 1921 through 1926, and coarse cotton cloth had risen in price by twenty to thirty percent. Unsigned, "Labor Conditions in Chekiang," Chinese Economic Journal Vol. I, No. 2 (February, 1927), pp. 216-22U. ———————— — — —— fact that the unions had greater economic bargaining power as well as U8 having members who were probably somewhat more sk ille d than non-members. The report indicated the following main reasons for unemployment in Canton: (1) Trade was bad, therefore workmen had been discharged; (2) There were strikes on against employers; (3) Effects of the Hong Kong strike s till lingered; (U) There were union wars, primarily between communist and non-communist unions; (£) Transportation was poor due to bandits; (6) It was not a busy season; (7) Machinery had replaced hand U9 workers; (8) There was a lack of raw materials. The general intent of the Commission's report indicated a degree of economic depression in Canton as well as certain insecurities on the part of union members. It did not indicate any serious widespread economic or social disorder as one might imagine in a warlord torn area. This paradox i s the key to understanding the economic s itu a tio n in Kwangtung in 1927. The Peasantry in Kwangtung The l a s t im portant element in the Kwangtung economy on which information is available is the condition of rural land ownership, c re d it, and union a c tiv ity . Kwangtung Province in 1927, according to 128 one source, had 900,000 square 11 (or thirty-four million mow) of arable land which accounted for seven percent of the total land area.^ Of this arable land, at least fifty percent was irrigated. In addition to this, Kwangtung received heavy rainfall which tended to leach the soil rather heavily. However, with intensive working of the land, two successive crops of rice could be grown, which meant that the province could support large numbers of people.^ In the twelve districts along the East River, 3U.$ percent of the cultivated land was farmed by owners and 6$.J> percent was farmed by part-owners and tenants. It is not indicated in the survey what percentage of tenants did not own any land at all. The East River data tends to correlate with the Statistical Annual for 1927, in which indepen dent farmers were said to number 33*5 percent, part-owners 29.2 percent, <2 and tenants 37.3 percent of persons working the land. However, it is evident that conditions of ownership differed in various parts of Kwangtung. For example, a survey of the "Middle Region" ^U nsigned, "A griculture in Kwangtung Province," Chinese Economic Monthly Vol. i n , No. 7 (Ju ly , 1926), p. 29$. Another source cites an arable area of Kwangtung of approximately th ree m illio n square l i . See Unsigned, "Kwangtung A g ricu ltu ral S ta tis tic s ," Chinese Economic Journal Vol. I I , No. U (A p ril, 1928), p. 332 for a discussion on this point. ^George B. Cressey, Land of the $00 Million (New York: McGraw- H ill Book Company, Inc., 1955)> pp. 9o, 1 0 9, 221. $2 Unsigned, "Kwangtung A gricu ltural S ta tis tic s ," Chinese Economic Journal, pp. 328-329. 129 (D istricts of Sunan, Tungkun, Punyu, Hokshan) indicated that five percent of the fanners owned their own land and eighty-five percent were part owners and/or tenants; ten percent were in other categories. A possible explanation of this "other" category is that it was a reflection of the subletting process in Kwangtung known as pao tien ( )• By this process, men who wanted to rent land from land owners in the capacity of tenants would in turn sublet the land to others who would actually cultivate it. These men were really middlemen who profited by the difference between the rent they collected from the real tenants and that which they had to pay the landowner. In statistics, this subletting should still be placed in the tenant category. Leases generally ran for long terms, varying from five to twenty years in Kwangtung. The rent varied with the productivity of the soil, but the amount fixed in the contract could not be reduced under any circumstances, even in a year of famine. Payment was usually either in kind or in silver, with silver as the increasingly popular species for payment. In addition, the landlord might add an extra three percent to be paid for managers or collectors of rent. Owing to the general increase in land values during the previous years, rents in 1927 were twice as high as they had been a decade before. The annual rent for rice fields averaged about $10 per mow, for vegetable gardens about 53 Ibid., pp, 329-330. 130 $7 per mow, and for less suitable soil good only for farming groundnuts and sweet potatoes, $U or $J> a mow. The rent for a mulberry plantation was between $20 and $30 per mow, and orchids per mow averaged around $60 to $70.^ The contracts made were usually verbal. Because of the high rents, the fruit farmer usually made contracts for short term leases, often for one year only. It was customary for orchard operators to offer their orchards' yields to the highest bidder while the trees were still in bloom, so that the buyer could bid according to the prospects of the crop.'*'* In this manner the farmer hedged against calamity by making correspondingly less money* In general most of the land was owned by the local gentry. The payment of the regular land tax was solely the responsibility of the landowner. In addition, the Canton government would extract "alluvium protection dues" and "special military contributions" which were 56 borne by the landowners and tenants in equal shares. It is not known how onerous these special taxes were for the peasantry. It is probable that in some areas the special taxes were so oppressive that some peasants Ibid., p. 2?6. See also Chung-kuo lao-tung nien-chien, Part I, p . UiU. ^U nsigned, "Kwangtung A g ricu ltu ral S ta tis tic s ," Chinese Economic Journal, p. 296. ' 56 Ibid. resorted to the classic defense of uprising. It should be noted that Consul Huston mentioned several times that peasant uprisings had occurred. 57 Landowners lacking capital sometimes made loans secured upon land leases, with which creditors were entitled to collect rents until payment of the principal and interest was made. During the term of the loan, should there be a new tenant, the new lease was turned over to the creditor. If the land were sold, the government required that it be registered and a new title bearing the official seal and the name of the new owner must be issued. In addition, the buyer usually published an announcement of his purchase in the vernacular newspapers. In remote provincial villages, the sale was considered valid if it to were sanctioned by the village elder and witnessed by a third party. The cost of farm labor in Kwangtung In 1927 and a few years before was high and had been rising. In 1926 the daily wages for temporary workers on farms ranged from sixty to seventy cents a day in the off season, to $1 U.S. a day rate during the busy season. The wages paid for regular farm hands were about half as much as for the temporary workers, 59 which probably reflects the fact that the 57 Huston, A Review of Political Conditions..., p. 1. 58. 132 permanent worker perhaps received room and/or board and additional "fringe benefits." The farmers of Kwangtung, in addition to their activity among the secret societies, about which little is known, formed a peasant union to attempt to improve conditions in the countryside. The union was o f f ic ia lly c a lle d the Kwangtung P rovincial Farmers' Union, and was established on May 1, 192$, At its first meeting in 192$, the 60 union had locals in some twenty-two counties. At th a t time an elaborate organization was se t up w ith a provincial executive committee and departments, each with officers having propaganda, organizational, financial, and military responsibilities. The local labor unions provided personnel for the local office staffs. Initially, limited funds ($100 per month) were available from the Ministry of Finance at Canton; later this amount was increased to $1,300 per month which was rumored to be largely supported by the Russians.^ The membership of the union overwhelmingly consisted of tenant farmers (ninety-five percent) as against farmer owners. The leadership Chung-kuo lao-tung nien-chien, Vol. I I , pp. U62-U63; T.C. Chang, The Farmers* Mpvementin Kwangtung (Kwangtung: N ational C hristian Council of China, 1928), pp. l-3« See also J.L. Buck, "Peasant Movements," in Frank Rawlinson, editor. China Christian Year Book 1928 (Shanghai: Christian Literature Society, 1928), p. 271. 61 Chang, The Farmers' Movement in Kwangtung, p. 13. of the organization was dominated until March, 1927 by communists or communist sympathizers. The three most important leaders in the move ment were P'eng P'ai (a communist), Luo Ti-yuan and Juan Hsiao-hsien (whose p o litic a l a f f ilia tio n s are not known). V 62 The union operated on the principle of democratic centralism whereby free discussion was allowed at all levels until the moment a decision was reached, at which point unconditional obedience was required of all members regardless of their private diagreements. Theoretically, the decision-making power flowed upward through the union pyramid. In practice, the central organization of the union was the base of power from which all decisions were made. The Kwangtung Farm ers1 Union grew rap id ly and by i t s second anniversary, local unions had been founded in forty-nine counties with a to ta l membership exceeding 600,000. The growth was somewhat retard ed by hostility on the local and county levels but this was somewhat offset by friendly assistance from the Provincial Government level and the Kuomintang. The official Kuomintang policy contained the following points: (1) the union was to be independent; (2) the union would have a right to organize bands against bandits; (3) it could point out tax abuses and might even at times collect taxes; (U) the union would receive protection from the law in enforcing and maintaining its contracts; 62 Buck, "Peasant Movements," in China Christian Tear Book 1928 , p. 27U. (£) the union would have the right to request that an oppressive official be removed; and (6) the union's representative could represent the 63 farmers at any conference at which farm matters were to be discussed. From i t s beginning the Kwangtung P rovincial Farmers' Union was active in politics, as well as attempting to dispel bandits, reduce rents, and deal with abusive or "evil" gentry. The union was credited with 6U significant services to the Revolutionary Army in its northward sojourn. The union was affected by the increasing antagonism between the Chinese Communist Party and the Kuomintang. In March, 1967 the Kwangtung government began an attempt to purge the union of its communists and leftists. This attempt led to fighting between the union's farmers and the soldiers of the Kwangtung Provincial Government. However, within a fairly short time, the communists in the union were suppressed sanguinely. According to J. Lossing Buck it became an appendage of the Kuomintang in 1928 and lost whatever autonomy it had previously.^ The effects of th is purge were evident when the Canton Commune in December fa ile d to rouse any significant support from the union. In general the situation in the Kwangtung countryside reflected the traditional pressure and counter pressure of gentry and peasants, \ 13$ and the attempt by the Provincial government to levy special taxes. The peasants, by virtue of the Farmers’ Union, as well as traditional means, were able to mollify the various pressures and maintain production. For there were no reports of any widespread famine in the countryside. Implications In providing an assessment of the general economic situation in Kwangtung in 1927, specifically in Canton and the surrounding rural areas, one motif (and generalization) has been that the political- military situation adversely affected the economy of the province. This was demonstrated in many ways, most notably by the m ilitary expenditures in the provincial budget and the special military taxes on the peasantry. However, it is possible that the effects of the political-military situation could be overstated and thus tend to distort the actual conditions. In general, Westerners dealing with a civil war situation tend to interpret Chinese conditions as a projection of a European-type of situation. However, no less an authority than Chen Ta, the noted Chinese economist and labor analyst, remarked that: civil war, of course, greatly impedes commerce and industry, but they CtheJpeople suffer relatively less in a war-ridden China than they would in a western country under such a conflict. In fact, the adverse effect of political unrest upon social and political conditions in China is considerably less than the outside world commonly assumes.66 66 Chen Ta, "Labor in China during the Civil War," Monthly Labor Review (July, 1930), p. 1. 136 Chen Ta substantiated this argument with two main reasons. First, from ancient times the Chinese have themselves, without governmental assistance, taken the initiative in managing commerce and industry. The traditional Chinese government adopted a laissez-faire attitude, and the people were left with a considerable amount of initiative. Secondly, civil war in China was frequently a conflict between two opposing military factions and did not involve the bulk of the people. The people carried on their daily activities and work almost as usual. Factories, workshops, 67 and businesses were generally not interrupted. The effects of civil war were partially deflected in Kwangtung by the r e la tiv e ly strong Kwangtung P rovincial Farmers’ Union which established militia-type organizations and was instrumental in eliminating ’’oppressive officials." In conclusion, the generally tolerable economic situation in Kwangtung and Canton may o ffe r a clue as to the lack of response from the city workers and peasants of the surrounding countryside to the Canton Commune. The harsh, but not overly oppressive, life may have countered a favorable attitude among these groups to communist propa ganda. It could also have been that these groups could not have found credibility in the likelihood of communist success in any uprising. 67 Ibid . CHAPTER VII DECISION FOR THE CANTON UPRISING A December 11 target date for an outbreak of violence in Canton was hardly set secretly months in advance behind Kremlin walls or even in the Shanghai refuge of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Although the Comintern and the CGP's C entral Committee did not have a direct hand in determining the date, these bodies had clearly indicated their approval of the type of activity which was to take place at Canton. The Comintern's recent July XU statement and subsequent actions of the Comintern and the CCP had pointed to the direction they wished their followers to take in China, and the December Canton Commune was an ardent effort to fu lfill these directives faithfully. With the split between the Left Kuomintang and the communists formalized in mid-July, the Left KMT continued to push for a reconciliation policy with Chiang Kai-shek. These efforts began to bear fruit only in September when a special Party reunion was held in Nanking, which resulted in the organization of a special committee. The fragile union of the Left and Right KMT was disrupted in late September, when T'ang Sheng-chih established an "independent" regime at Hankow. By mid-November a Nanking- directed expedition had farced T'ang from Hankow and into retirement. This ended the remaining Left KMT opposition at Hankow and extended and 138 reinforced the writ of the Nationalist Government at Nanking.-*- In July, even before the break at Wuhan between the Left KMT and the communists, rumors had begun to circulate that some of the communist military leaders in the armies under control of the Wuhan government would be cashiered. Coincidentally, several communist-officered units were at Nanchang—most notably the 20th Army under General Ho Lung, the 2Uth Division of the 11th Ariry under Yeh T’ing, and a training regiment under General Ghu Teh who was also Chief of Public Security at Nanchang. Although the exact reason for the rebellion of communist forces which occurred on August 1, 1927 are not known, it seems likely that fear of 2 dismissal and the threatened loss of military control were prominent. The August 1 insurgents formed the "Kuomintang Revolutionary Committee," which fought under the Kuomintang banner and claimed the support of Chang Fa-kuei. By August 5, because of increasing KMT m ilitary pressure on Nanchang, the insurgents were forced to withdraw and depart southward. By late September these forces had reached the Swatow area, but were defeated and retreated to the Hai Lu-feng vicinity of Kwangtung.^ ^Ch'ien Tuan-sheng, The Government and Politics of China (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1961), pp. 9$-$6} Grover Clark, China in 1927 (Peking: Peking Leader Press, 1928), pp. 17U-176, 18*>. 2 J. Guillermaz, "The Nanchang Uprising," China Quarterly No 11 (July-September, 1962), pp. 161-163; "Li Li-san’s Report: The Experience and Lessons of the August 1st Revolution," cited in C. Martin Wilbur, "The Ashes of Defeat," China Quarterly No. 18 (April-June, 196U), pp. 9-11. Guillermaz, "Nanchang Uprising," China Quarterly, pp. I 6 I4-I 6 8 ; Wilbur, "Ashes of Defeat," China Quarterly, pp. 3-3#. After the Wuhan break with the communists, the Comintern sent two representatives to China—Besso Lominadze, a fellow Georgian and friend of Stalin, and Heinz Neumann, a German communist and confidant of Stalin. It seems that they traveled together and arrived sometime in la te Ju ly or e a rly August. Lominadze and Neumann were to replace the previous Comintern agents in China, Borodin and Roy. Lominadze, senior in age and authority, had evidently been ordered by the Comintern to root out the "opportunism" present in the Chinese Communist Party. I t seems probable th a t Lominadze was issued general in stru c tio n s and that the specific persons to be "purged" were to be determined by him on the scene. This interpretation seems reasonable because of the chronic complaint made in Moscow by high Comintern officials about the U lack of information received from China. The August 7 Emergency Meeting: Implementation of the Agrarian Revolution In response to the rapidly changing situation, the Central Committee of the CCP called for an emergency meeting. Despite conflicting reports it seems that this emergency meeting, held on August 7, 1927, was called on Lominadze's In sisten ce. The conference was held in Hankow and was attended by only five Central Committeemen, indicating a definite lack Conrad Brandt, Stalin's Failure in China 192U-1927 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1966), p. ili7 - lUo of quorum and of legality in its proceedings.^ Later communist accounts recorded the aim of the meeting as being to oppose and eliminate Gh'en Tu-hsiu's opportunism.^ The meeting's resolutions claimed that the Comintern's policy had been sabotaged not by the rank and file of the party but by its leaders, Ch'en, one of the founders of the CCP, was deposed from his position as Secretary General. An interim standing committee of the Central Political Bureau was organized and chaired by Ch'u Ch'iu-pal, who also concurrently 7 assumed the post of Secretary General of the Party. Q The Emergency Meeting produced a circular letter and various 9 resolutions. Its "Resolution on the Agrarian Question," declared ^Brandt, Stalin's Failure in China 192U-1927, p. l£0. See also Benjamin I. Schwarts, Chinese Communism and the Rise of Mao (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1961), pp. 93-9L. ^Ho Kan-chih, A History of the Modern Chinese Revolution (Peking: Foreign Languages Press,' 10fio), p. 187. 7 Warren Kuo, A nalytical H istory of Chinese Communist Party (T aipei: Institute of International delations', 1966J, p. 207. At ihe same time a South China Bureau was established at Canton. Ibid. , p. 288. 8See Chung-kuo ko-ming (China's Revolution) (Shanghai, n.p., 1930) pp. lli7-20£ for a full text; a partial translation can be found in Conrad Brandt, Benjamin Schwartz, and John K. Falrbank, A Documentary History of Chinese Communism (Cambridge: Harvard University fcress, l9|?9), pp. 102-ll8 . 9 The authors of A Documentary History of Chinese Communism report that in 19!?2, the various resolutions of the August conference were unavail able. They used as a substitute a Japanese resume of the meeting. See Brandt, Schwartz, and Falrbank, A Documentary History of Chinese Communism pp. U96-U97. The various August re so lu tio n s were a v ailab le only in the Bureau of Investigation Archives on Taiwan in the secret newsletter "Chung- yang t'u n g -h sin ." Recently Warren Kuo, in w ritin g on the Chinese Communist movement, tra n sla te d the main portions of these re so lu tio n s. See Kuo, A nalytical H istory of Chinese Communist P a rty .pp. 28*>-292, U58-U62. 1U1 that "at the present time...the preparation by the Party of systematic, planned peasant insurrections, organized on the widest scale possible, is one o f the main task s of the Party.Its "Resolution on the Labor Movement11 stre sse d th a t "the most pressing demands of the p r o le ta ria t a t p resen t are econom ic...." The reso lu tio n also demanded th a t the workers should organize their own secret military organizations and should be given military training for "street battles." They should also be given weapons and preparations should be made for "actions in 11 coordination with peasant uprisings." Hence the resolution tied the workers' struggles with peasant uprisings. Another resolution answered the questions of when and where to stage an uprising. The "Resolution on the Political Tasks and Policy of the Chinese Communist Party" noted several points: (1) "Judging from the development of the objective situation... a new uprising of the Revolution is not only possible but inevitable." Thus it was that the CCP "must be prepared to organize revolutionary insurrection"; (2) Because of different situations in the various provinces, the CCP could not fix a date for the staging of a nationwide revolt. The ^"Resolution on the Agrarian Movement," published in Circular No. 2 (August 23, 1927), c ite d in Kuo, A nalytical H istory of Chinese Communist Party, p. 288. ^"Resolution on the Labor Movement," published in Circular No. 2 (August 23, 1927), cited in Kuo, Analytical History of Chinese Communist Party, p. 288. "Party's general line should be to work for revolt in provinces where peasant movement has developed"; (3) The CCP should still raise insurrections under the banner of the Left KMT; and (ti) The CCP felt that the situation in China was not ready for the establishment of "Soviet organizations." In place of soviets, the Party sought to establish "revolutionary committees...to guide 12 the insurrection." In other words the resolution called for the preparation of insurrections under the banner of the Left KMT for the immediate future. The August 7 "line" closely followed the policies outlined in 13 the previous July lU Comintern statement. Just as the Comintern statement enjoined the Chinese Communist Party to emphasize its work among the proletariat and to press for the agrarian revolution in peasant areas, the August 7 resolution urged the same. The Bnergency Meeting also confirmed the order to th e Chinese Communist Party to undertake worker and peasant uprisings under the banner of the Left KMT. 12 "Resolution on the Political Tasks and Policy of the Chinese Communist Party," published in Circular No. 2 (August 23, 1927), Ibid., pp. 289-290. 13 According to Schwartz, "the program of the conference adhered in a ll respects to the new Comintern line." Schwartz, Chinese Communism and the Rise of Mao, p. 9U. ^Chung-kuo ko-ming, pp. 157-162. See also Schwartz, Chinese Communism and the Rise of Mao, p. 9h» 1U3 In response to the August 7 Emergency Meeting's demand for widespread peasant uprisings, various peasant insurrections were staged in Hunan, Hupei, Kiangsi, Shensi, Kwangtung, and elsewhere. The most notable were Mao Tse-tung's Autumn Harvest Uprising in Hunan, P'eng P 'ai's uprising in the northeast area of Kwangtung, and peasant uprisings around Canton. Mao arrived in Hunan in mid-August and immediately began to plan for an insurrection. The line which Mao was told to follow, after some initial misunderstanding on his part, was to assassinate some of the most notorious landowners in the area prior to uprising, so as to raise the revolutionary pitch of the peasantry. He had been further Instructed that during the course of the uprising, he was to eliminate completely bad gentry and all other "reactionary" characters. The revolt was to be conducted by the people themselves in both the rural and urban areas. In carrying out the desired insurrection, Mao was planning to use four regiments of soldiers which were available to him, in an attempt to occupy Changsha m ilitarily. When the Central Committee was informed of this plan in late August, it pointed out that Mao was attaching too much importance to organized military forces. Mao assuaged some of the Central Committee's objections and put essentially his original plan into operation. The uprising began on September 9 and almost immediately ran into such strong oppositions that on September 15 Mao decided to call off the attack on Changsha as hopeless. Then Mao reorganized what was left of his four lUU regiments and retreated into the mountainous area known as Chingkangshan."