Letter to the Central Committee
(October 14, 1930, at night, in the city of Ji'an)
To the Southern Bureau, for transmission to the Central Committee:
1. I expect you have already received the letter sent on September 17th from
the Front Committee of the First Army Group in Liling to the Central Committee
via the Hunan Provincial Committee and the West Fujian Special Committee,
and the letter sent on September 26th from the Front Committee of the First
Front Army in Anyuan to the Central Committee via the Hunan Provincial
Committee, which recounted the course of the attack on Changsha, together with
our assessment of the situation, and plans for action. On the way from Anyuan to
Yuanzhou, we have conducted a few more discussions regarding problems of the
actions [to be taken], and have once again determined that [the goal of] our
current actions is to seize political power in Jiangxi, to occupy the Nanchang-Jiujiang Railroad and attack Nanchang and Jiujiang, and then to blockade the
Yangzi River, to attack Nanjing on the right, and to guarantee victory in Wuhan
on the left. Just as we were all packed up and about to set out from Yuanzhou,
Comrade Zhou Yili, who had been sent by the Yangzi Bureau, arrived there.
After hearing Comrade Zhou's report, we had another detailed discussion that
resulted once more in the decision to seize political power in Jiangxi. The First
Army Group is to attack and take Ji'an within a very short time, establish the
Soviet Government of Jiangxi Province, recruit new soldiers, procure provisions,
and so on. For its part, the Third Army Group is to occupy the xian seat of
Qingjiang and its vicinity, blockade the Gan River, procure funds, mobilize the
masses, reorganize and replenish its ranks, and so on.
2. The entire First Army Group reached the vicinity of Ji'an on October 3rd,
and before dawn on October 4th, with the collaboration of over 100,000 of the
masses from western Jiangxi Province, it began to attack Ji'an. The forces besieged in the city of Ji'an—Deng Ying's troops, a brigade of Jiangxi Provincial
police, and others—amounting to approximately four brigades, retreated that
same evening under cover of night, and our army broke through the barbed wire
fence that evening and entered the city. As a result, we failed to wipe out the
enemy and capture their arms, and this is most regrettable. Although from a
military point of view, the victory of the Ji'an uprising on this occasion did not
Our source for this letter is Jiangxi dangshi ziliao, Vol. 6, pp. 163-66. No other version
appears to be available.
OCTOBER 1930 553
lead to the destruction of the main force of the enemy army or to the capture of a
large quantity of guns (we did, however, seize over a hundred guns in the river),
from a political point of view the achievements were nevertheless not inconsiderable. The victory of the Ji'an uprising undoubtedly marks the final destruction
of rule by the despotic gentry, the warlords, and the Guomindang in southwest
Jiangxi, the completion of a local uprising in southwest Jiangxi, the beginning of
initial victory in the whole of Jiangxi Province, and an excellent occasion for the
bold expansion of the Red Army. The first day we entered the city, the Revolutionary Committee of Chinese Workers and Peasants put up posters promulgating the significance of the victory of the Ji'an uprising. As regards the tasks of
the revolutionary masses in Jiangxi Province, more than ten provisional regulations were promulgated by the Southwest Jiangxi Soviet Government (the content is to call upon the masses to eliminate the reactionaries and so on). The
Southwest Jiangxi Soviet Government also issued regulations for the enforcement of martial law. Plans to pursue the retreating enemy were also immediately
discussed, and troops were sent out immediately to pursue the enemy along the
two routes of the Jishui and the Xiajiang. As for procuring funds, the Financial
Administration Committee of the Southwest Jiangxi Soviet Government was put
in charge. Positions were filled equally by personnel from the General Political
Department of the First Front Army and personnel from the local governments.
The method employed for procurement is that, based on investigation by the
Financial Administration Committee, stores with assets in excess of 2000 yuan
are enlisted for contribution, the amount based on their progressive taxes (those
with assets of less than 2000 yuan are exempt). The total amount of the procurement will be over 600,000 yuan (however, it cannot all be collected quickly, and
to date, only 240,000 yuan have been received). Regarding the elimination of the
reactionaries, relatively comprehensive work has been done this time, and no
reactionaries hanging around in the town of Ji'an have been able to flee, although they haven't all been completely rooted out so far. Now we are still
actively mobilizing urban workers to carry out this task.
3. As for the establishment of the Soviet Government of Jiangxi Province, the
General Front Committee convened an enlarged session of the Southwest Jiangxi
Special Committee to decide on a list of names, which was then approved by a mass
meeting. There were fifty-three nominees in all, including local revolutionary leaders
as well as those from the Red Army, and leaders of the Ji'an workers (relatively few
leaders of the workers of Jingdezhen and Jiujiang, and revolutionary leaders
from Northeast Jiangxi are included, for we are less familiar with them). The
Provincial Soviet was already established on October 7th, and various resolutions were passed by the meeting, including the following: (1) Launch attacks
on Nanchang and Jiujiang, (2) Enlarge the Red Army to 1,000,000. (3) Resolutely oppose the rich peasants, and guarantee the success of land redistribution.
The following documents were issued: (1) A letter to the Soviet Union. (2) A
letter to the proletariat of the whole world. (3) A letter to the revolutionary

