Podcasts about guomindang

Last time we spoke about the battle Yaoyi. Japan pushed hard into Hubei with a plan: surround the main Chinese forces and seize Yichang, hoping to use it to strike at Chongqing. At first, the fighting was chaotic and punishing. The Chinese side tried to hold the line and disrupt the advance, and they even managed setbacks for the Japanese, pushing back, retaking key ground, and hitting supply and positioning weaknesses. But victory came with a cost: commanders were lost, and every gain was hard-won. Still, the battle didn't unfold as a clean Chinese retreat or a simple Japanese win. As Japanese units shifted and tested for openings, the Chinese forces adjusted—delaying, regrouping, and fighting to keep their formations from being completely trapped. Eventually, Japan managed to break through at critical moments, especially through crossings and maneuvers that the Chinese had not fully sealed off. In the end, Japan succeeded in taking Yichang, but it didn't achieve the decisive annihilation it wanted.    #201 The New Fourth Army Incident and the Strained United Front Welcome to the Fall and Rise of China Podcast, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about the history of Asia? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on history of asia and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel where I cover the history of China and Japan from the 19th century until the end of the Pacific War. After the catastrophe of the early 1930s, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) entered the war against Japan in a political mood that was both hopeful and wary: it wanted to be seen as a genuine national leader of resistance, yet it also feared being absorbed—or destroyed—by the Guomindang (KMT) state it had spent years battling. That tension became the organizing principle of the war's early years. The turning point came from the Xi'an Incident in December 1936, which forced a new calculation in Nationalist politics. In the months that followed, agreements between KMT and CCP representatives were publicly proclaimed in August and September 1937, after the Shanghai fighting began. Under these arrangements, the CCP accepted constraints that in peacetime would have looked like surrender: it pledged to strive for Sun Yixian's "Three People's Principles," to end its former policies of armed revolt and sovietization, to abolish the soviet government, and to discontinue both the term "Red Army" and the expectation that its forces would operate outside central control. Communist troops would be treated as part of the national military under KMT command, and the revolution's old administrative structures were to be formally dismantled. In return, the KMT offered the CCP something just as important: space to exist publicly and politically. Liaison offices were permitted in key cities; the CCP was allowed to publish the New China Daily; and it could nominate representatives to KMT advisory bodies. Civil rights were extended—political prisoners were released—and subsidies were established to help cover administrative and military expenses in "reintegrated" areas and territories. The war thus transformed the tactical reality on the ground: the CCP could not treat the KMT as an immediate enemy, but it also could not afford to become politically passive. It had to learn how to fight Japan while building legitimacy fast enough to survive the next phase. In the first year and a half, the Party Center focused on three problems that kept returning in different forms: how the "united front" would be defined—especially what the CCP's relationship to the National government should be; how to coordinate military strategy and tactics with Nationalist units without losing control of its own operations; and how leadership should be consolidated, particularly for Mao Zedong in a party that still contained rival centers of authority. These disputes mattered not just for doctrine but for survival, because the CCP's autonomy was constantly being tested by the very alliance that was supposed to protect it. Mao's own approach to the united front combined cooperation with a refusal to surrender independence. Publicly, the CCP praised Jiang Jieshi and the KMT and promised unity, but it did so in language that was deliberately broad. In private (and in internal party debates), Mao treated unity as conditional: the CCP must not split the united front, but it also must not be "bound hand and foot." The strategic idea that emerged was political initiative under constraints—fighting when it could plausibly claim justification, keeping enough restraint that the CCP would not appear self-interested or anti-national, and deciding for itself when to engage and when to withdraw. This balance was reinforced through military reorganization. In August–September 1937, CCP forces were reorganized as the Eighth Route Army (8RA), with roughly 30,000 men drawn from Long March survivors, local forces, and new recruits. The 8RA was divided into three divisions: the 115th, 120th, and 129th, commanded by Lin Biao, He Long, and Liu Bocheng respectively. Shortly after the war began, the National government also authorized a second major Communist force: the New Fourth Army (N4A), to operate in central China. Its core came from those left behind when the Long March began in 1934—small groups surviving in difficult conditions against continuing KMT pressure. Officially authorized at 12,000, it took months to reach that strength. Nominally commanded by Ye Ting, actual military and political control rested with Xiang Ying and Chen Yi. From the start, then, the CCP's wartime "integration" with the National system coexisted with a clear effort to preserve internal control. Ideologically, the CCP worked to make its revolutionary program compatible—at least in appearance—with a national resistance coalition. On the New Democracy demonstrated how this strategy operated on two levels. In KMT-controlled spaces, its language could be read as aligning with liberal-democratic expectations: public participation, multi-party governance, legally protected civil rights. But in CCP-controlled areas, the same text could carry sharper class-based and authoritarian implications. The Party wanted a united front that broadened support without becoming committed to Nationalist limits on how society itself might be reorganized after victory. Meanwhile, even as the rhetoric of unity rose, the CCP worried about something more dangerous than military setbacks: the possibility that the KMT might accommodate Japan. Late 1939 and early 1940 made this fear harder to dismiss. Japan pursued collaboration with Wang Jingwei, culminating in the establishment of a "reorganized" government at Nanjing in March 1940. At the same time, Japanese intermediaries sought approaches to Chiang Kai-shek himself—an effort that the CCP tracked closely as a sign that peace negotiations might be possible even when battlefield conditions looked grim. Propaganda was involved, but the anxiety was real: if Japan and the Nationalists reached an arrangement, the CCP's whole wartime legitimacy-building effort could collapse overnight. As a result, the united front was interpreted inside the CCP not as a permanent coalition with the KMT, but as a flexible strategy with a cardinal purpose: to prevent peace between Japan and the Nationalists. Mao's position on the united front reflected this. For him, the alliance was meant to suspend the possibility of a China–Japan settlement, not to end the CCP's separate identity. The CCP could participate in a reconstituted national framework—possibly even a "democratic republic"—to gain legality and influence, but it should remain politically and, where possible, physically separate from the KMT. By 1939, however, the practical meaning of "flexibility" collided with reality. What had seemed, to some observers, like an unusually cordial entente began to fade. The KMT Central Committee adopted measures early in 1939 aimed at restricting Communist expansion, and armed clashes increased through the summer and continued into autumn and winter—especially around North China Communist bases. The period of rising conflict was later labeled by the CCP as the "first anti-Communist upsurge" (roughly spanning December 1939 into March 1940), but the crucial point was that both sides viewed each confrontation as a test of legal rights, moral legitimacy, and control over territory. Strategically, the CCP understood the KMT's effort as an attempt to check unauthorized growth of Communist armed power and to recover areas where influence had already slipped away—either to the Communists or, by indirect effect, to Japan. The KMT emphasized its traditional legal authority; the CCP countered with its claim to an "evolutionary" moral right to challenge the government's legitimacy. In practice, the conflict took the form of increasingly systematic military pressure, including a blockade around the Shen–Gan–Ning region. By this point, the blockade involved large numbers of troops (on the order of hundreds of thousands), halting Communist expansion and disrupting direct contact with other Communist forces farther afield, even as fighting flared along border zones and around vulnerable points in the Communist defensive perimeter. So, by the edge of the "middle years," the wartime alliance had not broken into open civil war—but it had also stopped being secure. The united front survived, yet it operated under strain: its language of cooperation continued, while "friction" between partners hardened into a central feature of the resistance struggle. Transition into the war's second phase began in early 1939, shaped by the stalemate Mao had already anticipated at the sixth plenum in late 1938. Mao argued that during this prolonged "new stage" the forces of resistance—above all, Communist-led forces—would strengthen. The overall result, however, was mixed. In Shandong and Central China, new Communist bases did take shape. But across much of North China, Japanese consolidation cost the resistance heavily in manpower and population. Base-area economies suffered serious strain, and the peasantry endured hardships more severe than at any earlier point. This stalemate had two main dimensions. The first was the growing resentment of the Nationalists toward Communist expansion—resentment made especially sharp by their own losses. As the Nationalists were driven out of regions that had previously provided them their greatest wealth and power in the central and lower Yangtze basin, they also lost the "cream" of their armies. In contrast, the CCP was spreading through the wider countryside behind Japanese lines, extending its influence and winning broader popular support. The second dimension was Japan's desire—and need—to consolidate territories it had only nominally conquered and to extract economic value from them. After all, the logic of the "China Incident" was to draw on China's labor and resources to strengthen Japan, not to bleed Japan's gains away by draining wealth into China's vast interior. A Japanese colonel, lamenting the situation, captured the frustration of this drift into deeper entanglement: he regretted that Japan had not ended the "China Incident" once its initial objectives were reached. Instead, Japan was drawn into the hinterland and became bogged down in endless attrition—leaving it with little more than "real estate" rather than the popular support it believed it would secure from those it claimed to "liberate." To improve their position, Japanese authorities—still fragmented by internal rivalry—pursued several strategies. One was a new peace offensive aimed simultaneously at Jiang Jieshi, alongside efforts to establish a "reformed" Nationalist government under Wang Jingwei, who had fled Chongqing in December 1938. Japan also recruited more collaborators and puppet officials. Finally, it carried out forceful military, political, and economic measures intended to establish effective territorial control and eliminate opposition. During the middle years of the war, the Communists described their conflicts with the Nationalists using the euphemism "friction". By 1939, what many observers—possibly incorrectly—had viewed as an unusually warm alliance began to break down. In early 1939, the KMT Central Committee adopted measures meant to restrict the CCP. From the summer onward, military clashes began and continued into autumn and winter with increasing frequency and intensity, most of them concentrated around and within the North China base areas. The Communists later labeled the period from December 1939 to March 1940 the "first anti-Communist upsurge." Naturally, each side accused the other of aggression and claimed self-defense against unjust attacks. Strategically, though, the North China "upsurge" functioned as a Nationalist attempt to limit the CCP's expansion beyond the areas assigned to it and to regain influence in regions the Communists—or the Japanese—had already taken from the KMT. Jiang Jieshi framed the matter as a defense of legal rights grounded in tradition, while the Communists asserted an "evolutionary" right to challenge the moral legitimacy of those legal claims. During 1939, the Nationalists began to blockade Shen–Gan–Ning around its southern and western perimeter. Within a year, this blockade grew to nearly 400,000 troops, including some of the last remaining Central Army units under the command of Hu Zongnan. The blockade stopped further Communist expansion, especially into Gansu and Suiyuan, and severed direct contact between SKN and Communists operating in Xinjiang (Chinese Turkestan) adjacent to Soviet Central Asia. The Xinjiang Communists—including Mao Zedong's brother—were eliminated in 1942. Meanwhile, fierce fighting erupted along the Gansu–Shaanxi border and in the north-eastern corner of SKN near the Great Wall at Suide, as the blockading forces probed for weak points. Elements of He Long's 120th Division were even pulled back from the Jin–Sui base across the Yellow River to strengthen SKN's regular defenses. Economically, the blockade was even more damaging. During 1939, central government subsidies to the Border Region budget were cut off. Trade between the Border Region and other parts of China nearly stopped, a devastating blow to a region unable to supply itself with many basic commodities. At the same time, Nationalist and regional forces also attempted to expand their military and administrative authority into Hebei, Shanxi, Henan, and Shandong—areas the CCP now considered its base zones. In resisting these efforts, the CCP predictable accused its rivals of harming resistance work and damaging the people's interests. The "experts in dissension" were said to cooperate with the Japanese and their puppets. Based on increasing collaboration by regional units with Japan, the CCP implied that this was a deliberate and cynical strategy—described as "crooked-line patriotism"—intended to preserve those units for future anti-Communist operations. Even so, the CCP tried to avoid an open break with the Nationalist regime in Chongqing. In public, it consistently portrayed these clashes as being initiated by local commanders acting beyond orders from higher authority—despite knowing this depiction was false. Jiang Jieshi, unable to refute the claim outright, effectively permitted it to serve as the justification for a firm Communist response. Mao Zedong outlined the general resistance policy as "justification, expedience, and restraint". The CCP was to fight when it could claim justification and when it could gain advantage, but not to press attacks beyond what the Nationalists would tolerate or in ways that could damage its image as selfless patriots. Communist forces were expected to keep initiative as much as possible in their own hands—deciding when to engage, whether to engage, and when to disengage. The most striking episode of the "first anti-Communist upsurge" was the rupture with Yan Xishan in December 1939. Tensions in Shanxi had been rising throughout the summer and autumn, as Yan and his conservative supporters—associated with the "Old Army"—linked the Sacrifice League and the Dare-to-die Corps of the "New Army" with Communist forces. When base areas and Japanese occupation eventually took over much of his province, Yan was forced into exile at Qiulin across the Yellow River in Shaanxi. In November, Yan ordered his Old Army to disarm the Dare-to-die forces with help from central units dispatched by Hu Zongnan. In the bloody fighting that followed, these elements gradually broke free of even nominal provincial control and fully completed their connection with Communist forces. More than 30,000 people went over to the Communists. One KMT intelligence agent described the process with bitterness and a sense of inevitability: the Communists were first "full of sweet words," flattery, and distortions designed to open things up and conceal their actions. But once they had fully entrenched themselves, and once the low-level base had been established, they turned and bit. The agent suggested they had suspected things might end this way, but were not aware how quickly events would move—or that it could happen precisely while Communist calls for "united front" and "maintenance of unity for resistance" filled the air. About a month later, in February and March 1940, elements of the 8RA beat back this so-called upsurge. Zhang Yinwu's forces were disarmed and dispersed across the plains of north Hebei. To the south, Chu Huaiping and Shi Yusan were pushed out of the base area, as was the KMT-appointed provincial governor Lu Zhonglin. Although some non-Communist forces remained in the region, the CCP's and CCLY bases were never again seriously threatened by forces affiliated with the central government. Reinforcing the CCP's accusations, Shi Yusan was later executed in 1940 by the central government for collaboration with the Japanese. By late 1939, CCP central authorities maintained that the areas where the CCP could expand its armed strength were mainly limited to Shandong and Central China. In those regions, the CCP continued trying to carve out bases where they could operate. The situation in Shandong was complicated. After the Japanese invasion, most Nationalist-affiliated forces stayed in the province, while Communist forces and bases were weaker and more scattered than further west. Only in late 1938 did major 8RA units from the 115th and 129th Divisions—led by Xu Xiangqian and Luo Ronghuan—enter Shandong to link up with the Shandong column and local guerrillas, including survivors of a large band recently decimated by the Japanese. Even with these efforts, Communist actions led to clashes not only with Japanese forces but also with various Nationalist-affiliated groups—groups that were stronger than the Communists at the time. Until late 1940, the CCP's clashes with Nationalist forces in Shandong were actually bloodier than clashes with the Japanese. The CCP understood that its Chinese rivals mistrusted one another, and that their attitudes toward the CCP varied widely. The main Nationalist forces were often not tightly affiliated with Chiang Kai-shek or the central government. Instead, they operated under independent—and at times disgruntled—regional commanders. Communist tactics were expressed through slogans emphasizing ways to win support and isolate hardliners: develop progressive forces and win over fence-sitters while isolating "die-hards"; flatter top echelons, enlist the middle ranks, and hit the rank and file; and win over Yi Xuezhong, isolate Shen Honglie, and eliminate Qin Qirong. Still, unlike other North China base areas, the Communists were unable for several years to neutralize Nationalist forces in Shandong. Even if Japanese mop-up campaigns had not weakened those Nationalists, the text suggests the Communists may still have struggled to do so. By November 1940, Xu Xiangqian claimed meaningful progress while admitting Shandong had not yet become a fully consolidated base. CCP successes were greatest along parts of the Shandong–Hebei border, around the Taishan massif in central Shandong, and near the tip of the peninsula far to the east. Elsewhere, "progressive forces" remained weak. Communist regular troops numbered about 70,000, which was far below the party center's goals of 150,000 regulars and between 1.5 and 2 million self-defense forces. Moreover, systematic economic reforms had barely begun. The CCP relied on familiar practices—confiscations, collections of "national salvation grain," contributions, and loans—alongside a conventional taxation system adjusted to favor poorer peasants. Communist expansion in Central China was even riskier, with a greater likelihood of large-scale conflict with central government forces than in the north. In much of North China, "friction" came primarily from rapid Communist expansion into areas with partial vacuums. In Central China, however, base-building required displacing an existing Nationalist military-administrative presence closely tied to Jiang Kai-shek and the Chongqing government. The burden of this expansion was carried mainly by the 6th Detachment (northern Anhui and Jiangsu) and the 5th Detachment, which was reinforced by 15,000 to 20,000 8RA troops under Huang K'o-ch'eng. As Chen Yi's 1st Detachment crossed from south to north through the corridor provided by Guan Wenwei's local forces, it became actively involved as well. This expansion—driven by increasingly urgent directives from Mao and Liu during the latter part of 1939 and into 1940—brought the N4A north of the river into ever more frequent and sharper clashes with Nationalist authorities in Anhui and Jiangsu, especially with units under Jiangsu governor Han Deqin. South of the river, though, Xiang Ying did not directly challenge Chongqing's commanders. Mao later charged that Xiang Ying may have been influenced by Wang Ming, or else he may simply have seen no realistic alternative. His forces—three detachments plus a headquarters unit—were heavily outnumbered by Qu Chutong's Nationalist units, not to mention Japanese forces and their puppets. Even if Mao insisted bases could be built "anywhere," the Shanghai–Hangzhou–Nanjing triangle was especially difficult terrain. Xiang Ying and his followers had survived with extraordinary tenacity in the mountains of South China between 1934 and 1937, enduring brutal search-and-destroy operations that were not lifted until the war began. It therefore seems unlikely that such survivors would suddenly become "right-wing capitulationists."  