Mao: The Red Army can fight from a small base or a large base, but the greater it is,
naturally the greater and stronger will be the force it can mobilize for fighting the
Japanese. If we have three or four provinces we can summon to war a greater and
more effective anti-Japanese force than Nanjing's entire army. As for help, we need
much, the more the better, but still we can get along very well without any outside
assistance. We have already been fighting without anybody's help in a ten-year
revolutionary struggle.7 We are always prepared for war. We were prepared for it
when we went into Shanxi, toward the Japanese positions in North China. At the
time we did not get any help from outside, but on the contrary we were opposed by
the combined forces of Yan Xishan and Chiang Kaishek, the Generalissimo alone
concentrating his ten best divisions in our path. This movement presented a big
obstacle to our advance against the Japanese.

At that time, in order to avoid more futile fratricidal warfare, and further
weaken[ing of] the potential power of Chinese resistance, we did not engage
those troops, but voluntarily withdrew to our base in Shanxi, to try to negotiate a
truce and realize the United Front. Since then we have intensified our anti-Japanese
preparations. We are ready. The sooner the war begins, we believe, the better are
the chances for success for China. Meanwhile, we are prepared to fight Japan
whenever our forces have a front against Japan's troops in China.

Snow: How can the people best be armed, organized, and trained to participate
in such a war?

Mao: The people must be given the right to organize and to arm themselves.
This is a freedom which Chiang Kaishek has in the past denied to them. The
suppression has not, however, been entirely successful—as, for example, in the
case of the Red Army.8 Also, despite severe repression in Beiping, in Shanghai,
and other places, the students have begun to organize themselves and have
already prepared themselves politically. But still the students and the revolutionary anti-Japanese masses have not yet got their freedom, cannot be mobilized, cannot be trained and armed. When the contrary is true, when the masses
are given economic, social, and political freedom, their strength will be intensified hundreds of times, and the true strength of the nation will be revealed.

The Red Army through its own struggle has won its freedom from the militarists to become an unconquerable power. The Anti-Japanese Volunteers have
won their freedom of action from the Japanese oppressors and have armed themselves in a similar way. If the Chinese people are trained, armed, and organized,
they can likewise become an invincible force.9
The Red Army through its own struggle has won its freedom from the milita-

7. Here the published text omits a substantial passage printed below in italics.
8. The preceding two sentences were among the "personal references" omitted from
the text of this interview as published in The China Weekly Review.
9. The following paragraph has also been omitted from the published text.

rists to become an unconquerable power. The Anti-Japanese Volunteers have
won their freedom of action from the Japanese oppressors and have armed themselves in a similar way. If the Chinese people are trained, armed, and organized
they can likewise become an invincible force.

Snow: What, in your opinion, should be the main strategy to be followed in this
"war of liberation"?

Mao: The strategy should be that of a war of maneuver, over an extended,
shifting, and indefinite front: a strategy depending for success on a high degree
of mobility in difficult terrain, and featured by swift attack and withdrawal, swift
concentration and dispersal. It will be a large-scale war of maneuver rather than
the simple positional war of extensive trenchwork, deep-massed lines, and heavy
fortifications. Our strategy and tactics must be conditioned by the theater in
which the war will take place, and this dictates a war of maneuver.

This does not mean the abandonment of vital strategic points, which can be
defended in positional warfare as long as profitable. But the pivotal strategy must
be a war of maneuver, and important reliance must be placed on guerrilla and
partisan tactics. Fortified warfare must be utilized, but it will be of auxiliary and
ultimately of secondary strategic importance.

Geographically the theater of the war is so vast that it is possible for us to
pursue mobile warfare with the utmost efficiency and with a telling effect on a
slow-moving war machine like Japan's cautiously feeling its way in front of
fierce rearguard actions. Deep-line concentration and the exhausting defense of a
vital position or two on a narrow front would be to throw away all the tactical
advantages of our geography and economic organization, and to repeat the mistake of the Abyssinians. Our strategy and tactics must aim to avoid great decisive
battles in the early stages of the war, and gradually to break the morale, the
fighting spirit, and the military efficiency of the living forces of the enemy.

The mistake of the Abyssinians, quite aside from the internal political weakness
of their position, was that they attempted to hold a deep front, enabling the Fascists
to bombard, gas, and strike with their technically stronger military machines at
heavy immobile concentrations, exposing themselves to vital organic injury.

Besides the regular Chinese troops we should create, direct, and politically
and militarily equip great numbers of partisan and guerrilla detachments among
the peasantry. What has been accomplished by the anti-Japanese volunteer units
of this type in Manchuria is only a very minor demonstration of the latent power
of resistance that can be mobilized from the peasantry of all China. Properly led
and organized, such units can keep the Japanese busy 24 hours a day and worry
them to death.

