by Jung Chang
Lin took with him only documents that Mao wanted Moscow to see, so Stalin was kept in the dark about Mao’s machinations and real policies. Lin built Mao up as “the solid, decisive and principled leader of the CCP,” badmouthing Chou as a “swindler” and Zhu De (“the former gendarme”) as “not one of us.”
Lin was followed in June 1939 by Mao’s brother, Tse-min, ostensibly also for “health” reasons — although, as the Russians observed, he did not spend a single day in the hospital. Tse-min’s main task was to undermine Wang Ming, whom he called “a scoundrel,” denouncing him for, amongst other things, exaggerating the strength of the Chinese Red Army in the presence of Stalin — a potentially deadly accusation. Another aim of Mao’s was to have Wang Ming’s role downgraded at the forthcoming Party congress. Wang Ming was scheduled to deliver the second report, on organization. But Tse-min told Moscow that Wang Ming was not the right person, making the false allegation that he “had never run practical org[anisation]work.” Tse-min also threw mud at other foes of Mao, like Po Ku and Li Wei-han, an old Hunan Communist leader, both of whom he accused of “major crimes,” saying they should be kept out of all leading bodies. He likened Po Ku to “opportunists, Trotskyists and bandits.”
Mao’s third “extra” emissary, Chou En-lai, arrived just as the war in Europe started, checking into the Kremlin hospital on 14 September for an operation on his right arm, which had been badly set after he broke it in a fall from a horse. Chou had just converted to Mao — an unconditional conversion that made him Mao’s very faithful servant from then on. He worked assiduously to build up Mao, and told the Russians that the CCP leadership “considered that he [Mao] must be elected GenSec [General Secretary].” He assured Moscow that the CCP’s policy remained that “the anti-Japanese war comes above everything else,” and that the Party was committed to “the united front” with Chiang. He detailed the expansion of Red forces and territory, larding his account with a number of exaggerated claims, such as that the 8RA had fought no fewer than 2,689 battles against the Japanese. CCP membership, he stated, had “increased sevenfold [to] 498,000” since the war had started.
While using Chou, Mao also made sure he was cut down to size. After visiting Chou in the hospital, Tse-min told the Russians that Chou held “unhealthy” views on relations with the Nationalists, and claimed Chou had opposed shooting the prominent Trotskyist Chang Mu-tao.
Mao was also worried about Otto Braun, Moscow’s adviser in China since before the Long March, who had come to Russia with Chou, and might tell the Russians things Mao did not want them to hear. Tse-min made a point of calling Braun’s tactics “counter-revolutionary”—an accusation that could well have got Braun shot. Braun, who survived, claims that this was the intention. Chou also weighed in, calling his former friend and close colleague “an enemy of the Chinese revolution.” (Braun described Chou as his “chief prosecutor.”)
Mao later accused his rivals of “running others down to foreign daddies.” But none of them engaged in anything remotely like the character assassination that Mao practiced.
According to a Russian archive source declassified in 2005, Mao told Stalin’s envoy Mikoyan on February 3, 1949 that the situation around the Zunyi Conference was “most unfavorable.” The reason Mao gave (which was false) was that Chang Kuo-tao, with an army of 60,000 men, “was on the offensive against us.” “But,” Mao said, “we annihilated over 30,000 of his troops.” (Tikhvinsky 2005, page 65)
Mao’s first celluloid image shown in Moscow seems to have been in 1935, when a news-reel of CCP leaders was screened before the 7th Comintern Congress. Comintern No. 3 Piatnitsky, later executed by Stalin, said he thought Mao looked like a “hooligan.”