Yet by spring 1940, Mao was pressing Xiang Ying more intensely. The Central Committee's message was explicit: expansion was necessary in all cases. It meant reaching into all enemy-occupied areas rather than being bound by the Kuomintang's restrictions—going beyond Kuomintang limits, not waiting for official appointments, not depending on higher-ups for financing, and instead expanding armed forces freely and independently. It also meant setting up base areas without hesitation, independently mobilizing the masses in those areas, and building united front organs of political power under Communist Party leadership. The struggle between Nationalists and Communists involved more than contests for control of territory behind Japanese lines. It also involved national-level politics, ideology, and leadership. One worrying development for the CCP was the campaign throughout 1939 to expand Jiang Kai-shek's prestige and formal power—adding more titles for him across major party, government, and military positions. In early 1939, the Central Executive Committee appointed him "director-general" of the Kuomintang, a title reminiscent of the one previously held by Sun Yat-sen. In addition, during the summer and autumn of 1939 there was talk of constitutional rule. In November, the KMT announced plans to convene a constitutional assembly the following year. If Jiang could fulfill these promises, he and his government could gain new legitimacy and wider popularity. Mao and his colleagues could not allow this to go unchallenged. If the Nationalists were to have a paramount leader and authoritative spokesperson, the CCP needed one as well. The timing of Mao's famous "On the new democracy"—written in late 1939 and published the next January—was therefore no accident. Its substance had been anticipated earlier, but its final timing and full development were shaped by the KMT's constitutional movement. The CCP's entry into this competition served as both a bid for support away from the KMT and a statement of the multi-class united front that the CCP wanted to lead. Although "On the new democracy" was written in a tone that seemed moderate, it persuaded many Chinese readers that the CCP had either diluted its revolutionary objectives or postponed them to a distant future. In Kuomintang-controlled areas, the work could be read through the liberal values associated with Anglo-American democracy—popular participation, multi-party government, legally protected civil rights. In CCP-controlled territories, the same language carried stronger authoritarian, class-based meanings. In internal documents meant for party audiences rather than public consumption, the ambiguity was removed, showing a tough but patient and flexible commitment not only to resistance but also to social control and social change. During this same period, the Communists expressed deep concern about Nationalist capitulation to Japan—not only on the battlefield behind Japanese lines but also at the highest levels. Some of this concern was propaganda, but beneath propaganda lay genuine anxiety. In late 1939 and early 1940, politically aware Chinese already knew that Japan was negotiating with the unpredictable Wang Jingwei, who had fled Chongqing a year earlier. A "reorganized national government" in Nanjing was finally established in March 1940, representing the most formidable collaboration with Japan to date. Less well known, but equally important, was that Japan was also seeking an understanding directly with Jiang Kai-shek through intermediaries in Hong Kong. This effort, called "Operation Kiri"—described as spreading a "feast for Chiang"—combined intrigue with a kind of dark comedy. Reports suggested Chiang's reported interest in peace could have been a stratagem designed to discredit Wang Jingwei by keeping him waiting. But even if Chiang had no intention of coming to terms with Japan, the Communists could not be sure what the outcome would be until after the multi-pronged peace offensive had failed. By the middle of 1940, China had never been so isolated. In Europe, the "phony war" ended in the spring when Germany launched a blitz across the Low Countries. France fell soon after, and England appeared likely to be next. Japan used this moment to press China to sever its last tenuous connections to the outside world: cutting the Burma Road, trade with neutral Hong Kong, and the rail link running from Hanoi to Kunming. At the same time, Russia was engaged in a difficult and embarrassing war with Finland and reduced military aid to the Nationalists. The United States was only gradually moving away from isolationism and clearly regarded England as more important than China. In Chongqing and elsewhere in "Free China," signs of war weariness, despair, and demoralization were visible. Under these circumstances, Mao's insistence on aggressive expansion was a calculated risk—either it would deter any Japanese advance, or it would place the Communists in the strongest possible position in case a split between the KMT and the CCP became unavoidable. In Central China, the size and pace of the fighting kept increasing, starting in the final months of 1939. One flashpoint was the clash between Luo Pinghui's 5th Detachment and units of Han Deqin's Jiangsu force near Lake Gaoyou. In the following months, Guan Wenwei's forces ranged along the left bank of the Yangtze, repeatedly running into Luo's troops as they operated farther north. Luo also began receiving some 8RA reinforcements, moving them south through areas controlled by the 6th Detachment. Clearly, a major showdown was taking shape across north and central Jiangsu. At the same time, the South Yangtze Command was doing poorly. Nationalist commanders Leng Xin and Qu Chutong restricted its activities so severely that Mao and Liu gradually abandoned the idea of building a unified, consolidated base in that region. During late spring and early summer, Chen Yi moved most of his 1st and 2nd Detachments north of the Yangtze. In September, the 3rd Detachment followed suit, crossing the river into the area around Lake Chaohu, where the 4th Detachment was already stationed. After these moves, only the Headquarters Detachment—under Ye Ting and Xiang Ying—remained south of the Yangtze, positioned at Qingxian in southern Anhui. As the military situation edged toward an open confrontation, negotiations began in June 1940 between representatives of the KMT and the CCP. The core issues were Communist operating zones and the authorized strength of the armies led by the CCP. Proposals were exchanged, followed by equally sharp and hostile counter-proposals, but no agreement was reached. The KMT viewed it as a concession to permit the CCP "free rein" north of the pre-1938 course of the Yellow River, with the exception of southern Shanxi, which was to remain under the influence of Yan Xishan. In exchange, the KMT demanded that all 8RA and N4A units evacuate Central China. In effect, the KMT was offering the CCP something it was already prepared to allow, in return for the CCP giving up what it might soon be able to obtain by force of arms. Nationalist authorities then issued a set of deadlines, but without clearly stating what would happen if those deadlines were violated. On the surface, the CCP appeared to be complying in part. The movements of Chen Yi and the South Yangtze Command could look like obedience, but in reality they were responses to orders coming from their own superior leadership rather than instructions issued by the Nationalists. Even so, Xiang Ying's continued delays and evasions during the autumn and winter of 1940 remained puzzling. One possibility is that he felt—quite reasonably—that Mao had already lost confidence in him and that once he crossed to the north bank of the river he would lose his command. Another complication was that directives from Yan'an were sometimes ambiguous and even contradictory. He may also have been trying to reach secure understandings with KMT commanders about evacuation routes and guaranteed safe conduct out of the area. For a period, Han Teqin kept most of his forces—estimated at about 70,000 men, far outnumbering the N4A—in north Jiangsu, thereby blocking the expansion of the 6th Detachment and slowing further southern intrusions by 8RA troops. But by mid-summer he realized he would have to counter the N4A build-up in central Jiangsu, or else risk writing that region off to the Communists. A confusing sequence of engagements then unfolded, culminating in a decisive battle in early October 1940 near the central Jiangsu town of Huangjiao. Over the course of four days, several of Han's main-force units belonging to the 89th Army were destroyed, while others were scattered. That battle also served as a signal for the 6th Detachment to advance more aggressively in the north. In the aftermath, one of Han's principal commanders entered collaboration with the CCP, while another defected to the Nanjing government under Wang Jingwei. Although Han Teqin managed to maintain a foothold in Jiangsu until 1943, his real power had been broken. Relatively little attention was paid to the battle of Huangjiao in the Chinese press. The KMT did not want to publicize what it considered a disastrous defeat, while the Communists were satisfied to stay silent about an episode that conflicted with their proclaimed policy of a united front. As could be expected, during the autumn—after Han Teqin's defeat—KMT-CCP negotiations deteriorated further. In early December, Jiang Kai-shek personally ordered that all N4A forces withdraw from southern Anhui and southern Jiangsu by 31 December. He also ordered that the entire 8RA be positioned north of the Yellow River by the same deadline, followed one month later by the N4A. Discussions then followed between Ye Ting and Qu Chutong's deputies concerning the route to be taken, safe conduct, and—astonishingly—the money and supplies that were to be provided to the N4A to help it move. On 25 December, Mao Zedong ordered Xiang Ying to begin evacuating immediately. Yet it was not until 4 January 1941 that Ye and Xiang actually started moving. Almost immediately, Qu Chutong's forces harassed and dispersed the N4A Headquarters Group, which included administrative personnel, wounded soldiers and dependents, as well as combat-ready troops. In an attempt to reorganize, they moved southwest toward Maolin, where they were surrounded by Nationalists and, over the next several days, were cut to pieces. Losses were heavy on both sides. The CCP suffered an estimated 9,000 casualties. Xiang Ying tried twice to break out of the blockade on his own, but failed. He was then denounced as a deserter by Ye Ting, who took over full command of the doomed forces. Xiang Ying eventually escaped, but he was killed a couple of months later by one of his own bodyguards, motivated by the N4A gold reserves that he had taken with him. Up to the very end, Xiang either failed or refused to seek refuge in Liu Shaoqi's domain north of the Yangtze. The unfortunate Ye Ting was arrested and spent the rest of the war in prison. He was finally released in 1946, only to die one month later in a plane crash, along with several other high-ranking party members. On 17 January, Jiang Kai-shek declared that the New Fourth Army was dissolved for insubordination. Direct contacts between Yan'an and Chongqing nearly came to an end, and CCP military liaison offices in several cities held by the Nationalists were closed. This is what became known as the New Fourth Army incident, also referred to as the South Anhui incident. Clearly, it functioned as an act of retaliation for the defeats suffered by Han Teqin in north and central Jiangsu. It ended any realistic prospect of establishing a consolidated Communist base south of the Yangtze. Still, from a strategic perspective, these losses were ultimately more than offset by the gains achieved farther north. In fact, only a few months later, the reorganized N4A quietly began reintroducing some units into this region, where they carried out guerrilla activities without possessing a secure territorial base. Unlike the relative silence surrounding the fighting at Huangjiao, the New Fourth Army incident sparked bitter, prolonged controversy. The CCP argued that it was a second "anti-Communist upsurge," even more serious than the first. Presenting themselves as martyred patriots, they depicted their opponents as people who wanted to end the War of Resistance through what they called "Sino-Japanese cooperation" aimed at "suppressing the Communists." In their account, the Nationalists wanted to replace the war of resistance with civil war, substitute capitulation for independence, trade unity for a split, and replace light with darkness. People were telling each other the news and were horrified. Indeed, they claimed that the situation had never been as critical as it was at that moment. The Nationalist response, of course, was that provocations had been numerous and serious, and that violations of military discipline could not be tolerated. But the KMT's unwillingness to describe in detail its own defeats at the CCP's hands left it speaking in broad generalities. In the propaganda battle, the CCP clearly gained the better position and won more political capital. If it was politically valuable to be regarded as a national hero, it was even more valuable to be seen as a national martyr.  Many Chinese—and some outside—observers were genuinely alarmed and feared that civil war might openly resume. Yet, with a few exceptions, the events that culminated in the New Fourth Army incident have generally been interpreted as marking the breakdown of the second united front. That interpretation, however, is described as being wrong in two respects. First, the CCP understood the united front not as a narrow arrangement limited to a few major partners, but as a strategy that could be applied flexibly to all political, military, and social forces in China—from the highest levels of the central government down to the smallest village. Relations with Jiang Jieshi and the Guomindang regime mattered, but they did not, by themselves, constitute the whole of the united front. Even regarding Jiang and the Nationalists specifically, the common reading is said to be misguided. Throughout the war, a cardinal objective of the united front was to prevent peace between Japan and the Nationalists. Therefore, if clashes between CCP forces and those of the central government on such a large scale as at Huangjiao and Maolin could occur without leading to peace with Japan and without triggering a full-scale resumption of civil war, then this should not be understood as the end of the united front—it should be seen as its fundamental vindication. If friction at that scale could nevertheless be tolerated by Jiang Jieshi, then fears about his future accommodation with Japan were greatly reduced. Following the New Fourth Army incident, the CCP reorganized its political and military presence in Central China. The Central Plains and South-east China Bureaus were merged and renamed the Central China Bureau, with Liu Shaoqi placed in charge, reflecting the area's importance to Party Central. The New Fourth Army was also reorganized completely and substantially regularized. Chen Yi became its new acting commander, since Ye Ting was imprisoned. He directed the force, now divided into seven divisions. Each division had territorial responsibilities, and in each region the CCP claimed the establishment of a base. Indeed, base construction proceeded in earnest only after the friction of 1940 and the New Fourth Army incident. In the years that followed, the operating areas of the First through Fourth Divisions contained expanding enclaves of consolidated territory, where military dominance was joined with open party work: administrative control, the development of mass organizations, local elections, and socio-economic reforms. The other three areas fluctuated between semi-consolidated and guerrilla status. With the incident, the worst phase of the KMT-CCP conflict was now over. When CCP documents later speak of a third upsurge in 1943, they refer to something openly political. With the exception of Shandong—where a fairly strong Nationalist presence persisted for a longer time—the overall balance of power among Chinese forces behind Japanese lines had shifted in favor of the CCP by mid-1941. In subsequent years the CCP's predominance became even more pronounced, until by the end of 1943 the Communists were virtually beyond challenge by Chinese rivals.   I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me. After the CCP and KMT entered the united front, cooperation felt conditional from the start. Mao pushed the New Fourth Army to reorganize and preserve Communist autonomy, even as the 1937 agreements publicly pledged obedience to KMT leadership. In 1939–40 the Communists worried that Chiang might negotiate peace with Japan; so they expanded bases and military presence, triggering repeated clashes. The pressure intensified when KMT orders forced the New Fourth Army to evacuate south Anhui in late 1940. 