masses of the whole country about striving for the victory of the revolution
throughout the country. Moreover, in response to instructions in the letter of
August 29th from the Central Committee for us to issue a proclamation to those
outside [the Party], the Government issued another proclamation, announcing its
establishment, and proclaiming thirteen articles of its political program. We are
sending a clean copy of each of these documents upward [to the Central Committee]. Please let us know your directives. (Note:¹ only the letter regarding
resolutely launching attacks on Nanchang and Jiujiang and the proposal to all
revolutionary masses in the country to strive for the nationwide victory of the
revolution were received.)
4. As for the arrangement of the work in the province after the Ji'an uprising,
the Jiangxi Provincial Action Committee, made up of Comrade Li Wenlin and
12 other people, set up at an enlarged session convened by the General Front
Committee, with the participation of local Party branches, will deal with this. It
has been decided to establish West Jiangxi, South Jiangxi, East Jiangxi, Northeast Jiangxi, and Northwest Jiangxi action committees. The Provincial Action
Committee and the Provincial Soviet will advance northward with the army. In
addition to the action committee within the Party in west Jiangxi, a west Jiangxi
office of the Provincial Soviet has also been set up to direct the work in Jiangxi.
For the purpose of rooting out residual counterrevolutionary forces, continuing to
recruit new soldiers, and so on, about 200 additional people have been organized
to go northward to carry out this work, and to cooperate with the Red Army in its
uprising.
5. Recently the entire Party in southwest Jiangxi has been showing signs of a
very serious crisis. The entire Party leadership is dominated by the rich peasants'
line, and the slogan about transforming the consciousness of the peasants is
being exploited by the rich peasants and landlords to oppose the poor peasants
and farm laborers, or even to undermine the trend of equal land distribution in
southwest Jiangxi. A large number of AB Corps members have been found in the
organs of the Special Committees of both the Party and the Youth League, the
Soviet Government of southwest Jiangxi, and the Red Army School respectively.
A majority of the leading organs at all levels, both internal and external, are
leading organs filled with AB Corps members and rich peasants. Thus, the equal
distribution of land means merely "taking from the plentiful to make up for the
scarce," but not "taking from the fat to make up for the lean."² As a result, the
rich peasants have obtained good land, and the farm laborers and poor peasants
remain oppressed. So the land is being redistributed once again, to serve the

1. In the Chinese text, this note is attributed to xin ("heart"). We do not know whether
this is a code word for the Central Committee, the Yangzi Bureau, or some other editor.
2. As indicated above, in a note to the land law of August 1930, Mao himself had only
very recently discovered this second principle. In February 1930 he had called only for
quantitative redistribution.
OCTOBER 1930 555
interests of the farm laborers and poor peasants, to repress the rich peasants, to
eliminate rich peasant leadership, and to get rid of the AB Corps. Without a basic
transformation of the Party in southwest Jiangxi, this crisis can assuredly not be
overcome. At present the General Front Committee is engaged in planning this
work but, because of obstacles to our action, the task may not be accomplished
very well. The Central Committee must pay careful attention to this matter, and
offer assistance.
6. The Twentieth Army in west Jiangxi has recruited over 3,000 men, with
more than 1,700 guns. Recently, the Twenty-second Army in south Jiangxi has
also developed substantially. We are preparing to have the whole Twentieth
Army work in Ji'an for a short time before advancing northward. The Twentysecond Army will attack Ganzhou, or make arrangements for an uprising in
Ganzhou, and then proceed northward.
7. This time, while we were in Ji'an, we enlisted 8,000 new soldiers. This
reinforcement is far from adequate, and because the local party branches are
carrying out a rich peasant line, the number previously set cannot be achieved.
This problem is extremely serious. After our departure, we left an office in Ji'an
to continue enlisting new soldiers. It is predicted that by the end of this year, at
least twenty independent regiments can be recruited to send to the front. This
plan is closely linked to correct leadership by the Party in southwest Jiangxi.
This goal can be realized only after the Party in southern Jiangxi has undergone a
transformation.
8. We are convinced by experience that the more imminent the decisive
battle between the classes, the more indispensable is preparation in terms of
military technology. Because there was no one to use the radios captured during
the occupation of Changsha by the Third Army Group and during the attacks on
Ji'an by the First Army Group, we have lost numerous opportunities to wipe out
the enemy. In addition, we must request the Central Committee to give us assistance in obtaining military equipment and trained personnel for items such as
guns to shoot to high altitudes (used against airplanes), cannons, poisonous gases
and masks against them, and so on, for only thus can we successfully prepare for
this decisive class war against the imperialists and the Nationalist warlords.
9. The decision of the Politburo of the Central Committee in June and the
letter from the Central Committee to the Front Committee of the Fourth Army
were not received until recently.³ We have discussed them in detail, together
with the political report presented by Comrade Zhou,⁴ and the letter from the

3. The reference is to the resolution of June 11, which constitutes the fullest and most
extreme expression of the Li Lisan Line, and the letter of June 15, 1930, to the Fourth
Army. For summaries of these two documents, see above, the Introduction to this volume.
4. The reference must be to Zhou Enlai's report to the Politburo on August 22 and 24,
1930, immediately after his return from Moscow. For a summary of the report and the
discussion which followed it, see Jin Chongji, Zhou Enlai, pp. 219-20.