Proclamation of the
Provisional Central Government on the
Convening of the Second National Congress
of Soviet Deputies
(August 1, 1933)
Workers, peasants, and Red fighters in all the soviet areas throughout the country:
Workers, peasants, and revolutionary soldiers in the White areas throughout the
country:
From the First National Congress of Soviet Deputies down to the present, it has
already been a full two years. These two years have been two years of
imperialism's wildly intensified attacks on the Soviet Union and on the Chinese
revolution. They have been two years of the most cruel massacres and blockades
by imperialism and the Guomindang against the soviet areas, two years of
shameless Guomindang surrender and selling out of China to the Japanese and to
all the imperialists. Yet they have also been two years of great and glorious
victories obtained through the bitter struggle of the Chinese Workers' and
Peasants' Red Army under the correct leadership of the Soviet Central Government. In these two years of struggle, we have enlarged and consolidated
soviet political power, and we have obtained infinitely rich and precious
experience. In order to bring together our leadership of the soviet movement
throughout all of China, in order to take another step forward in the development and consolidation of soviet political power, and in order to sum up these
two years of soviet experience, the Soviet Central Government has specifically decided to convene the Second National Congress of Soviet Deputies at
the Red capital in Ruijin, on the sixth anniversary of the Guangzhou Uprising
(December 11, 1933).
During the past two years, the crisis of the Chinese nation has become more
and more profound. The intensified imperialist aggression and the increased
selling out of the country by the Guomindang have resulted in several million
This proclamation was first published in Ho11gse 7-ho,ghua, no. 101, August 13,
1933. We have followed this version rather than the reprint in Mao Zed011gji. Vol. 3, PP·
30~. because a few characters are missing from the latter version.

square miles of sovereign territory and several tens of millions of people of the
Three Northeastern Provinces, Rehe, and the Beiping-Tianjin area falling totally
beneath the iron heel of Japanese imperialism. That China has been partitioned
in this way by imperialism today is the result of the consistent surrender and
sell-out by the Guomindang, which has recently intensified. The cruel fate of the
complete colonization of China has enveloped the whole of the Chinese people.
During the past two years, the general collapse of the Chinese national economy has become even more profound. The bankruptcy of a large part of the
national industry, the final collapse of the agricultural economy, and the widespread disasters of flood and drought throughout China have already forced the
great majority of the workers and peasants onto the road of joblessness, starvation, and death. But the exploitation of the Guomindang warlords is constantly
increasing. In Sichuan, the Guomindang warlords have already collected advance grain tax payments down to the year 1971, and there are more than 1,700
fees and miscellaneous taxes. Throughout the nation, landlords and despotic
gentry are exploiting the peasants even more cruelly, capitalists are intensifying
their attacks on the workers, and the clashes and chaotic wars of the
Guomindang warlords are further accelerating the collapse of the Chinese economy. The sufferings of the workers and peasants of the whole country have truly
reached an indescribable level!
Dear Comrades! The Chinese workers and peasants cannot and will not endure this any longer. Today the flames of revolution are burning fiercely
throughout the whole country, spreading the heroic struggle against the imperialist Guomindang-from demonstrations, strikes, and uprisings to guerrilla warfare and large-scale revolutionary war. And in the last two years, the great
victories of the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Soviets and Red Army, the
enormous growth of the soviet areas, and the vigorous expansion of the heroic
Red Army from several tens of thousands to several hundreds of thousands are
more than ever the most powerful levers for developing the revolutionary situation in China.
Two roads now lie before the popular masses of all China: the colonialist road
of the imperialist Guomindang and the soviet road! Under the rule of the imperialist Guomindang, China can only be turned entirely into a colony of imperialism. Under the political power of the soviets, the forces of imperialism
have already been completely overthrown. The Central Soviet Government, representing the revolutionary masses of all China, has already formally declared
war on Japan. In addition, on the one hand, it is leading the heroic Red Army in
vigorously expanding the national revolutionary war to overthrow the
Guomindang warlords who are preventing the Red Army from going north to
resist Japan. On the other hand, it has already called repeatedly on the White
armed forces throughout the country to stop attacking the soviet areas and to
conclude an agreement with the Red Army to fight together against Japan. Under
the rule of the imperialist Guomindang, the worker and peasant masses and the

soldiers are being cruelly exploited and oppressed by the despotic gentry, the
landlords, the capitalist class, and the Guomindang warlords, to the point of
bankruptcy and joblessness, sinking into starvation and death. But under the
political power of the soviets, the feudal and semifeudal exploitation of the
despotic gentry and landlords has already been totally eliminated. The toiling
peasants and Red fighters have all received shares of land, the working class has
received the protection of the Labor Law, the economic reconstruction of the
soviets is in the process of developing vigorously, and the life of the worker and
peasant masses has been greatly improved. Under the rule of the imperialist
Guomindang, the actions of the worker and peasant masses are met with arrest,
imprisonment, and massacre. All freedoms of speech, assembly, and belief, especially the freedom to resist Japan and oppose imperialism, have been taken away.
The organs of political power are totally in the hands of the landlord and capitalist minority. But under soviet political power, workers and peasants have attained their own complete political freedom and have taken away the political
power of the exploiting classes (the capitalists, landlords, and rich peasants). For
the first time in Chinese history, the workers and peasants are in control of their
own state, the workers and peasants have become the ruling class, and the
working class is the leading force. All of this makes plain once again that the
only road that can save China is the soviet road, and that the victory of the Soviet
Revolution is the victory of the popular masses of the whole country over imperialism and China's landlords and bourgeoisie. It is precisely for this reason
that the Guomindang and all the counterrevolutionary political cliques, directly
commanded and organized by the imperialists, have mobilized all their forces in
a hopeless attack against the soviet areas and against the Red Army. Even though
the enemy's first, second, third, and fourth "Encirclement and Suppression"
campaigns have already been totally smashed by the iron fist of the heroic Red
Army, the imperialist Guomindang, in one last struggle, is now actively preparing an even more brutal large-scale Fifth "Encirclement and Suppression," in an
attempt to wipe out the soviets and the Red Army completely. This "Encirclement and Suppression" of the imperialist Guomindang is a necessary and important step in the fight of the imperialist Guomindang to put China on the colonial
road. The popular masses of all China should, for their part, concentrate all their
forces to smash this "Encirclement and Suppression" and fight for the victory of
Soviet China.
The Chinese Central Soviet Government calls upon the workers, peasants,
toiling masses, and revolutionary soldiers of the whole country to rise up and
oppose imperialist aggression and the Guomindang sell-out of the country, to
oppose the Fifth "Encirclement and Suppression" of the imperialist Guomindang
against the Soviet Red Army, to smash this "Encirclement and Suppression," to
overthrow the rule of the landlord and bourgeois Guomindang, to support the
Second National Congress of Soviet Deputies, to elect deputies and send them to
the National Soviet Congress, and to fight for the soviet way out for China.

Relying on the activism of the revolutionary struggle of the popular masses of
all China, relying on our ever-victorious heroic Workers' and Peasants' Red
Army and upon the resolute Chinese proletariat and the correct leadership of its
vanguard, the Communist Party, victory
will certainly be ours!
Popular masses of all China, rise up eagerly and fight for a New Soviet
China!
Long live the Second National Congress of Soviet Deputies!
Chairman
Vice-Chairmen
Mao Zedong
Xiang Ying
Zhang Guotao