^ In the spring of 1927, P’eng P 'a i and the Kwangtung P rovincial Committee were aware of the possibility of a Kuomintang-communist sp lit. Since the spring, P'eng had attempted to secure more weapons and increase the number of m ilitiam en being tra in e d in the Hai Lu-feng area* The Right KMT attempt at suppression in April, 1927 at Canton resulted in a communist takeover in Hai-feng, which was quickly suppressed. In mid- August the news of the southward march of Ho Lung’s and Teh T'ing's forces toward Swatow, along w ith d ire c tiv e s from th e August 7 Emergency Meeting, reached the undercover communists in the Hai Lu-feng area. The communists decided on September 1 as the date for another uprising, Hie KMT troops occupying Hai-feng had been substantially reduced since April, and the communist-directed peasant uprising quickly occupied several villages outside Hai-feng and captured Lu-feng. Only on September 17 after the Kuomintang troops had voluntarily withdrawn from Hai-feng did the communists secure that city. Expecting a strong counterattack, the communists established a base in the nearby mountainous area. A KMT attack on September 25 caused the communists to withdraw from the towns of Hai-feng and Lu-feng and to retreat to their newly established base. After the collapse of the Teh T'ing and Ho Lung forces at Swatow, few Stuart Schram, Mao Tse-tung (Middlesex: Penguin Books, 1966), pp. 120-125; Jerome Ch'en, Mao andT the Chinese Revolution (London: Oxford University Press, 1965), pp. 131-1&. 1U5 of the troops reached the communist haven in the Hai Lu-feng region. The intensification of the conflict between Generals Li Chi-shen and Chang Fa-kuei in Canton necessitated a withdrawal of significant portions of Li's troops from Hai-feng in late October. On November 1, the communists led an uprising which in a few weeks controlled all of the hsien. A 'Worker, Peasant, and Soldier Soviet" was established in mid- November. The soviet government established administrative organs, intensified military training and carried out severe agrarian reforms (e.g. the attempted extermination of all "reactionary" rural elements). The defeat of the Canton Commune, which temporarily reunited the feuding armies of Chang Fa-kuei and Li Chi-shen, reinforced the pressure on the Hai Lu-feng soviet. After some serious battles in January, February, and March, 1928, the communist forces there retreated to the mountainous area once again.^ In response to the August 7 Emergency Meeting's general directives, the Kwangtung P rovincial Committee form ulated a peasant in su rrectio n plan, evidently for the peasants around Canton. On September 9 the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party agreed to the plan but cautioned that the uprising "must be started immediately without waiting for the Shinklchi Eto, "Hai-lu-feng—the First Chinese Soviet Govern ment," (Part II) China Quarterly No. 9 (January-March, 1962), pp. 162- 179} Wang Chlen-mln, Chung-kuo kung-chan-tang shih kao Vol. I ., pp. 573- 575 . 1U6 arrival of the Teh T'ing and Ho Lung forces. 17 A letter dated September 23 from the Central Committee again directed the Provincial Committee to undertake in su rrectio n in Kwangtung w ithout w aiting fo r the Yeh-Ho force 18 whose "whereabouts i s unknown." The Kwangtung P rovincial Committee never staged this uprising, perhaps because the Nationalist military pursuit of the Yeh-Ho forces dampened their ardor. It seems certain that the peasant uprisings around Canton were to be coordinated with a workers’ revolt inside the city as well, because with the failure of the autumn harvest uprisings in central and south China, the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party ordered the Kwangtung P ro v in cial Committee on October 12 to "stop insurrection in the province..." including '.'the insurrection 19 in Canton...." The Chinese Communist P a rty 's P o litic a l Bureau met on September 19, probably in Shanghai. The resolution adopted there indicated that the Chinese Communist Party's policy of attempting to revolutionize the Kuomintang could not be realized. Thus the September meeting directed that the Chinese 17 "The Central Committee's Letter to Members of the Kwangtung Provincial Committee on September 9, 1927," published in Circular No. 3 (September 20, 1927), cited in Kuo, Analytical History of Chinese Communist P arty , pp. 292-293. 18 "The C entral Committee's L etter to Members of the Kwangtung Provincial Committee on September 23, 1927," published in Circular No. 6 (September 30, 1927), Ibid. 19 "The C entral Committee's L ette r to the Kwangtung Provincial Committee of the CCP, October 12, 1927," published in Circular No. 7. Ibid., p. 297. 1U7 Communist Party should no longer stage revolts under the Kuomintang banner. The resolution also called not only for the publicizing of 20 soviets, but also for their actual establishment. With the failure of the August 7 insurrections generated in Hunan, Hupei and Kwangtung, and the defeat of Teh's and Ho's forces, the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party felt it was necessary to hold another plenum. The November Plenum: A New Uprising Policy The Politburo o f the Central Committee o f the Chinese Communist Party decided to hold an enlarged meeting on November 9-10, 1927. The meeting was held in Shanghai and was attended by Lominadze and p ossib ly 21 Neumann. The Politburo needed something or someone to blame for the recent failures since the Comintern was infallible by definition. The Politburo finally placed the blame on those who had executed the recent policy of peasant risings, among whom were T'an P'ing-shan, Mao Tse-tung, and Chang K uo-t'ao. The Southern Bureau and the Kwangtung Provincial Committee were reprimanded because they had committed "errors" in directing peasant risings, in failing to grasp the meanings of the slogans related 20 "Resolution on the Problem of the KMT's Leftist Members and Slogans of the Soviet,” published in Circular No. 6 (September 30, 1927) Ibid., pp. 309-310. 21 Schwartz, Chinese Communism and the Rise of Mao, p. 103. 1U8 to land problems, and in carrying out military actions without coordinating 22 them w ith a mass movement. In sh o rt, the Southern Bureau and the Kwangtung Provincial Committee were accused of "vacillation" and "disbelief" 23 in trusting the masses as a revolutionary force. The call for armed uprisings was not repealed. By the time the Central Committee held a plenum in November, it seemed more optim istic in i t s outlook, although the China scene a c tu a lly appeared as gloomy as ever, with the exception of the establishment of the Hai Lu-feng Soviet. The Plenum, by terming the situation ready for the establishment of "soviets" and the undertaking of "armed insurrection" was implicitly stating that the Chinese revolutionary movement was rising, for in communist theory soviets can be formed only in a period of upsurge. Perhaps the Central Committee's optimism radiated from Moscow's perception o f events in China and Comintern d ire c tiv e s to the Chinese Communist P arty . The Plenum c a lle d fo r the Chinese Communist Party to undertake three immediate objectives: (1) To organize the masses more effectively; (2) To combine the sporadic and scattered uprisings of peasants into a large scale insurrection; and 22 "Resolution on Political Discipline," Kuo-wen Chou-pao Vol. 5, No. 3, pp. 5-7. For English translations see Wilbur, "The Ashes of Defeat," China Quarterly, pp. 53-5U, and Kuo, Analytical History of Chinese Communist P arty , pp. U72-U79. "Resolution on Political Discipline," Kuo-wen Chou-pao, pp. 5-7. 1U9 (3) To coordinate workers' uprisings with peasants' u p r is in g s . Thus the Chinese Communist Party apparently wanted a coordinated insurrection of the urban proletariat and peasants who would proclaim a workers', peasants', and soldiers' soviet. This laid the doctrinal groundwork for the Canton Commune. The Plenum's policy seemed to be in agreement with the then current Comintern "line." Lominadze's presence as the live oracle of the Comintern would tend to prevent any line contradictory to Comintern policies from being formulated. The fact that the political resolution of the November Plenum was re p rin te d in the Comintern p ress without 2< unfavorable comment would tend to indicate general approval. ^ Two other facts led to the conclusion that the Comintern sought and assisted the Canton Commune. There is evidence that Heinz Neumann, the Comintern agent, was in Canton and aided the establishment and later the defense of the Canton Commune. 26 His wife claims that he was sent 27 there by Stalin and she tells of his dangerous escapades there. The "Resolution on the Party's Tasks Under the Present Situation in China," Kuo-wen chou-pao, Vol. 5, No. 3, p. 5. (Paraphrased.) 25 "The Perspectives of the Chinese Revolution," International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 5 (January 26, 1928), pp. lSl-123. 26 Kim San and Nym Wales, Song of Ariran (New York: John Day Company, 19Ul), pp. 9h and 100; Margarets Buber-Neumann, Von Potsdam Nach Moskau (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlag-Anstalt, 1957), pp. 17U-191J International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 16 (March l£, 1928), p. $22. 27 Buber-Neumann, Von Potsdam Nach Moskau, pp. 17U-191. i$o mere presence of Neumann at Canton would seem to Indicate that he was there on Comintern business. The other point is that the actual leader of the Canton Soviet was Chang T’ai-lei, who was the ’’Peoples' Commissioner of the Arny and Navy,” as well as ’’Acting Chairman of the Soviet Government." Su Chao- ch'ing was elected Chairman in absentia, but was unable to come to Canton and remained in Shanghai. Chang had a long history of service with the Comintern. In 1921 he was at Irkutsk and was designated as secretary of the Chinese section of the Far Eastern Secretariat of the Comintern. Chang also attended the Third Congress of the Comintern, as well as the Congress of the Toilers of the East in Moscow in 1922. He had acquired a fluency in the Russian language through his frequent visits to Russia and was later the chief interpreter for Borodin in Canton. At the August 7 Emergency Meeting, Chang T’ai-lei was appointed as Secretary of the Kwangtung P rov incial Committee and concurrently as head 28 of the Southern China Bureau. With Chang in charge of the planning of the Commune, the Comintern had a reliable person who would be agreeable to its Instructions. 28 H.L. Boorman, Men and P o litic s in Modern China (New York: Columbia University Press, 1^6o), pp. 20-21. 1*1 Decision for the Canton Uprising It appears that the Central Committee sought an uprising in Kwangtung along th e lin e s la id down in the November R esolution. 29 According to M.N. Roy, the Kwangtung P rovin cial C entral Committee received the following instructions from the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party urging an armed u p risin g : The worker-peasant masses of Kwangtung have only one way out, that is, to utilise (siq) the opportunity of the civil wars... in order resolutely to expand the uprising in the cities and villages..* to agitate among the soldiers, to stage mutinies and revolts, and in the time of war swiftly to link such uprisings into a general uprising for the establishment of the rule of the Workers', Peasants', and Soldiers' Delegates' Councils (Soviets).™ Subsequently, according to Ch'u, Ch'iu-pai, then Secretary General of According to Li Ang, nearly every day the Comintern sent one or two telegrams urging Canton to initiate armed insurrection, because the Comintern felt it was necessary for strategic reasons. Further, declared Li Ang, the Comintern wanted an uprising, even if it lasted only "three m inutes." Li Ang, Hung-se W u-taj(Red Stage) (Hong Kong: Sheng Li Publishing Company, 19Ul)7 PP* 59-U8. The accuracy of Li Ang's Hung-se wu-tai as an historical source is open to grave doubts. Li Ang (the pseudonym of Chu Hsin-fan), after being captured by the Kuomintang, renounced his earlier beliefs and agreed to write an "expose" of his former associates. In addition, there is reason to believe the Li renounced communism only under some physical pressure. Hence much of what is said in Hung-se wu-tai Li probably wrote to please his captors. Li Ang's attempt to demonstrate Comintern involvement and culpability upon almost every possible occasion creates serious doubts as to the general validity of his writings. Thus Li's work should be used with extreme caution and should be cross-referenced. According to a confidential source, Li Ang was killed sometime in 19Ul or 19li2 despite his assistance to the Kuomintang. 30 M.N. Roy, Revolution and Counter-Revolution in China (Calcutta: Renaissance Publishers, 1?U6), pp. *5?-558. See also (Teng)Chung-hsia, "The Canton Uprising and th e T actics of the Chinese Communist P a rty ," Lozovskii et. al. Kuang-chou kung-hsi, p. 1*2. 1*2 the Chinese Communist P arty , the Kwangtung C entral Committee met on November 26, 1927 in obedience to an in stru c tio n sent by the C entral Committee of the Party a t Shanghai on November 18, and discussed the uprising question. The Kwangtung Central Committee, according to Ch'u, unanimously decided to carry out an uprising policy, but tempor- 31 arily did not fix a date for the event. The November Kwangtung meeting led to the establishm ent of a Revolutionary Military Committee and created a general staff to guide the uprising. It also designated a plan to organize and activate 2,000 32 Red Guards (Hung wei-ping) as well as two suicide companies and two transportation companies. In addition, the Party urged sympathizers secretly to manufacture spears, bombs, grenades, and gun powder. Intelli gence gathering units of the Party would also be expanded to provide greater information. The November meeting of the Kwangtung Committee also authorized the use of revolutionary slogans, including" "Release all political prisoners" (held by Chang Fa-kuei)j "Increase workers' pay"; "Confiscate Ch'u Ch'iu-pai, Chung-kuo ko-ming yu kang-ch'an tang (n.p., Chinese Communist Party, l928J, p. 2U6. See also (ifeng) Chung-hsia, "The Canton Uprising and the T actics of the Chinese Communist P a rty ," Lozovskii efc. al. Kuang-chou kung-hsi, p. 1*2. 32 The Chinese term "Hung-wei ping" for these Red Guards is the same term used by the Red Guards of the Cultural Revolution of 1966 through 1968. 33 Ch'u Ch'iu-pai, Chung-kuo ko-ming yu kung-ch'an tang, p. 2£0. See also Hua Kang, I-chiu-erh-wu nien— -i-chlu-erh-ch'l nlen t l chung- kuo ta ko-ming shih (A History of China's Great Revolution, 192^-19^7) (Second Edition) (Shanghai: Ch'un king, 1932), pp. 229 and 232. 153 the capitalist properties and disperse them for the benefit of the poor people"; "Kill all the bad landowners"; "Overthrow the m ilitarists" and "Overthrow the KMT." The last slogan confirmed that no longer would uprisings be staged under the KMT flag. I t seems th a t December 11 was not the o rig in a l date s e t fo r 35 the uprisin g . One source suggests December l£ as the day while 36 37 another in d icates December 13 ; s t i l l another suggests December 20. The unanimity of various sources suggesting that originally a later date was set for the uprising tends to indicate that the date was advanced. However, according to Neuberg (thought to be Heinz Neumann), the Provincial Committee unanimously decided on December 7 to organize the "upheaval" for the morning of December 11. The Committee’s decision was based on news received by the Party that Chang Fa-kuei, on the insistence of Wang Ching-wei, was sending one of his divisions back from 3U Hua, I-chiu-erh-wu nien— i-chlu-erh-ch' 1 nien ti chung-kuo ta ko-ming shih, pp. 230-231. See also (Teng) Chung-hsia, "The Canton ^prising and the Tactics of the Chinese Communist Party," Lozovskii et. a l., Kuang-chou kung-hsi, pp. U5-U6. 35 Hin Wong, "The Failure of the Labor-Peasant Uprising at Canton," China Weekly Review (December 31, 1927), p . 119. ^Harold Isaacs, The Tragedy of the Chinese Revolution (Second Revised Edition) (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1961), p. 285. 37 "Experience of the Canton Commune," located in Shih shih hsln pao (December 23, 1927) cited in Kung-fel huo-kuo shih liao hul-pien (Critical Essays on the H istory of the Communist Bandits 'troubling China), Vol. I . (n.d., n.p.), p. 5lU. the front and ordering it to Canton to disarm the Instructors' Regiment and establish "order." Neuberg added, "It was clear that with the disarmament of this regiment, the reactionary terror was going to redouble, that Tchang Qa-koa [Chang Fa-kueijJ.. .would suppress a ll revolutionary possibilities in Canton. A. Neuberg, L'Insurrection armSe (Paris; n.p., 1928), p. 111*. This account is substantiated by Huang £ing, "The Canton Uprising and its Preparation," Lozovskll et. a l., Kuang-chou kung-hsi, pp. 90-91. CHAPTER VIII THE CANTON COMMUNE Im Osten Beginnt ein Glockenspiel Den neuen Stahlgesang Moskau-Kanton Kanton-Moskau Moskau, Kanton Moskau K anton... 1 Rote brennen die Sterne in China. Canton in 1927 had not been a city free from political turmoil, to which the April and November coups could testify. Tet these coups were relatively bloodless and caused little damage to the city or business property; disruptions of trade were minor. The three-day Canton Commune was not to follow in this tradition. Although an hour by hour log of the uprising itself is neither available nor important for analysis, some fam iliarity with the events of that short period are essential to an evaluation of criticisms made after the Commune and of broader ramifications this brief event was to have. 2 On the morning of December 11 at four o'clock, the first tremors F.C. Weiskopf, Die Reise Nach Kanton (Berlin: Dietz Verlag, 19!>3)» p. 23. ------1*6 of the uprising were being felt in Canton. The communists had seemingly chosen a good time, for the city was defended by only some 3>000 policemen and a few remaining regiments of the Fourth Army. For several days prior to the 11th, forces had been leaving to join in severe fighting along the West River where Chang Fa-kuei's troops under Huang Chl-hslang were being hard-pressed by Li Chi-shen's forces. Several hours before the actual uprising was to take place, heavy police patrols and armored cars appeared on the streets in response to rumors of insurrection. Pedestrians were searched on all the main arteries. One communist hideaway was discovered, and a small cache of 3 munitions was seized. However, the police could do little else to forestall an uprising if one were on the way. Revealing that some plan must have been in effect, the revolt began quietly rather than as a sudden outburst, and then gathered momentum. The communists began with an appeal to the soldiers and officers of the An actual handbill distributed during the uprising gave four o'clock a.m. as the time for the start of the uprising. The handbill, entitled Hung Ch'i (Red Flag), is available in the Huston Collection at the Hoover Institution. Most later accounts of the uprising indicate that it began at 3:30 o'clock a.m. See Huang Ping, "Canton Uprising and its Preparation," Lozovskii, et. a l., Kuang-chou kung-hsi (Canton Commune) (n.p., Wu-ch'an chieh-chi, 1935), p. 9l; Harold Isaacs, The Tragedy of the Chinese Revolution Second Revised Edition (Stanford: Stanford university fres's, W6I), p. 285. Isaacs, The Tragedy of the Chinese Revolution, p. 285; Reporter, "Sketch of the Canton Disturbances," Kuo-wen Chou pao, Vol. 5, No. 1 (January 1, 1928), p. U. 157 U Chao-tao t'u a n (in s tru c to rs ’ Regiment) encamped a t Canton East Parade Ground. Chang T 'ai-lei, Acting Chairman of the Soviet founded earlier in the day, delivered a brief verbal appeal to the assembled regiment after which the bulk of the soldiers, with the exception of the commander and fifteen "reactionary officers," joined the uprising. This seemingly The Instructors' Regiment was originally part of the Instructors' Division of the Central Government under T'an Yen-ta, which drew heavily from the students of the Central Military Political School at Wuhan. In December, 1927, the officers of the Instructors' Regiment were mainly political officers; a majority were communists. According to one source, Chang Fa-kuei knew that the regiment of some 1,200 men was strongly "leftist" and had appointed Yeh Chien-ying (at that time an undercover communist but of known l e f t i s t in c lin a tio n ) i t s commander. Chang f e l t th a t he could control the regiment. This regiment went from Chou-kiang to Nanchang and chased the Yeh-Ho forces into Kwangtung. The source states that the Instructors' Regiment was going to join the Yeh-Ho forces, but no opportunity presented itself. Thus the regiment found itself at Canton. Reportedly Chang Fa-kuei had intended to disband the regiment, but Wang Ching-wei felt otherwise and it remained intact. At Canton Yeh Chien-ying was transferred to a new position as Dean of the Whampoa M ilitary Academy, and he was replaced by Yang Hsiu-sung, a non-communist. The source states that Yang was well- known as a "fool." The political orientation of the regiment did not change at this time however, because its remaining influential personnel, Political Commissar Yeh Teh-sheng, B attalion Commander Fen C hiung-ling, and Company Commanders Yeh Yung and Lu Kung-ju were a l l communists. Wang W ei-llen, "History of the Canton Uprising," Hsien-tai shih-liao, Vol. I (Shanghai: H ai-t'ien, 193U), pp. 205-207. Hsien-tai shlh-llao presented articles, usually anonymous, on contemporary events. Caution should be exercised when using these volumes because of a strong anti-communist bias, as well as anti-left Kuomintang bias. The articles themselves contained little or no documentation, but at times presented new insights or information, which when weighed can be an aid to historical knowledge. Hsien-tai shih-liao (Materials on Modern History) U Volumes (Shanghai: H ai-t'ien, 193U-1935)• 1*8 miraculous conversion was aided by the fact that among the Instructors' Regiment of 1,200 enlisted men and officers, there existed a core group of about two hundred communists.** Even with the soldiers of the Chao-tao t'uan, the communist forces were badly outnumbered. According to Neuberg (thought to be Heinz Neumann), there were only 3,200 insurgent troops classified as follows: Instructors' Regiment, 1,000 men; a squadron of constabulary in the city, $0 men; one section of guards at the arsenal, £0 men; two sections of students at the Whampoa Academy, 100 men; and Red Guards a t Canton, 2,000 men.^ According n to Teh T'ing, U,200 men participated in the uprising. It is evident that some of the insurgent leaders felt the neighboring peasants would 8 send armed men to Canton, which the peasants failed to do. In addition to being few in number, the insurrectionists were poorly armed. One estimate credits the revolutionists with having at most thirty revolvers and automatics, two hundred grenades, fifty rifles in the hands of workers, and approximately 1,600 rifles in the hands of 9 soldiers. Neuberg wrote that the insurgents faced in Canton alone: two "’Huang Ping, "Canton Uprising and its Preparation," cited in Kuang-chou kung-hsi, p. 85. ^A. Neuberg, L 'In su rrectio n armge (P a ris: n .p ., 1928), p. 112. ^M.N. Roy, Revolution and Counter-Revolution in China (Calcutta: Renaissance P ress,“ I5C57T™P^55H7,™‘,"“ * —— — — —— — Q Margarete Buber-Neumann, Von Potsdam N ach Moskau (S tu ttg a rt: Deutsche Verlag-Anstalt, 195>7), p. 183. regiments of 3,000 men under Li Fu-lin on nearby Honan Island; one artillery regiment with 500 men and 30 cannons; one infantry regiment of 600 men; and 2,000 municipal policemen.'*'® In addition to these armed men in Canton th ere was the army of Chang Fa-kuei to ta lin g about 50,000 men two or three days march away; these troops had l i t t l e trac e of communist influence.^ Shortly after the capitulation of the Instructors’ Regiment to 1? the communists, * one of its three battalions was sent to disarm a nearby artillery regiment; another moved to disarm an infantry regiment in the city, and the last battalion marched to the city to collaborate with the 13 insurgents. Kim San, a Korean communist, evidently aided in the capture of the artillery battalion. A former artillery expert with this Chang Fa- kuei battalion, a Korean named Yang Ta-fu led the attacking force. The ~ communist force surrounded the encampment and Yang, who knew the commanding officer, talked him into surrendering and disarming his men. Captured rifles were put into cars and some artillery pieces were dismantled and transported to the central area of Canton, while others were brought in on th e ir c a rria g e s.1^ l°Neuberg, L1Insurrection armee, p. 112. ^ ‘Ch'en Shao-yu, Wu-chuang pao-tung (Armed Uprising) (n.p., n.p., 1929), p. 70; Isaacs, The Tragedy of the Chinese Revolution, p. 28U. 12 Yeh Yung was appointed Commander of the Chao-tao t'uan and Li Ying, one Korean graduate of the Red Academy in Moscow, was appointed as his assistant. Kim San (pseudonym) and Nym Wales (pseudonym of Mrs. Helen Foster Snow), Song of Ariran (New York: John Day Company, 19Ul), p. 92. 