21. MOST DESIRED SCENARIO: STALIN CARVES UP CHINA WITH JAPAN (1939–40; AGE 45–46)
ON 23 AUGUST 1939 the Soviet Union signed a non-aggression pact with Nazi Germany, and the following month the two countries invaded Poland and divided it up between them. Many in China were outraged by Stalin’s deal with Hitler. These feelings were perhaps best articulated by the founding father of the CCP, Chen Tu-hsiu, the man who had set Mao on the path of communism, but had been expelled from the Party for being too independent. After years imprisoned by the Nationalists, he had been released with other political prisoners when the Nationalist — Communist “United Front” was formed in 1937. Now he penned a poem expressing his “grief and anger,” comparing Stalin to “a ferocious devil,” who
strides imperiously into his neighbouring country
… And boils alive heroes and old friends in one fell swoop …
Right and Wrong change like day and night,
Black and White shift only at his bidding …
The Stalin — Hitler Pact opened up the prospect that Stalin might do a similar deal with Japan, with China a second Poland. Indeed, at this very moment, the Kremlin signed a ceasefire with Japan, bringing to a halt fighting that had been going on between the Soviet Red Army and the Japanese on the border of Outer Mongolia and Manchukuo. The Poland scenario caused Chiang Kai-shek acute concern, which he raised with Moscow. Mao’s reaction, however, was one of delight. His whole strategy for the war with Japan was aimed at prevailing on Russia to step in. Now a real chance appeared that Stalin might occupy part of China, and put Mao in charge.
In late September that year, when Edgar Snow asked Mao how he felt about a Soviet — Japanese pact, Mao’s reply was enthusiastic. He said that Russia might sign such a pact “as long as this does not hinder its support for … the interest of the world liberation movement [i.e., Mao himself and the CCP].” Asked whether “Soviet help to China’s liberation movement may take a somewhat similar form” to Russian occupation of Poland, Mao gave a very positive reply: “It is quite within the possibilities of Leninism.” The Poland scenario was now Mao’s model for China.
Similarly, Mao hailed Russia’s seizure of eastern Finland in early 1940, though not for public consumption. In a secret directive on 25 June, he claimed that the Soviet — Finnish peace agreement, under which Moscow annexed large swaths of Finnish territory, “guarantees the victory of the world and the Chinese revolution” (italics added). After France was divided between a German-occupied half and a puppet regime based at Vichy, Mao again drew a comparison. He wrote in coded language in a circular issued to top commanders on 1 November 1940: “There is still the possibility of the Soviet Union stepping in to adjust China — Japan relations.” Referring to a partition of the kind imposed on France, he went on to talk about the Reds “getting a better deal [relying on] the Soviet Union stepping in to do the adjustment, and us keeping trying.” Again, Mao was hoping that Russia would partition China with Japan.
Mao even had an ideal demarcation line, the Yangtze, which flows across the middle of China. To his inner circle, Mao dreamed of “drawing a border … at the Yangtze, with us ruling one half …”
Replicating the Poland scenario was indeed at the front of Stalin’s mind, and Russia began talks with Japan in September 1939, right after the signing of the Nazi — Soviet Pact, with the future of China very much at the center of the negotiations. Stalin thus had a very direct interest in the expansion both of the Chinese Red Army and of Red territory, as that would strengthen his bargaining position vis-à-vis Japan, and further his long-term goals for the postwar period.
Over the winter of 1939–40 there was a marked shift in what Mao told Moscow about the armed clashes between the Chinese Reds and Chiang’s forces. He became much more candid about the level of fighting. Before Stalin’s pact with Hitler, Mao had been presenting the clashes as the result of Nationalist attempts to wipe out Communist forces, claiming that the Reds were acting in self-defence. After the Nazi — Soviet Pact, he began to seek Stalin’s approval for expanding aggressively at Chiang’s expense. On 22 February 1940 he sent a highly belligerent report to Moscow, saying that in fighting Chiang’s forces, “victory is generally ours.” “We wiped out 6,000 [Nationalists] in Hebei, 10,000 … in Shanxi,” he reported.<
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Stalin did not say “Stop!” On the contrary, three days later he authorized the huge sum of US$300,000 per month for the CCP. When Chou En-lai left Moscow shortly afterwards, he brought with him a new radio system for communicating with Moscow, which he delivered to Mao. Mao’s Russian-language aide noted: “Chairman Mao alone had the right to use it. He kept all communications personally, and decided to whom he would show the information.”
AFTER THE Nazi — Soviet Pact and the prospect that Stalin might do a similar deal with Japan, in September 1939 Mao initiated a long, close and little-known collaboration with Japanese intelligence, in the hope of further sabotaging Chiang — and preserving his own forces. The CCP operation was headed by a man called Pan Hannian, who worked with the Japanese vice-consul in Shanghai, Eiichi Iwai, a senior intelligence officer. Pan was given a special Japanese ID, addressed: “To all Japanese military, gendarme and police personnel: any enquiry regarding the bearer, please contact the Japanese Consul-General.” A radio operator from Yenan was installed in Iwai’s house, for direct contact with Yenan, though in the end this channel was not used, as it was considered “too risky.”