The final Soviet offensive, and some details on Chiang Ching-kuo's activities as a student in Moscow.Further reading:Bruce A. Elleman and Stephen Kotkin, eds., Manchurian Railways and the Opening of ChinaMichael M. Walker, The 1929 Sino-Soviet WarJay Taylor, The Generalissimo's Son: Chiang Ching-Kuo and the Revolutions in China and TaiwanSome names from this episode:Zhang Xueliang, Manchurian warlordFeng Yuxiang, northwestern warlord who turned on Chiang Kai-shek during Sino-Soviet warJoseph Stilwell, United States military attaché in ChinaMikhail Borodin, Comintern agent and political head of Soviet mission to aid the Guomindang during the first Communist-Guomindang united frontChiang Ching-kuo, son of Chiang Kai-shek Zhou Enlai, leading CommunistVasily Blyukher, commander of the Special Far Eastern ArmyAleksandr Cherepanov, commander of the 39th Rifle Division in the Soviet Far EastEpisode artwork: Picture of a young Chiang Ching-kuoSupport the show

The Guomindang moves to seize Soviet assets in Manchuria. Also, subscribe to the new substack at https://peopleshistoryofideas.substack.com/.Further reading:Bruce A. Elleman and Stephen Kotkin, eds., Manchurian Railways and the Opening of ChinaMichael M. Walker, The 1929 Sino-Soviet WarSome names from this episode:Li Lisan, Chairman of Central Committee Propaganda DepartmentChen Duxiu, Co-founder of the Chinese Communist PartyLi Dazhao, Co-founder of the Chinese Communist PartyLev Karakhan, Soviet deputy commissioner for foreign affairs in 1919 and acting commissioner in 1929Zhang Zuolin, Manchurian warlord killed by Japan in 1928Zhang Xueliang, Manchurian warlord, son of Zhang ZuolinMartemyan Nikitich Ryutin, Bolshevik leader of Harbin soviet in 1917Episode artwork: Flag of the Chinese Eastern RailwaySupport the show

We look at two letters written by Mao on November 28, 1929, and introduce our discussion of “On Correcting Mistaken Ideas in the Party” and the other parts of the Gutian Resolution.Further reading:Pang Xianzhi and Jin Chongji, Mao Zedong: A Biography, vol. 1: 1893-1949Stuart Schram, ed., Mao's Road to Power, vol. 3: From the Jinggangshan to the Establishment of the Jiangxi Soviets, July 1927-December 1930Mao Zedong, “On Correcting Mistaken Ideas in the Party”Abimael Guzmán, “Report of the Meeting of the Central Leadership with the Cangallo-Fajardo Regional Committee”Peking Review (Feb. 3, 1967)Some names from this episode:Li Lisan, Chairman of Central Committee Propaganda DepartmentYang Kaihui, Mao's first wifeMao Anying, Mao's first sonChen Yi, member of Front Committee of Fourth Red ArmyChen Duxiu, former general secretary of the Communist PartyMao Zemin, Mao's brotherXie Hanqiu, observer from the Fujian Provincial CommitteeLiu Heting, Guomindang military commanderJin Handing, Guomindang military commanderZhang Zhen, Guomindang military commanderEpisode artwork: He Kongde's Gutian Meeting posterSupport the show

Wer unsere Arbeit mit einer Spende unterstützen will, kann dies per PayPal tun: paypal.me/hellepanke Likes, Abos und ein Besuch auf www.helle-panke.de helfen uns ebenso. Den Newsletter mit unserem Wochenprogramm gibt es hier: www.helle-panke.de/de/topic/22.newsletter.html Mitschnitt vom 30. April 2024 Referent: Prof. Dr. Felix Wemheuer Moderation: Dr. Frank Engster Von Felix Wemheuer ist 2019 die Broschüre "Globale chinesische Migration und die Umwälzung des kapitalistischen Weltsystems" bei uns erschienen, die hier bestellt werden kann: https://www.helle-panke.de/de/topic/158.publikationen.html?productId=70781 In letzter Zeit ist Taiwan in das Zentrum der geopolitischen Auseinandersetzungen zwischen den USA und der Volksrepublik China gerückt. Zwischen den Parteien Taiwans sowie im Verhältnis zur Volksrepublik China spielen Konflikte um Identität und die Interpretation der Geschichte eine wichtige Rolle. In Taiwan ist besonders der Umgang mit dem Erbe der Diktatur durch die Guomindang (1945–1991) hochumstritten. Lange präsentierte die Guomindang Taiwan als das bessere China, in dem chinesische traditionelle Hochkultur und Sprache weiter gepflegt werden würden – im Gegensatz zum kommunistischen Festland. Das Umfeld der regierenden Demokratischen Fortschrittspartei propagiert heute hingegen das Geschichtsbild eines selbstständigen Taiwans, in dem China in eine historische Reihe mit anderen temporären ausländischen Invasoren gestellt wird. Der Ursprung Taiwans wird bei den UreinwohnerInnen gesucht, die zum Ausgangspunkt eines multikulturellen Selbstbildes gemacht werden. Während die japanische Kolonialherrschaft (1895–1945) eher wohlwollend behandelt wird, ließ die Regierung viele Museen errichten, um den "weißen Terror" und die Menschenrechtsverletzungen der Guomindang-Diktatur zu dokumentieren. Zugleich gibt es noch historische Monumente aus dieser Zeit, wie die Gedächtnishallen für den Diktator Chiang Kai-shek und den Staatsgründer der Chinesischen Republik Sun Yat-Sen. Selbst an diesen Orten werden Ausstellungen für die Opfer der Diktatur integriert. Felix Wemheuer analysiert kritisch, u.a. anhand seiner Recherchen in Museen und Universitäten, die kontroverse Erinnerungslandschaft auf Taiwan und den Konflikt mit China. Felix Wemheuer ist Professor für Moderne China-Studien an der Universität Köln. Zu seinen Veröffentlichungen gehören „Social History of Maoist China“, „Marx und der globale Süden“, „Chinas große Umwälzung“ sowie eine Biografie von Mao Zedong. Er studierte „Geschichte der KPCh“ an der Volksuniversität in Beijing (2000-2002), war Gastwissenschaftler an der Harvard Universität (2008-2010), Fudan Universität in Shanghai (2018, 2023) und an der Academia Sinica in Taibei (2023). Seine neusten Veröffentlichungen sind „Die Zukunft mit China denken“ (herausgeben mit Daniel Fuchs u.a.).

Mao's April 5, 1929 reply to Zhou Enlai.Further reading:Pang Xianzhi and Jin Chongji, Mao Zedong: A Biography, vol. 1: 1893-1949Stuart Schram, ed., Mao's Road to Power, vol. 3: From the Jinggangshan to the Establishment of the Jiangxi Soviets, July 1927-December 1930David Apter and Tony Saich, Revolutionary Discourse in Mao's RepublicTony Saich, The Rise to Power of the Chinese Communist PartyMichael Heinrich, Karl Marx and the Birth of Modern Society: The Life of Marx and the Development of His WorkSome names from this episode:Zhou Enlai, head of the Organization Department of the Central CommitteeXiang Zhongfa, General secretary of the CPGuo Fengming, bandit turned Guomindang local despot in ChangtingLiu Shiyi, Guomindang commanderYe Ting, Communist military leaderHe Long, Communist military leaderSupport the Show.