160 By early morning the communists had gained control of the head quarters building of Chang Fa-kuei’s Fourth Amy, the Bureau of Public Safety, the Canton Garrison's Headquarters, the Telephone, Telegraph and Electric Light Bureau, the main post office, the railway office, l£ the Central Bank, and a number of police stations. Yet several of the larger police stations and the divisional headquarters of the Twelfth Amy of Huang Chi-hsiang (containing a large store of munitions) were s t i l l in enemy hands by th e afternoon of December 11. The Kwangtung Federation of Labor was attacked by Red Guards who failed to take its building and instead burned it down, incinerating its occupants. Yet by dawn, most of the city was in the hands of the insurgents. With the fall of the city, leaders of the Chang Fa-kuei regime crossed the river to safety on Honan Island, where Li Fu-lin was in control. Li was unprepared for the communist coup inasmuch as the bulk of his troops had just taken over control at Kongmoon a few days before. Reportedly, Li had only three hundred troops to defend Honan. He made frantic efforts to reach his army, and was aided by a British gunboat in the river which 17 radioed a message to his amy commander at Kongmoon. Ch'u Ch'iu-pai, Chung-kuo ko-ming yu kung-ch'an-tang (China’s Revolution and the Chinese Communist P a y ty J ^ n .p ., Chinese Communist Party, 1928), p. 2!>6j see also J.C. Huston, Peasants'. Workers' and Soldiers' Revolt of December 11-13, 1927 at Canton, China, Hoover Institution Library Imp.; n.-p.,-19?7jrp.iJ. ------^Huston, Peasants', Workers' and Soldiers' Revolt of December..., p. 2 2 . 17 Ibid., p. 23. 161 The communists established their headquarters in the Public Safety Bureau and set up the Canton "Soviet of Workers', Peasants' and 1 ft Soldiers' Deputies." The Soviet was launched by a group consisting of ten representatives of the workers, three representatives of the peasants, and three representatives of the soldiers. 19 Two of the peasant delegates did not arrive in time to participate in the uprising. 20 According to later communist sources, before the insurrection began, fifteen men were elected to represent the workers, peasants, and soldiers as the "Canton Council of Workers', Peasants' and Soldiers' 2 1 Deputies." It would seem that "selection" rather than "election" had 1®Hua Kang, I-chiu-erh-wu nien——i-ch'iu-erh-ch'i nien t i Chung-kuo ko-ming shih (A History of China*s (Jreai Revolution i925-l9^7lJ Second Edition, (Shanghai: Ch'ung-king, 1932), p. 235* According to his wife, Heinz Neumann participated in the capture of the Public Safety Building. Buber-Neumann, Von Potsdam Nach Moskau, p. 187. 19Neuberg, L* Insurrection armle, p. 111. 20 The initial statement about the absence of an elected Soviet at the Canton Commune made h7 the Ninth Plenum was not to be repeated again. On the first anniversary of the uprising, the relevant Comintern articles were ambiguous on this point, but their inferences were that the soviet had been elected. See Theses of the Agitprop (agitation and Propaganda Department) of the ECCI, "The First Anniversary of the C ant on Revolt," In te rn a tio n a l P ress Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 89 (December 13, 1928), p . "1697; Tang Shin She ( s ic ) , "The Anniversary of the Canton In su rre c tio n ," In te rn a tio n a l Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 87 (December 7, 1928), p. 1656. tfhe now standard line of an elected soviet present during the Canton Commune is represented in the following reference: Hansu Chan, "The Canton Uprising and Soviet China," China Today (December, 193U), p. UU. 21 "Resolution on the Chinese Question," (adopted at the Ninth Plenum). International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 16 (March l£ , 1928), p 322. See also chung-kuo ko-ming (China^s Revolution) (Shanghai: Min-chih shu-tien, 1930), p. Eg? ------162 been the process followed, although communist ideology defines a Soviet as consisting only of elected representatives. Trotsky noted that the February reso lu tio n of the Executive Committee of the Communist In te r national (ECCI) had stated that "there was an absence of an elected 22 Soviet in Canton as an organ of insurrection." Trotsky argued that this opposed all Lenin's teachings and said: ...to set up an elected Soviet is not at all an easy matter: it is necessary that the masses should know from experience what a Soviet is, that they should understand its form, that they should have accustomed themselves in the past to election of Soviets. Of this, there was not a sign in China as the slogan of Soviets was declared to be a Trotskyite slogan precisely in the period when it should have become th e nerve center of the e n tire movement. When, however, a date was fixed in all haste for an insurrection so as to skip over their own defeats, they simultaneously had to appoint a S o v ie t.23 The names and positions of the staff of the Soviet were as follows: Chairman: Su Chao-ch'ing (Before Su's arrival, Chang T 'ai-lei was to a c t fo r him) Commissioner of Internal Affairs for the People: Huang Ping Commissioner of Counter-Revolutionary Suppression: Yang Yin Commissioner of Labor for the People: "Chou W'en W1 ang" (ChouW'en- yung. Commissioner of Land for the People: P'eng P'ai (P'eng was then the Soviet Chairman at Hal Lu-feng, and Chao Tzu-hsuan was to act for him in Canton) Commissioner of Foreign Affairs for the People: Huang Ping Commissioner of Justice for the People: Chen Yu Commissioner of the Army and Navy fo r the People: Chang T 'a i- le i Chief Secretary: Yun Tai-ying Commander-in-chief of the Red Army for the Laborers and Peasants: Yeh T 'ing Chief of Staff of the Red Army for the Laborers and Peasants: Hsu Kuang-ying.21; 22 Leon Trotsky, Problems of the Chinese Revolution, Translated by Max Schactman, Second Edition (rfew York: Paragon Book Gallery, 1962), p. 1*>2. 23 Ib id . 2Slung Ch'i handbill found in Huston collection. See Appendix for these background biographies. 163 If the inclusion of Su Chao-ch'ing was meant to attract the workers of Canton to the uprising standard, the attempt was a failure. After establishing the Soviet the communists desperately sought to rouse the urban workers and gain adherents to the uprising. Badges proclaiming support were handed out to anyone who would wear them. In addition, communist women were sent into the streets to entice the workers through propaganda to join the fight. One female orator was heard to offer every person who joined the uprising $20 U.S. and a gun. Moreover, the communists attempted to attract new Insurgents by tacking up posters and proclamations. Hung Ch'i (Red Flag) handbills arguing that the Soviet represented the workers and therefore the workers had a responsibility to defend it, were issued frequently. Evidently these types of appeals 26 were ineffective in attracting new followers. ^Huston, Peasants', Workers' and Soldiers1 Revolt of December..., p. 17. 26 The contents of a typical propaganda handbill are reproduced here: LABORERS: RISE AND ARM YOURSELVES Canton has not become the laboring class's Canton: Therefore, the laboring class should assume the responsibility themselves (sic) for the protection of Canton. There is still a great deal of the remnant influence of the m ilitarists, demagogues, and gentry who w ill take every possible opportunity to attack Canton. It is necessary therefore, for the laboring class to rise for the resistance of such counter-revolutionary attack. Laboring class: Rise and arm yourself for the protection of the Soviet Canton. To protect the Soviet of Canton is to protect the administration of your own, and in other words, to protect all your administrative and economic in te r e s ts . Don't miss this opportunity for arming yourselves. Don't let the enemies tre sp a ss upon yourselves. Laboring class! Arm yourselves, and hold yourselves in readiness to fight with the Soviet trespassers. Ibid., p. 17. 16U One of the Soviet’s first acts was to release an estimated 3,300 political prisoners, and it was even said that the Soviet Government had "offered to free all inmates on the condition that they would join their (communist] 27 ranks." This stipulation hardly seems necessary since the great majority were "leftist" political prisoners who would be favorably inclined toward the communist u prising anyway. Early on the first day of the insurrection, copies of the Manifesto published for the uprising were still stored in a printing office directly in the line of fire. This made it necessary to reprint the Manifesto elsewhere, so it could not be distributed until later in the day. The main part of the program of the Soviet was contained, however, in a Hung Ch'i handbill. The Soviet Government decreed the following regulations primarily directed at Canton's workers: (1) An eight hour day would be enforced in all factories; (2) There would be an increase in all laborers' pay; (3) The Soviet would use the government's resources to support the livelihood of the unemployed; (U) The new regime would support and increase the original rights of the Hong Kong strikers; (5) The communists would confiscate the rich hotels and give them to the workers as living quarters; (6) The Soviet would put all banks, railways, mines, factories, and steamers under the control of the state; and (7) The Soviet would 27mo Syin-yang, Chung-kuo ko-ming yao-kai (An Outline of China's Revolution) (Moscow: Foreign Language Press, 1932), p. 66. In an article the figure 2,600 is given for prisoners released. Hin Wong, "The Failure of the Labour-Peasant Uprising at Canton," China Weekly Review (December 31* 1927), p. 120. 16$ 28 confiscate the property of all capitalists and landlords. In the days of alliance with the Kuomintang, the communists had confined themselves to limited reform approved by the KMT and had, as a result, perhaps suffered from this lack of boldness. Now when they were a handful of revolutionaries against many, their programs reflected a desire to appeal to all people, rather than a carefully articulated communist program. The Soviet Government called for a large meeting at two o’clock in the afternoon on the first day of the uprising. The Hung-ch'i handbill announcing the meeting listed the opponents of the regime and placed a $$0,000 reward on their heads. The lis t of names included Li Chi-shen, Chang Fa-kuei, Huang Shao-hung, Huang Chi-hsiang, Chiang Kai-shek, Wang Ching-wei, and IA Tsung-jen.~^ Neumann and four members of the Soviet were driving to the meeting when their car was suddenly ambushed. Neumann escaped but some of the other passengers were killed.^® According to one optimistic report, 10,000 workers, peasants, and soldiers assembled for the meeting at "Hsi-kwa" Park. "Amidst enthusiastic greetings and thunderous applause, they approved the program as well as the new personnel "Soviet Administration’s Message to the People,” Huston, Peasants1, Workers’ and Soldiers' Revolt of December..., Enclosure 2. See also Isaacs, The Tragedy of the Chinese Revolution, p. 286 and Buber-Neumann, Von Potsdam Hach Moskau, p . Ibb. 29 Huston, Peasants', Workers' and Soldiers' Revolt of December..., Enclosure 2. 30 Buber-Neumann, Von Potsdam Nach Moskau, p. 190. 166 31 of the government...." According to Isaacs, only three hundred men 32 appeared, so the meeting was changed to a meeting of "delegates." In view of the lack of support, it would seem that the attendance of the meeting was probably much closer to the latter figure. This sparsity of attendance at mass rallies was explained by Ch*u Ch'iu-pai, who told the Sixth Comintern Congress "that there were very few people at the mass meetings in Canton...but there were about b-5> thousand workers constantly crowding about the general staff of the insurrection in the course of two days clamoring for arms." Ch'u continued: "We told them to go to the mass meetings and to hail the new 33 government, but they insisted that we give them arms first." A decision was made on the evening of the 11th to call another meeting on the following 3b day at noon at the Taiping Theatre. No other details of this meeting are know. There is a possibility that it never materialized. 31 Hansu Chan, "The Canton Uprising and S oviet China," China Today (December, 193b), p. bb. 32 Isaacs, The Tragedy of the Chinese Revolution, p. 288. 33 Strakhov (Ch'u Ch'iu-pai), "The Lessons of the Chinese Revolution," International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 68 (October b, 1928), p . K5T. ------ 3b Huang Ping, "Canton Commune and its Preparation," Lozovskii, et. a l., Kuang-chou kung-hsi, p. 98. 167 Second Day: December 12 By the afternoon of the 12th, the anti-communist forces had rallied and had begun to test the defenses of the Canton Commune. General Hsieh Yeh's troops from the North River area concentrated their attack at the western sid e of the c ity , coming to grips w ith insurgents a t Koon Yam H ill. Several hundred insurgents, including two Russians, died before the h ill was taken. General Yeh's attack served to draw off many Red Guards from the heart of the city to the outskirts so that when the a tta c k from Honan came, the insurgents on the bund were weakened. 3£ On the same day, perhaps to d iv e rt the energy, a communist force of two hundred men including sixty Koreans, crossed the Pearl River to Honan Island and attempted to take Lingnan University there. These troops were not given the message to retreat and fought on until overwhelmed on December 17. Third Dayt December 13 On the morning of the 13th, the curtain was quickly drawing to a close for the Canton Commune. Li Fu-lin began his attack from Honan, forcing the insurgents back from their sandbag entrenchments on the river and the fight became a street to street battle. Li was aided by an armed Huston, Peasants', Workers' and Soldiers' Revolt of December..., p. 2lu 3 6 San and Wales, Song of Ariran, pp. 239-2U1. 168 fifth column of the fighting guards of the Mechanics Union, who played 37 havoc on insurgent communication lines. One of the last buildings to fall was the Bureau of Public Safety, seat of the Soviet Government, which was taken at noon. Various small groups of workers fought sporadically throughout the day but were individually defeated hy the 38 end of the day. According to Buber-Neumann, on the last day of the uprising, Neumann found himself in the northeastern part of Canton where he hired a rickshaw to drive to the foreign concession area. As he rode there he saw posters on the walls offering rewards for his arrest. When he reached one of the entrances to the concession area, Spanish guards denied him entrance because, in his disheveled state, they thought he was a non-European. Reportedly Neumann cursed them in his best English 39 and he was allowed to enter. The devastation which greeted the incoming Nationalist troops was staggering. Arthur N. Holcombe, a noted China specialist, arrived in the city just after the uprising had been suppressed and later wrote, Huston, Peasants*, Workers1 and Soldiers* Revolt in December..., pp. 2l*-2£. Hua Kang, I-chiu-erh-wu nien— i-chiu-erh-ch*i nien tl Chung- kuo ta ko-ming shih, p. 236. Correspondence from Canton, "Great Canton Worker-Peasant Uprising,” Wu chan ching-nien, No. U (n.p., early 1928?), pp. 72-7U. 39 Buber-Neumann, Von Potsdam Nach Moskau, p. 192. Mrs. Neumann reported that her husband met Lominadze the next day and both returned via Manchuria to the Soviet Union. Ibid. However, this seems inaccurate because Lominadze took part in the debates of the Fifteenth Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union held in Moscow from December 2-19. See International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 1 (January S>, 1928), pp. 23-2U,™3^3ltr™"™™” 169 "The better part of the city had been burned. The banks had been looted. Uo Money had lost its value. Trade was prostrate...." The looting of what had not been burned was carried on hy communists and non-communists alike. According to Huston, several thousand shops were looted of every thing from chairs, electric fans, household utensils, to more valuable items. An official estimate of the damage done by the communist uprising was placed at fifty million Hong Kong dollars, with more than forty-six Ul streets and one thousand homes and shops destroyed. Several eyewitness accounts credited the communists with starting fires which destroyed large sections of Canton so that the city was lighted up every night U2 the communists were in control. On the latter part of December 13, Nationalist troops under Li Fu-lin raided the Soviet Russian Consulate and seized the Vice Consul Has sis along with two other Russians who were discovered in a nearby building. These three men plus two others captured in the fighting were marched around the city barefoot, hands bound behind their backs, and their legs hobbled so they were forced to take mincing steps. The populace was allowed to molest them while they marched and the victims UO "Nationalist China," Foreign Policy Association, No. 62 (March, 1929), p. 10. Ul Huston, Peasants1, Workers' and Soldiers1 Revolt of December..., pp. 20-21. U2 Ts'in Fen (pseudonym), "Record of the Canton Insurrection," Hsien tai shih liao. Vol. I, pp. U06-U08. were stoned, spat upon and mutilated with various sharp instruments. On the following day, the Russians were executed in one of the main U3 public squares. Moreover, the Chinese military authorities wanted to shoot the Russian Consul General Boris Pokhvalinsky, but were talked out of this action by the foreign consuls. The Consul General UU was allowed to leave on December 30. The five Russians were executed on the grounds that they had conspired with the communist insurgents. The question of the role of the members of the Soviet Russian Consulate in the insurrection is an important one. The Nationalist Government at Nanking claimed the "Soviet Consulate and Soviet State Commercial Agencies were actually accomplices of the Communists...." The available evidence indicates little or no actual participation in either the planning or execution of the insurrection on the part of the Russians. Huston, who was a confirmed believer of Russian involvement in the uprising, could only point to such "proof" of Russian aid as the capture of some thirty machine guns and rifles in the raid on the Consulate. In addition, a Russian document was found on the Consular premises which advocated "peasant U3 Huston, Peasants', Workers' and Soldiers' Revolt of December..., p. 36; Hong Kong Telegraph, December 16, 1928, p. 1. Ul1 Huston, Peasants', Workers' and Soldiers' Revolt of December..., p. 38. China Weekly Review, December 2U, 1927, P» 90. revolution" and "armed uprising." The weapons can viewed as part of a normal precautionary security system at the Consulate. The so-called "revealing" document was nothing more than a restatement of Comintern policy during the latter half of 1927. The fact that Russians were reported fighting with the insurgents can be partially explained by the known fact that several White Russians, not connected with the Consulate hi in Canton, were known to be fighting with the insurgents. However, it seems that the Russian Consulate, contrary to its traditional practice, U8 did allow some of its personnel to aid in directing insurgent units. Perhaps the temptation to aid the communist insurgents was too alluring and a gross breach in diplomatic protocol was made. To that extent the Chinese Nationalist Government was correct in saying the Soviet Union was an accomplice to the Canton Commune. R etreat Amidst much confusion, and the tightening circle of Kuomintang troops surrounding Canton, some of the Canton Soviet's leaders gathered a part of the Instructors' Regiment and a few Red Guards (Neuberg said they totaled about 1,£00 men) and started to march toward Hai Lu-feng. Not all of the units were notified of the withdrawal; as a result, some Huston, Peasants', Workers' and Soldiers' Revolt of December..., pp. lli, 28-31. 172 U9 troops attempted to escape too late and were annihilated. Not all of the escaping communists reached safety; many were repeatedly ambushed by armed m ilitia and killed."*0 On January 27, 1928, part of the troops which had taken part in the Commune arrived at Hai Lu-feng. These remnants had retreated from Canton and had assembled at Hua-hsien where they were 51 reorganized into the Fourth Division of the Red Army under Yeh Yung. One of the questions relating to the very rapid recapture of Canton by Kuomintang forces revolved around the role of foreign navies. One of the first armies to return to Canton was that of Li Fu-lin, which was located near Kongmoon. The rapid return of Li's troops was aided by the fact that the British had allowed the General to use their radio to notify his troops at Kongmoon. The United States gunboat Sacramento and the British warship Moreau, according to communist sources, also carried Kuomintang troops to various parts of the city. Allegedly, Japanese marines had landed in Canton on December 11, attacked the Red fo rces, and prevented them from occupying parts of the Bund which were of considerable strategic 52 importance. In the available United States documents and Hong Kong U9 San and Wales, Song of A rlran, pp. 102 and 239. 50 Ibid., pp. 102-103. ^Shinkichi Eto, "Hai-lu-feng—the First Chinese Soviet Government," Part I, China Quarterly, No. 9 (January-March, 1962), p. 17U. 52 Hansu Chan, "The Canton Uprising and Soviet China," China Today (December, 193U), p. hll. 173 newspaper accounts, no indication is given of actual U.S. military support or participation, but only of the rescue of a number of stranded 53 American citizens and other nationals. Estimates of those killed by the communists when they held sway in Canton varied. The China Weekly Review stated that "nearly 600 persons 5h met their death." The statement by the EGCI one year later mentioned that "there were executed about 700 enemies of the people."^ One source described how the communists cruelly sliced some of their "enemies" to death.^ It seems likely that the number executed lies in the vicinity of 600 persons because of the agreement between the communist and non communist sources, the short time the Soviet Government ruled in Canton, and because the leaders of the insurrection were later to be charged by the Comintern with not executing enough "reactionaries" and thus "deepening" the revolution. However, with the defeat of the Canton Uprising, the inevitable counter-executions took place. This period of executions has been called the "White Terror" in communist literature. The Comintern protested this 53 Department of State, Relations of the United States, 1927, Vol. II. (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, lftufr), p. jih; Hong Kong Telegraph, December 11-13, 1927. 5U Hin Wong, "The Failure of the Labour-Peasant Uprising at Canton," China Weekly Review, p. 120. 55 T'ang Shin-she, "The Anniversary of the Canton Insurrection," Inter national Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 87 (December 7, 1928), p. 1656. ^Kung-fei huo-kuo shlh-liao hui-bien (Critical Essays on the History of the Communist bandits Troubling China), Vol. I. (n.p., n.d.), p. 522. 17b in an editorial entitled, "Manifesto of the League Against Imperialism against the Terror in China," which began by decrying: The sanguinary ferocity with which the workers and peasants were slaughtered in Canton by the mercenary army of the feudal- bourgeois reactionaries, is without parallel.... Besides the workers and peasants killed in the streets, more than 5,000 persons were arrested as Communists and were straightaway shot, hanged, or beheaded in the streets where their dead bodies lay for several days.57 Another communist source stated that according to the reactionary generals' own figures, they executed b,000 communists. This source corrects this estimation by stating that according to the exact calculations 58 of the All-Chinese Trade Union Federation, there were 5,700 killed. With the failure of the Canton Commune, the various sources of authority investigated the shortcomings of the insurrection. The two most important sources of failure were the lack of support the masses gave to the uprising and various military inadequacies. Who joined the uprising once it began, and how extensive was the support of the rising among the masses of Canton? Yeh T'ing "Manifesto of the League Against Imperialism against the Terror in China," International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 1 (January 5, 1928), p. 7” See also, "The Lessons of the t|>rising of Workers, Peasants, and Soldiers," Pu-erh-sal wei-k*o (Bolshevik) No. 10 (December 18, 1927), pp. 269-270j "Chinese Communist Second Announcement of the Canton U prising to the People of the Whole N ation," P u-erh-sal-w ei-k*o. No. 10 (December 18, 1927), p. 279; J. Thomas, Die Kantoner Kommune (Zurich: Mopr Verlag, 1933?), p. b. T'ang Shin-she, "The Terror of the Imperialists and the M ilitarists in China," International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 3b (June 21, 1928), p. 623. 175 observed: The masses took no part in the insurrection. All shops were closed, and the employees showed no d esire to support us. Most of the soldiers we disarmed dispersed in the city. The insurrection was not linked to the difficulties of the railroad workers. The re a c tio n a rie s could s t i l l use the Canton-Hankow Line. The workers of the power plant cut off the light and we had to work in the dark. The workers of Canton and Hongkong, as well as the sailors, did not dare to join the combatants. The river sailors placed themselves shamefully at the service of the Whites. The railway workers of the Hongkong and Canton-Hankow Line tran sm itted the telegrams of the enemy and transported their soldiers. The peasants did not help us by destroying the tracks and did not try to prevent the enemy from attacking Canton. The workers of Hongkong did not display the least sympathy for the insurrection.59 Deng Cheng-tsah wrote that "its social basis was not broad.Neuberg stated that: The great majority of the proletariat and the petit-bourgeoisie did not give sufficient support to the new power. The railway workers, the m unicipal workers, th e s a ilo rs of Hongkong and others did not stop work. The petit-bourgeoisie, for the most part, adopted a waiting attitude. At the moment of the insurrection, there was no important revolutionary movement among the peasants adjacent to Canton. The peasants were completely isolated; no aid could be expected from them.61 Huston commented on the support given by the people to tfie u p risin g . In general, he felt there had been little response to the rising among the population; he stated that although there were 8,OCX) communists in the 62 various unions, only 2,000 took part in the revolt. Yeh T'ing, "Report on the Canton Insurrection," cited in Roy, Revolution and Counter-Revolution in China, p. 558. 