Pan supplied Iwai with information about Chiang’s ability to resist the Japanese, his conflicts with the CCP and his relations with foreign powers, as well as about US and British agents in Hong Kong and Chongqing. This intelligence rated high with the Japanese: one item reportedly sent the Japanese ambassador to China “wild with joy.” Before Japan invaded Hong Kong in December 1941, Iwai helped arrange the evacuation of CCP agents. As Pan assured Iwai, some of the agents would continue to collect intelligence for the Japanese, while others would come to Shanghai to “help with our ‘peace movement.’ ” The “peace movement” was Japan’s chief non-military drive to force China to surrender. One prominent organization in this scheme was the “Revive Asia and Build the Country Movement,” which Pan helped to start, funded by Tokyo and largely manned by secret Communists.
The Reds used the Japanese to stab the Nationalists in the back. “At the time,” one CCP intelligence man recalled,
our Party’s tactic with the Japanese and collaborators was: “Use the hand of the enemy to strike the other enemy …” Comrade Kang Sheng told us this many times … Collaborators’ organisations were filled with our comrades, who used the knives of the Japanese to slaughter Nationalists … Of the things I knew personally, the Japanese annihilation of the [Nationalist underground army] south of the Yangtze [was one of the] masterpieces of cooperation between the Japanese and our Party.
Apart from sabotaging Chiang, Pan’s other task was to get the Japanese to allow the Reds to operate unmolested, and this went as far as floating the idea of a secret ceasefire in northern China to Japan’s highest intelligence officer in China, Major-General Sadaaki Kagesa.
In east central China, a deal was struck under which the Communist New 4th Army left the railways alone in return for the Japanese leaving the N4A alone in the countryside. For years, Japanese trains ran smoothly, and the N4A expanded quietly. The underlying reasoning behind leaving the Reds in peace was spelled out to us by Emperor Hirohito’s brother, Prince Mikasa, who was an officer in China at the time. He told us that the Japanese view was that while the Communists could be a nuisance, they had no strategic importance. The Japanese considered Chiang Kai-shek to be their main enemy.
BY SPRING 1940, huge tracts of countryside in northern China were in Communist hands. In one series of battles in March, immediately after Stalin’s tacit go-ahead, the Communists concentrated 30,000–40,000 troops, and destroyed over 6,000 Nationalists. Having established a strong position in northern China, 8RA commanders Zhu De and Peng De-huai felt it incumbent on them to do something against the Japanese, and on 1 April they ordered preparations for large-scale sabotage operations against Japanese transportation lines. Mao refused to permit the attack. Instead, he ordered all available troops to be moved to east central China to seize more territory there. Zhu and Peng were forced to abandon their plan.
At this point, Chiang invited Zhu, who minded about the continuing internal strife, to Chongqing to discuss a solution. En route, Zhu stopped in Yenan, as Mao had told him that a Party congress was about to convene. Zhu found no congress — and no sign of one. Nonetheless, he was prevented from proceeding to Chongqing, and was in effect detained in Yenan for the rest of the war. Even though he was the C-in-C of the 8RA, he played no role in the war, and Mao basically used him as a rubber stamp.
Mao sent someone else to Chongqing — Chou En-lai, who was now the exclusive channel with Chiang. Mao had completed his stranglehold on communications with the two places that counted — Moscow and Chongqing.
At this time, in May 1940, the Sino-Japanese war entered a critical phase. The Japanese began to intensify their bombing of Chongqing, which soon became the most heavily bombed city in the world to date; over the next six months, the tonnage dropped on it equaled one-third of what the Allies dropped on all Japan throughout the Pacific War; up to 10,000 civilians died in one raid. The Japanese army meanwhile advanced up the Yangtze towards Chongqing. Tokyo demanded that France close the railway from Vietnam, and that Britain shut down the Burma Road — the only routes into now landlocked China other than from Russia. Both Western states acquiesced, on 20 June and 18 July, respectively (although Britain’s closure was only for three months). In Chongqing, sentiment strengthened for a deal with Japan. Chiang — and China — were facing a momentous crisis.