It must be remembered that the war will be fought in China. This means that
the Japanese will be entirely surrounded by a hostile Chinese people. The Japanese will be forced to move in all their provisions and guard them, maintaining

troops along all lines of communications, and heavily garrisoning their bases in
Manchuria and Japan as well.
The process of the war will present to China the possibility of capturing many
Japanese prisoners, arms, ammunition, war machines, etc. A point will be
reached where it will become more and more possible to engage Japan's armies
on a basis of positional warfare, using fortifications, deep entrenchment, etc., for
as the war progresses the technical equipment of the anti-Japanese forces will
greatly improve, and will be reinforced by important foreign help. Japan's economy will crack under the strain of a long expensive occupation of China, and the
morale of her forces will break under the trial of a war of innumerable but
indecisive battles. The great reservoirs of human material in the Chinese people
will still be pouring men ready to fight for their freedom into our front lines long
after the tidal flood of Japanese imperialism has wracked itself on the hidden
reefs of Chinese resistance.

All these and other factors will condition the war and will enable us to make
the final and decisive attacks on Japan's fortifications and strategic bases and to
drive Japan's army of occupation from China.
Japanese officers and soldiers captured and disarmed by us will be welcomed
and will be well treated. They will not be killed. They will be treated in a
brotherly way. Every method will be adopted to make the Japanese proletarian
soldiers, with whom we have no quarrel, stand up and oppose their own Fascist
oppressors. Our slogan will be, "Unite and oppose the common oppressors, the
Fascist leaders." Anti-Fascist Japanese troops are our friends, and there is no
conflict in our aims.

Interview with Edgar Snow
on Internal Affairs
(July 18-19, 1936)

Snow: What is the immediate policy of the soviet government with regard to
(a) native small capitalists, petty bourgeoisie, etc., (b) big bourgeoisie, landlords
and compradors, and (c) intellectuals or professional workers-doctors, engineers, editors, architects, etc.?

Mao: Under present conditions, when people of the whole of China face the
imminent danger of becoming Japanese slaves, our policies in many respects
have been modified in order to unite all patriotic elements into a national AntiJapanese Front.

Not only today, but from the beginning of the Soviet movement, we have
always welcomed the participation of the intelligentsia. All professional people
are given the rights of Soviet citizenship. The petty-bourgeoisie, small merchants, etc., are also given political rights. Those men whose families are capitalists or landlords, but who themselves participate in the revolution, are offered the
full rights of Soviet citizenship, and can be elected to office.

We not only welcome intellectuals, we urge them to come to join us, and we
guarantee to help them find a useful and happy life in the Soviet districts. We
can offer them immediate employment, and adequate livelihood.

In this period of preparation for the anti-Japanese war we urge the full protection of all industries which have a service to perform in the national liberation
movement. The Red Army everywhere will protect the patriotic activities of the
people, as well as of industry and commerce. Proof of this is to be seen in our own
proclamations and decrees posted on the walls of towns and cities of Shaanxi.

In this period land of the rich peasants is not confiscated. Landlords' land
must be redistributed, for failure to carry out the agrarian revolution would
hinder the strengthening of the base for the anti-Japanese war, but landlords who
are confiscated are given their portion of land to cultivate. Property of small
landlords is not subject to confiscation. Landlords who participate in the antiJapanese movement are given special consideration. White officers who participate in the anti-Japanese war are entitled to land and their families are protected.

Our source for this third interview is Edgar Snow's typewritten manuscript. For details,
see the source note to the first interview of July 15, 1936. The Nianpu, Vol. 1, p. 559,
confirms that this interview extended over the two days July 18 and July 19; it contains a
summary touching on the main points discussed below.

In Soviet law there is a special clause which provides for the protection of
interests of overseas Chinese. Such Chinese are patriotic, they are also under
oppression in many lands; we will, therefore, do everything possible to defend
their dignity and their rights.
The object of our policies now is to hasten the union of all people against
Japanese imperialism, and to win our national liberation through war against the
Japanese invaders.
We have abolished all taxes imposed by the Guomindang. In Shaanxi and
Gansu we at present collect no land taxes, and in the future we will collect only a
very low progressive tax.

Snow: Aren't some of these modifications likely to give the impression that you
are abandoning Communism as your goal?