60 nn / Isaacs, The Tragedy of the Chinese Revolution, p. 288; (Teng) Chung-hsia, "Canton tJprising and the Tactics of the Chinese Communist Party," in Lozovskii, et. a l., Kuang-chou kung-hsi, pp. U8-U9. ^Roy, Revolution and Counter-Revolution in China, p. 559. 62 Huston, Peasants1, Workers' and Soldiers' Revolt of December..., p. 19. CHAPTER IX MILITARY APPRAISAL OF THE CANTON COMMUNE Comintern policy toward China in 1927 had laid the basis for the Canton Insurrection, but with the collapse of the Commune, the Communist International was quick to lay the blame for the failure at the door of the Chinese Communists, citing an obvious lack of popular support by the inhabitants of Canton"** and military blunders committed. Its criterion for appraisal of the uprising's military aspects appears to be in large part a comparison with specifications outlined in the Comintern's own 2 uprising manuals for standard insurrection practices. During 1927, the Comintern's proclaimed policy of armed insurrection had tended to emphasize the need for urban insurrection, with rural 3 insurrection playing a supportive role. The failure of the year-end Commune led the Comintern to a reappraisal of its policies. At the Ninth Plenum, a little more than two months after the debacle at Canton, the Executive Committee began to revise its previous strategy. Now the ^The reasons for this failure are discussed in Chapter VIII. 2 A comparison of manuals on insurrections such as Rex Applegate, Crowd and Riot Control, Sixth Edition (Harrisburg: Stackpole Company, 1961:), especially pages 195-205; Andrew R. Molnar, et. a l., Undergrounds in Insurgent. Revolutionary, and Resistance Warfare (Washington, D.C.: Special Operations Research Office of the American University, 1963); and Sterling A. Wood, Riot Control (Harrisburg: M ilitary Service Publishing Company, 1962), especially pages 100-118, indicates a close convergence of practices with the communist manuals. 3 See Chapter IV for a discussion of 1927 Comintern policies in China. 177 Comintern turned to an emphasis on the development of rural soviets, a peasant army, and the use of guerilla warfare tactics. However, urban areas retained their importance because they were to be the objectives of the peasant army, and they were to form the necessary base for any communist conquest of China. Yet the Comintern’s preoccupation with the importance of the urban areas was definitely ended by the time of the Sixth Comintern Congress in the summer of 1928. Mao Tse-tung's assumption of predominant power in the CCP at the 1935 Tsunyi Conference was to establish in the forefront a conception of world revolution in which peasants, rather than urban proletariat, would U play the dominant role. The Maoist elaboration of the tactics and strategy of agrarian revolution is a legacy which still troubles the contemporary world. Today the peasant in rural, underdeveloped areas is the man of the hour in the Chinese conception of world revolution. He is courted as the instrument whose rural insurrection w ill bring about the downfall of resistance to communism. Guides to revolution such as the works of Mao Tse-tung and "Marshal1* Lin Piao's "Long Live the Victory of the People's For a detailed discussion of the effects of the Canton Commune on Comintern and CCP policy see Chapter X. 5 War" present prescriptions for peasant uprisings. The early literature of the Comintern was filled with demands for urban insurrection, but little guidance was provided as to how it should be carried out. A few definite models for action in conducting insurrec tions were contained in some confidential manuals made available to those who could not travel to Moscow to learn the art. Few of these manuals are now available for ready inspection, but two which are available are explicit enough that a composite of a model urban insurrection can be drawn from them. Per Weg zum Sieg (Road to V ictory) was w ritten in 1927 by an "Alfred Lange. Most sources fe e l th a t Lange was a pseudonym fo r none other than Most of Mao's military writings can be found in Mao Tse-tung, Selected Military Writings of Mao Tse-tung (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1963). See also Brigadier General Samuel B. G riffith, translator, Mao Tse-tung on Guerilla Warfare (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1966), Stuart R. Schram, translator, Basic Tactics (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1966). For analyses of Maoist tactics see Edward L. Katzenbach, Jr., "Time, Space, and W ill," Marine Corps Gazette, October, 1969, pp. 36-l|Oj Edward L. Katzenbach, J r . and Gene L. Hanrahan, "The Revolutionary S trategy of Mao Tse-tung," Political Science Quarterly, September, 1995, pp. 321-3U0; Stuart R. Schram, *fhe Polltteal ifhought of Mao Tse-tung (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1963), especially Chapter V7 "l^he Military Principles of Mao Tse- tung," pp. 193-211. ^For a text of Lin Piao's September, 1969 statement on guerilla warfare, see Lin Piao, Long Live the Victors'- of the Peoples' War (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1965). For an analysis of this declaration see Robert B. Rigg, "Peking's Declaration of War" in Military Review, March, 1966, pp. 76-79. Alfred Lange, Per Weg zum Sieg (Rofld to Victory) (Berlin: Ernst Schneller, 1927?), hereafter cited as Road to Victory. The German edition has been translated into English by the Unlied States Department of the Army. This translation is conveniently located in the United States House Committee on Un-American A c tiv itie s, The Communist Conspiracy, P art I , Section D (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1956), pp. 299-327. 179 Hans Kipenberger, the former chief of the German Communist Party’s military apparatus.*^ The second manual, entitled L’Insurrection armee, g was w ritte n in 1928 by A. Neuberg, presumably the pseudonym of Heinz 9 Neumann, German Comintern agent and one-time confidant of Stalin. The 7 Adolf E hrt, Communism in Germany (The Truth About the Communist Conspiracy on the Eve of the National Revolution) (Berlin: General League of German Anti-Communism A ssociations, 1933), p. 10. This Nazi propaganda piece states that Lange is Hans Kiepenberger. See also Stefan Possony, A Century of Conflict (Chicago: Henry Regency Company, 1993)* P* 178. Pos*sony also feels that the author of Road to Victory was Kiepenberger. The circumstantial evidence which Possony cites as evidence pointing to Kiepenberger1s authorship is that fact that the booklet was published by Ernst Schneller, a leading German Communist and one-time editor of the secret monthly Oktober, a magazine devoted to the problems of military insurrection and irregular warfare. However, Possony states that experts working for the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee felt th a t Lange probably stood fo r Tuure Valdemar Lehen (a lia s Leino), a Finnish Communistj see also William R. K intner, The Front i s Everywhere (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1990), p. 109. Kintner agrees with Possony on Kiepenberger's authorship. ^A. Neuberg, L'Insurrection armde (Armed Insurrection) (Paris: Bureau d1Editions, 1931). This volume is a French translation of the now unavailable German edition of A. Neuberg, Per bewaffnete Aufstand (Armed Insurrection) (n.p., 1928) j Ehrt, Communism in (jermany, p. 15. A later French abrigded edition was published! with an anti-communist commentary. See Leon de Poncins, editor. Le Plan communiste d’insurrection armee (Paris: Les Liberties Francaises, 19397* The introduction of the 1931 French edition has been translated into English and is found in United States House Committee on Un-American A c tiv itie s , The Communist Conspiracy, P art I , Section D, pp. 27-37. 9 Authorities seem to be in agreement that A. Neuberg is Heinz Neumann. See Possony, A Century of Conflict, p. 128; Kintner, The Front is Everywhere, p. 121; E hrt, Communism in Germany, p. 10. Neumann’s close re la tio n sh ip with S ta lin is discussed in Tpsilon (psudonym of Johann Rindl and Julian Gumperz), Pattern for World Revolution (Chicago: Ziff- Davis Publishing Company, 19U7), PP* 185-187, and in Ruth Fischer, Stalta and German Communism (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 19U8), p. UU6. 180 Neuberg book offered case studies as well as detailed discussion of military ta c tic s , while the Lange volume was a more general th e o re tic a l discussion of armed insurrection. Lange’s book disclaimed universal guidelines because insurrection in different countries, or even in the same country at different times, would always take place under different conditions. Because of this it vrould be impossible to lay down exact rules. In other words there could 10 be no "master blueprint" for an uprising. Important to an understanding of the theory of armed insurrection in Lange’s view was the difference in Marxian usage of the terms "uprising11 and "civil war." An armed uprising in the Marxist sense was: the rising of the masses of the people against the reactionary regime, the beginning of the armed collision between the revolu tionary and counter-revolutionary classes, the direct fights for the capture of the political power through a revolutionary class. The concept of civil war on the other hand, included not only a struggle for the capture of political power but also: the fight between the revolutionary and counter-revolutionary parties for power in general, that is to say, for the retention and defense of the power once it has been captured. Armed uprising then, was the in itial phase of civil war. The importance ^L ange, The Road to V ictory, in The Communist Conspiracy, P a rt I , Section D, p. 305. 11 Ibid., p. 301. 181 of differentiating between these two concepts was the fact that the strategy and tactics accompanying each concept were significantly different.12 In the later phases of civil war, according to Lange, there would be battles between "organized armed formations" along continuous fronts. However, in an armed uprising situation, there would be no continuous front, and the revolutionary army (i.e. revolutionary masses) would be scattered all over the country at the moment of the uprising."Friend 13 and foe will find themselves face to face everywhere." The manual noted that at the beginning of an insurrection, the size of the "revolu tionary army could not be exactly predetermined but would consist of rather primitive troops formations.1^ Lange thought the key to the success of an uprising would be a correct judgment of the revolutionary mood of the masses. The choice of the proper moment to stage an uprising had always intrigued the th e o re tic ia n s of communism. In h is essay on "Marxism and U prising," Lenin pointed out several factors to be considered when judging whether 12 Ib id . Ibid., p. 302. Lange points out that Marx coined the expression "art of uprising" and it was he who felt special attention should be given to it. See Karl Marx, "Democracy at the Helm" cited in Lange, Road to Victory in The Communist Conspiracy, Part I, Section D, pp. 302-303^ Hi Ibid., p. 303. 182 or not the time was auspicious for an uprising: To be successful, the uprising must be based not on a conspiracy, not on a party, but on the advanced class (i.e. the proletariat). This is the first point. The uprising must be based on the revolutionary upsurge of the people. This is the second point. The uprising must be based on the crucial point in the history of the maturing revolution, when the activity of the vanguard of the people is at its height, vacillations in the ranks of the enemies, and in the ranks of the weak, half-hearted, undecided friends of the revolution are at their highest point. That is the third p o in t.l5 Lenin’s crucial prerequisites of victory then, were clearly an active participation of the proletariat and other revolutionary classes (or at least a large part of them), and the presence of a revolutionary upsurge among the people. The Party organization should be close enough to the people to ascertain the exact degree of this fervor. Another important criterion for a communist victory should be the presence of weakening and disunity in the camp of the opposition. An uprising, according to Lenin, would have little chance of success if the ruling class were to stand united and armed with all the means of the state's power to oppose the revolutionary class. Lange noted the propensity of some comrades to believe that "armed uprising can be plotted and determined in advance, that a date can be set more or less in advance, and that the revolution can be unfolded according to a timetable," a stand which Lenin had labeled as "trifling" Lenin,,rMarxism and U prising," c ite d in Lange, Road to V ictory in The Communist Conspiracy, Part 1, Section D, p. 308. 183 with revolution. Lange's opinion was that: The theory that the events of the revolution can be plotted beforehand with a calendar comes from a tendency to overestimate the administrative and mechanical power of the leaders of the revolution. 16 In addition to choosing an opportune time for action, the Lange manual prescribed that there should be an overall strategic plan covering an entire country and subsidiary plans for its various regions and cities. The strategic plan must determine, for example, which cities or areas were ripe for uprising, and whether or not an uprising should be coordinated with a general strike. The tactical plan was to include an estimate of the strength of enemy forces, and was to pinpoint target areas, define command structures, allocate forces to targets, anticipate the enemy*s probable course of action, prescribe measures to prevent the arrival of enemy troop reinforcements, and spread propaganda to lure new forces into the conflict.^ The concentration of a numerical superiority of insurgents at a particular place or battle would tend to ensure their success, according to Lange. In general, the qualitative military superiority of the opponent could be overcome only by the quantitative superiority of the masses. The l6Ibid., p. 310. 17 I b id ., pp. 321-323, passim. 18U only way to mobilize such numerical superiority would be for the masses to participate actively in the uprising. Moreover, the revolutionary fo rces, as w ell as the communist party, should be concentrated at the crucial time and at the proper place. A mistake to be avoided would be involvement with abstract problems during an uprising. A correct concentration of revolutionary forces would enable simultaneous uprisings in the whole country or in a whole province. According to Lange, if the forces of the revolution were confined to one small area, or if uprisings were scattered over a wider area, the effect would be to have an isolated uprising or a series of isolated uprisings which would lead to d efeat. As for a crucial place in which to stage an uprising, often the capital of the country would be desirable, for it would be the center of a state's political machinery. In addition, the administrative centers of the provinces would be equally significant targets. Lange felt that the choice of the most important locations (or location) would be obvious, 1_8 therefore discussions on this point would tend to be a "waste of time." A point stressed in both manuals was the necessity for training civilian insurgents in the rudiments of warfare. Neuberg emphasized that in order for the revolutionaries to have a combat organization capable of 18 Lange, Road to Victory in The Communist Conspiracy, Part I, Section D, pp. 311-315• 1 8 £ fighting an organized enemy, communist leaders must work feverishly in the short time preceding an uprising to train, organize and arm the workers systematically. An improvised fighting force attempting to organize at the moment of insurrection could not win. The training of the cadres and combat leaders must include the theoretical study of revolution and wars, d rill, experimental tactics, maneuvers, and 19 participation in uprisings. The success of any uprising, according to Lange and Neuberg, would depend, from a m ilitary point of view, on engaging in aggressive 20 and offensive operation. Lange c ite d Marx to the e ffe c t th a t: Once the uprising is begun, it is necessary to act with the utmost decisiveness and to grasp the offensive. The defensive is the death of every armed revoltj it is lost before it has even met the enemy.21 In his article, "Lessons from the Moscow Uprising," Lenin also wrote that the offensive, the daring attack, was one of the keys to an uprising's success. 22 Ibid., pp. 303-301*. Neuberg, L*Insurrection armee, p. 30. 20 Lange, Road to Victory, in The Communist Conspiracy, Part I, Section D, pp. 315-316; Neuberg, L1 Insurrection armSe, p."^l. 21 Karl Marx, "Democracy at the Helm," cited in Lange, Road to V ictory in The Communist Conspiracy, P art I , Section D, p . 315* 22 Lenin, "Lessons from the Moscow Uprising," in Lange, Road to V ictory in The Communist Conspiracy, P art I , Section D, p . 3 l £ 186 The success of an uprising would also depend on the use of terror. Lange cited the Paris Commune of 1871 as a situation in which the prole tariat succeeded in gaining power, and then showed moderation and mercy to the defeated enemy. This "hunanitarianism " could be in te rp re te d by the enemy as a sign of weakness. According to Lange, the great lesson of "all the previous experiences with revolution" was that the "avowed enemy of the uprising should be shown only the strictest revolutionary 23 discipline, yes, even terror." ^ The importance of initial success in deciding the outcome of an uprising was stressed by Lange. Although this initial success would depend greatly on surprise, preparation for an uprising should not be kept entirely secret. The communists would not expect the enemy to be ignorant of conditions for an impending uprising. Besides, exaggerated secrecy could preclude the mobilization of the revolutionary forces and thus foster certain defeat.2^ Once in itial success was gained, much of the revolutionary success would depend on the prevention of the concentration of the enemy's forces. Road to Victory stated that from the first moment of an uprising, it would be imperative to surround enemy forces and decompose them by all 23 Lange, Road to V ictory in The Communist Conspiracy, P art I , Section D, p. 3lTi 2h Ibid., pp. 320-321. 187 available means, including propaganda, assassination of enemy leaders, cutting of their communications and lines of retreat, or finally, direct attack. The enemy would be expected to resist encirclement and isolation. However, he could still be defeated if the insurrectionists had correctly judged the general situation. If an uprising turned out to be unsuccessful, a plan for retreat would be needed. Retreat, whether the result of a bitter battle or of peaceful capitulation by the insurgents, according to communist theory, always r e su lts in la rg e-sca le destruction of communist forces and the 26 appearance of a so-called "White Terror." According to Neuberg, urban insurrectionists were to be aided by rural peasant armies. These were to be built upon the territorial principle, with each local unit having a headquarters unit subordinated to the local Communist Party branch. The headquarters unit would organize logistics for the army and would also organize m ilitia units. Older men would guard their villages while the younger men would be active in more mobile detachments. In addition, the headquarters unit would be responsible for maintaining reconnaisance over the local area. Neuberg felt that one of the necessary elements of success for such an army would be that communists 25 Ibid. , pp. 322-32U. 26 A frequently used communist term denoting the "oppression" used by "reactionary" forces in maintaining their power. Ibid., p. 306. 1 8 8 and industrial workers would assume leadership in crucial political and military positions. Seemingly Neuberg had a low opinion of the leader ship qualities of the peasants, an impression which would be confirmed 27 by the peasant ineptness in Kwangtung during the Canton Commune. Lange concluded his treatise by observing that the "act of the armed uprising" demonstrated "at every turn" the need for a revolutionary party as the "most important prerequisite of victory." He cited the need ' for a party because "a revolutionary mass movement without leadership is chaotic, blind, muddled and aimless." In order for the party to be successful, it must be closely connected with the proletariat and have the confidence of the people. In addition, the party must be united in 28 desiring the uprising. Communist Criticism of the Commune’s Military Execution The voluminous charges engendered by the failure of the Canton Commune within both the Conintern and the Chinese Communist Party included not only criticisms of the various military errors committed by insurgents, but also dwelled on the general lack of support provided by the Cantonese. The vehemence of the criticism suggests that the Comintern sought to prevent similar errors in the future. 27 Neuberg, L'Insurrection arraSe, pp. 17-18, 257-275. 28 Ibid., p. 325. 18? The major communist m ilita ry c r itic ism s of the Canton Commune range in importance from doctrinal claptrap to substantive charges which w ill receiv e greater d iscu ssion . One communist claim was that "imperialist" naval support, as well as the failure of the insurgents, to eliminate the Chinese Navy were major causes for the defeat of the Commune. In "exposing" alleged "imperialist" support, the communists 29 did not document th eir claim s. One source attached great significance to the role played by the Chinese Navy at Canton, avowing that "the decisive factor was the Chinese Navy and the support of the im p eria lists." Because Canton was partially surrounded by water, one of the major shortcomings of the preparation for the uprising was the failure to account for the contingency of a navy unsympathetic to the cause. This source pointed out that during the first day of the insurrection the Navy wavered, but in the end it joined the "reactionaries." The source also criticized the insurrectionists for failing to: organize their own naval detachments or forces for protection from the action of the fleet. The insurgents could have done that because they had at their disposal members of the Seamen's Union and a number o f boats and junks. 29 Harry Joven, "The Lessons of the Canton Uprising," The Communist Vol. VH, No. 1 (January, 1928), p. 22. International Press Correspondence fumed about the extensive "imperialist" aid to the Nationalists rapidly encircling Canton. Yet the article stated that the imperialists "fired twelve shots on Canton." Even if this statement were correct, it represents something very much less than substantial support. International Press Correspondence, Vol. 7, No. 72 (December 22, 1927), p. 163 I. 190 However, it seems that such a primitive navy could have at most only hampered the action o f the enemy's navy and the conveyance of the 30 enemy's troops along the rivers and canals near Canton. Given the close proximity of the feuding armies around Canton, and the land approach routes of these armies, even a communist takeover of the Navy could not have stopped the Nationalist victory. The only p o ssib le aid a communist Canton f le e t could have afforded was perhaps a brief lengthening of the existence of the Canton Commune. In addition, a Canton Navy could have aided in the escape of the insurrectionists by taking them by sea to the Hai Lu-feng Soviet area. In his L'Insurrection armee, Neuberg had suggested that only hurried and cursory study of the insurrection plan by the leadership of the uprising (i.e. the Chinese Communist Party leaders in Kwangtung) was a major explanation for the failure of the Commune. The author, who quite probably was himself one of the leaders who drew up the main outlines of the plan, in now way indicated that the plan itself was defective. The obvious bias of Neuberg, who was protecting the Comintern from possible 31 charges of error, as well as protecting himself, was evident. However, evidence indicates that the insurrection plan actually was followed. For 30 Harry Joven, "The Lessons of the Canton Uprising," The Communist, pp. 22-23. 31 Neuberg, L'Insurrection armSe, pp. 12U-127. 191 example, during the initial hours of the uprising, the relative coordin ation of various conglomerate groups in seizing certain objectives reflected the presence of some plan. Certainly the possibility that the plan was insufficiently studied is quite feasible. Neuberg mentioned, for example, that an arms depot and arsenal in Canton were never occupied because of an inability to follow plans. However, even assuming that the plan was poorly executed, the resultant catastrophe was so rapid and of such magnitude, it would seem that the root causes of the failure must lie elsewhere.