Looking at what Mao and Zhu De did to install a new Communist order after conquering Changting.Further reading:Pang Xianzhi and Jin Chongji, Mao Zedong: A Biography, vol. 1: 1893-1949Agnes Smedley, The Great Road: The Life and Times of Chu Teh [Zhu De]Stuart Schram, ed., Mao's Road to Power, vol. 3: From the Jinggangshan to the Establishment of the Jiangxi Soviets, July 1927-December 1930Mao Zedong, “On New Democracy”Some names from this episode:Guo Fengming, bandit turned Guomindang local despot in ChangtingFeng Yuxiang, warlord close to both the USA and the Soviet UnionWang Jingwei, leader of the Guomindang leftDai Jitao, Guomindang ideologueYan Xishan, warlord accused by Mao of being a running dog for the Japanese imperialistsSupport the show

Zhou Enlai planned in secret the details of the Chinese Communist's escape from the encirclement of the Central Soviet. He identified a Guangdong warlord who preferred to save his troops rather than fight the Red Army.The First Red Army was able to pass through a number of blockhouses, before reaching the last of Chiang Kai-shek's fortifications near the Xiang River and suffering major casualties. They lost their heavy weapons and almost half their troops at that battle.Then the Red Army moved quickly and often at night on The Long March. They reached northern Guizhou, close to the base of the Second Red Army, and rested.At the Zunyi Conference, the 28 Bolsheviks lost their previous influence over the Communist Party of China and Mao Zedong began his rise to power. Mobile and guerilla warfare again became military policy.The destination for the Long March changed at this point and instead of staying in Guizhou, the First Red Army tried to cross north into Sichuan. Faced with defensive resistance and at risk of annihilation, the First Red Army crossed the Chishui River four times. They escaped destruction, but now chose to move west and then north through Yunnan. They reached western, rather than eastern Sichuan.The Long Marchers faced Snowy Mountains and a treacherous bog.The First Red Army finally met up with the leader of the Fourth Red Army, Zhang Guotao, but couldn't reach agreement on a destination. Zhang preferred that they all settle around Sichuan, where he already had built a base and had the strongest Red Army.Mao preferred to continue travelling to northern Shaanxi. His column arrived there in late 1935 and in 1936, moved within northern Shaanxi to Yenan.It is said they crossed 18 mountain ranges and 24 rivers to reach there. Early on, Mao saw the Long March's myth-making potential and used it to turn this military retreat into a story of the Communists trip through the wilderness to a new land. It was symbolic of the journey from the old China to the new promised China.Zhang Guotao's column was soon defeated and, having lost his military strength, Zhang also lost power in the Communist Party and after a trial and self-criticism, went over to the Guomindang.Chiang Kai-shek might have allowed the Communists to retreat westward in order to follow them and take greater control over autonomous provinces like Guangxi and Sichuan. Because of the Long March, he was able to influence Sichuan for the first time and later made its then city of Chongqing his capital during World War II.The Communist Party leadership survived because of the Long March, but most ordinary soldiers did not. Mao's wife gave birth painfully along the way. Of the approximately 80,000 troops who left the Central Soviet, only about 7,000 arrived in northern Shaanxi, and that was with recruitment along the way. Yet much had changed, including greater autonomy of the Chinese Communists from Moscow.Please let me know what you think of the podcast here !Image: "Map of the Long March 1934-1935-en" by Chinese_civil_war_map_03.jpg: User:Guimard derivative work: Rowanwindwhistler (talk) is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

How the Fourth Red Army spent their time in Donggu, and how they took the first city in the new base area in the Jiangxi-Fujian border region.Further reading:Pang Xianzhi and Jin Chongji, Mao Zedong: A Biography, vol. 1: 1893-1949Agnes Smedley, The Great Road: The Life and Times of Chu Teh [Zhu De]Joseph Fewsmith, Forging Leninism in China: Mao and the Remaking of the Chinese Communist Party, 1927–1934Gao Hua, How the Red Sun Rose: The Origins and Development of the Yan'an Rectification Movement, 1930-1945Stephen Averill, “The Origins of the Futian Incident”Some names from this episode:Xiao Ke, an officer in the Fourth Red ArmyPeng Pai, Communist peasant organizerLong Chaoqing, important early Communist in Jinggangshan areaPeng Dehuai, Leader of the 5th Red ArmyGuo Fengming, Bandit turned Guomindang local despot in ChangtingSupport the show

Chiang Kai-shek used strong-armed tactics to fundraise for his army and government. Kidnapping, ransoms and execution were part of his tactics. He allied with the Green Gang of Shanghai, as did the French authorities.Shanghai businessmen were kidnapped and held for ransom unless they bought Nanjing's bonds during the Northern Expedition.T.V. Soong found a better way to sell Chinese bonds. He increased the interest rate. He also abolished the likin system in areas under Nationalist control, gained control over Chinese tariffs and negotiated the return of some Boxer Indemnity funds. But he made Japan his enemy and annoyed Chiang by pushing back against the constant demands for more money for the KMT's armies. He was forced out in favour of his brother-in-law H.H. Kung, who understood his job as Finance Minister was to provide Chiang with money for the military regardless of the cost.Deng Yanda and the Provisional Action Committee of the Guomindang offered an alternative to Chiang's leadership. It sought mass appeal by organizing students, peasants and workers. It also gained supporters who had graduated from the Whampoa Military Academy. An insurrection was planned and Commander Chen Cheng appeared ready to bring Deng to power. But instead he was arrested and executed.This was the final straw for Song Qingling, the widow of Sun Yat-sen and sister of T.V. Soong. She had already supported the USSR when it invaded Manchuria in a dispute over the China Eastern Railway. Now she asked a Comintern representative to join the Communist Party. They preferred her to be outside the party, criticizing the Nationalists as a disgruntled ex-KMT member. But she received secret agent training and was loyal to the Communist Party of China until her death, when she was rewarded with a party membership on her deathbed.Please let me know what you think of my recent podcast changes here !Image: "File:Teng-Jan-dah - (Deng Yanda ) 1927.jpg" by Chinarail2 is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

After the Northern Expedition, the Guomindang (KMT) ejected Communists from the Nationalist Party. The Communist Party of China had no army.Zhou Enlai had inserted Communists into the Nationalists' Army and the Nanchang Uprising was a coup planned to carve a Red Army out from the Guomindang's troops. It succeeded and they briefly formed a Revolutionary Committee in Nanchang and He Long took command. They retreated before Zhang Fakui could attack them.While Moscow hoped they would march south and support the Canton Commune, instead they headed south east to Shantou, along the coast. The hoped for resupply ship from Russia never arrived and the Red Army troops were scattered.Zhu De, future Commander-in-Chief of the People's Liberation Army, survived by assuming a fake name and briefly joining the Nationalist Army again and pretending to be loyal. Then he and his troops escaped north and formed Soviets and burned villages under orders of the Communist Party. He then joined forces with Mao Zedong.Mao had already been in the Ridge of Wells area along with the remainder of troops from the unsuccessful Autumn Hills Uprising. Mao had joined forces with bandits and then taken over those gangs and absorbed them. His forces were raiding and looting from "the rich", which included farmers with a few hens.Mao and Zhu and 3000 troops then moved in 1929 before Chiang Kai-shek's troops could capture them. These early days for the Red Army and for Mao's leadership in the countryside held plenty of lessons. They were surviving and learning.Please let me know what you think of my recent podcast changes here !Image: "People's Liberation Army" by Kent Wang is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Nationalists' Northern Expedition began with doubts by their Communist allies.But it was a military success and quickly Henan and then Hebei provinces were captured. Mikhail Borodin then wanted the armies to move north along the Hankou-Beijing railway line. Instead, Chiang Kai-shek (Jiang Jieshi) preferred to follow the Yangzi River downstream and take the rich provinces controlled by the warlord Sun Chuanfang. That was slower going and the new KMT administration in Wuhan was threatening Chiang's funding and role as Commander-in-Chief.Chiang supported a purge of Communists in his territories and the crackdown on Communism in Shanghai and other cities caused a split in the Guomindang. Two rival capitals and governments were set up. One in Wuhan was allied with the Communists and Soviets. Chiang's in Nanjing was anti-Communist.Warlords joined in and the Manchurian General had Li Dazhao killed when the Soviet Embassy was raided. Zhou Enlai barely escaped Shanghai.The Wuhan administration pushed the military campaign north towards Beijing while trying to stop the peasants from "excesses" in the countryside. Then Wuhan and the Soviet's ally, the Christian Warlord Feng Yuxiang, turned on the Communists and insisted that the Wuhan government purge itself of Communists. The first United Front was over and the split in the Guomindang ended. The crackdown on Communists and the social revolution intensified.Chiang and his allies were then able to push north and capture Beijing. The Northern Expedition had been a military success. The Nationalists had achieved their long held goal of forming a national government.Mao Zedong was a survivor of the anti-communist violence and led a small group of rebels in the countryside. They would need to relocate to a mountain hideout. Mao learned a few things during the Northern Expedition. "Political power is obtained from the barrel of the gun." He also realized that taking land from independent cultivators who neither paid rent nor received rent, was a mistake. They were the "swing voters" of the rural revolution. By 1928, he realized he needed those middle peasants as allies.Chiang Kai-shek had won the battles of the Northern Expedition. But would he win the peace?Image: "Chiang Kai-shek in 1927" by quinet is licensed under CC BY 2.0.Please share your advice and make the podcast even better here ! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Mao and the Fourth Red Army break the encirclement of the Jinggangshan and retreat across southern Jiangxi with the Guomindang in hot pursuit.Link to map of Jiangxi province: https://www.chinamaps.org/china/provincemaps/jiangxi-province-map.htmlFurther reading/watching on the difficulties of finding good maps of China:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restrictions_on_geographic_data_in_Chinahttps://www.reddit.com/r/Maps/comments/b6qnvc/just_blew_my_mind_every_map_of_china_is/https://www.reddit.com/r/China/comments/7pju2c/why_is_google_maps_coverage_of_china_slightly_off/Further reading:Stuart Schram, ed., Mao's Road to Power, vol. 3: From the Jinggangshan to the Establishment of the Jiangxi Soviets, July 1927-December 1930Pang Xianzhi and Jin Chongji, Mao Zedong: A Biography, vol. 1: 1893-1949Agnes Smedley, The Great Road: The Life and Times of Chu Teh [Zhu De]Stuart Schram, ed., Mao's Road to Power, vol. 4: The Rise and Fall of the Chinese Soviet Republic, 1931-1934Some names from this episode:Chen Yi, Political commissar for the 28th regiment of the Fourth Red ArmyLin Biao, Battalion commander in the 28th regimentWu Ruolan, Communist cadre and Zhu De's wifeSupport the show

Our third (and last) close look at Bukharin's speech at the 6th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party, held in Moscow in the summer of 1928.Further reading:Nikolai Bukharin, “On the International Situation and the Tasks of the Chinese Communist Party”Lenin, “Speech at the First All-Russia Congress of Working Women”Some names from this episode:Nikolai Bukharin, general secretary of the executive committee of the CominternPeng Dehuai, Guomindang colonel who was secretly a Communist and who launched an uprising in July 1928Support the show

Bukharin articulates a vision of the Chinese Revolution at the 6th Party Congress which is highly colored by the non-revolutionary Marxism of the 2nd International.Further reading:Nikolai Bukharin, “On the International Situation and the Tasks of the Chinese Communist Party”Andre Gunder Frank, World Accumulation, 1492–1789Immanuel Wallerstein, The Modern World-System, vol. I: Capitalist Agriculture and the Origins of the European World-Economy in the Sixteenth Century Mao Zedong, “The Chinese Revolution and the Chinese Communist Party”Vladimir Lenin, “Two Tactics of Social-Democracy in the Democratic Revolution”Vladimir Lenin, “Once Again on The Trade Unions: The Current Situation and the Mistakes of Trotsky and Bukharin”Hung Hsueh-ping, “The Essence of ‘Theory of Productive Forces' is to oppose Proletarian Revolution”Some names from this episode:Nikolai Bukharin, general secretary of the executive committee of the CominternChen Duxiu, Co-founder and first general secretary of the Communist PartyMikhail Borodin, Comintern agent and head of Soviet mission to aid the Guomindang during the period of the first united frontSupport the show

Potentially explosive guidance arrives in the Jinggangshan from the 6th Party Congress of the Communist Party, and plans are laid to break out of the enemy encirclement.Further reading:Stephen Averill, Revolution in the Highlands: China's Jinggangshan Base AreaStuart Schram, ed., Mao's Road to Power, vol. 3: From the Jinggangshan to the Establishment of the Jiangxi Soviets, July 1927-December 1930Pang Xianzhi and Jin Chongji, Mao Zedong: A Biography, vol. 1: 1893-1949Tony Saich, The Rise to Power of the Chinese Communist PartyMao Zedong, “Combat Liberalism”Some names from this episode:Peng Dehuai, Guomindang colonel who was secretly a Communist and who launched an uprising in July 1928Wang Zuo, Bandit leader who joined with Mao ZedongYuan Wencai, Bandit leader who joined with Mao ZedongWang Shouhua, President of the General Labor UnionChen Yi, Political commissar for the 28th regiment of the Fourth Red ArmyLong Chaoqing, secretary of the Ninggang County Committee of the Communist PartyWang Huai, secretary of the Yongxin County Committee of the Communist PartyHe Changgong, important Fourth Red Army cadreSupport the show

