To the workers, peasants, and Red Army soldiers of all Soviet areas across the country: To the workers, peasants, and revolutionary soldiers in the White Areas: Exactly two years have passed since the First All-China Congress of Soviets. These two years have been marked by imperialist powers’ frenzied intensification of their attacks against the Soviet Union and the Chinese revolution; by the Kuomintang’s most brutal massacres and sieges directed at the Soviet regions; by the Kuomintang’s shameless capitulation to Japan and its wholesale betrayal of China to all imperialist forces. At the same time, they have also been years in which the Chinese workers, peasants, and Red Army, under the correct leadership of the Central Soviet Government, achieved glorious and momentous victories through arduous struggle. During these two years, we have greatly consolidated and strengthened the Soviet power, amassing an immensely rich store of invaluable experience. In order to centralize our leadership over the nationwide Soviet movement, to further advance and consolidate Soviet power, and to summarize the experiences of the past two years, the Central Soviet Government has specially decided to convene the First All-China Congress of Soviets on the sixtieth anniversary of the Guangzhou Uprising—November 10, 1933—in Ruijin, the “Red Capital.”

Over the past two years, the crisis facing the Chinese nation has deepened ever further. Imperialism’s intensified aggression and the Kuomintang’s escalating treason have resulted in hundreds of thousands of square miles of territory and tens of millions of people in Northeast China, Rehe, and the Beiping–Tianjin region falling entirely under the iron heel of Japanese imperialism. Today, the imperialist partition of China, facilitated by the Kuomintang’s consistent policy of surrender and betrayal, is accelerating rapidly. The tragic fate of reducing China to a complete colony now hangs over the entire Chinese people.

During these two years, the total collapse of China’s national economy has grown even more profound. Mass bankruptcies have swept through the national industries, rural economies have reached their final ruin, and widespread floods, droughts, and famines have ravaged the whole country. The vast majority of workers and peasants have been driven onto the path of unemployment, starvation, and death. Meanwhile, the exploitation by the Kuomintang warlords has only intensified: in Sichuan, the local warlord authorities have already collected taxes and grain levies up to the year 1971, while the number of oppressive miscellaneous taxes and levies has swelled to over 1,700. Landlords and gentry throughout the country are subjecting the peasantry to ever more savage exploitation, and capitalists are increasingly pressing their offensive against the working class. The incessant conflicts and civil wars among the Kuomintang warlords have further hastened the economic collapse. The suffering of workers and peasants nationwide has reached an indescribable level, yet they continue to endure.

Now, revolutionary flames are burning in every corner of the country, as courageous struggles against imperialism and the Kuomintang unfold—from demonstrations and strikes to uprisings, guerrilla warfare, and large-scale revolutionary war. Moreover, the great victories won by the Chinese workers, peasants, and Red Army over the past year, together with the tremendous expansion of the Soviet areas and the Red Army’s rapid growth from tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of troops, have become the most powerful lever driving the development of the Chinese revolutionary situation. Before the Chinese people lies a choice between two paths: the colonial road of imperialist Kuomintang rule, and the Soviet road! Under imperialist Kuomintang domination, China can only be reduced to a full-fledged imperialist colony; whereas under Soviet power, imperialist forces have been completely overthrown.

The Central Soviet Government, representing the revolutionary masses of the entire country, has formally declared war on Japan. On one hand, it leads the valiant Red Army in vigorously waging the national revolutionary war, toppling those Kuomintang warlords who obstruct the Red Army’s northward advance to resist Japan. On the other hand, it has repeatedly called upon all armed forces in the White Areas to cease their attacks on the Soviet regions and to conclude anti-Japanese combat agreements with the Red Army.

Under imperialist Kuomintang rule, workers, peasants, and soldiers are subjected to cruel exploitation and oppression by the gentry, landlords, the bourgeoisie, and the Kuomintang warlords, leading to destitution, hunger, and death. However, under Soviet power, the feudal and semi-feudal exploitation practiced by the gentry and landlords has been completely abolished. Working peasants and Red Army soldiers have received land allocations, the working class enjoys legal protection, and the Soviet economic construction is advancing vigorously, significantly improving the living standards of workers and peasants.  Under imperialist Kuomintang rule, workers and peasants are constantly arrested, imprisoned, and slaughtered; any freedom of speech, assembly, or belief—especially anti-imperialist and anti-Japanese expression—is utterly denied, and political power is concentrated entirely in the hands of a small clique of landlords and capitalists. In contrast, under Soviet power, workers and peasants have attained full political freedom, while the exploiting classes—capitalists, landlords, and rich peasants—are deprived of their political rights. For the first time in Chinese history, workers and peasants are governing their own state; they have become the ruling class, with the working class serving as the leading force. All of this clearly demonstrates that the Soviet path is the only way to save China. The victory of the Soviet revolution represents the triumph of the entire people over imperialism and the landlord-bourgeoisie in China. It is precisely for this reason that, under the direct command and organization of imperialism, the Kuomintang and all counter-revolutionary political factions have mobilized their full strength to launch desperate offensives against the Soviet areas and the Red Army. Although our brave Red Army has decisively defeated the enemy’s eleven, thirteen, and fourteen encirclement campaigns, the imperialist Kuomintang, in a last-ditch effort, is actively preparing a fifth, even more brutal and large-scale encirclement campaign, aiming to utterly annihilate the Soviet system and the Red Army. This latest encirclement campaign by the imperialist Kuomintang constitutes a necessary and crucial step toward realizing its goal of turning China into a colony. Therefore, all the people of China must unite their efforts to crush this encirclement and fight for the victory of a Soviet-led China.

The Central Soviet Government of China calls upon all working-class, peasant, and revolutionary soldier comrades: Rise up against imperialist aggression and Kuomintang treachery! Oppose the imperialist Kuomintang’s five encirclement campaigns against the Soviet Red Army! Smash this encirclement, overthrow the landlord-bourgeoisie’s Kuomintang rule, support the First All-China Congress of Soviets, and elect delegates to participate in the congress. Let us struggle together for a Soviet future for China! Relying on the revolutionary zeal of the Chinese people nationwide, and guided by the unwavering leadership of our invincible, heroic Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army and the steadfast proletariat of China, with the Communist Party as its vanguard, victory shall surely be ours! People of all China, rise up and fight for a new, Soviet China! Long live the First All-China Congress of Soviets! Long live the day!