^ The most substantive communist criticisms of the failure of the Canton Commune indeed portray keen analysis. One of the main reasons for the failure, according to communist sources, as well as objective analysis, was the Chinese Communist Party's inadequate preparation among the workers and peasants. The Ninth Plenum of the Comintern enumerated some of these shortcomings: insufficient preliminary work...among the armed force.. .incorrect methods of approaching the workers who are members of the yellow trade union...inadequate preparation of the party organizations and the Communist Youth League for the insurrection.. .weakness in the political mobilization of the masses (absence of broad political s t r ik e s .. .).3 3 32 Ibid., p. 120. 33 International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 16 (March 15, 1928), p. 322. A lack of even basic military training for even a few insurgents was evident. The workers had little or no knowledge about the operation of captured military weapons. For example, only a few workers knew how to use the thirty captured cannon, and as a result, only five were actually fired. The same situation existed for the operation of captured machine guns. In addition, when the enemy closed in on the city, methods of barricade erection were not applied, and thus the enemy made rapid inroads into the city. 3k Related to the above criticism was the fact that the relationship between the workers of Canton and the peasants of the Kwangtung country side was not intimate. Neuberg had stressed in his manual that there must be coordination between rural and urban groups for an uprising to succeed. Yet at the Canton Commune, the peasant m ilitia failed to send units to the insurrection or even harass the enemy’s lines of communication. Inexperienced and weak leadership was another apparent cause for defeat. Neuberg specifically cited the case of Yeh T'ing, military commander of the uprising, who arrived only six hours before the actual insurrection. Yeh had been in the Hai Lu-feng area since October and ^Neuberg, L*Insurrection armee, p. 123; Ch'u Ch’iu-pai, Chung-kuo ko-mlng yu kung-chan-tang (The Chinese Revolution and the Communist Party) (CWen) Shao-yu, Wu-chuang pao-tung (n.p., n.p., 1929), p. 70j Ch'u Ch'iu-pai, Chung-kuo ko-mlng yu kung-chan-tang, pp. 269-270. 36 Neuberg, L1Insurrection armee, p. 120. therefore could have come to Canton earlier. Even if it were assumed that the date of the uprising may have been advanced because of Chang Fa-kuei’s discovery of the plot, still it would appear that Yeh T'ing was delinquent in his duties. Neuberg pointed out other shortcomings and gave examples of other tactics that the leadership could have used. Some of the disarmed enemy soldiers could have been selected, given a rapid political indoctrination and used ag ain st the enemy. Neuberg re c a lle d th a t when th is was suggested, the leadership responded by calling for the drawing up of a list of prisoners and their alleged political convictions. Neuberg labeled this a bureau- 37 cratic action which would be fatal to a revolutionary situation. The last major reason offered for the Canton Commune's failure was the patent fact that the timing for the insurrection was inappropriate. The general political-m ilitary situation around Canton, even to an enthusi astic supporter of the Commune such as Neuberg, was unfavorable. He commented th a t nearly J>0,000 enemy troops who had l i t t l e or no tra c e of qO communist ideological leanings were in the immediate vicinity of Canton. S till, soon after the uprising, Comintern publications subscribed to the correctness of the view that the timing and the general situation around Canton had been appropriate for a successful insurrection. For example, one source answered the question of appropriate timing in the 19k affirmative: "The general situation in China bears an exceptionally tense, directly revolutionary character." Moreover, the source went on to say that: There can be no question whatever that the moment of revolt in Canton coincided with the highest point of the rise of both the workers' and the peasants' movement throughout the Kwangtung Province.39 This "line" rapidly disappeared, particularly after the Ninth Plenum's discussion of the uprising, which called it "an heroic attempt of the proletariat to organize a Soviet Government...."^ The rather critical review of the Commune by the Plenum led to a new view that the timing and general situation had not been appropriate for the rising.^ Later, in 1928, Ch'en Shao-yu, in Wu-chuang pao-tung, asked the rhetorical question, "Was the decision to hold the uprising on December 11 right?" Ch'en noted that some communists had argued that if the uprising had not taken place on December 11, then all would have been lost, because Chang Fa-kuei already knew of the insurrection plan and was rapidly attempting to counter rebel plans. Citing Lenin, Ch'en argued that this lin e of reasoning was in c o rre c t. Ch'en saw the December, 1927 conditions A. Lominadze, "Historical Significance of Canton Rising," Communist In te rn a tio n a l, Vol. V, No. 2 (January 15, 1928), p. 33* 1*0 In te rn a tio n a l Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 16 (March 15, 1928), p.”5 ^ hi John Pepper, "Position and Tasks of the Chinese C. P. after the Canton R ising," Communist In te rn a tio n a l, Vol. 5, No. 6 (March 15, 1928), pp. 158-160. See also John Pepper, "After the Canton Uprising," The Communist, Vol. V II, No. 3 (March, 1928), pp. 15U-159. 195 in Canton as reminiscent of the July, 1917 situation in Russia. In 1917, Lenin had made the decision to postpone a scheduled uprising and 1*2 suffer the attendant casualties rather than stage a "premature" uprising. In short, the basic military reasons for the failure of the Canton Commune were enunciated by the communists themselves. The inadequate preparations among the workers and peasants, their lack of coordination, weak and inexperienced leadership, and the selection of a time when the general situation was unfavorable, along with the lack of mass support generated by the uprising were the crucial political- m ilitary reasons why the Canton Commune was unsuccessful. ^(Ch'en) Shao-yu, Wu chuang pao-tung, pp. 71-72. CHAPTER X RAMIFICATIONS OF THE CANTON COMMUNE OUTSIDE CHINA Although it is tempting to try to pinpoint causal links between the Canton Commune and subsequent events, historical evidence suggests no clearcut connections. Rather than calling the events at Canton merely a link between historical processes, it would seem more prudent to view the Commune as a catalyst and a crystallizer. For the Canton failure served to speed the progress in clarification of policies which had earlier roots and to crystallize the development of certain trends. The event at Canton served in these capacities in several aspects of the external scene. Certainly it speeded up the break between Nanking and the Soviet Union. The Commune had direct implications for the Comintern's policy of armed insurrection, although its effect on the celebrated Stalin-Trotsky struggle was most probably minor. These external ramifications are the subject of this Chapter, and implications for the internal situation, specifically for the Chinese Communist Party and the Kuomintang, will be discussed in Chapter XI. Break of R elations w ith the Soviet Union The Canton Commune was used as an excuse by the Nationalist Government at Nanking to break "relations" with the Soviet Union. Hints of the 197 possibility of a rupture between Nanking and Moscow can be traced to the successes of the Northern Expedition by the spring of 1927, the departure of Borodin, the split between the Kuomintang and the Chinese Communist Party in the summer of 1927, and the Comintern-directed armed insurrection policies of late 1927* Thus, the o f f ic ia l N a tio n a list Chinese mandate of December lU, 1927 handed to Mr. Koslovsky, the Consul General of the U.S.S.R. at Shanghai, was somewhat m isleading. The mandate noted: th is momentous step {.breaking of "diplom atic” relatio n s} was forced by the startling event which occurred at Canton... CHO was discovered that this rising was made possible because the Soviet Consulate and Soviet State Commercial agencies were actually accomplices of the Communists, having long since permitted the use of their premises as as base fo r Communist o p e ra tio n s.l The note provided that: . . .recognition accorded to the Consuls of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics stationed in various provinces under the juris diction of the Nationalist Government shall be withdrawn and.. .the Soviet State Commercial agencies in the various provinces shall also suspend their functions.2 The Chinese note to the Soviet Government implied that the decision to break with the Soviet regime came after the Canton Commune. This was not the case. The action to close Soviet Consulates and State Agencies had been ratified by the Preliminary Conference of the Central Executive ^China Weekly Review, December 2U, 1927, p. 90. 2 Ibid . 198 Committee of th e Kuomintang which was held in Shanghai during the week of December 3-7, 1927. A resolution had been passed, but kept secret, which recommended the breaking of re la tio n s . This reso lu tio n was to be taken up at the forthcoming Fourth Plenary Conference of the Kuomintang which was to be held in early January.^ The Canton Uprising apparently precipitated earlier action. The Nationalist decision to end relations with the Soviet Union was opposed by some. Madame Sun Y at-sen, in Moscow a t the tim e, wrote to Chiang Kai-shek that this policy was "suicidal in nature" and that one of Doctor Sun Yat-sen's last requests had been "that cooperation should always be exchanged between Russia and China." Chiang's reply informed Madame Sun Ya-sen that she did not have all the facts at her disposal and should come to China for the "first hand information."^ On December 16 the Soviet Government replied to the Nationalists' note, stating three main points. The first was that the "Soviet Government has never recognized this so-called Chinese Nationalist Government at Nanking..." and the second that "the Soviet Government has to repudiate in the most energetic manner the completely unfounded statem ents...that the Soviet Consulates and the Soviet Commercial Agencies "Action of the Nationalists Causes Curious Situation in Chinese- Russian Relations," China Weekly Review, December 2U, 1927, pp. 90-91. See also Week in Chinaf December 17, 1927. pp. 12-13. ^Reporter, "Sketch of the Canton Disturbances," Kuo-wen chou pao, Vol. E>, No. 1 (January 1, 1928), p. 8. 199 are to be considered responsible for the Red propaganda and an 'asylum fo r the Communists.The Soviet Government also repudiated the allegation that the "Soviet Consulate in Canton was guiding the revolu tio n ary movement of the peasants and workers in Kwangtung province." The third and final point was a veiled threat which implied that the Nationalist Chinese interests would be the ones harmed for breaking relations—not those of the U.S.S.R. On December 21, the date set in the Nanking order of expulsion, the Soviet Consul-General at Shanghai and some twenty staff members boarded a vessel at Shanghai for Vladivostock. Consular authorities at Canton and Hankow had already gone. Following the departure of the Soviet consular authorities from South China, Germany, at Russia's 6 request, agreed to take care of Russian commercial matters there. The Nationalist reply to the Soviet note of December 16 was rather brief and called the note "propaganda." The reply again charged the Russians with conspiracy at Canton and stated that: we formerly believed that the Soviet Government and we could live on peaceful terms. This belief has been obliterated by the incessant conspiracies of the Soviet Government against our Government. We are no longer concerned with the feelings of the Soviet Government.? "Soviet Consulates in China: Reply from Ghicherin to the Note of the Shanghai Commissioner for Foreign Affairs Withdrawing Recognition," Jane Degras, e d ito r. Soviet Documents on Foreign P olicy, Vol. H (New York: Oxford University Press, 1952), pp. 290-291. ^Week in China, December 2U, 1927, p . 25. Reporter, "Sketch of the Canton Disturbances," Kuo-wen chou pao, p. 9. 200 However, within a very short time, several members of the Nanking Government began to question the wisdom of the previous actio n . They began to evidence some concern for Soviet feelings, but were probably motivated more by a concern for trade. Dr. C.C. Wu, Minister of Foreign Affairs for the Nanking Government, noted hopefully that: China has an extensive trade with Russia and if some method can be work out whereby this trade can' be continued without the complications which have developed in the past, China would be quite willing.8 Thus the Nationalist Government desired Soviet trade and aid, but wanted no "strings" attached. The Canton Commune proved to be a catalytic agent in the disruption of relations between the Nationalist regime and the Soviet Government. The break between the two was clearly on the horizon of 1928, if the events in China of the spring and summer of 1927 are taken into account. The Uprising was used as a ready excuse by the Nationalist Government to end a relationship which was an inconvenience since the Nationalist goal of the unification of the country had almost been attained. Comintern Policy after the Canton Commune A second context in which the Canton Insurrection had repercussions was Comintern policy toward China. It will be recalled that the August 7, 1927 Emergency Meeting of the Chinese Communist Party had called for "N ationalist China 'Breaks' with Soviet Russia," China Weekly Review, December 2U, 1927, p. 91. 201 systematically planned peasant uprisings throughout China, a strategy suggested by the July lli, 1927 Comintern statement. At its November meeting later in the year, the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, evidently on Comintern instruction, had sought coordinated workers’ and peasants' uprisings. The Canton Commune was a result of this policy. The Ninth Plenum^ of the Comintern, th e f i r s t a fte r the Canton Uprising, met from February 9 through February 2£, 1928 to discuss several crucial items—one of which was the Chinese Question.^ The Plenum adumbrated the policy stand to be taken by the later Sixth Congress by informing the Chinese Communist Party th a t: It is necessary to fight energetically against putschism among some sections of the working class, against unprepared and unorganized action, both in the towns and rural districts, against playing with insurrection.il Preparatory to the Ninth Plenum, a conference on China was reportedly held to discuss Comintern policy toward that area. The known persons in attendance were John Pepper (pseudonym of Josef Poganyi of the United States), Lominadze and Neumann. I t is known th a t th ere was ra th e r acrimonious debate between Lominadze and Neumann, and John Pepper. I t seems th a t S ta lin was not present, suggesting that the conference occurred while Stalin was touring Siberia for a detailed view of grain procurement problems from January l£ to February 6, 1928. International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 76 (October 30, 1928), pp. 1399-1UOO, International Press~Correspondencej Vol. 8, No. 78 (November 8 , 1928), pp. Ili6l-iu62. ^A lthough the Plenum was not an enlarged one (perhaps as before a t the Eighth Plenum the Comintern leadership sought to lim it the number who would hear of the several disasters vrhich befell the Comintern line), twenty- seven countries were represented by ninety-two participants. The Chinese Communist Party was probably represented by Hsiang Chung-fa. Department of State, Far Easterners in the Comintern Structure, p. 18. 11 International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 16 (March 1S>, 1928), p. 3 2 2 . The Canton Commune was not included in the category of "putschism." The Plenum adopted a "Resolution on the Chinese Question" which attempted to define the situation. According to it, China was still in a period of bourgeois-democratic revolution for several reasons. China had not completed an economic revolution (meaning an agrarian revolution). The struggle against imperialism was not thought to be over. Finally, the character of the government was not yet considered one of dictatorship 12 of the proletariat and the peasantry. Further, the Resolution stated that the first "wave of the broad revolutionary movement of workers and peasants" was over. It had ended in defeat because the bourgeoisie had made alliances with the feudal m ilitarists and imperialists. At the present time there was "no mighty upsurge of the revolutionary mass movement on a national s c a le ." But a ris in g mass movement was seen to be "on the way" as indicators like the Canton Commune, the growing sovietization of Kwangtung, and the growing revolutionary movement in Hunan, Kiangsi, Hupeh, Honan, Shantung (and various other parts of China) illustrated. The Canton Commune was called "heroic" and was said to have "played an enormous role in the development of the workers’ and peasants' revolution...." Nevertheless, the Ninth Plenum resolution stated that 12 International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 16 (March 15, 192R), p.“ 32T: 203 lb the insurrection had "revealed a whole series of blunders...." In effect, the Comintern criticized the conditions under which the Canton Uprising was initiated, but not the general policy of insurrection. The Comintern still sought coordinated efforts in the countryside as well as in the urban areas. This was the rationale behind the Ninth Plenum's maintaining that: the Party must have in view that these actions [."guerilla actions of the peasants# 15 can be transformed into a victorious national uprising only on condition if they will be linked up with the new upsurge of the revolutionary wave in the proletarian centres.1° Hence the leading ro le in the Chinese revolutionary movement, according to the Comintern, still belonged to the urban centers. 3h an International Press Correspondence report on the Ninth Plenum published in March, 1928, i t was pointed out th a t the Chinese Communist Party should follow the resolutions of the Plenum. The report rephrased the task of the Communist Party of China as: on the one hand, to fight determinedly against unprepared and unorgan ized actions in town and country, and on the other hand, that the various spontaneous partisans can become the starting point for the victorious insurrection only when they proceed hand in hand with a new uprise [sic3 of the revolutionary wave in the proletarian centres.*-' 15 The resolution disparaged the "enthusiasm concerning guerilla warfare in the rural districts," shown by some elements of the Chinese Communist P arty. Ib id . 16 Ibid. Emphasis added. 17 D. Bennet, "A New Stage in the Chinese Revolution," International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 16 (March 15, 1928), p. 320. 20U By June the Russian as well as the Comintern press had begun to prepare the public for a change of policy. The leading article in Pravda on June 21, 1928, reprinted in International Press Correspondence, stated th a t: The situation in China is not only extraordinarily complicated... but it is also changeable.... Needless to say, in such a situation it would be premature to draw any final conclusions.18 The Sixth Congress of the Chinese Communist Party convened in Moscow on July 9> 1928."^ Two explanations are usually offered for the fact that the OOP Congress met in Moscow. It was thought to be too dangerous to hold a Congress in China because of the Kuomintang*s ’White Terror." Secondly, at this time the Comintern wished to wipe away any Trotskyite remnants in the Chinese Communist Party, and Moscow was the best place to do that. 20 The Congress criticized Ch'en Tu-hsiu’s "opportunism" and Ch'u Ch’iu-pai’s "putschism." In general a fundamental policy shift was under taken, one which was to guide the Chinese Communists until their ultimate v icto ry in 19U9. The Chinese revolution was s t i l l termed "bourgeois- democratic" and was said to be motivated by the driving force of "workers "The Situation in China," International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 16 (March 1$, 1928), p. 320. 19 According to one report, it was attended by eighty-four delegates with ninety-two observers and guests present. The Comintern sent Bukharin as its representative. Wang Shih, et. a l., Chung-kuo kung-ch1 an-tang li shih chien-plen (Brief History of tEe cKInese Communist Party) (Shanghai: Peoples Publishing House, 19$8), p. 10$. Many sources incorrectly lis t the Sixth Chinese Communist Party Congress as convening in June and terminating in September. 20Conrad Brandt, Benjamin Schwartz and John K. Fairbank, A Documentary History of Chinese Communism (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, p. 12U. 20£ and peasants." The main tasks of the revolution were said to be the genuine unification of all China and achievement of "land revolution." The "Political Resolution" and the "Resolution on the Peasant Movement" spelled out in detail what the Chinese Communist Party was expected to do to achieve revolutionary victory. The Party was criticized for failing to change its policy after the Canton Commune. This failure to fight against "adventurism" was due to an erroneous estimation of the strength of the enemies of the revolution. Thus the CCP resolution implied that its policy of coordinated armed uprising had been changed only at the Sixth Party Congress. The Canton Commune was "objectively" correct if it were considered a "rearguard fight." Part of the reason for this policy change was that the Chinese Revolution had passed its climax, but "a climax of the revolution was bound to (re)appear." The Sixth CCP Congress then called for a critical change in policy. The direction of Party work was to "change from armed insurrection on a large scale to daily increases in organization and mobilization of the 21 masses." But how was the Party to "mobilize" the masses? The "Resolution on the Peasant Movement" provided the answer. The peasants and "rural Chung-kuo kun-ch'an-tang t i l i u tz'u chruan kuo ta hut i-chueh- an (Resolutions the Sixth National Congress of the Chinese Communist Tarty) (n.p., n.p., 1928), p. 3U. See also Brandt, et. a l., A Documentary History of Chinese Communism, p. 139. 206 proletariat" would constitute the basis of the Party in rural areas. Along with their urban comrades, these peasants were to struggle against capitalism, feudalism, and imperialism, and the "principal 22 form of struggle" was going to be "guerilla war." It is interesting to speculate what prompted the Comintern, and therefore the Chinese Communist Party, to undertake such a fundamental change in policy. Certainly the Canton Commune's failure as a model of a coordinated worker and peasant insurrection was a factor. In addition, the Chinese Communist Party's organizational structure in the cities and urban proletariat had been almost totally destroyed. Party membership declined from the Fifth CCP Congress from 1*8,000 to 10,000 in the summer 23 of 1928. Lastly, the only available significant Party strength lay in areas having soviets. The Sixth Congress of th e Communist In te rn a tio n a l was held in « 2li Moscow from July 17 to September 1, 1928. — Bukharin opened the Congress with a lengthy, detailed report on the world economic situation. According 22Chung-kuo kung ch'an tang t i liu tz'u ch'uan kuo ta hui i-chueh an, pp. lH^-loH. See also Brandt^ e t .a l., A Documentary History of Chinese Communism, pp. 156-165. 23 Communist Party of Great Britain, Communist International Between the Fifth and Sixth World Congresses 192l*-l9?8 (London: (Uommunist Party of Greai Britain, 1920)7 P* UU5. 2lt According to one source there were 532 delegates representing some fifty-seven countries. Department of State, Far Easterners in the Comintern S tru cture (December 7, 1950) (Mimeographed), p. 20. 207 to Bukharin, the first period of post World War I development of capitalism had ended by the latter part of 1923. This period had been marked initially by an "acute crisis of the capitalist system" but had ended in defeat with a series of "revolutionary failures in Central Europe." The following period from lp2lt to 1928 had been characterized by a "partial stabilization of the capitalist system," 2^ C> during which there had been two basic developments—*the collapse of the temporary and partial stabilization of world capitalism and the impending outbreak of: wars of the imperialist states against the U.S.S.R.; wars of national liberation against imperialism; wars of imperialist intervention and gigantic class b a t t l e s . 26 Besides extensive discussion on the colonial question at the Congress, the various European, American, and Russian (for the last time) disputes 27 were aired. j The "Theses on the Revolutionary Movement in Colonial and Semi- Colonial Countries," outlined a new policy. The essential guides to this new policy for the whole colonial areas were: (1) condemnation of the native bourgeoisie as weak and vacillating; and (2 )in sisten ce upon"hegemony of the p ro le ta ria t" in any c o llab o ratio n s. 2d International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. Ul (July 30, 1928), pp. 72£-72£ 26 Ibid., pp. 726-733. See also Kermit E. McKenzie, Comintern and World Revolution 1928-19U3 (New York: Columbia University Press, 196U), pp. 113-139 for additional discussion of the Sixth Comintern Congress. 27 See relevant resolutions in Degras, The Communist International, Vol. II (New York: Oxford University Press, 1966), pp. 5U8-55>6. 