Mao: No, I think not. The victory of the Chinese national liberation movement
will be part of the victory of world communism, because to defeat imperialism in
China means the destruction of one of its most powerful bases. If China wins its
independence the world revolution will progress very rapidly.
If our country is subjugated by the enemy we shall lose everything. For a
people being deprived of its national freedom the revolutionary task is not immediate socialism, but the struggle for independence. We cannot even discuss
communism if we are robbed of a country in which to practice it.
The war against Japanese imperialism cannot be confined to the participation
of any one class, nor conducted on a single front. To deny this is to deny the fact
that many rich people have participated in the anti-Japanese movement, because
Japanese imperialism is ruining the rich with the poor. Some capitalists, a few
bankers, even some landlords, and many officers in the Guomindang armies,
have shown their readiness to fight for national liberation. We cannot deny them
a function in the struggle. Even if Chiang Kaishek one day decides to join the
Anti-Japanese offensive we will welcome his participation. As you know, we
have written many letters and sent messages to him proving our sincerity in this
respect, and offering to put our forces at his disposal the day he is willing to
resist Japan.

Snow: Have any replies been received to these proposals?

Mao: Thus far the Generalissimo has not responded.1 But the offer remains, and
we are still hopeful that he will accept it. Nanjing's troops are now advancing

1. In keeping with our aim of modifying the style and atmosphere of these interviews
as little as possible, we have not replaced the term "Generalissimo," commonly applied to
Chiang Kaishek in the 1930s, with the more literal translation of Chiang weiyuanzhang,
"Chairman Chiang [of the Guomindang Military Affairs Commission]" employed
elsewhere in this edition.

and attacking us. On the one hand we must reply to these attacks; we are obliged
to wage defensive war against those who wish to destroy us. At the same time
we continue to urge Nanjing to cooperate. Our slogan is "Cease civil war, unite
to oppose Japan!"

The movement against continuance of civil war is increasing throughout the
whole country, and more and more Guomindang officers will join the United
Front, until Chiang is forced to change his tactics.2

After all, some of our ablest Red leaders were once Guomindang officers and
officials-for example, Zhu De, Luo Binghui, He Long, Peng Dehuai, Lin Biao,
Chen Geng, Ye Jianying, Xu Xiangqian, to mention only a few, were all once
Guomindang commanders. Lin Boqu was once treasurer of the Guomindang and
a member of the Central Executive Committee.4 Many others such as these have
joined and in the future will join the Red Army as the struggle against Japanese
imperialism intensifies.5

Snow: Much has appeared in the press, both in China and abroad, concerning the
"savagery" and "brutality" of the Red Army. Probably these attacks have been
written by gentlemen in Nanjing, Shanghai, and other cities who have never seen
a Red warrior, but still some people believe their stories, just as many people in
America believe the tales of Hearst and McFadden concerning alleged "famines," "baby-butchery," "communized wives," etc. in the U.S.S.R. In actual practice what persons are, in the eyes of Soviet law, guilty of crimes deserving of
punishment by death?

Mao: Formerly Chiang Kaishek and the Guomindang spread many fanciful stories about the alleged killing, raping, and burning in the Soviet areas, by the Red
Army. Recently there has not been so much of this propaganda, probably be-

2. Here the following note appears in the manuscript which constitutes our source:
The outstanding demonstration of this, of course, were the recent events at Sianfu
[Xi'an], when the Manchurian troops in Northwest China, under Zhang Xueliang,
detained Chiang Kaishek and submitted eight demands to him. These demands
correspond almost exactly to the program for a United Front and "national defense
government" outlined in this interview.-E.S.

Judging from the way the Xi'an Incident is presented here, it seems likely that Snow
revised this version of the interviews sometime in late December 1936, before Chiang's
release, when the outcome was still hanging in the balance.
3. For Edgar Snow's own account of Chen Geng's career and his relationship with
Chiang Kaishek, see Snow, Random Notes, pp. 90-99.
4. Lin Boqu was elected an alternate member of the Guomindang Central Executive
Committee in 1924, and a full member in 1926. In 1927, he served not as treasurer, but as
minister of finance in the short-lived Left Guomindang government in Wuhan.
5. Here the indication "Bao'an, July 19, 1936," appears in the manuscript, confirming
that the interview continued on the next day.

cause few people today can be deceived by these crude lies. We invite you to
look around for yourself and see whether anyone is occupied in killing and
burning as pastimes. Our people get their sport in other ways—by running,
jumping, playing tennis and basketball, and helping the farmers till their fields.
You will not hear of a single case of rape by a Red soldier, either. Such a crime
is punished by death in the Red Army.