The national Guomindang center takes note of the Communists' resilience, and takes charge of organizing a new suppression campaign, which is preceded by a tight economic blockade. Peng Dehuai makes his way to the Jinggangshan.Further reading:Stephen Averill, Revolution in the Highlands: China's Jinggangshan Base AreaStuart Schram, ed., Mao's Road to Power, vol. 3: From the Jinggangshan to the Establishment of the Jiangxi Soviets, July 1927-December 1930Pang Xianzhi and Jin Chongji, Mao Zedong: A Biography, vol. 1: 1893-1949Mao Zedong, “The Struggle in the Chingkang Mountains”Edward Dreyer, China at War: 1901-1949James Sheridan, China in Disintegration: The Republican Era in Chinese History, 1912-1949Agnes Smedley, The Great Road: The Life and Times of Chu Teh [Zhu De]Peng Dehuai, Memoirs of a Chinese MarshallSome names from this episode:Chen Yi, Political commissar for the 28th regiment of the Fourth Red ArmyWang Zuo, Bandit leader who joined with Mao ZedongHe Zizhen, Communist cadre known as the “Two-Gunned Girl General”Peng Dehuai, Guomindang colonel who was secretly a Communist and who launched an uprising in July 1928Teng Daiyuan, Fifth Red Army leading cadreHe Changgong, important Fourth Red Army cadreSupport the show

La Longue Marche joue un rôle essentiel dans l'histoire du parti communiste chinois et l'affirmation de l'autorité de Mao Zedong. Ce long périple à travers la Chine dure environ un an, entre octobre 1934 et octobre 1935.Cet épisode s'inscrit dans la guerre civile qui, de 1927 à 1950, oppose les communistes chinois à l'armée du Guomindang, fondé par Sun Yat-sen, le fondateur de la République chinoise, et dirigé, depuis 1925, par Tchang-Kaï-chek.En 1934, les troupes du Guomindang attaquent les communistes dans leur bastion principal, le Jiangxi, dans le centre du pays. Même si la décision ne fait pas l'unanimité, les troupes communistes, fortes d'environ 130.000 hommes, décident de fuir.Elles s'échappent donc vers l'ouest et le nord-ouest, divisées en trois colonnes principales. C'est à cette occasion que s'est affirmé l'ascendant de Mao sur l'armée et les autres dirigeants du parti.La principale formation, forte d'environ 90.000 hommes, et dans laquelle se trouve Mao, se dirige d'abord vers l'ouest. Elle atteint la province du Guizhou à la mi-janvier 1935.Dès lors, les avis divergent sur la conduite à tenir et la direction à prendre. C'est à ce moment-là, semble-t-il, que Mao, par la rigueur de son raisonnement, s'impose comme le chef incontesté des communistes.C'est lui qui convainc ses hommes de se diriger vers le nord. Dès lors commence une marche éreintante, dans des régions arides ou enneigées. En outre, les communistes doivent faire face aux nationalistes de Tchang-KaI-chek, qui les poursuivent et, du haut de leurs avions, mitraillent leurs colonnes.Ajoutée aux combats, aux rigueurs du climat et à la maladie, la fatigue a souvent raison de ces hommes exténués. Les historiens estiment que la Longue Marche aurait coûté la vie à 90.000 ou même 100.000 hommes.En février 1935, la colonne de Mao, élu entretemps chef du parti communiste, rencontre celle d'un autre dirigeant, qui emmène ses hommes vers l'ouest. Se dirigeant toujours vers le nord, Mao arrive au Shanxi, terme du voyage, le 19 octobre 1935, après une odyssée de 12.000 kilomètres. Hébergé par Acast. Visitez acast.com/privacy pour plus d'informations.

La Longue Marche joue un rôle essentiel dans l'histoire du parti communiste chinois et l'affirmation de l'autorité de Mao Zedong. Ce long périple à travers la Chine dure environ un an, entre octobre 1934 et octobre 1935. Cet épisode s'inscrit dans la guerre civile qui, de 1927 à 1950, oppose les communistes chinois à l'armée du Guomindang, fondé par Sun Yat-sen, le fondateur de la République chinoise, et dirigé, depuis 1925, par Tchang-Kaï-chek. En 1934, les troupes du Guomindang attaquent les communistes dans leur bastion principal, le Jiangxi, dans le centre du pays. Même si la décision ne fait pas l'unanimité, les troupes communistes, fortes d'environ 130.000 hommes, décident de fuir. Elles s'échappent donc vers l'ouest et le nord-ouest, divisées en trois colonnes principales. C'est à cette occasion que s'est affirmé l'ascendant de Mao sur l'armée et les autres dirigeants du parti. La principale formation, forte d'environ 90.000 hommes, et dans laquelle se trouve Mao, se dirige d'abord vers l'ouest. Elle atteint la province du Guizhou à la mi-janvier 1935. Dès lors, les avis divergent sur la conduite à tenir et la direction à prendre. C'est à ce moment-là, semble-t-il, que Mao, par la rigueur de son raisonnement, s'impose comme le chef incontesté des communistes. C'est lui qui convainc ses hommes de se diriger vers le nord. Dès lors commence une marche éreintante, dans des régions arides ou enneigées. En outre, les communistes doivent faire face aux nationalistes de Tchang-KaI-chek, qui les poursuivent et, du haut de leurs avions, mitraillent leurs colonnes. Ajoutée aux combats, aux rigueurs du climat et à la maladie, la fatigue a souvent raison de ces hommes exténués. Les historiens estiment que la Longue Marche aurait coûté la vie à 90.000 ou même 100.000 hommes. En février 1935, la colonne de Mao, élu entretemps chef du parti communiste, rencontre celle d'un autre dirigeant, qui emmène ses hommes vers l'ouest. Se dirigeant toujours vers le nord, Mao arrive au Shanxi, terme du voyage, le 19 octobre 1935, après une odyssée de 12.000 kilomètres. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

After the war, earnest efforts were made to form a coalition government with the Guomindang and the communists.  When that failed the civil war between the two rekindled. The roughly three-year extension of the civil war saw the collapse of the Nanjing government and the Nationalists' control of China. Eventually leading to in 1949, the inauguration of the Peoples Republic of China, by the communists, and the Nationalists' flight to Taiwan.    