208 China was extensively discussed and used as an example, evidently because of the Comintern's abundant experience there. The "Theses" noted that in the colonial and semi-colonial countries the "national emancipatory struggle" against imperialism "exerts considerable influence on the revolutionary process...." Along with this national struggle, the "agrarian revolution" would be crucial. According to the "Theses" the communists should give their greatest attention to developing the agrarian crisis so that the intensification of "class contradictions in the village" must be guided from the beginning in a class conscious revolutionary direction. The communist parties were warned of the varying attitudes of the native bourgeoisie in their reactions to imperialism. An incorrect estimation of the national reformist and national revolutionary bourgeois movements could lead to "the fundamental mistake in to which the Communist Party of China fell in 1925-1927." The "Theses" rejected the "formulation of any kind of bloc between the Communist Party and the national reformist opposition," but said "this does not exclude the formation of temporary agreements and the coordinating of separate activities in connection with definite anti-imperialist demonstrations," provided that it would aid the mass movement. In th is situ ation the "Communist Party must take particular care...to maintain its complete political independence and to make quite clear its own character...." The "Theses" p articu larly noted that in China the "revolutionary wave had already ebbed." The "heroic" struggles under the slogan of Soviets could only achieve a few temporary successes, and the Chinese 29 Communist Party was admonished for "extremely harmful putschist mistakes." The current Chinese situation was described as following: The Chinese national bourgeoisie obtained power, the composition of the former bloc of the imperialists and m ilitarists was partly altered and the new ruling bloc now represents the immediate chief enemy of the revolution. The Chinese Communist Party was advised that in order to overthrow the "new ruling bloc" it would be: necessary to win over the decisive masses of the proletariat and the peasantry to the side of the revolution. This constitutes the most important task of the Chinese Communist Party for the immediate fu tu re.30 The fact that the peasants overwhelmingly outnumbered the workers in China indicated the direction of Comintern policy. Later in the "Theses" the Chinese Communist Party was told to propagate the ideas of "soviets" as organs of insurrection.^ The Comintern-assigned task for the CCP was one of "building up and development." The Comintern predicted that the rising wave of the revolution will once more confront the party with the immediate practical task of preparing for and carrying through armed insurrection as as to complete the bourgeois-democratic revolution. ^International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 88 (December 12, 1928), pp. 1665-1570. However, the "existing circumstances" in China were said to be "characterized primarily by the absence of a revolutionary impulse 32 among the broad masses of the Chinese people...." Thus, according to the "Theses," the "Party’s chief task is the struggle for the masses.. To achieve this goal the"Party must utilize every conflict" between the "workers and the capitalists" in the factories, "peasants and landlords in the villages" and "soldiers and officers in the army...." In addition within the Party attention was to be placed on restoration of cells and local Party committees destroyed by the recent suppression, improvement of the social composition of the Party, and establishment of cells in the more important industries, factories, and railway workshops. The "Theses also urged, in one of the few indications of Comintern emphasis on rural a c tiv ity at the S i_rth Comintern Congress, that: the most serious attention must be given by the CCP to the social composition of village party organizations, to insure that they consist of the proletarian, semi-proletarian, and poor rural strata.. In general then, the Sixth Comintern Congress sought the building of an elaborate foundation of support for the Communist Party among the workers and peasants in China, as well as in the other colonial and semi colonial states. The "Theses" rarely indicated the new emphasis on Degras, The Communist International, Vol. II, p. £1*3. See also International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 88 (December 12, 1928), pp. 1571. 33 Degras, The Communist International, Vol. H , p. 5UU. See also International Press Correspondence, Vol. 8, No. 88 (December 12, 1928), pp. 1671-1&73. 211 "agrarian revolution" heralded at the Sixth CCP Congress only a short time before. In i t s resolu tion s and theses, the Sixth Comintern Congress seemingly tended to attach equal importance to the revolution in the urban and rural areas. Perhaps this was an appeal to the more general and widespread audience of the "Theses on Revolutionary Movement in Colonial and Semi-Colonial Countries," which covered the whole Middle and Far East. Perhaps the Comintern f e l t that a generalized scheme could provide an "infallible" theory to cover any contingencies, or perhaps it felt that an emphasis only on agrarian matters in all the colonial and semi-colonial countries might not be the wisest policy. The Stalin-Trotsky Struggle A fin a l context of the Canton Commune's influence was i t s allaged intrusion into the Stalin-Trotsky struggle. In Problems of the Chinese Revolution, Trotsky was the first to maintain that the "insurrection in Canton timed for the Fifteenth Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union" was staged "in order to cover up the physical extermination 3U of the Russian Opposition...." Later Harold Isaacs in Tragedy of the Leon Trotsky, Problems of the Chinese Revolution, Second Edition (New York: Paragon Book Gallery, 1962), p. 2£l. See also Boris Souvarine, S ta lin (New York: Longmans, Green and C o., 1939), P* U71 and V ictor Serge, From Lenin to Stalin (New York: Pioneer Publishers, 1937), p. U7. 212 Chinese Revolution argued that: the Canton Insurrection was made to coincide with the Fifteenth Congress of the Communist Party of the S oviet Union a t which Stalin completed his conquest of the opposition.3!> Acceptance of the Trotsky-Isaacs' challenge that Stalin used the Canton Commune as an event to cover up the Opposition's elimination rests on several crucial questions: (1) What was the nature of the defeat the Russian Opposition suffered at the Fifteenth Congress? ; (2) What evidence is there to confirm Trotsky's contention that the revolt was planned to coincide with the Fifteenth Party Congress? ; and (3) If Trotsky were correct in saying that the Commune had been used as a propaganda ploy, why was it not exploited at the Fifteenth Congress? When Lenin died, a struggle for power in the Kremlin was touched off between Stalin and Trotsky. The struggle was fought in terms of ideological issues which tended to camouflage the desire for personal aggrandizement of both men. The Chinese issue initially played little or no part in the struggle. Issac Deutscher, Trotsky's biographer, stated that "not once, it seems, in these years 192U-26, did he speak about China in the Executive [The Executive Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union) or the commissions of the Comintern." Deutscher concluded Harold Isaacs, The Tragedy of the Chinese Revolution (London: Sacker and Warburg, 1938 ), p. 357. 213 th at: He was evidently not clearly aware of the force of the tempest breaking over China and o f the magnitude and gravity of the approaching c r is is in communist p o lic y .36 Only beginning in April, 1926 did Trotsky raise the issue of the direction of Comintern policy in China. He protested the admission o f the Kuomintang in to the Comintern and again repeated h is objections to the admission of the Chinese communists into the Kuomintang. From then until April of the following year, the Opposition leaders did not again take up the China is s u e .^7 In April, 1926 Trotsky and his former critics of 192U and 192?, Zinoviev, President of the Comintern, and Kamenev, alternate member of the Politburo of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, formed what was called the "United Opposition," an uneasy coalition which tended to be conspiratorial in nature. The Opposition presented a common plat form and sought to build an elaborate organization based on secret couriers « jO and clandestine rendezvous. Stalin ordered a systematic persecution of United Opposition members Isaac Deutscher, The Prophet Unarmed (London: Oxford U niversity Press, 19?9), pp. 321-322. At a Politburo meeting in early 192U, Trotsky expressed doubts about the wisdom of allowing the Chinese communists to enter the Kuomintang. Ib id . , p. 321. 37 Deutscher, The Prophet Unarmed, pp. 323-32U. 38 Robert Vincent Daniels, The Conscience of the Revolution (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 196?J, pp. 271-^7. soon after its formation and made a concerted effort to disrupt their organization. The result was that on October 16, the United Opposition leaders Trotsky, Zinoviev, Kamenev, Piatokov, and Sokolnikov signed a statement confessing their guilt in violating Party discipline and the ban on factional activity, and promised to abandon open resistence. If the Opposition expected leniency after this confession, they were mistaken, fo r a t a C entral Committee Plenum l a te r th a t month Trotsky and Kamenev were removed from the Politburo, and Zinoviev was replaced by Bukharin as President of the Comintern. Except for some frantic Opposition activity at the Fifteenth Conference^ where the issue of "socialism in one country" was debated, there was a winter lu ll in the struggle.4'*' In April, 1927 Chiang Kai-shek demonstrably turned against the communists. The United Opposition seized upon the event and charged the Stalin-Bukharin leadership not only with following an "opportunist lin e" but also with "bureaucratic methods" o f le a d e r sh ip .^ S ta lin 39Ib id . , pp. 278-280. hO The Fifteenth Party Conference of October-Hovember, 1926 is not to be confused with the Fifteenth Party Congress of December, 1927. 111 0 Q I b id ., pp. 280-282. 112 " • Trotsky, "The Chinese Revolution and the Theses of Comrade Stalin," May 7, 1927 cited in Problems of the Chinese Revolution, p. 2£. 215 condemned the Opposition for a v io la tio n of the no-factionalism pledge of its confession. In Kay, a raid on the Soviet Trade Agency in London for espionage activities brought out the spectre of imminent war between B ritain and the Soviet Union. The war scare semed to ju s tify further repression of the Opposition, and Trotsky found many of his friends and allies being transferred to remote areas of the Soviet Union or to diplom atic posts abroad. In the Central Committee Flenum of July 29 to August 9, Stalin uttered threats of expulsion of the Opposition from the | A Party. In September the Opposition leaders prepared a new platform which was a detailed reiteration of earlier Opposition criticism. In late October, 1927 a Plenum of the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party met and formally removed Trotsky and Zinoviev from the Central Committee. Shortly thereafter, on the November 7 revolutionary anniversary, the United Opposition attempted a direct appeal to the populace. Trotsky in Moscow, and Zinoviev in Leningrad headed the Oppositionists who put up posters, made balcony speeched and rode in automobile processions through the city. The result could have easily been foreseen. The municipal governments were able to disperse the demonstrations itfithout trouble. Stalin quickly reacted and the Central 13 Leon Trotsky, The Real Situation in Russia (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1928), translated by Max Shachtman, pp. 1-195* Committee ordered that "opportunists who oppose the policy of the Party in non-Party meetings are to be immediately expelled."^1 On November 15 Trotsky and Zinoviev were expelled from the Party by the Central Control Commission. At the same time, all other prominent oppositionists were relieved of their positions in the Party. There were no demonstrations in response to these decisions and few protests were heard from either the populace or the rank and file of the Party.^ While preparations were in progress for the convening of the Fifteenth Party Congress, the Opposition managed to have recorded during the vote for delegates that 6,000 members of the Party supported the Opposition. None of the supporters of the Opposition were to be elected to the Congress. When the F ifteen th Party Congress opened on December 2, Zinoviev and Kamenev threw themselves upon the mercy of the leadership and abandoned their alliance with Trotsky. Stalin, vrho was by now predominant in the Party, refused their pleadings and assistance and asserted that: They edited Opposition!, a tiny group, representing scarcely half of one percent of our party, graciously promise to assist us if the imperialists attack our country. We don't believe in your assistance, and we don’t need it]u 6 ^Decree of the Central Committee, Pravda, November 11, 1927, cited in Daniels, The Conscience of the Revolution, p. 316. Ii5 217 The defeat which the United Opposition suffered at the Fifteenth Party Congress was a formal one. Their expulsion from the Party was officially sanctioned there. The Opposition's real defeat had taken place previous to the Congress, bit by bit, in til the last shreds of power were taken from them in October and November by dismissal from their Party positions. Hence, the Canton Commune could not have, as Trotsky and Isaacs argued, covered up the Opposition's elimination, for that had happened before the Congress. Trotsky's contention that the Canton Uprising was planned to coincide with the Fifteenth Party Congress seems incorrect. It would seem more likely that the intensity and chaos caused hy the warlords' fighting in Kvangtung created from the Comintern's and from the Chinese Communist Party's point of view, nearly ideal conditions for an armed insurrection. Moreover, the Comintern undoubtedly favored a general policy of uprising, but there is no evidence which could confirm a conclusion that actual timing of the Canton Uprising was set by it. Rather, the local communists struck while the warlords were away locked in combat and seemingly could not return immediately to put down an insurrection. It also seems significant that while Trotsky was rarely at a loss for evidence to bolster his views, the sparsity of documentation for his assertions on Canton are noticeable. If Trotsky’s claim that the Canton Commune was used as a propaganda ploy were correct, there is no evidence to indicate that it was exploited 218 at the Fifteenth Congress by the Stalin leadership. When Bukharin and Stalin spoke of a new revolutionary upsurge In China, they did not mention the Canton Commune as an illu s tr a tiv e example of such an upsurge. For example, Bukharin described the Chinese revolution: Far from having died, the Chinese revolution appears to me, in all probalility (£ic3 to be on the eve of a new and active stage of its development, a stage characterised fcicj by a new foundation, new forces, and new activity on the part of the peasantry and the proletariat.^7 Similarly, Stalin was optimistic about the revolution, but did not s p e c ific a lly mention the Canton Commune when he remarked in h is inim itable way: Only the blind and the fainthearted can doubt the Chinese workers and peasants are moving toward a new revolutionary upswing.U8 U7 N. I. Bukharin, "Report on Revolutionary Situation in Colonial and Semi-Colonial Countries," International Press Correspondence, Vol. 7, No. 73, p. 1679. U8 Joseph S ta lin , P o litic a l Report o f the Central Committee to the Fifteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U. (Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 19!?0), p. 23. CHAPTER XI RAMIFICATIONS OF THE CANTON COMMUNE INSIDE CHINA Prospects in China after the Canton Commune hardly warranted Stalin's unqualified optimism. It is true that the Chinese Communist Party did valiantly attempt to display the prescribed revolutionary fervor through various organizational and policy reforms. However, in a ctu a lity the Commune had served as an example of Kuomintang strength. In e f f e c t , i t aided Chiang Kai-shek in achieving predominant power in the Kuomintang w hile he u n ified that organization. Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party's Prognosis Scarcely less than three weeks after the defeat of the Canton Commune, on January 3, 1928, the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party passed a "Resolution" critically analyzing that uprising. The "Resolution" urged the Chinese Communist Party to study the details of the uprising for the "important significances," and to benefit from 1 "The S ign ifican ce and Lessons of the Canton Uprising," c ite d in C'u C h'iu-pai, Chung-kuo ko-ming yu kang-chan-tang (The Chinese Revolution and the Communist PartyJ (n.p., Chinese Communist Party, 1928), Appendix II. pp. 231-298. 0 the mistakes made." The "Resolution" acknowledged that the Central Committee had ordered an uprising a t Carton to take place, but stated 3 th at i t had fixed no d efin ite date. The document further sta ted , seemingly to dispel any notions of opportunism, that "there are no opportunists in the Kwangtung CCP or in the Central Committee...." The Commune was described as a "development of objective class struggle..." and the Kwangtung Provincial Committee's decision to stage an uprising on December 11 was termed correct.^ The "Resolution" outlined the forthcoming tasks of the Chinese Communist Party. It was felt that the Canton Commune had indicated that there was a need for further bolshevization of the Party to root out the "remaining poison of opportunism," and a particular need for more extensive democratic discussion. Moreover, it was felt necessary for the Party to expand its organization and recruitment to arrive at an additional tvrenty thousand new Party members. Sixty percent were to be workers and thirty percent were to be peasants.'’ It would appear that the Chinese Communist Party was s till very urban-oriented, judging from this ratio. The "Resolution" demanded that the communists attempt to secure dominance over more unions and spread propaganda through union publications. The Chinese communists were told to lead the workers in their economic and political demands, but at the same time inculcate the aims of communism.^ The "Resolution" also urged the Chinese Communist Party to protect party and union organizations and save cadres by using the method of secret organization. Thus, if a serious "White Terror" 7 were to prevail, the party could still operate. The "Resolution" defined the situation in China as one ready for "organizing" a great victorious peasants’ revolution..." which should be carried out under the slogan and flag of soviet-type regimes. The "Resolution" also demanded th a t propaganda work be conducted among the peasants in suburban areas of large cities, so that when warlord struggle emerged in the vicinity, a combined worker and peasant uprising, such as the Canton Commune, could occur. For this aim, the party should also attempt to unify the worker, peasant and soldier struggles, that is, to "tighten the relationship between the city workers and the rural 8 peasants...." The "Resolution" advised that the Chinese Communist Party should also correct its previous lack of attention to propagandizing "enemy" armies. According to the experience of the Canton Uprising, intellectuals and small capitalists in the cities should be drawn into the revolutionary movement and the Chinese Communist Party should aid the local people in rising up to overthrow local warlords. Moreover, the Party must renew its fervor to expel all imperialists and confiscate their properties in China, and to strengthen the bonds of the Chinese 9 and Russian proletarian classes. The Commune's Reverberations in the Kwangtung P rovincial Committee The Kwangtung Provincial Committee of the Chinese Communist Party held a meeting from January 1-5, 1928 which also seriously surveyed the Canton Commune and its apparent ramifications. The Provincial Committee must have received in an abridged form the essence o f the Central Committee's January 3 statement on the Canton Commune, because i t released a laudatory "Draft R esolution on the Central Committee Report. This "Resolution" repeated essentially what the Central Committee had called for. It held that any future insurrection should start with "mass uprisings to establish peasant, worker, soldier regimes," that the local Party organizations diould root out any remaining "opportunists," and that the local Party organizations should be reformed. In addition the Provincial Committee affirmed the Central Committee's prognosis of the 223 situation by declaring: the Canton Commune is the sta r t of the uprising of the whole Kwangtung Province. The Kvrangtung Committee should e sta b lish uprising in every sector of so cie ty . This Committee f e e ls this is appropriate to the revolution.10 In short, the Kwangtung Provincial Committee agreed with the Central Committee's estimation that the Canton Commune was the beginning of a new upsurge in the revolutionary movement. In its own estimation of the Canton Uprising, the Kwangtung Provincial Committee stated somewhat more exaggeratedly th a t the Commune: must make the workers and peasant masses across the province and across the nation gain confidence and courage and stimulate them to join the political struggle to overthrow the ruling c la sse s. The Provincial Committee further fe lt that the Commune had created a more revolutionary situation because it had intensified warlord struggle and had showed the masses how reactionary were the contending "enemy" forces. Hence the P rovincial Committee saw the d efeat o f the Canton Commune as the initial battle in a series of encounters in an increasingly revolutionary situation.^ 10 "Chung-yang pao-kao chueh-i-an," (Draft R esolution on the Central Committee's Report), Canton Police Bureau, editor. Kung-fei tsui-chin shih chung-yao i-chueh-an (Recent Important Resolutions of the Communist Bandits) (Canton: n.p., 1928), p. 11 , "Kuang-chou pao-tung chueh-i-an" (Draft R esolution on the Canton Tfcrising), Ibid., pp. 5-13* 22b The Kwangtung Provincial Committee was convinced th a t the Canton Commune had demonstrated the need for several improvements which could be profitably carried out in provincial party organization. One of the main problems of the party organization in Kwangtung was the predominance at all levels of intellectuals in responsible positions. "Opportunism" resulted, primarily because these intellectuals, who could not communicate with the masses, staffed such responsible positions as Party Secretary, and acted as chiefs of organizational and propaganda departments. The dilemma of how to staff such crucial posts with illiterate peasants and workers was pointed out but remained unsolved. The Provincial Committee noted that sound basic organization was not yet established in Kwangtung. For example, in the province the committees at the county and city levels did not pay much attention to branch work. In an area where party organization was present, most factories, workshops, and villages did not have cells. According to the "Resolution" the results were that workers and peasants refused to join in the revolutionary struggle because of a lack of acquaintance with the communist program. Kwangtung p arty organization was c ritic iz e d because i t was not "collectivized," meaning that there was a lack of teamwork and a tendency to emphasize and glorify the individual. A related problem was the lack of discussion at all levels within the party on policy 225 questions and problems. The "Resolution” carried a complaint that members only followed "Party orders." It would seem that such criticism would be endemic to a party operating under the principle of democratic centraliam. The "Resolution" noted that not enough "lower class people" were in worker and peasant unions. For example, in Shan-tou, Chang-meng, and Fu-shang, the peasant associations contained few poor people. In addition, there was little or no secret organization in the unions, leaving the party organization susceptible to collapse should there be a suppression of communists. The party inspectors of the provincial organizational structure were lazy, according to the Provincial Committee's "Resolution." The inspectors were charged with failure to report on local conditions to the Provincial Committee. They were said to be negligent in accurately representing the Provincial Committee's directives, and some were said to have neglected to propagandize for the development of "land revolution." The Provincial Committee urged that the party organization be modified in several ways. The party would have to "bolshevize," increase democratization within the party (with emphasis on party discussion), expand party branch organizations into factories and villages, and establish secret organizations at all party levels as well as in worker and peasant organizations. Moreover, the inspector system was to be revamped. The Provincial Committee would send an average of three permanent Committeemen to the lower echelons a t a l l tim es. The inspectors were to assist local party units only on instructions from the Provincial 226 Committee, and the inspectors would be expected to report to the Provincial Committee before making any major d ecisio n s, i f th is was p o ssib le . Inspectors were enjoined to keep the important centers of each area 12 under special surveillance and to keep in touch with the local people. It is not known how successful the Provincial Committee was in applying these organizational modifications. However, the severe suppression of communist a c tiv ity in Kwangtung in 1928 would tend to suggest that few, if any, changes were effected. The Communist Youth Organization was one target for reformation by the Kwangtung Provincial Committee. Special a tte n tio n was to be given to the youth groups because of their "special mood." Evidently Chinese youth in 1928 were as intractable as the current Cultural Revolution's Red Guards. The "Resolution on the Communist Youth Problems" stated that the Kwangtung Communist Youth had in the p a st been releg ated to work solely in the student movement. This was now said to be incorrect; the youth organizations should "solidify" and aid in the worker and peasant movement, so that in a future uprising (similar to the Canton Commune) the Communist Youth Corps could render assistance. The Provincial Committee recommended that at every level the party should send representa tives to Communist Youth conferences and that the Permanent Committee on each le v e l must have Communist Youth re p re se n ta tiv e s. F inancial aid was "Tsu chih wen-ti ts'ao-an" (Draft Resolution on the Problem of Organization), Ibid., pp. 21-26. 