To Mao the crisis was a godsend — the worse the better. He said later that he “had hoped they [the Japanese] would go as far as … Chongqing.” That way, he reckoned, Russia would have to intervene.
But Peng De-huai, now de facto chief of the 8RA after Zhu’s quasi-detention in Yenan, wanted to take some of the heat off Chongqing, and resuscitated his plans for a large operation to sabotage Japanese transportation lines in northern China, calling it by the resounding name of “Operation 100 Regiments.” On 22 July he ordered the 8RA to get ready to launch on 10 August, and radioed the plan to Mao, twice. There was no reply. When Peng got no answer to a third cable, he gave the go-ahead for the 20th.
Peng knew that Mao would dislike his operation. Not only would it help Chiang, it would also hurt the Reds, as Tokyo was bound to retaliate against Red territories. Peng was putting country before Party.
The operation, which lasted about a month, mainly involved attacks on installations, not on Japanese troops. It took the Japanese “totally by surprise,” in their own words. Damage to railways and highways in some sections was reported as “extremely serious” and “on an indescribably large scale” (the sabotage work was carried out partly by corvée labor). The Jingxing coal mines, which supplied the key Anshan iron and steel works in Manchuria, were badly hit, and the main mine put out of action “for at least half a year.” The Japanese had to pull back one division from the front against Chiang, and briefly delay plans to capture two railways into southern China.
The main effect was on Chinese morale, especially in heavily bombed Nationalist areas. The Nationalist press there praised the 8RA for taking the offensive, and for “dealing a deadly blow to enemy rumours that we are split and sunk in internal strife.” From Chongqing, Chou cabled Mao that the operation had had “an extremely big impact.” “We are publicising it and propagating it everywhere … now is the time to spread our Party’s influence …” Mao milked the fall-out to the hilt.
But in private he was seething, partly because the operation led to heavy Red casualties—90,000, according to Zhu De. The Japanese took extremely harsh reprisals against Red-controlled territory, which was soon reduced by about half; the population under Red rule fell from about 44 to some 25 million. But Peng soon got the 8RA and the bases back on their feet. In slightly over two years, the 8RA more than recovered its pre-1940 strength, to 400,000 men, and Peng had rebuilt its base areas.
But what most infuriated Mao was that the initiative lessened the chances of Chiang’s defeat — and hence of R
ussia intervening. In future years, Mao was to make Peng pay dearly for this, the only large-scale operation carried out by any Communist forces during the whole eight years of the Japanese occupation.
MEANWHILE, IN SPITE of Japanese bombing, Chongqing still stood, and Chiang did not collapse. Mao had to find another way to try to draw the Russians in. Chiang now came up with a plan to end the Nationalist — Communist fighting by separating the two forces physically. By this time, the 8RA had control over most of the territories they could expect to lay their hands on in northern China, so fighting there had died down. The main theater of civil war had moved to the Yangtze Valley in east central China near Shanghai and Nanjing. Chiang’s plan called for the Red N4A to move out of the Yangtze region and join the 8RA in the north, in return for letting the Reds keep virtually all of the territory seized in northern China. On 16 July 1940, Chiang offered this trade-off, couched in the form of an “order,” and gave the N4A a deadline of a month.
Mao had no intention of giving up the rich and strategic heartland. He turned Chiang’s order-offer down flat. Actually, he positively hoped that Chiang would use force to remove the N4A, and that there would be all-out civil war. “Mao’s calculation,” Russian ambassador Panyushkin wrote, was that “if there is a civil war, the Russians would back the CCP,” and Mao wanted to “nudge such a development.”
In his many cables to Moscow that summer, Mao kept urging the Russians to help him deal “serious blows” to the Nationalists. Instead of moving north, the N4A launched its biggest-ever attack on the Nationalists at the beginning of October, at a place called Yellow Bridge, wiping out 11,000 Nationalist troops and killing two generals. Chiang did not order any retaliation, and kept quiet about the defeat, as he had after many other defeats at the hands of the Reds. Unlike Mao, Chiang was afraid of igniting an all-out civil war, which would doom China’s chances against Japan. He only reiterated on 19 October that the N4A must move to the “appointed areas” within one month.