India Policy Watch #1: Futility Of Fighting Lies Insights on burning policy issues in India— RSJI have been following the case of Mohammed Zubair, the co-founder of the fact-checking site Alt News with interest. He was granted interim bail by the Supreme Court a couple of weeks back. You can read more about the story here. I border on free speech absolutism, so my opinion on this case, as with many other similar cases in India, is simple. No one should be jailed for any speech unless they are violating Mill’s harm principle. In his essay On Liberty, Mill wrote:“That principle is, that the sole end for which mankind is warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant.”But free speech is not the only reason I have brought up the case of Mohammed Zubair here. The case illustrates a point I have made before in this newsletter: while countering lies with fact checks is a noble, worthwhile endeavour, it means nothing in an environment where people are intoxicated with half-truths and grand illusions about a ‘real’ past or an ‘imagined’ future.A few years back, I came across this wonderful essay ‘Monopolize the Pretty Lies’ by Bryan Caplan. While I understood it back then, reading it again now is insightful. Caplan writes:What then is the primary purpose of censorship?  It’s not to suppress the truth – which has little mass appeal anyway.  The primary purpose of censorship is to monopolize the pretty lies.  Only the powers-that-be can freely make absurdly self-aggrandizing claims. Human beings like to say – and think – whatever superficially sounds good.  Strict censorship allows rulers to exploit this deep mental flaw.  If no one else can make absurd lies, a trite slogan like, “Let’s unite to fight for a fantastic future!” carries great force.  Truthful critics would have to make crowd-displeasing objections like, “Maybe competition will bring us a brighter future than unity,” “Who exactly are we fighting?,” or “Precisely how fantastic of a future are we talking about?”  A rather flaccid bid for power!  Existing rulers tremble far more when rebels bellow, “Join us to fight for a fantastic future!”This is why I think this case won’t go anywhere. It will fizzle out here because fact-checkers don’t really matter. What will matter is if there is a counter-narrative based on dubious claims of an equally fantastic future. It explains why AAP is seen as a credible threat by the BJP.Caplan ends his essay with a rather pessimistic view of free speech:Doesn’t this imply that free speech is overrated?  Yes; I’ve said so before.  While I’d like to believe that free speech leads naturally to the triumph of truth, I see little sign of this.  Instead, politics looks to me like a Great Liars’ War.  Viable politicians defy literal truth in virtually every sentence.  They defy it with hyperbole.  They defy it with overconfidence.  They defy it with wishful thinking.  Dictators try to make One Big Political Lie mandatory.  Free speech lets a Thousand Political Lies Bloom.Yes, freedom of speech lets me make these dour observations without fear. I’m grateful for that.  Yet outside my Bubble, dour observations fall on deaf ears.  Psychologically normal humans crave pretty lies, so the Great Liars’ War never ends.I guess once you’ve gotten into the chakravyuha of the Mahabharata of lies, there’s no way of getting out. You will only find an avalanche of prettier lies from all sides engulfing you in future. India Policy Watch #2: Nature Of Representation Insights on burning policy issues in India— RSJDroupadi Murmu, the NDA presidential nominee, was elected as the 15th President of India a couple of weeks back. Murmu, a tribal leader from Mayurbhanj, Odisha, had earlier served as the governor of Jharkhand. That a woman from a historically marginalised section of the society now occupies the highest constitutional post is a moment to celebrate in the 75th year of Indian independence. It shows a kind of deepening of democracy. This is because we associate democracy with representation. It was no surprise therefore that a lot of opinion pieces reflected this sentiment while talking about her. Here’s Aditi Narayani Paswan writing for the Indian Express:“Droupadi Murmu is not just a source of inspiration for us; her life and struggle, determination and success in the face of great odds represent the hope and promise of New India.Under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Indian democracy has become more representative and inclusive. The BJP represents the New India of prosperity, equality and socio-economic mobility, reflecting the true embodiment of samajik samarasta (social harmony). A tribal woman succeeding a Dalit to the highest constitutional post of the nation is a remarkable testimony to the deepening roots of Indian democracy.”And here’s a piece in Outlook:“What is really significant for us to understand here is that Murmu’s victory is not merely the victory of a specific party to power. Rather its implications can be drawn deep down to the very philosophy of what India as an independent nation has been striving to practically achieve. Whether or not her victory can bring goals of that philosophy to fruition is a matter of time to tell. But at the moment, from the point of view of a modern, multicultural, multi-ethnic nation-state, Murmu’s victory is the victory of representation.”Origin StorySince we are all talking about the victory of representation, I thought it would be useful to go deeper into the idea itself. What does representation mean in a democracy? How useful is it? Does an increasing emphasis on identity in society mean a greater opportunity for democracies to be truly representative? Is there such a thing as too much representation? To understand this, we will go back to the modern conception of the state and, therefore, to Hobbes. There are good reasons to go back to ancient history and the Roman republic or the Roman empire while talking about representation. But the political theory of the time concerned itself with the question of who was fit to rule us from among the people who should be ruling us. It didn’t answer the question of how we find who was fit to rule us. The process didn’t matter much then. So, we start with Hobbes again. This is a familiar territory for this newsletter so forgive me for going over it again. For Hobbes, human life in the state of nature is ‘solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short’. We would be a ‘fractious multitude’ forever at war with each other for scarce resources because there would be no powerful force to keep us in order. The solution, Hobbes wrote, was for people to come together to form a pact, let’s call it the ‘commonwealth’, where they voluntarily give up some of their freedoms to a powerful entity called the ‘sovereign’ in exchange for protection against the violence that’s inevitable in the state of nature. So that’s how the State worked. There were the multitudes, a notion of the commonwealth, and then there was the sovereign. The sovereign was all-powerful but ruled because of the legitimacy of the commonwealth. If the sovereign itself became brutish, the multitudes might dismantle the commonwealth and look for another. Hobbes didn’t care much about how to search for the sovereign. It could be through a parliament, or it could be a monarch; it didn’t matter so long as it had absolute power to maintain order which was in turn voluntarily offered to them by the people. The enlightenment thinkers who followed Hobbes concerned themselves with two big ideas. One was individual liberty and how it should be protected and championed in the face of a powerful sovereign. The other was the separation of the ‘church’ from the State or how to ensure the sovereign doesn’t bow down to another power in the name of God. The revolutions and political reforms in the late 18th century Europe and North America were a result of the excesses of the sovereign and the propagation of these ideas within those societies. The primacy of individual liberty, the weakening of monarchy and the separation of the church led to the evolution of the modern, representative democracy where the people chose who would lead them. The people would be sovereign through the mode of representation. A system of checks and balances between the legislature, executive and judiciary would limit the concentration of power in any one person. This became the democratic model to emulate. The Problem Of RepresentationThe problem of representation wasn’t too difficult to solve in the early days of democracy. There was no universal suffrage, people lived in villages over generations, their representatives knew their issues well, and the people chose someone who presented the best option to address their concerns. There was very little information asymmetry. This model started fraying with increasing industrialisation and deepening of capitalism leading to greater social and geographic mobility. Cities with diverse populations, new professions, break down of the feudal structure in the countryside and universal suffrage followed. This meant it was difficult for any representative to know their people as well as before. Even the people couldn’t keep pace with all the information around them. Like Walter Lippman would write, there was a world outside, and there was a picture of it inside our heads. We make our decisions based on this picture which is a second-hand view of the world because we cannot see all of the world. Because of this, we search for an authentic messenger who can explain the real world to us. The elites use the media to present themselves as the authentic messengers and shape public opinion. It is this elite then who influence representation for the public. Once this model got established, we saw the elites dominate representation in democracies for most of the 20th century. This wheel turned in the last decade when the excesses of the financial system, the concentration of the benefits of globalisation, the proliferation of media and greater disparity in opportunities led to a populist backlash against the elites.The Three NarrativesThere are now three competing narratives on representation today. The first is the old Burkean point on the role of a representative of people. His speech to the electors of Bristol in 1774 is a classic on the role of a representative:“Certainly, gentlemen, it ought to be the happiness and glory of a representative to live in the strictest union, the closest correspondence, and the most unreserved communication with his constituents. Their wishes ought to have great weight with him; their opinion, high respect; their business, unremitted attention. It is his duty to sacrifice his repose, his pleasures, his satisfactions, to theirs; and above all, ever, and in all cases, to prefer their interest to his own. But his unbiased opinion, his mature judgment, his enlightened conscience, he ought not to sacrifice to you, to any man, or to any set of men living. These he does not derive from your pleasure; no, nor from the law and the constitution. They are a trust from Providence, for the abuse of which he is deeply answerable. Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion.”This is the model of an independent representative with a mind of his own. They work with autonomy using their judgment to do what they think is best for their people.The second narrative is about the representative being either an expert or who will rely on experts for finding the best answers to the concerns of the public. This narrative strengthens when a nation is in crisis because of a war, economic failure or an emergency (health or environment, for instance). These don’t last long, and an expert eventually falls out of favour unless they reinvent themselves. The last narrative is that of a representative who is like you and me, the proverbial US politician who you could have a chat with over a beer. This is the literal interpretation of representation where fealty to someone is drawn because of how closely they resemble us. In a world where every expertise can be questioned, where independent thinking is viewed with suspicion, and tribal loyalty is the highest virtue, this literal view of representation is the strongest. Of course, this isn’t to say that these narratives of representation cannot come together in the shape of a single person who could satisfy all of them. But that looks increasingly rare around the world these days. What’s easier is for a representative to fashion themselves in closer affiliation to a particular identity among the people and use that to come to power. Over-indexing on any one of these narratives and choosing representatives on that basis is bad for democracy. It weakens the state. It is something we must keep in mind while celebrating representation.  Matsyanyaaya: A New East Asian TransitionBig fish eating small fish = Foreign Policy in action— Pranay KotasthaneThis week’s news was dominated by the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan. If you weren’t sleeping under a rock, you would have already read many views, claims, blames, and counter-claims around this event. Here’s another one, but from an Indian realist perspective.The dominant narrative sees this visit as another episode of the ongoing US-China great power rivalry. In this narrative, Taiwan by itself, is secondary. All that matters is to place the blame either on China or the US for the escalations. One framing is that this visit was unnecessary, provocative, and irresponsible. The argument goes that the US has worsened the security situation of China’s neighbours by inviting the latter’s aggression. The opposite framing suggests that the blame rests solely on China’s expansionist tendencies over the last five years. China’s response of activating a military response ahead of the upcoming 20th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party only shows what this event is really about.Both frames of the dominant narrative are missing a crucial element: the choices of the Taiwanese people. The great power rivalry framing often ignores that other nation-states also have the agency to make their sovereign choices, even if doing so sometimes involves playing one great power against another. Ukraine’s case is similar. Some people blame NATO’s expansion on Russia’s borders, while others point out that an invasion has no justification (I share this view). But we forget that most Ukrainians themselves want to move away from Russia and get closer to the West. Any final analysis needs to take this factor into account. My colleague Nitin Pai made a critical argument in early March: ““NATO/EU shouldn’t have expanded” is an insult to the agency of countries that have willingly exercised their choice to join. Accepting their sovereign decisions is also realism. Pretty silly to call yourself a ‘realist’ while pretending sovereign states don’t exist/lack agency.”So is the case with Taiwan. Some analysts are stuck in the old times, believing that Taiwan is China’s “internal issue”. They haven’t been paying enough attention to Taiwan’s domestic polity. The Taiwanese “nation”—the imagined community in Benedict Anderson’s conception— has been carefully constructed over the last few years. Democracy, freedom, and deep connections with the broader world are key foundations of Taiwanese nationalism. This kind of nationalism is antithetical to the mainland’s nationalism. The two consecutive electoral victories of the ruling party—Tsai Ing-wen’s DPP—is a sign that this Taiwanese identity has taken shape. The DPP defeated the grand old Guomindang, a party that has been soft on China. This is what Taiwan’s foreign minister, Joseph Wu said in a BBC interview a couple of days ago:"We want to maintain the status quo, which is that Taiwan has no jurisdiction over mainland China and the People's Republic of China (CCP) has no jurisdiction over Taiwan. That is the reality… On the index of freedom Taiwan is ranked number one, on economic freedom Taiwan is also at the top. Taiwanese people enjoy democracy, freedom and the value of human rights, that put Taiwan in the democratic world…. We have the will and the capability. We need other countries to provide Taiwan with defensive articles, but defending Taiwan is our responsibility, we are not asking other countries to sacrifice their lives to protect Taiwan."Read the lines again. They are definitely not about a small internal issue or a minor historical, ideological tussle. What About Pelosi’s VisitHaving understood the categorical shift in Taiwan’s politics, we can better understand Ms Pelosi’s visit. The Taiwanese government knew what they were getting into. Taiwan orchestrated the visit precisely to clarify to the world that its differences with China are irreconcilable. Even the Guomindang came out in support of the visit. Having been under the threat of a mainland invasion for over 73 years, the Taiwanese know China’s intentions and actions better than most others.The visit, by itself, was just symbolic. It didn’t involve a leader from the Biden administration. Moreover, both Pelosi and the Biden administration made it clear that they are not reversing the “One China” principle. It was China that raised the stakes. China could’ve opted to let it pass by with a strong statement alone. But it chose to ratchet tensions, hoping that this tried-and-tested strategy would stare down Taiwan.But that was not to be. Taiwan and Pelosi called China’s bluff. And when that happened, China began conducting massive military drills, fired missiles and withdrew from important dialogue forums with the US. All this in response to just a symbolic visit by a legislators’ group! Just like the unsportsmanlike kid who walks away with his bat, ball and wickets after being adjudged out. (I know I’m breaking my injunction against anthropomorphising international relations.)How Should We in India Process This?Thus far, we have opted for our favourite position of taking a stance by not taking a stance. Foreign ministers of the US, Australia, and Japan jointly condemned China’s launch of missiles. The fourth Quad member was conspicuous by its absence.From an Indian perspective, Taiwan standing up to China’s expansionism is encouraging. India is familiar with China’s tantrums over visits by foreign diplomats. On every occasion a US Ambassador to India visits Arunachal Pradesh, the Chinese government gets riled up. Pelosi’s visit should be seen in the same context. China’s unreasonable demands and the disproportionate escalation when the demands aren’t heeded, deserve strong criticism short of any change in the “One China” formulation. At the same time, India should close the long-pending free-trade agreement with Taiwan. Its strategic value far outweighs the benefits of haggling over import duties.These words from Joseph Wu serve as a useful reminder to India and Indians:“Look at their[China’s] behaviour over Hong Kong, or claiming the East China Sea and the South China Sea. It is the typical expansionism of an authoritarian state.. Countries in this region need to watch out for what China is trying to do. Taiwan is not going to be the last piece in Chinese dream of expansionism.”Want to find out more about India and Taiwan? Start with this Puliyabaazi episode we recorded with Sana Hashmi, an Indian scholar of East Asian international relations (it’s in Hinglish). Earlier this year, Sana also anchored a comprehensive policy report analysing the India-Taiwan partnership for the Taiwan Asia Exchange Foundation. The report has twenty chapters on various facets of the relationship. I have co-written a chapter on semiconductors, while my colleague Shambhavi has a chapter on bilateral cooperation to tackle future pandemics. Finally, my colleagues have analysed a few cross-strait scenarios from an Indian national interest perspective in an excellent Takshashila Intelligence Estimate. Course Advertisement: Admissions for the Sept 2022 cohort of Takshashila’s Graduate Certificate in Public Policy programme are now open! Visit this link to apply.HomeWorkReading and listening recommendations on public policy matters[Blog] If you are interested in the semiconductor angle in the Taiwan-PRC tensions, we have a post on it in our High-tech Geopolitics newsletter. [Book] Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China by Ezra Vogel is necessary reading to understand China better. [Tweet thread] Common mistakes we make in pronouncing Chinese names. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit publicpolicy.substack.com

The 29th Regiment goes against Mao's orders and decides to stay in Hunan, with disastrous results for the Communists.Further reading:Stephen Averill, Revolution in the Highlands: China's Jinggangshan Base AreaAgnes Smedley, The Great Road: The Life and Times of Chu Teh [Zhu De]Jurgen Domes, Peng Te-huai: The Man and the ImageStuart Schram, ed., Mao's Road to Power, vol. 3: From the Jinggangshan to the Establishment of the Jiangxi Soviets, July 1927-December 1930Pang Xianzhi and Jin Chongji, Mao Zedong: A Biography, vol. 1: 1893-1949Some names from this episode:Wang Zuo, Bandit leader who joined with Mao ZedongYuan Wencai, Bandit leader who joined with Mao ZedongHu Shaohai, Commander of the 29th regiment of the 4th Red ArmyDu Xiujing, Inspector sent to the Jinggangshan by the Hunan Provincial Committee in May 1928 and who returned in JuneFan Shisheng, Guomindang general and old friend of Zhu DeYuan Chongquan, 28th Regiment battalion commander who mutiniedYuan Desheng, Representative of the Hunan Provincial CommitteePeng Dehuai, Guomindang colonel who was secretly a Communist and who launched an uprising in July 1928Support the show

Mao explains his refusal to comply with orders from the Hunan Provincial Committee.Further reading:Stephen Averill, Revolution in the Highlands: China's Jinggangshan Base AreaStuart Schram, ed., Mao's Road to Power, vol. 3: From the Jinggangshan to the Establishment of the Jiangxi Soviets, July 1927-December 1930Pang Xianzhi and Jin Chongji, Mao Zedong: A Biography, vol. 1: 1893-1949Some names from this episode:Du Xiujing, Inspector sent to the Jinggangshan by the Hunan Provincial Committee in May 1928 and who returned in JuneYuan Desheng, Representative of the Hunan Provincial Committee in the JinggangshanYang Chisheng, Guomindang commander defeated by the Communists in June 1928Wang Zuo, Bandit leader who joined with Mao ZedongYuan Wencai, Bandit leader who joined with Mao ZedongWang Jun, Guomindang military commander in JiangxiShang Chengjie, Guomindang military commander in HunanXu Kexiang, Guomindang military commander in HunanWu Shang, Guomindang military commander in HunanSupport the show

The new National government in Nanjing begins.  For most of its existence it was led by Chiang Kai-Shek and his Guomindang cadre.  Many parts of China were united for the first time since 1916.  It was an uneasy unity facing many challenges both immediately and in the future. Chiang Kai-Shek would eventually emerge as an autocratic, powerful, and dynamic leader.  He would face great challenges.  Some of those were economic and political as well as from Japan, warlords, and the Chinese Communist Party.

There were many reasons for the Peking (Beiyang) government's failure.  Its fecklessness led to the organization and planning of the massive nationalist campaign in China in the 1920s. Its goal was to unify China and expel or neutralize foreign intrusion and interference.  Russia ironically played a large role. Through the merger of the Guomindang Nationalists and the Communists, the government in Peking was cast out.  Chiang Kai-Shek emerges during this period as a key leader.  He led the Nationalists in the Northern Expedition to establish a new government in Nanjing in 1928. Later he expelled the Communists from the new government and the Guomindang. 

Spring of 1912, and Yuan Shikai is the first president of the Republic of China.  He was given considerable powers, and quickly moved to consolidate it. The newly elected legislative assemblies, both national and provincial, were new political concepts to China.  Whether or not any of this new concept would work depended on many factors and time.   The Nationalists, or Guomindang, were the dominant political party.  They soon, however, found themselves in dispute against the president, Yuan Shikai.  By 1914, he had dissolved the national and local legislatures.  In 1916, he sought to appoint himself an emperor.  That was quickly abandoned after strong and determined opposition. By 1915, world war was consuming the world's attention. China declared her neutrality.  She had her own issues dealing with Japanese aggression in China.

The roughly forty-year period, between the fall of the imperial Qing Dynasty to the inauguration of the People's Republic of China, is a complex, confusing, and ambiguous era in the history of China.  The era is defined by powerful and violent foreign influence in China and intense and violent Chinese nationalism. I begin this episode near the end of the Qing Dynasty and the ushering in of its replacement the Republic of China in 1912.   The early key protagonists in this story are Yuan Shikai and Dr. Sun Yat Sen.  It was a portentous and unclear beginning for the new Republic.