227 to be extended to the Communist Youth and the party was directed to pay attention to their political opinions. The "Resolution" also forbade any party member over twenty-three years of age to work in the youth organization. The party was to be more active in estab lish in g Communist Youth Corps, and i f th e party wished to transfer a member of the Corps, it would need the organization's permission. Inspectors were now to inspect the activities of the Corps and unions populated by young persons. The "Resolution" also called for the organization of youth branches in unions in addition to the regular party cells. In the revolutionary army and Red Guards, as well as in "reactionary fo rce s," the Communist Youth Corps was urged to e sta b lish m ilitary branches. Moreover, the responsible Communist Youth leader a t any level might join the party military committee at that particular l e v e l .^ The "Resolution" reflected an exaggerated idea of the role the Communist Youth could play. The Communist Youth was intended by i t s founders to play as large a role as possible among students. The "Resolution" carried th e d esire fo r the Communist Youth to move in to the areas of peasant and army work—areas in which i t was not o rig in a lly designed to 13 "C Y w en-ti chueh-i-an" (D raft Resolution on C Y (Communist Youth) Problems), Ibid., pp. 27-29. 228 operate. The intellectual orientation of the Communist Youth Corps would tend to prevent its functioning effectively in peasant and army contexts. The "Resolution" implied th a t i f the Communist Youth Corps had been more a c tiv e , many more young persons would have joined the Canton Commune. While it may be true that additional youth might have joined the uprising, the role that the Communist Youth Corps could have played in a Canton Commune type of situation seems exaggerated. The "Resolution" describing the fu tu re tasks of the Kwangtung Provincial Communist Party reflected optimism. It called the Canton Commune a "temporary failure" but said that "in the view of the whole province's objective political and economic condition the trend of revolution has not declined...on the other hand it is rising." The "Resolution" saw the provincial ruling class as becoming daily less stable. It alluded to new peasant outbreaks in the counties of Hua hsien, Ghau-yang, Chieh-yang, Pu-ning, and Huei-yang. The Hai Lu- feng Soviet was thought to have grown mare sta b le . According to the "Resolution," the major mission of the party in early 1928 was to lead the workers and peasants actively under the slogans of "land revolution" and "anti-warlord wars." The worker and peasant masses were to k ill evil gentry, landlords, and labor exploiters. The party was directed to "beseige" anti-revolutionary troops with propa- 229 ganda. The Chinese Communist Party was to develop sharp class divisions in areas it occupied, so as to create additional communist support. The strategy engendered to fu lfill the party's mission was to develop peasant uprisings in Tung Chiang, Pei Chiang, Hsi Chiang and Nan-lu by using the technique of "dividing" areas. With these divided areas, the city of Canton could be surrounded. While in Canton the party would actively lead the workers' movement there. The "Resolution" envisioned by way of example, that with the intensification of warlord feuding, a second Canton Uprising could be held in conjunction with a peasant uprising in the neighboring peasant areas. However, the "Resolution" specifically stated that the mission of the party was "not immediately to carry out another uprising...." In other words, what the "Resolution" called for were still coordinated peasant-worker uprisings, although the emphasis was on development of the peasant movement—a foreshadowing of the policy to be formulated at the Sixth Congress of the Chinese Communist Party. The "Resolution" stated that the Chinese Communist Party should develop more peasant strength in Tse-chiu, Wu-hua, Pu-ning, Chao-ya, and Chieh-yang. These counties, as well as others, should not wait to be liberated by the army of the Hai Lu-feng Soviet.^ ^Tzu ch'ien te jen-wu nai kung tso te fang-chen ts'ao-an," (Draft Resolution on Our Present Mission and the Guidance of Our Work), Ibid., pp. lU- 19. The "Resolution" detailed a plan specifying that in the northeast part of the West River area, the party-directed peasants should take the town of Cheng-yuan as the center of the uprising and spread "division" in the 230 The Canton Commune and the Kuomintang The Canton Uprising had important effects on the Kuomintang's internal political situation. Ironically, the uprising had tended to strengthen the overall unity of the Kuomintang as well as Chiang Kai- shek's position, a backfire which must have annoyed the Chinese Communists. It will be recalled that in September following the summer chaos during which the Left Kuomintang had actively opposed the Right Kuomintang, a reunion of the Kuomintang factions was carried out. A special committee had been formed and had replaced the Central Executive Committee elected by the Western Hills clique and the Second Congress of the Kuomintang. This special committee had invited Wang Ching-wei and Chiang Kai-shek to be members, but both men had chosen to resign from public life , ostensibly to facilitate reunification of the Kuomintang. Ry the end of September, the reconciliation had collapsed. Wang Ching-wei established a separate p o litic a l committee in defiance of Nanking. By mid-November a Nanking- directed expedition had arrived at Wuhan and forced Wang Ching-wei and his military protector T'ang Sheng-chih to flee. In the fall Wang had allied himself with Chang Fa-kuei, then the Fourth Army Commander. On November 17, Chang had staged a successful coup against Li Chi-shen in surrounding areas, especially Cheng-yuan and Ying-te. In the west part of the river area the party was to direct that Kwai-ning be taken and the revolution expanded from there into Gao-yao and Lo Ting-tzau. In the southern part of the river area, the party was directed to take Lien-chiang and expand from there to Hsin-yi and Hua-hsien. In Chung-ya, in the central part of the river area, in a very short period and using its own forces, the party was told it should purge the local warlord and undertake to expand the local peasant movement with the thought of establishing a soviet regime. 231 Canton. With Canton in Chang Fa-kuei’s hands, Wang Ching-wei had another regional power base after his Wuhan exodus. Immediately after Chang's coup, Li Chi-shen in Shanghai demanded a punitive expedition. Various meetings had been held in Shanghai by the contending factions, with Chiang Kai-shek playing an unofficial role as mediator. A Kuomintang Preliminary Conference to a proposed Fourth Plenary Conference of the KKT began on December 3, 1927. After a week of acrimonious discussion which had threatened to split the party permanently and disrupt the Nationalist Government, it was decided on December 10 to shelve temporarily the various factions' major differences and re-elect Chiang Kai-shek as Commander of the Nationalist forces. Chiang's nomination had been made by Wang Ching-wei, who represented the "Canton delegation." When Wang, who was seen as an outstanding statesman and a major successor after Sun Yat-sen's death, supported Chiang, the nomination was reportedly approved unanimously. Chiang's election as General issimo appeared to offer the only feasible way of bringing the Kuomintang 19 factions together. For only Chiang could obtain the confidence of the feuding factions with his assurance of their personal safety. Chiang was J.3 .P . ( i n it i a l s of John B. Pow ell), "Chiang Kai-shek Resumes P o litic a l A c tiv itie s —Canton Goes Red!" China Weekly Review, December 17, 1927, p. 82. 232 to play the role of mediator among the various factions, balancing one against the other—a role he was to play throughout his political life on the mainland of China.^ The chief controversy at the conference which threatened repeatedly to cause complete disruption was the recent Chang Fa-kuei coup in Canton. Li Chi-shen's demand for redress for his grievances was backed by fellow Kwangsi generals Li Tsung-jen and Pai Chung-hsi, 17 who were some of the major m ilitary powers in the Kuomintang. The Canton situation, a thorn in the side of the reunited Kuomintang at Shanghai, seemed to have solved itself thanks to the communist coup. For with the coup went Chang Fa-kuei's political prestige in Canton. With the elimination of Chang Fa-kuei as a military power at Canton, Wang Ching- wei' s political fortunes within the Kuomintang fell. Hence, Wang and Chang were accused of aiding the communists by th e ir November coin. Wang Ching-wei, Chiang Kai-shek's major political challenger, retired on 1 8 December 20 and le ft Hong Kong for a prolonged trip to France. Conversely, Chiang Kai-shek benefited a great deal from the Canton Insurrection. In addition to the elimination of the ''Canton faction" and 16 Ch'ien Tuan-sheng, The Government and Politics of China (Cambridge: Harvard University i’ress, pp. 9U-lo6. 17 J.B .P ., "Chiang Kai-shek Resumes P o litic a l A c tiv ite s—Canton Goes Red!" China Weekly Review, p. 82. ^G rover Clark, e d ito r. The Week in China (Peking), December 2ii, 1927, p. 2U. 233 the reduction of Wang Ching-wei's political influence, Chiang’s anti communist and anti-Soviet position was vindicated by the alleged direct participation of the Soviet Consulate in Canton. Moreover, Li Chi-shen’s return to power at Canton aided Chiang in establishing good relations with the Kwangsi clique. The apparent fact that Chiang Kai-shek was the only person who could act the necessary role of mediator was reinforced by Chiang's ability to prevent civil war between Chang Fa-kuei's and Li Chi- shen's fo rces in Kwangtung. Overview The Canton Commune then did not set new processes into motion. Rather, it served to speed the progress in clarification of policies which had earlier roots and to crystallize the development of trends both within China and outside. The Commune hastened the break between Nanking and Moscow which had been on the horizon for some time. It brought into sharper focus the futility of the Comintern's continuing an emphasis in policy on urban- based insurrections. Internally, the Commune may have given the Chinese Communist Party a false sense of the pulse of revolutionary fervor in Kwangtung and encouraged them to prime o rgan izational a c tiv ity to encourage further outbreaks. Ironically, however, perhaps the Commune’s greatest impact was in strengthening the position of Chiang Kai-shek in the Kuomintang and in Tonifying that body in its anti-communist fervor. CHAPTER XII CONCLUSIONS In December, 1930 the Chinese Communist Party called fo r i t s annual celebration of "the brightest day in Chinese history," the anniversary of the Canton Commune. The Party exhorted its members to "utilize any class struggle, be it big or small, in order to substan- 1 tiate the meaning of the Canton anniversary." When the last remnants of the 1927 insurrectionists had been rounded up, it was evident that the Canton Commune had created its heroic martyrs, but its broader "meaning" was likely not yet clear. Although the uprising had been an obvious failure in achieving its immediate goals, its implications were far-reaching. The most noticeable effect was within the Comintern itself. The failure of the Commune shattered the Comintern's previous reliance on the correctness of urban insurrection and signaled a turn toward greater acceptance of guerilla warfare as an important tool of revolution in the Far East. Although Comintern personnel were present in Canton and Revolutionary Red Aid Society in China, China Correspondence, No. 1-2 (November-Deeember, 1930), pp. Ilt-l5. In the United States tne American workers were also told to commemorate the Third Anniversary of the Canton Commune. "Defend Chinese Revolution!" Daily Worker, December 2, 1930, p. 1. 23S definitely took some part in the uprising, there is no evidence to show that the Canton Commune was planned and directed from Moscow as a demon stration of urban uprising. Rather, the Chinese Communist Party and the Kwangtung communist planners of the uprising had made an e ffo r t to carry through the policy directives on concerted worker-peasant uprisings outlined by the Comintern during the previous months. Other peasant uprisings which had the capture of cities as their goal had already taken place. The destruction of the Russian Opposition by Stalin, for all practical purposes, had been accomplished by this time, so Stalin would have had l i t t l e motive to order an uprising in Canton as a weapon against Trotsky's claim . Nor did S talin even mention the Canton Commune at the Fifteenth Congress of the Russian Party where the formal expulsion of Trotsky and the Opposition was made; this disputes Trotsky's accusation that Stalin deliberately initiated the Commune so he could use it as a coup de grace to the destruction of the Opposition. A more likely supposition is that the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party and the Kwangtung communists believed that p olitical and economic conditions, as well as the absence of warlord armies from the city, made Canton ripe for insurrection. The Commune itself evidenced m isinterpretation o f conditions and poor execution of plans. Workers and peasants did not rally to the cause as predicted, and poor military planning made the uprising a disaster in the face of overwhelming odds when feuding 236 warlords unified to put down the revolt. A change in Comintern insurrection policy was not the only outcome of the failure at Canton. The Commune's significance for the Chinese Communist Party and the Kuomintang was far-reaching. The uprising p recip ita ted the N a tio n a list Government to announce i t s severance of diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union earlier than had been anti cipated. It renewed the intensity of anti-communist feeling in the Kuomintang ranks, and even contributed to s ta b iliz in g the in tern a l p o litic s of the Kuomintang. The Chinese Communist Party was affected by the Comintern's d iift toward peasant insurrection after the Canton Commune, and this was evidenced in the Party's attempt to tighten its organization in preparation for the creation of peasant soviets. The sig n ifica n ce o f the Canton Commune as an h is to r ic a l event lies more in the implications of its failure than in whatever success it had during its three day existence. The failure of this urban insurrec tio n pointed the way for o f f ic ia l communist p olicy to emphasize ru ral insurrectionary warfare, which s till remains its major tool of revolution in underdeveloped areas. SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY BOOKS O riental Languages Canton Police Bureau. (Ed.) Kung fe i tsui-chln chlh chung-yao i-chueh-an (Recent Important Resolutions o f the Communist Bandits) danton: n7p., 1928. (jCh'en} Shao-yu. Wu-chuang pao-tung (Armed prising) n.p., n.p., 1929. Ch'u, Ch'iu-pai. Chung-kuo ko-ming yu kung-ch1 an-tang (The Chinese Revolution and the Chinese Communist Party; n .p., Chinese Communist Party, 1928. Chung-kuo ko-ming (China's Revolution) Shanghai: n.p., 1930. Chung-kuo kung-ch1an-tang ti llu tz'u eh'uan kuo ta hul i-chueh-an (Resolutions of tbe Sixth National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party) n .p ., n.p., 1928. Hu, Hua. Chung-kuo hsin min-chu chu-i ko-ming shlh (H istory of C hina's New Democracy) Peking: Peoples Revolutionary Publishing House, 1952. Hua, Kang. I-chiu-erh-wu nien— 1-ch'lu-erh-ch'i nien tl chung-kuo ta ko-ming shlh (A Hist cay ol China's Great Revolution: 1925-1927) (Second Edition) Shanghai: Ch'un king, 1932. Hua, Ying-shen. Chung-kuo kung-ch'an-tang lieh-shlh eh'uan (Biographies of Chinese Communist Martyrs) Shanghai: New Democracy Publishing Company, 19h9» Huang, Y.P., et. al. (Eds.) Kuang-chou p'i-fa wu-chla chlh shu-so-yin (The Wholesale Prices and Price Indexes In canton: 19^7-1^33) bant on: Bureau of Economic Research of Sun Yat-sen University, 193h» Ken'lehi, Hatano. (Compiler) ChUgoku ka^sant? shi (History of the Chinese Communist Party) Vol. I . tfokyo: «flji Publishing Company, 1961. 2 3 8 Kuang-chou shlh-plen yu Shanghai hul-yi (The Canton Disturbances and the Shanghai Conference) Canton: n.p., 1928. Kung-fel huo kup-shlh llao hul-bien (Critical Essays on the History of1 the Communist Bandits Troubling China) Vol. I. n.p., n.p., n.d. Li, Ang. Hung-se wu-tai (Red Stage) Chungking: Ming-chung shu-tien, 19U2. Li, Min-hun. (Compiler) Ch'lh se tang an (Materials on Red Activities) Peking: n.p., 1929. Lozovskii, (Pseudonym of Solomon Abramovich Dridzo) e t .a l . Kuang-chou kung-shi (Canton Commune) n.p., Wu ch'an chieh-clir,”T930. Mo, Syin-yang. Chung-kuo ko-ming yao-kai (An Outline of China's Revolution) Moscow: foreign Language Press, 1932. Na, Pi-hsun et. al. (Eds.) Chung-kuo lao-tung nien-chien (Chinese Labor YearbookT” Peking: Institute of Social research, 1932. Tsou, Lu. Chung-kuo kuo-min-tang kai shih (Draft Histozy of the Kuomintang) Chungking: n.p., i9Uh* Wang, Chien-min. Chung-kuo kung-ch*an-tang shlh kao (Draft History of the Chinese Communist Party) Vol. 17 T aipei: Wang Chien-min, 1969. Wang, Ching-ben et. al. (Eds.) Chung-kuo lao-tung nien-chien (Chinese Labor Yearbook) ""Peking: Institute of Social Kesearch, 1928. Wang, Po-yen. Tl-erh tz'u kuo-nel ko-ming chan-cheng shih-ch'i tl nune-t8'un kP-mlne ken-chuTT (The Agrarian Revolutionary Base in the Period of the Second Revolutionary Civil War) Shanghai: Hsin chih-shih, 1996. Wang, Shlh e t .a l . Chung-kuo kung ch'an-tang li- s h ih chlen-pien (B rief H istory ofHEhe Chinese Communist P arty; Shanghai: Peoples Publishing House, 1998. 239 Western Languages Allen, George Cyril and Donnithorne, Audrey A. Western Enterprise In Par Eastern Economic Development tendon: George Allen & tfnwln, Ltd., T93Ir .------Anderson, Adelaide Mary. Humanity and Labour in China (An Industrial V isit and its Sequel, 1923-1926) Edinburgh: Turnbull & Spears, 1928. Applegate, Rex. Crowd and Riot Control Harrisburg: Stackpole Company, 1961. Arnold, Julian. China: A Commercial and Industrial Handbook Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government M inting Office, 1926. Arnold, Julian. Some Bigger Issues in China's Problem Shanghai: Commercial Press , Ltd., "1923: ------ Asiaticua. Von Kanton bis Schanghai, 1926-1927 Wien-Berlin: Agis-Verlag, 1928. ------Berkov, Robert. Strong Man of China Boston: Houghton-Mifflin Company, 1938. Boersner, Demetrio. The Bolsheviks and the National and Colonial Question Paris: Librarie Minard, 1957. Boorman, H. L. (Ed.) Men and P o litic s in Modern China New York: Columbia University Press, I960. Borg, Dorothy. American Policy and the Chinese Revolution 1929-1928 New York: Macmillan Company, l9u7. Brandt, Conrad. S ta lin 's F ailu re in China 192U-1927 Cambridge: Harvard University Press, i960. Brandt, Conrad, Schwartz, Benjamin, and Fairbank, John K. A Documentary History of Chinese Communism Cambridge: Harvard University Tress, 1959. Buber-Neumann, M argarets. Von Potsdam Nach Moskau S tu ttg a rt: Deutsche* Verlag - Anstalt, 1997. 21(0 e Bureau Permanent de 1'Entente Internationale contre III Internationale. Tableaux des Organisations Sovietque GenSve: n.p., 1928. Carr, Edward Hallett. The Bolshevik Revolution Vol. IH . New Tork: Macmillan Company, 1953. Chang, T.C. The Farmers Movement in Kwangtung Kwangtung: N ational C h ristian douncil of China, 192B. Chapman, Owen. The Chinese Revolution London: Constable and Co., Ltd., 1928. Ve Congres de 1*In tern atio n ale Communiste. Compte Rendu Analytique. Paris: Librariede l'Humanlte, 192u. Chen, Han-seng. Landlord and Peasant in China New Tork: International Publishers, 1936. Ch'en, Jerome. Mao and the Chinese Revolution New Tork: Oxford University Press, 1^65. Ch'en, Jerome. Tuan Chlh-kal Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1961. Ch'en, Kung-po and W ilbur, C. M artin. The Communist Movement in China New Tork: East Asian Institute of Columbia University, i960. Chesneaux, Jean. LeMouvement Ouvrier Chinois de 1919 a 1927 Paris: Mouton & Co., 1962. Chesneaux, Jean. Les Syndicats Chinois: 1912-1927 Paris: Mouton & Co., 1965. ------ Chiang, Chung-cheng (Chiang Kai-shek). Soviet Russia and China: A Summing- up at Seventy New Tork: Farrar, Straus & 6udahy, 19571. Ch'ien, Tuan-sheng. Government and Politics of China Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1961. Clark, Grover. China in 1927 Peking: Peking Leader Press, 1928. Clark, Grover. Economic Rivalries in China New Haven: Tale University Press, 1932. 2 1 1 Communist P arty of G reat B rita in . F ifth Congress of the Communist International (Abridged Report)London: Communist Party of Great brlfcain, 1921*. Communist P arty o f Great B rita in . Fourth Congress of the Communist International London: n.p., 195u. Condliffe, J.B. China To-Day: Economic Boston: World Peace Foundation. 1932. ------ Cressey, George B. Land of the $00 Million New Tork: McGraw-Hill Book Company, In c ., 1955. Daniels, Robert Vincent. The Conscience of the Revolution Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1965* Degras, Jane. The Communist International 1919-191*3 Vols. I and H . London: Oxford University Press, 1956 and 196b. 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China's Industrialization, A Statistical Survey Shanghai: China Institute of Pacific Relations, 1931. Fuse, K. Soviet Policy in the Orient Peking: Enjinsha, 1927* Gitlow, Benjamin. I Confess New Tork: E.P. Dutton and Company, 1?U0. Great Britain Foreign Office. Memorandum on Labour Conditions in China London: His Majesty's Stationery Office, 1^27. (Command Paper 2ou&7) Great Britain Foreign Office. Papers Respecting Lahore Conditions in China London: His Majesty’s stationery Office, I 9 2 5. (dommand Paper 2bli2.) Green, Own Mortimer. The Story of China's Revolution London: Hutchinson & Co., Ltd., 19US. G riffith, Samuel B. Mao Tse-tung on Guerilla Warfare New Tork* Frederick A. Praeger, 1966. Ho, Kan-chih. A History of the Modern Chinese Revolution Peking* Foreign Languages Press, 19o6. Houn, Franklin W. Central Government of China 1912-1928 Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1959# House Committee on Un-American A c tiv itie s . The Communist Conspiracy (Section C) Washington, D.C.* U.S. Government Printing Office, 1956. Hulse, James W. The Forming of the Communist In te rn a tio n a l. Stanford: Stanford U niversity P ress, 196U. Isaacs, Harold. The Tragedy of the Chinese Revolution London: Sacker & Warburg, 193 ti. Isaacs, Harold. The Tragedy of the Chinese Revolution (Second Revised Edition) Stanford: Stanford University tress, l$6l. Jenkins, Douglas. China Since the Revolution of 1911—Kwangtung, Kwangsl and Kweichow (Series D, No. bit, China No. Ul) Washington, D.C.: tf.S. Government Printing Office, 1926. 21*3 K intner, W illiam R. The Front is Everywhere Norman: U niversity of Oklahoma P ress, 1950. Koung, Shien-ming. Comment remedier 8. la Situation tragiquedes Travailleura Chinois Louvain: it. Bracke—van Geest, 1927* Krarup-Nielsen, A. The Dragon Awakes New Tork: Dodd Mead & Company, 1928. ------Kuo, Warren. A nalytical H istory of Chinese Communist P arty T aipei: Institute for International Relations, 1$66. Lange, Alfred. Per Weg zum Sleg Berlin: Ernst Schneller, 1927? Lee, T.L. Some Aspects of the Labor Situation in Canton Canton: TMCA, 1928. ' Leng, Shao-chuan and Palmer, Norman D. Sun Yat-sen and Communism New Tork: Frederick A. Praeger, Publishers, i960. Lenin, V.I. Selected Works Vol. X. New Tork: International Publishers, 1938. Li Chien-nung. The Political History of China 181*0-1928 Translated by S.T. Teng and Jeremy Ingalls. Princeton: D. Van Nostrand Company, Inc., 1965. Lieu, D.E. China's Industries and Finance Shanghai: Chinese Government Bureau of Economic Inform ation, 1927. Lin, Piao. Long Live fee Victory of the Peoples' War Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1965. Lin, Tung-hai. The Labour Movement and Labour Legislation in China Shanghai: China United 'Press, 1933. Linebarger, Paul. The China of Chiang Kai-shek Boston: World Peace Foundation, 191*1. Linebarger, Paul. Sun Tat-sen and the Chinese Republic New Tork: Century Company, 19^5. Liu, F.F. A Military History of Modern China Princeton: Princeton University Press, 195b. 21*1* Lo, R.Y. China's Revolution from the Inside New Tork: Abingdon Press, 1930. Lowe, Chuan-hua. Facing Labor Issues in China Shanghai: China Institute of Pacific Relations, 1933': McKenzie, Kermit E. Comintern and World Revolution 1928-191*3 New Tork* Columbia University Press, 1961*. Mao Tse-tung. Selected Military Writings of Mao Tse-tung Peking: Foreign Language Press, 19&3. Misselwitz, Henry Francis. The Dragon Stirs New Tork: Harbinger, 19l*l* Molnar, Andrew R. et. al. Undergrounds in Insurgent. Revolutionary, and Re3 Istance1?ar7are Washington, D.C. : Special Operations Research Office of the American University, 1963. Neuberg, A. (Pseudonym of Heinz Neumann) L1Insurrection armle Paris: Bureau d'Editions, 1931. ——————— —— Nollau, Gunther. International Communism and World Revolution New Tork: Frederick A* Praeger, 196l. North, Robert C. Kuomintang and Chinese Communist E lite s Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1952. North, Robert C. Moscow and Chinese Communists (Second E dition) Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1963. North, Robert C and Eudin, Xenia J. M.N. Roy's Mission to China Berkeley: University of California Press, 1963. Oudendyke, William J. Way3 and By-Ways in Diplomacy London: Peter Davies, 1939. Perleberg, Max. Who's Who in Modern China Hong Kong: Te Olde Printer!®, Ltd.. 19SU. Pick, Eugene. China in the Grip of the Reds Peking* 1927. 21*5 Poncins, Leonde. (Ed.) Le Plan Communists d 1Insurrection armee Paris* Les Libert£s Franca ises, 1939* ~ Possony, Stefan T. A Century of Conflict Chicago: Henry Regency Company, 1953. Powell, Ralph L. Rise of the Chinese Military Power 1895-1912 Princeton* Princeton University fress, 1958. Quatre Premiers CongrSs Mondlaux de 1 'In tern atio n ale Communiste 1913-1923 Paris: Librarie du Travail, 193U. Quigley, Harold S. China's Politics in Perspective Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1962. Rawlinson, Frank (Ed.) The China Christian Yearbook 1928 Shanghai: Christian Literature Society, 19^8. 1 Remer, C.F. Readings in Economics for China Shanghai: Commercial P ress, 1 9 tt Roy, M.N. Memoirs Bombay: A llied P u b lish ers, 1961*. Roy, M.N. Revolution and Counter-Revolution in China Calcutta: Renaissance Publishers, 191*6. San, Kim and Wales, Nym. Song of Ariran New York: John Day Company, 191*1. Schram, Stuart R. Basic Tactics New York: Frederick A Praeger, 1966. Sehram, Stuart R. Mao Tse-tung Middlesex: Penguin Books, Inc., 1966. Schwartz, Benjamin. Chinese Communism and the Rise of Mao Cambridge: Harvard University Press, l9 6 l. Seng, Sin-fu. China: A Survey of the Historical and Economic Forces Behind the Nationalist Revolution Great Britain: The Communist Party 5f "SreaT T rltal ri, 1927, ------ Serge, Victor. From Lenin to Stalin New York* Pioneer Publishers, 1937* Sheridan, James E. Chinese Warlord: The Career of Feng Yu-hsiang Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1966. 21*6 Snow, Helen. The Chinese Labor Movement New York: John Day Company, 19U5 Souvarine, B oris. S ta lin New York: Longmans, Green & C o., 1939. Spector, Stanley. Li Hung-chang and the Huai Army Seattle: University of Washington P ress, 196U. Stalin, J.V. Political Report of the Central Committee to the Fifteenth ess of the CI*StJ Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, Stalin, J.V. Works Vols. VIII-XI. Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 195U. Stamp, L. Dudley. Asia: A Regional and Economic Geography London: Methuen & Co., Ltd., 19527 Sworakowski, W itold. The Communist In te rn a tio n a l and i t s Front Organi zations Stanford: ftoover Institution, 1965. T'ang Leang-11. The Inner History of the Chinese Revolution London: George Rutledge and Sons, Lid., 1930. Theses and Resolutions adopted at the Third World Congress of the Communist In te rn a tio n a l ttew York: dontemporary Publishing Association, 1921. Thomas, J . Die Kantoner Kommune Zurich: Mopr V erlag, 1933. Tong, Hollington K. Chiang Kai-shek Taipei: China Publishing Co., 1933. Toynbee, Arnold J. Survey of International Affairs, 1926 Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1928. Toynbee, Arnold J. Survpy of International Affairs, 1927 Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1929, Toynbee, Arnold J. Survey of International Affairs, 1928 Oxford: Oxford University Press, 19S9. T re in t, A lbert. Les Documents de l 1 Opposition francaise et la reponse du Parti. Paris: n.d. (1927?) 2U7 T rotsky, Leon. The F ir s t Five Years of the Communist In te rn a tio n a l Vol. I. New fork: Pioneer Publishers, l9b5. Trotsky, Leon. Problems of the Chinese Revolution New York: Paragon Book Gallery, 1962. Trotsky, Leon. The Real Situation in Russia New York: Harcourt, Brace & Company, 1928. Tsai, Chien and Chan, Kwan-wai. Trend and Character of China's Foreign Trade Shanghai: China Institute of Pacific Relations, 19^3. Tsing, Chin-chun. Le Mouvement Ouvrier en Chine Paris: Librarie Orientaliste, 1929. Tso, S.K. Sheldon. The Labor Movement in China Shanghai: n.p., 1928. Tyau, Min-ch'ien T.Z. Two Years of Nationalist China Shanghai: Kelly and Walsh, 1930. Union Research I n s titu te . Who's Who in Communist China Hong Kong: Union Research Institute, 1966. Vinaeke, Harold. Problems of Industrial Development in China Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1926. W ales, Nym.(pseudonym of Helen Snow) The Chinese Labor Movement New York: John Day Company, 19U5. Wei, Henry W.C. China and the Soviet Union Princeton: Van Nostrand Company, I n c ., 1956. Welskopf, F.C. Die Reise Nach Kanton Berlin: Dietz Verlag, 1953. Whiting, Allen S. Soviet Policies in China 1917-1921* New York: Columbia University Press, 1951*. Wilbur, C. Martin and How, Julie Lien-ying. (Eds.) Documents on Communism, Nationalism, and Soviet Advisers in China 1918-1927 New fork: Columbia University Press, 1956. W ittfogel, Karl A. A Short Histoiy of Chinese Communism (Manuscript) S e a ttle , 1961*. — — 21*8 Woo, Thomas T.C. The Kuomintang and the Future of the Chinese Revolution London: George A llen & tJnwin, 192tf. Wood, Sterling A. Riot Control Harrisburg: Military Service Publishing Company, 1962. Woodhead, H.G.W. (Ed.) China Yearbook 1926-27, 1929, 1931 T ientsin Press, Ltd., 1927, 1$36,"T931. Wu, Aitchen K. China and the Soviet Union Mew York: John Day and Company, 195&. Yu, George T. Party Politics in Republican China: The KMT 1912-1921* Berkeley: University of California Press, 1966. 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Shanghai. 1917-1927. ------ Monthly Labor Review. Washington, D.C. 1930. Mew M ilitant New York. 1928-193U. New York Times New York. 1927. North China Herald. Tientsin. 192U-1927. Peoples Tribune. (New Series) Peiping. 1933. Political Science Quarterly. 1955. Pu-erh-sal-wei-k1o (Bolshevik) 1927-1930. Sankel Shimbun. Tokyo. 1967. Studies in Asia. Lincoln. 1963. Tine. 1966. Trade Information Bulletin. Washington, D.C. l?2lu Week in China. Peking. 1927. World Politics. 1955. Wu-chuan ch 'ing-nien. Shanghai. 1927. SPECIAL COLLECTION Jay C. Huston Collection, Hoover Institution, Stanford University APPENDIX APPENDIX A DRAMATIS PERSONAE: COMMUNISTS IN THE CANTON SOVIET GOVERNMENT The following composite biographical sketches of persons who figured prominently in the Canton Soviet Government were drawn from the sources listed after each sketch. CHANG T'AI-LEI Chang T'ai-lei was born in Wu-chin ) Kiangsu in 1898. He attended the Changchow Middle School in his native district, where he was a classmate of Cb'u Ch'iu-pai. Chang left the school before graduating, and in the following years he learned to speak English, probably at Soochow University. Hatano states that Chang graduated from Peiyang Ta Hsueh in Tientsin, and thus could have learned his Ehglish th e re . In 1918 Chang was a leader of the Social-Democratic Youth Corps, which la te r became the Communist Youth League of which he was S ecretary. From 1920 to 1922 Chang T 'a i- le i trav eled extensively in China, Japan, and Russia, and during this period evidently began his study of the Russian language, which served him in good stead when, in the spring of 1921, he was in Irkutsk as Secretary of the Chinese section of the Comintern's Far Eastern Secretariat. In July, 1921 Chang attended the 253 Third Congress of the Comintern and demanded that more attention be accorded to the situation in the Far East, particularly in China. Chang also attended the Congress of the Toilers of the East in Moscow during February of 1922. He returned to China in 1923 and became general secretary of the Social-Democratic Youth Corps. After the beginning of Kuomintang and Chinese Communist Party collaboration, Chiang Kai-shek was sent to Russia as head of a delegation to servey conditions there. Chang T’ai-lei, then a member of the Kwangtung Regional Committee of the Chinese Communist P arty, accompanied that delegation, which left Shanghai in August, 1923. Chiang Kai-shek returned to China after a few months, while Chang T 'ai-lei remained in Moscow and probably studied at the Communist University for Toilers of the E ast. Chang again returned to China in 1925 and became chief interpreter in Borodin's office in Canton until Borodin left for Wuhan In October, 1926. At that time Chang became secretary of the Wuhan Municipal Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. At the August 7 "Emergency Meeting" at which Chen Tu-hsu's leadership was overtly challenged by Ch'i Ch'iu-pai, Chang must have firmly backed Ch'u, because Ch'u made him Secretary of the Kwangtung Provincial Committee of the Chinese Communist Party and con currently, head of the Southern China Bureau of the Central Committee. After the "Emergency Meeting," Chang journeyed to Canton. En route he made contact with the Yeh T'ing and Ho Lung forces. 2$k Chang took an active leadership role in the Canton Commune, and on December 12, the second day of th is event, he was k ille d . To d ate, several articles have appeared to commemorate his gallant and heroic efforts on the Comintern’s behalf. H.L. Boorman, editor. Men and Politics in Modern China (Preliminary 50 Biographies) (New York: Columbia University Press, I9 60 ),pp. 20-22. Xenia Joukoff Eudin and Robert C. North, Soviet Russia and the East 1920-1927 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1957), P* 1*58. N. Fokin, ”In Memory of the Organizer of the Canton Rising— Comrade Chang Ta L ai," The Communist In te rn a tio n a l, Vol. 5, No. 6 (March 1?, 1928), pp. 155-156. Ken’ichi Hatano, compiler. CKUgoku kyfrsanW shi (History of the Chinese Communist Party), Vol. I (Tokyo: J ljl Publishing Company, 1961), p. 227. Hu Hua, Chung-kuo hsln min-chu chu-i ko-ming shih (History of China’s New Democracy) treking: Peoples Revolutionary Publishing House, 1952), pp. 113-lHl. CHEN YU Kwangtung in 1902 and became active in union activities in the 1920’s. He took part in the Hong Kong strike in protest against the May 20th Incident in Shanghai in 1925. Chen was one of the leaders of the Chinese Seamen's Union in the 1920's. He- took part in the Canton Commune as Commissioner of Justice. Subsequent to the Commune, Chen was elected a member of the Castral Committee and alternate member of the Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party at the Sixth National 255 Congress. Later Chen was active in the Kiangsi Soviet, and at the First National Soviet Congress in Juichin in November, 1931. Since 19^9 Chen has held high positions in the Peoples Republic of China. Union Research I n s titu te , Who's Who in Communist China (Hong Kong: Union Research Institute, 1966), pp. 90-£2. CHOU W'M-YUNG Chou W' en-yung was Commissar of Labor fo r the Canton Soviet Govern ment. The Kwangtung P ro vincial Committee c ite d h is poor performance as Commander of the Red Guards during the Commune. Its "Resolution" after the uprising- recommended th a t Chou be dism issed as a permanemt member of the "leading organization" (the Revolutionary Committee of the Canton Commune, established in November, 1927) and should also lose his posts as a member of the Canton Municipal Committee and the Kwangtung Provincial Committee. I t was fu rth e r recommended th a t he be tra n sfe rre d to "lower work." These sanctions were subject to approval by the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist P arty. "Resolution on the Canton Uprising" (of the January, 1928 meeting of the Kwangtung P rovincial Committee of the Chinese Communist P arty ), Canton Police Bureau, editor. Rung fel tsui-chin chihchung-yao i-chueh-an (Recent Important Resolutions of the Communist Bandits) ( C a n t o n : n.p., 1928), p . 12. 256 HSU KUANG-YING Previous to the Commune, Hsu Kuang-ying had been placed on a one- year Party probation for unauthorized arrests and killings which he had ordered as Chief of the Public Security Bureau in Swatow. The Kwangtung P rovincial Committee's "Resolution on the Canton Commune" cited Hsu's performance as Chief of Staff of the Commune's military forces as "timid and vacillating." Because of his previous punishment by being "observed" by the Party during a probationary period, the Committee determined that his errors during the Commune qualified him for dismissal from the Party. "Resolution on Political Discipline" (of the November Chinese Communist Party meeting), in Kuo-wen Chou-pao (Kuo-wen Weekly), Vol. 5, No. 3 (January 15, 1928), p. 9. "Resolution on the Canton Uprising," Kung fel tsui-chin chih chung-yao i-chueh-an, p. 13. HUANG PING In Moscow from 19lU to 192U, Huang Ping studied part-time at Sun Yat-sen University. Upon his return to China he was active in the Chinese labor movement and was one of the leaders of the Hong Kong-Canton Strike of 1925. In 1926 he was appointed Communist Party delegate to the Second National Congress of the Kuomintang. Huang participated in the Canton Uprising as "Commissioner of Public Affairs." For his alleged 257 failures, especially for his lack of any retreat plan during the uprising, the Kwangtung P rovincial Committee recommended in January, 1928 th a t Huang be dismissed from his membership in the "leading organization" (the Revolutionary Committee of the Canton Commune, established in November, 1927). He also lost his posts as Secretary of the Canton Municipal Committee and member of th e Kwangtung P rovin cial Committee, and was placed on a three-month probationary period by the Party. The P rovincial Committee also recommended th a t Huang be tra n s fe rre d to "lower work." These actions were subject to approval by the Party’s Central Committee, and it is believed such approval was given. Huang did go to Moscow for the Sixth Congress of the Comintern. In 1932 he started a periodical called "Workers' Guide" in Shanghai. On December lU, 1932 Huang was arrested and shortly thereafter was converted to the Kuomintang persuasion. He was released in early 1933 with Yu Fei, a former Central Committee member of the Chinese Communist Party and Hsu Shih-keng, former communist labor organizer and former liaison officer of the Chinese Communist Party w ith the Comintern. "Resolution on the Canton Uprising," Kung fei tsui-chin chih chung- yao 1-chueh-an, p. 12. Huang Ping, 'Why I Left the Communist Party," The Peoples Tribune T'ang I«ang-li, Editor., No. 1 (February 1, 1933), New Series, pp. 61-65. Nym Wales (pseudonym of Mrs. Helen F oster Snow), The Chinese Labor Movement (New York: John Day Company, 19U5), p. 211. 258 P'ENG P'AI P'eng P'ai was born in Kwangtung's Hai-feng ( ) in 1895 to a well-to-do family. After graduation from middle school in September, 1918 P'eng en ro lled a t Tokyo's Waseda U niversity. While th e re he became seriously interested in radical ideas, and when he returned to China in 1921 he became associated w ith some Shanghai communists. That year Ch'en Ch'iung-ming, tu-tu of Kwangtung, appointed P'eng Superintendent of Education and gave him permission to establish some peasant associations with a view to improving the standard of living of the peasants. In 1922 P'eng was dismissed from his positions after criticizing General Ch'en. In late 1922 and 1923 P'eng returned to organizing the peasants in the Tung-chiang area of Kwangtung. P'eng's communist-dominated General Peasant Association of Hai-feng reportedly had 100,000 members. The Association sponsored some free education and medical facilities, as well attempting to reduce rents and land taxes. The Hai-feng Association shortly spread to Lu-feng, Hui-yang, Pu-ning and other neighboring hsiens. In 1925 when the Kuomintang regime at Canton launched its two Eastern Expeditions into the northeast area of Kwangtung, the peasant associations aided these troops. In early 1927 P'eng was elected to the Executive Committee of the All-China Peasant Association and to the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party by the Sixth Party Congress. P'eng was a participant in the Nanchang Uprising in August, 1927, and retreated after its failure southward to the Hai Lu-feng area. In 2 5 9 November of 1927 he established a soviet government in Hai-feng and Lu- feng with himself as Chairman. The new soviet government initiated many radical land reform policies. During the preparations for the Canton, P'eng reportedly agreed to furnish peasant m ilitia for the uprising. In addition, he was "elected," evidently in absentia, Commissioner of Land in the Canton Soviet Government. During the brief reign of the Canton Commune, P'eng's peasant army was unable to lend any support to the u p risin g . A portion of the retreating Canton Commune farces which reached the Hai Lu-feng area under Yang Yin were incorporated into the Fourth Division of the Worker- Peasant Revolutionary Army. By February, 1928 the Nationalist pressure on the Hai Lu-tfeng Soviet area forced P'eng to flee to Shanghai. At the Sixth Congress of the Chinese Communist Party in Moscow in the summer of 1928, P'eng (in absentia) was elected to the Central Committee and an alternate member of the Politburo. P'eng also became chief of the Peasant Department under the Central Committee. In 1929 he was betrayed by a fellow communist, Pai Hsin, in Shanghai and later was executed by the Shanghai authorities. Boorman, Men and P o litic s in Modern China, pp. 10U-106. Conrad Brandt, Stalin's Failure in China (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1958), p. 200. Shinikichi Eto, "Hai-lu-feng: The First Chinese Soviet Government," Parts 1&2, China Quarterly, Nos. 8 and 9 (October-December, 1961 and January- March, 1962), pp.l61-lB3and 1U9-181. 2 6 0 Ying-shen Hua, Chung-kuo kung-ch'an-tang lie h -sh ih ch'uan (Biographies o f Chinese Communist M artyrs) (Shanghai: New Democracy Publishing Company, 19h9), pp. U5-51. P'eng P'ai, "Memoirs of a Chinese Communist,” translated from "Chung-kuo Nung-min" in The Living Age, Vol. 3UU (A p ril, 1933), PP* H 7 - 129. SP CHAO-CH'ING Su Chao-ch'ing, also called Su Chao-jen, was born in Hsiang ) Kwangtung in 1885. According to one re p o rt, as a boy and young man, he was a seaman. Su became activ e in union a c tiv itie s after the First World War. As Chairman of the Strike Committee in 1922, Su led one of the earliest successful seamen's strikes for increased pay and improved working conditions against Hong Kong shippers* Su joined the Chinese Communist Party in 1925 and played a predominant role at the Second National Labor Congress in Canton in May, 1925. The Hong Kong S trik e of June, 1925 which la s te d fo r fifte e n th months, was le d by Su. When the N ationalist Government moved to Hankow at the end of 1926, Su Chao-ch'ing was appointed Minister of Labor. At the First Pan Pacific Trade Union Congress at Hankow in 19.27, Su was elected Chairman of its Secretariat. When the split between the communists and the Kuomintang occurred in Hankow in July, 1927, Su resigned his M inisterial position. He was elected the official chairman of the Canton Soviet, but he failed to take part in the uprising reportedly because of ill health which forced 2 6 1 him to remain in Shanghai. After the Canton Commune, Su was elected Chinese representative to the Sixth Congress of the Communist International and was also elected head of the Executive Committee of the Peasant International. He died on Februaiy 2k, 1929. Hatano, Chugoku Kuosanto s h l. Vol. I , p . 227. Hua, Chung-kuo kung-ch'an-tang lieh-chih chuan, pp. 21-32. Max Perleberg, Who's Who in Modern China (Hong Kong: Ye Olde Printerie, Ltd., 195U), p. 190. Wales, The Chinese Labor Movement, pp. 208-212. YANG YIN Yang Yin, born in th e Chungshan ( tj? Ja ) district of Kwangtung, was an early member of the Tung Meng Hui. He became activ e in union a c tiv itie s , p a rtic u la rly among Canton-Hankow Railway workers, and became a communist in 1923. Yang was one of the leaders of the Hong Kong-Canton Strike of 1925. During the Commune, Yang Yin held the position of "Commissioner of Counter-Revolutionary Suppression." Evidently his performance in this capacity was considered inadequate, and it was recommended by the Provincial Committee, subject to ratification by the Central Committee, that he should be dismissed from the Provincial Committee and be sent to do "lower work." Subsequently Yang again rose in the Party 262 ranks and at his death at the Nationalist Garrison Headquarters in Shanghai on August 30, 1929 he was a member o f the Chinese Communist Party’s Central Committee, "Resolution on the Canton Uprising," Kung fei tsui-chin chlh chung-yao chueh-an, p. 13. TEH T'ING Yeh T 'ing was born Kwangtung in 1896 of a merchant fam ily. A fter graduating from Paoting M ilitary Academy, Yeh joined the Chinese Communist Party in 1921 and shortly thereafter joined General Ch'en Ch'iung-ming1s army, firs t serving as a company commander and then later as a battalion commander. With Ch'en Ch-iung-ming's defection from the revolutionary cause and withdrawal from Canton in 1923» Yeh remained in th e c ity and became an o ffic e r in the Canton "gendarmerie." In 192U, with increasing Russian influence in the Kuomintang, Yeh T'ing left Canton for Moscow for further military study. Yeh returned to China in mid-192^ and organized a special regiment which formed the advance guard of the Northern Expedition and which was later expanded to what became the Fourth Army. The officers and men of this unit reportedly showed such bravery it became known as the "Ironsides." After the arrival of the Northern Expedition at Wuchang in Hupei, Yeh became garrison commander and was promoted to the rank of M ajor-General. 263 The break between the Left Kuomintang and the communists in July, 1927 found Yeh T'ing in Nanchang as one of the chief plotters of the Nanchang Uprising, which took place on Auguat 1. After this abortive uprising, Yeh retreated southward into Kwangtung. He was made the "Commander in Chief of the Red Army of Workers and Peasants" of the Canton Soviet Government of December, 1927. However, Yeh arrived only a few hours before the actual beginning of the uprising, and was later criticized fo r alleged " in a c tiv ity " as commander. The Kwangtung P ro v in cial Committee decided in January, 1928 th a t Yeh should be "observed" for a period of six months by the Party. Yeh T'ing left China in 1928 and reportedly stayed in the Soviet Union until 1936-37. In 1937 he returned to China and assumed command of the new Fourth Army. In 19Ul he was arrested during the Anhwei Incident by the N a tio n a lists and was re le a se d only in 19U6. Yeh and h is fam ily were killed in an airplane accident in April of that same year. Asiaticus (pseudonym), "Autobiography of General Yeh T'ing," Amerasia, Vol. $, No. 1 (March, 19Ul), pp. 2U-29. Robert S. Elegant, China's Red Masters (New York: Twayne Publishers, 1991), pp. 68-70. Hua, Chung-kuo kung ch 'an tang lie h -sh lh chuan, pp. 17U- 188. Perleberg, Who's Who in Modern China, p. 21*8. 2 6k YUN TAI-TING Yun Tai-ying was born in Wu chin ( A C ) Kiangsu in 1895* According to P erleberg, during the May Uth Movement, Yun was a leader of the youth movement in the Yangtze River area and organized the first student demonstration for the salvation of the country. Yun was later active in Wuhan in the "Li chun Literary Club" which was the organi zational center for stirring up the educational circles of the youth in Hunan, Hupei, Anhwei, Honan, and Szechwan. In 1923 he was the Minister of Information and Propaganda in the Shanghai Communist Youth Corps. In addition, he was editor of the magazine Qiinajfouth^ From 1925 to 1927 Yun was a p o litic a l le c tu re r a t the Whampoa M ilitary Academy and "Chief" of the Wuhan School for M ilitary and Political Affairs. Yun's activities as Commissioner of Justice during the Canton Commune were sharply c ritic iz e d by the Kwangtung P rovincial Committee. The Committee recommended, subject to C entral Committee confirm ation, that Yun be dismissed from the Central Committee. Later in 1928 Yun regained his former stature and was made a member of the Party's Politburo. From that time until his imprisonment and death in a Nanking prison in 1931 > Yun wrote voluminously. Hatano, CBHgoku kyosanto shi, p. 227. Hua, Chung-kuo kung ch'an-tang lie h -c h ih chuan, pp. 52-55* Perleberg, Who's Who in Modern China, p. 258. "Resolution on the Canton Uprising," Kung fei tsui-chin chung-yao i-chueh-an, p. 13. APPENDIX B MAP OF KWANGTTKG* r-— ,t1>g ^ iffn r T R ep rin ted rroro ~ ollege, »• ^ • 17 (South China) (Taiwan: H X All CANTON iKfAHGCHOfJ S A A t E I £ i i # CMttoM B GULF OF TONKIN .I~ ______l1m111