I am joined for my interview with Edward Tyerman by Ed Pulford, another host on our channel. Together, we discuss Edward's new book, Internationalist Aesthetics: China and Early Soviet Culture (Columbia University Press, 2021). Internationalist Aesthetics examines how knowledge of China is produced in the early Soviet period through the aesthetic idiom of internationalism. Tyerman shows how artist intellectuals, especially Sergei Tretyakov, the book's protagonist, make China affectively sensible for Russian audiences. Each chapter takes on a separate medium: travelogue, stage, film, and “bio-narrative,” to think through how Soviet aesthetes negotiate old and new forms to demystify China, a nation that even in the revolutionary environment of 1920s Russia, was still understood through recourse to orientalist tropes. The book ultimately spans a very short period, a slither of the 1920s, a moment of opportunity before the Guomindang's persecution of the communists in China in 1927 and a moment of aesthetic possibility before the purges of the 1930s in Russia. Join us in our conversation about how a certain mode of “Chinese studies” emerges in the media aesthetics of this turbulent period. Julia Keblinska is a Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Center for Historical Research at the Ohio State University specializing in Chinese media history and comparative socialisms. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

I am joined for my interview with Edward Tyerman by Ed Pulford, another host on our channel. Together, we discuss Edward's new book, Internationalist Aesthetics: China and Early Soviet Culture (Columbia University Press, 2021). Internationalist Aesthetics examines how knowledge of China is produced in the early Soviet period through the aesthetic idiom of internationalism. Tyerman shows how artist intellectuals, especially Sergei Tretyakov, the book's protagonist, make China affectively sensible for Russian audiences. Each chapter takes on a separate medium: travelogue, stage, film, and “bio-narrative,” to think through how Soviet aesthetes negotiate old and new forms to demystify China, a nation that even in the revolutionary environment of 1920s Russia, was still understood through recourse to orientalist tropes. The book ultimately spans a very short period, a slither of the 1920s, a moment of opportunity before the Guomindang's persecution of the communists in China in 1927 and a moment of aesthetic possibility before the purges of the 1930s in Russia. Join us in our conversation about how a certain mode of “Chinese studies” emerges in the media aesthetics of this turbulent period. Julia Keblinska is a Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Center for Historical Research at the Ohio State University specializing in Chinese media history and comparative socialisms. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/history

I am joined for my interview with Edward Tyerman by Ed Pulford, another host on our channel. Together, we discuss Edward's new book, Internationalist Aesthetics: China and Early Soviet Culture (Columbia University Press, 2021). Internationalist Aesthetics examines how knowledge of China is produced in the early Soviet period through the aesthetic idiom of internationalism. Tyerman shows how artist intellectuals, especially Sergei Tretyakov, the book's protagonist, make China affectively sensible for Russian audiences. Each chapter takes on a separate medium: travelogue, stage, film, and “bio-narrative,” to think through how Soviet aesthetes negotiate old and new forms to demystify China, a nation that even in the revolutionary environment of 1920s Russia, was still understood through recourse to orientalist tropes. The book ultimately spans a very short period, a slither of the 1920s, a moment of opportunity before the Guomindang's persecution of the communists in China in 1927 and a moment of aesthetic possibility before the purges of the 1930s in Russia. Join us in our conversation about how a certain mode of “Chinese studies” emerges in the media aesthetics of this turbulent period. Julia Keblinska is a Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Center for Historical Research at the Ohio State University specializing in Chinese media history and comparative socialisms. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/east-asian-studies

I am joined for my interview with Edward Tyerman by Ed Pulford, another host on our channel. Together, we discuss Edward's new book, Internationalist Aesthetics: China and Early Soviet Culture (Columbia University Press, 2021). Internationalist Aesthetics examines how knowledge of China is produced in the early Soviet period through the aesthetic idiom of internationalism. Tyerman shows how artist intellectuals, especially Sergei Tretyakov, the book's protagonist, make China affectively sensible for Russian audiences. Each chapter takes on a separate medium: travelogue, stage, film, and “bio-narrative,” to think through how Soviet aesthetes negotiate old and new forms to demystify China, a nation that even in the revolutionary environment of 1920s Russia, was still understood through recourse to orientalist tropes. The book ultimately spans a very short period, a slither of the 1920s, a moment of opportunity before the Guomindang's persecution of the communists in China in 1927 and a moment of aesthetic possibility before the purges of the 1930s in Russia. Join us in our conversation about how a certain mode of “Chinese studies” emerges in the media aesthetics of this turbulent period. Julia Keblinska is a Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Center for Historical Research at the Ohio State University specializing in Chinese media history and comparative socialisms. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/film

I am joined for my interview with Edward Tyerman by Ed Pulford, another host on our channel. Together, we discuss Edward's new book, Internationalist Aesthetics: China and Early Soviet Culture (Columbia University Press, 2021). Internationalist Aesthetics examines how knowledge of China is produced in the early Soviet period through the aesthetic idiom of internationalism. Tyerman shows how artist intellectuals, especially Sergei Tretyakov, the book's protagonist, make China affectively sensible for Russian audiences. Each chapter takes on a separate medium: travelogue, stage, film, and “bio-narrative,” to think through how Soviet aesthetes negotiate old and new forms to demystify China, a nation that even in the revolutionary environment of 1920s Russia, was still understood through recourse to orientalist tropes. The book ultimately spans a very short period, a slither of the 1920s, a moment of opportunity before the Guomindang's persecution of the communists in China in 1927 and a moment of aesthetic possibility before the purges of the 1930s in Russia. Join us in our conversation about how a certain mode of “Chinese studies” emerges in the media aesthetics of this turbulent period. Julia Keblinska is a Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Center for Historical Research at the Ohio State University specializing in Chinese media history and comparative socialisms. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/performing-arts

I am joined for my interview with Edward Tyerman by Ed Pulford, another host on our channel. Together, we discuss Edward's new book, Internationalist Aesthetics: China and Early Soviet Culture (Columbia University Press, 2021). Internationalist Aesthetics examines how knowledge of China is produced in the early Soviet period through the aesthetic idiom of internationalism. Tyerman shows how artist intellectuals, especially Sergei Tretyakov, the book's protagonist, make China affectively sensible for Russian audiences. Each chapter takes on a separate medium: travelogue, stage, film, and “bio-narrative,” to think through how Soviet aesthetes negotiate old and new forms to demystify China, a nation that even in the revolutionary environment of 1920s Russia, was still understood through recourse to orientalist tropes. The book ultimately spans a very short period, a slither of the 1920s, a moment of opportunity before the Guomindang's persecution of the communists in China in 1927 and a moment of aesthetic possibility before the purges of the 1930s in Russia. Join us in our conversation about how a certain mode of “Chinese studies” emerges in the media aesthetics of this turbulent period. Julia Keblinska is a Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Center for Historical Research at the Ohio State University specializing in Chinese media history and comparative socialisms. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/russian-studies

I am joined for my interview with Edward Tyerman by Ed Pulford, another host on our channel. Together, we discuss Edward's new book, Internationalist Aesthetics: China and Early Soviet Culture (Columbia University Press, 2021). Internationalist Aesthetics examines how knowledge of China is produced in the early Soviet period through the aesthetic idiom of internationalism. Tyerman shows how artist intellectuals, especially Sergei Tretyakov, the book's protagonist, make China affectively sensible for Russian audiences. Each chapter takes on a separate medium: travelogue, stage, film, and “bio-narrative,” to think through how Soviet aesthetes negotiate old and new forms to demystify China, a nation that even in the revolutionary environment of 1920s Russia, was still understood through recourse to orientalist tropes. The book ultimately spans a very short period, a slither of the 1920s, a moment of opportunity before the Guomindang's persecution of the communists in China in 1927 and a moment of aesthetic possibility before the purges of the 1930s in Russia. Join us in our conversation about how a certain mode of “Chinese studies” emerges in the media aesthetics of this turbulent period. Julia Keblinska is a Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Center for Historical Research at the Ohio State University specializing in Chinese media history and comparative socialisms. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/chinese-studies

I am joined for my interview with Edward Tyerman by Ed Pulford, another host on our channel. Together, we discuss Edward's new book, Internationalist Aesthetics: China and Early Soviet Culture (Columbia University Press, 2021). Internationalist Aesthetics examines how knowledge of China is produced in the early Soviet period through the aesthetic idiom of internationalism. Tyerman shows how artist intellectuals, especially Sergei Tretyakov, the book's protagonist, make China affectively sensible for Russian audiences. Each chapter takes on a separate medium: travelogue, stage, film, and “bio-narrative,” to think through how Soviet aesthetes negotiate old and new forms to demystify China, a nation that even in the revolutionary environment of 1920s Russia, was still understood through recourse to orientalist tropes. The book ultimately spans a very short period, a slither of the 1920s, a moment of opportunity before the Guomindang's persecution of the communists in China in 1927 and a moment of aesthetic possibility before the purges of the 1930s in Russia. Join us in our conversation about how a certain mode of “Chinese studies” emerges in the media aesthetics of this turbulent period. Julia Keblinska is a Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Center for Historical Research at the Ohio State University specializing in Chinese media history and comparative socialisms. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/art

I am joined for my interview with Edward Tyerman by Ed Pulford, another host on our channel. Together, we discuss Edward's new book, Internationalist Aesthetics: China and Early Soviet Culture (Columbia University Press, 2021). Internationalist Aesthetics examines how knowledge of China is produced in the early Soviet period through the aesthetic idiom of internationalism. Tyerman shows how artist intellectuals, especially Sergei Tretyakov, the book's protagonist, make China affectively sensible for Russian audiences. Each chapter takes on a separate medium: travelogue, stage, film, and “bio-narrative,” to think through how Soviet aesthetes negotiate old and new forms to demystify China, a nation that even in the revolutionary environment of 1920s Russia, was still understood through recourse to orientalist tropes. The book ultimately spans a very short period, a slither of the 1920s, a moment of opportunity before the Guomindang's persecution of the communists in China in 1927 and a moment of aesthetic possibility before the purges of the 1930s in Russia. Join us in our conversation about how a certain mode of “Chinese studies” emerges in the media aesthetics of this turbulent period. Julia Keblinska is a Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Center for Historical Research at the Ohio State University specializing in Chinese media history and comparative socialisms.

Mao Zedong and Zhu De learn warfare through warfare as they face continuing onslaughts from Guomindang forces.Further reading/watching:Stephen Averill, Revolution in the Highlands: China's Jinggangshan Base AreaPang Xianzhi and Jin Chongji, Mao Zedong: A Biography, vol. 1: 1893-1949China: A Century of Revolution documentaryCommunist Party of Nepal (Maoist), “Experiences of the People's Warand Some Important Questions”Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), “Advance in the Great Direction of Creating Base Areas!”Mao Zedong, “Problems of Strategy in China's Revolutionary War”Name from this episode:Sunzi [Sun Tzu], Ancient Chinese generalSupport the show (https://www.paypal.com/donate?hosted_button_id=DACDMMMEASJVJ)

We look at the successful conquest of three cities (and one heart) by Zhu De during the course of the uprising he led in south Hunan at the beginning of 1928.The link for my new course on academia.edu mentioned at the end of the episode:www.academia.edu/learn/MatthewRothwellFurther reading:Agnes Smedley, The Great Road: The Life and Times of Chu Teh [Zhu De]Marcia Ristaino, China's Art of Revolution: The Mobilization of Discontent, 1927 and 1928Stephen Averill, Revolution in the Highlands: China's Jinggangshan Base AreaPang Xianzhi and Jin Chongji, Mao Zedong: A Biography, vol. 1: 1893-1949Stuart Schram, ed., Mao's Road to Power, vol. 3: From the Jinggangshan to the Establishment of the Jiangxi Soviets, July 1927-December 1930Christina Gilmartin, Engendering the Chinese Revolution: Radical Women, Communist Politics, and Mass Movements in the 1920sSome names from this episode:Zhu De, Communist military commanderHu Shaohai, Communist from YizhangFan Shisheng, Guomindang general and old friend of Zhu DeXu Kexiang, Notorious Guomindang general known as the Peasant ButchererTang Shengzhi, leader of Guomindang Left military forcesChen Yi, Communist from a scholarly family and staff officer of Zhu DeWu Ruolan, Married Zhu De in LeiyangHe Zizhen, Communist cadre known as the “Two-Gunned Girl General”He Zhihua, Mother of Zhu De's daughterLuo Yinong, Communist leader killed after He Zhihua informed on himSupport the show (https://www.paypal.com/donate?hosted_button_id=DACDMMMEASJVJ)

The last major armed uprising of 1927, in which the Communists temporarily took over Guangzhou.Further reading:Arif Dirlik, “Narrativizing Revolution: The Guangzhou Uprising (11-13 December 1927) in Workers' Perspective”Marcia Ristaino, China's Art of Revolution: The Mobilization of Discontent, 1927 and 1928Hsiao Tso-Liang, “Chinese Communism and the Canton Soviet of 1927”Lenin, “Advice of an Onlooker”Some names from this episode:Zhang Tailei, secretary of the Guangdong Provincial Committee of the Communist PartyYe Ting, Communist military leaderHe Long, Communist military leaderHeinz Neumann, German Comintern agentZhang Fakui, Guomindang militarist who seized Guangzhou on November 17, 1927Xu Xiangqian, Communist military officer, played leading role in Guangzhou UprisingDeng Zhongxia, Communist labor leaderHuang Ping, One of the organizers of the Guangzhou uprisingQu Qiubai, top leader of Communist Party beginning in the summer of 1927Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/donate?hosted_button_id=DACDMMMEASJVJ)

Some background on the situation in Guangzhou leading up to the uprising.Further reading:Arif Dirlik, “Narrativizing Revolution: The Guangzhou Uprising (11-13 December 1927) in Workers' Perspective”Marcia Ristaino, China's Art of Revolution: The Mobilization of Discontent, 1927 and 1928Hsiao Tso-Liang, “Chinese Communism and the Canton Soviet of 1927”Manuel Gomez, “Organize for Liberation of the Colonies: Canton Center of World Movement”Some names from this episode:Wang Jingwei, leader of the Guomindang LeftLi Jishen, Guomindang militarist allied with Wang JingweiZhang Fakui, Guomindang militarist who launched a coup in Guangzhou in November 1927Zhang Tailei, secretary of the Guangdong Provincial Committee of the Communist PartyLiu Ersong, the chairman of the Workers' Delegates ConferencePeng Pai, Communist peasant leaderZhou Enlai, leading CommunistLi Chai-sum, Guomindang generalSupport the show (https://www.paypal.com/donate?hosted_button_id=DACDMMMEASJVJ)

THÉMATIQUE : TAÏWANValérie Niquet, chercheuse à la Fondation pour la recherche stratégique, spécialiste de la Chine et de l'Asie du Sud-Est. Elle a consacré de nombreux ouvrages à la doctrine stratégique chinoise et au Japon.Taïwan, officiellement « République de Chine » depuis 1945, représentait 23,6 millions d'habitants et un PIB de 585 milliards d'euros en 2020 selon la Banque Mondiale. Son niveau de vie est le quinzième plus élevé au monde. Son territoire s'étend sur environ 35.000 km2. Il est composé de l'île de Taïwan, située à 180 km du continent et de petits archipels. Depuis 1949, cet ensemble insulaire est revendiqué par la République populaire de Chine après que les nationalistes du Guomindang s'y sont réfugiés à la suite de leur défaite face aux communistes et Pékin considère Taïwan comme sa 23e province. La Chine continentale poursuit une politique de mise à l'écart de Taiwan du jeu diplomatique, depuis qu'en1971, dans le cadre de son rapprochement avec les États-Unis, le régime communiste a remplacé l'ancienne Formose à la représentation de la Chine à l'ONU. Depuis, les États reconnaissant la légitimité de Taipei sont de moins en moins nombreux. Ils ne sont aujourd'hui que 14, même si la plupart des pays entretiennent des relations avec le gouvernement taïwanais. Après le règne autoritaire de Tchang Kaï-check jusqu'à sa mort en 1975, le pays a connu sa première alternance politique en 2000. Depuis 2016, il est dirigé par le Parti démocrate progressiste, favorable à l'indépendance de l'île, tout en étant soucieux de limiter les tensions avec Pékin. Les études d'opinion montrent que la population est de plus en plus acquise à l'indépendance, notamment les jeunes. Taïwan fait office de modèle de société libérale avancée dans le sud-est asiatique, par exemple en étant le premier pays d'Asie à autoriser le mariage entre personnes de même sexe. Avec 3,11% de croissance en 2020, Taïwan a été relativement peu impactée par la crise économique grâce à une politique sanitaire saluée dans le monde entier et un plan de soutien à l'économie. Sur fond de rivalité sino-américaine, la compétitivité de son économie a été renforcée comme l'illustre le secteur des semi-conducteurs dont Taïwan est le leader mondial, créant de fortes dépendances mondiales vis-à-vis de son industrie.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

A TORCH Book at Lunchtime webinar on ‘China's Good War: How World War II is Shaping a New Nationalism' by Professor Rana Mitter. Book at Lunchtime is a series of bite-sized book discussions held weekly during term-time, with commentators from a range of disciplines. The events are free to attend and open to all. About the book: For most of its history, the People's Republic of China limited public discussion of the war against Japan. It was an experience of victimization - and one that saw Mao Zedong and Chiang Kai-shek fighting for the same goals. But now, as China grows more powerful, the meaning of the war is changing. Professor Rana Mitter argues that China's reassessment of the World War II years is central to its newfound confidence abroad and to mounting nationalism at home. China's Good War begins with the academics who shepherded the once-taboo subject into wider discourse. Encouraged by reforms under Deng Xiaoping, they researched the Guomindang war effort, collaboration with the Japanese, and China's role in forming the post-1945 global order. But interest in the war would not stay confined to scholarly journals. Today public sites of memory—including museums, movies and television shows, street art, popular writing, and social media—define the war as a founding myth for an ascendant China. Wartime China emerges as victor rather than victim. The shifting story has nurtured a number of new views. One rehabilitates Chiang Kai-shek's war efforts, minimizing the bloody conflicts between him and Mao and aiming to heal the wounds of the Cultural Revolution. Another narrative positions Beijing as creator and protector of the international order that emerged from the war—an order, China argues, under threat today largely from the United States. China's radical reassessment of its collective memory of the war has created a new foundation for a people destined to shape the world. Speakers: Professor Rana Mitter is Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China at the University of Oxford. His books include China's War with Japan: The Struggle for Survival, 1937-1945 (Penguin, 2013), [US title: Forgotten Ally] which won the 2014 RUSI/Duke of Westminster's Medal for Military Literature, and was named a Book of the Year in the Financial Times and Economist, and China's Good War: How World War II is Shaping a New Nationalism (Harvard, 2020). His recent documentary on contemporary Chinese politics "Meanwhile in Beijing" is available on BBC Sounds. He is a regular presenter of BBC Radio 3's Free Thinking/BBC Arts and Ideas Podcast. Professor David Priestland is Professor of Modern History at St Edmund's College Oxford. His research specialises in communism and market liberalism, especially in the communist and post-communist worlds. His publications include a comparative history of communism, The Red Flag: Communism and the Making of the Modern World, and Merchant, Soldier, Sage: A New History of Power, a study of the history of market liberalism and its place in global history. Professor Vivienne Shue is Professor Emeritus of Contemporary China Studies and Emeritus Fellow of St Anthony's College Oxford. Her current research examines certain distinctively 21st century Chinese governance techniques and practices, including high-tech national development planning. Her publications include The Reach of the State: Sketches of the Chinese Body Politic, and most recently To Govern China, co-edited with Professor Patricia Thornton. She is the former director of Oxford's Contemporary China Studies Programme.

A TORCH Book at Lunchtime webinar on ‘China's Good War: How World War II is Shaping a New Nationalism' by Professor Rana Mitter. Book at Lunchtime is a series of bite-sized book discussions held weekly during term-time, with commentators from a range of disciplines. The events are free to attend and open to all. About the book: For most of its history, the People's Republic of China limited public discussion of the war against Japan. It was an experience of victimization - and one that saw Mao Zedong and Chiang Kai-shek fighting for the same goals. But now, as China grows more powerful, the meaning of the war is changing. Professor Rana Mitter argues that China's reassessment of the World War II years is central to its newfound confidence abroad and to mounting nationalism at home. China's Good War begins with the academics who shepherded the once-taboo subject into wider discourse. Encouraged by reforms under Deng Xiaoping, they researched the Guomindang war effort, collaboration with the Japanese, and China's role in forming the post-1945 global order. But interest in the war would not stay confined to scholarly journals. Today public sites of memory—including museums, movies and television shows, street art, popular writing, and social media—define the war as a founding myth for an ascendant China. Wartime China emerges as victor rather than victim. The shifting story has nurtured a number of new views. One rehabilitates Chiang Kai-shek's war efforts, minimizing the bloody conflicts between him and Mao and aiming to heal the wounds of the Cultural Revolution. Another narrative positions Beijing as creator and protector of the international order that emerged from the war—an order, China argues, under threat today largely from the United States. China's radical reassessment of its collective memory of the war has created a new foundation for a people destined to shape the world. Speakers: Professor Rana Mitter is Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China at the University of Oxford. His books include China's War with Japan: The Struggle for Survival, 1937-1945 (Penguin, 2013), [US title: Forgotten Ally] which won the 2014 RUSI/Duke of Westminster's Medal for Military Literature, and was named a Book of the Year in the Financial Times and Economist, and China's Good War: How World War II is Shaping a New Nationalism (Harvard, 2020). His recent documentary on contemporary Chinese politics "Meanwhile in Beijing" is available on BBC Sounds. He is a regular presenter of BBC Radio 3's Free Thinking/BBC Arts and Ideas Podcast. Professor David Priestland is Professor of Modern History at St Edmund's College Oxford. His research specialises in communism and market liberalism, especially in the communist and post-communist worlds. His publications include a comparative history of communism, The Red Flag: Communism and the Making of the Modern World, and Merchant, Soldier, Sage: A New History of Power, a study of the history of market liberalism and its place in global history. Professor Vivienne Shue is Professor Emeritus of Contemporary China Studies and Emeritus Fellow of St Anthony's College Oxford. Her current research examines certain distinctively 21st century Chinese governance techniques and practices, including high-tech national development planning. Her publications include The Reach of the State: Sketches of the Chinese Body Politic, and most recently To Govern China, co-edited with Professor Patricia Thornton. She is the former director of Oxford's Contemporary China Studies Programme.

The first days of Mao Zedong’s long career of armed struggle.Further reading:Marcia Ristaino, China’s Art of Revolution: The Mobilization of Discontent, 1927 and 1928Roy Hofheinz, “The Autumn Harvest Insurrection”Pang Xianzhi and Jin Chongji, Mao Zedong: A Biography, vol. 1: 1893-1949C. Martin Wilbur, The Nationalist Revolution in China, 1923-1928Elizabeth Perry, Anyuan: Mining China’s Revolutionary TraditionSome names from this episode:Lu Deming, Leader of the Lu Deming RegimentZhang Fakui, Guomindang general close to Wang JingweiQu Qiubai, Named head of new provisional politburo at August 7, 1927 Emergency ConferenceZhang Guotao, Leading Communist Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/donate?hosted_button_id=DACDMMMEASJVJ)

The new policy of mass uprisings against the Guomindang is decided upon, and Mao’s comments at the meeting stand out for their epistemology.Further reading:Marcia Ristaino, China’s Art of Revolution: The Mobilization of Discontent, 1927 and 1928C. Martin Wilbur, The Nationalist Revolution in China, 1923-1928Tony Saich, The Rise to Power of the Chinese Communist PartyStuart Schram, ed., Mao’s Road to Power, vol. 3: From the Jinggangshan to the Establishment of the Jiangxi Soviets, July 1927-December 1930Some names from this episode:Chen Duxiu, Communist general secretary until July 12, 1927Zhou Enlai, Member of temporary standing committee of Communist Politburo appointed in July 1927Zhang Guotao, Member of temporary standing committee of Communist Politburo appointed in July 1927Li Lisan, Member of temporary standing committee of Communist Politburo appointed in July 1927Qu Qiubai, Named head of new provisional politburo at August 7, 1927 Emergency ConferenceXia Xi, Named to the South Hunan special committee responsible for the Autumn Harvest UprisingGuo Liang, Named to the South Hunan special committee responsible for the Autumn Harvest UprisingRen Zuoxuan, Named to the South Hunan special committee responsible for the Autumn Harvest UprisingMikhail Borodin, Comintern agent and head of Soviet mission to aid the GuomindangBesso Lominadze, New Comintern head in China starting in July 1927Li Dazhao, Co-founder of the Chinese Communist PartyWang Jingwei, Leader of the Guomindang LeftSupport the show (https://www.paypal.com/donate?hosted_button_id=DACDMMMEASJVJ)

Publisher: Harvard University Press, 2020 Chinese leaders once tried to suppress memories of their nation's brutal experience during World War II. Now they celebrate the "victory"--a key foundation of China's rising nationalism. For most of its history, the People's Republic of China limited public discussion of the war against Japan. It was an experience of victimization--and one that saw Mao Zedong and Chiang Kai-shek fighting for the same goals. But now, as China grows more powerful, the meaning of the war is changing. Rana Mitter argues that China's reassessment of the World War II years is central to its newfound confidence abroad and to mounting nationalism at home. China's Good War begins with the academics who shepherded the once-taboo subject into wider discourse. Encouraged by reforms under Deng Xiaoping, they researched the Guomindang war effort, collaboration with the Japanese, and China's role in forming the post-1945 global order. But interest in the war would not stay confined to scholarly journals. Today public sites of memory--including museums, movies and television shows, street art, popular writing, and social media--define the war as a founding myth for an ascendant China. Wartime China emerges as victor rather than victim. The shifting story has nurtured a number of new views. One rehabilitates Chiang Kai-shek's war efforts, minimizing the bloody conflicts between him and Mao and aiming to heal the wounds of the Cultural Revolution. Another narrative positions Beijing as creator and protector of the international order that emerged from the war--an order, China argues, under threat today largely from the United States. China's radical reassessment of its collective memory of the war has created a new foundation for a people destined to shape the world. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/pbliving/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/pbliving/support