Most people by now know that Chiang Kaishek's tactics have consistently
involved the destruction of whole districts and the burning of villages taken back
from the Reds. Chiang himself has said that "it is impossible to tell a good citizen
from a Red-bandit" in the Red districts. It is a fact that only by murdering the masses
of the people in a Sovietized district—for the masses are the only real "base" the Red
army has—can the Guomindang "reclaim" such areas for its own rule.

The Red Army does not burn any houses nor kill any innocent people. Common
sense should tell people that the Red Army has been able to survive for many years
only because it has had the complete sympathy and support of the masses in the
Soviet districts, and common sense ought to tell people also that you cannot win the
sympathy and support of the masses by burning down their houses and killing them.

We have not yet abolished the death sentence; this we cannot claim. But only
toward those persons who endanger national security, or endanger the revolution,
only the worst of criminals such as traitor-henchmen of Japan or active leaders of
counterrevolution are subject to severe punishment. Even among them the Soviets make a distinction, and their offenses are punished by sentences varying from
corrective education, public labor, detention and imprisonment, up to death. So
far as petty criminals are concerned, they are released after a brief questioning,
discussion, and educative detention. The basis of Soviet criminal law is the
interest of society as a whole.

Four months ago the Red Army captured a brigade commander and 1,500
men of the army under Ma Hongkui. After disarming them, the Red Army gave
them their freedom, and those who wanted to return to the White areas were
given traveling expenses. During the Shanxi expedition we captured many white
officers and men belonging to Yan Xishan's army, and they were treated in the
same way. Most of the men stayed with us, and one former major of Yan's army
is now working in our education department. During our wars with Chiang
Kaishek in the past we have captured a total of no less than 300,000 of his
troops. With the exception of three or four of his highest officers (for example,
General Zhang Huizhang [Zhang Huizan]), who were fiercely hated by the people for their oppression and brutality, we did not execute any of them. They were
given the choice of joining us, and submitting to Soviet law, or returning to the
White regions. This is now a widely known fact among the Guomindang troops,
despite all the lies which the White press is forced to publish.

Some propaganda says that the Reds kill the intelligentsia. This is an especially foolish lie. The intelligentsia we must have, and we try in every way to
win them to the revolution. Our mission is to liberate the intelligentsia, not to

destroy them. Just look around in the Soviet districts at the schoolteachers, the
technicians, the engineers, and the writers, and ask them whether it is true that
the Reds kill the intelligentsia.

It is also said that we kill the landlords. You can witness yourself how many
landlords we kill. It is not the Soviet policy to take the life of any landlord who
does not engage in counterrevolution. Big or small landlords who obey Soviet
laws, do peaceful labor, and do not engage in active counterrevolution, can
easily live in the soviet districts without oppression from the Soviets.
The discipline of Soviet law is to modify the conduct of criminals, to educate
and reform them, and not to destroy them. This is just the opposite of the
Guomindang's treatment of criminals.

There are two kinds of courts provided for in the provisional laws of the
Soviet republic. One is a juridical system, with judge and jury elected by the local
Soviet. The prisoner can make his own appeal to the judge and jury, and he can
discuss with the judge the sentence passed upon him. He can appeal for a hearing
from village soviet to xian soviet, from xian soviet to provincial soviet, and so to
the Soviet Supreme Court. He can also appeal to the Red Army, to his trade
union, or to the mass organization of which he is a member for intervention by
petition on his behalf.

Another kind of trial is held before a Comrades' Court. Here the accused
appears before his own fellows, for criticism or advice. These courts "try" only
very minor offenders, and they cannot impose anything except a disciplinary
sentence, with acceptance by the accused. Comrades' courts are found in all
government organs, and in all mass organizations.

Present Soviet law takes cognizance of the fact that there are some other parties
in China besides the Communist Party which wish to follow an anti-imperialist
policy. Such parties cannot exist freely in Guomindang territory. We offer them
asylum. We give all freedom to the people, granting freedom of speech, press,
assembly, and organization. We deny these privileges only to counterrevolutionaries, national traitors, and oppressors of the people.

The government of the Chinese People's Soviet Republic permits no official
corruption in its ranks. Severe punishment, including the death sentence in serious cases, is provided for anyone guilty of embezzlement or theft of public
property. Communists guilty of such offenses are much more harshly condemned
than non-Communists.

Snow: What industries will the Soviet government place under state ownership or
control at once? Which will be allowed to remain temporarily under private control?

Mao: Generally speaking, it is not our present policy to take over private industry, nor place it under State ownership. Naturally, however, all Japanese-owned
industries and enterprises must be confiscated immediately and operated for the
benefit of the people.

cause few people today can be deceived by these crude lies. We invite you to
look around for yourself and see whether anyone is occupied in killing and
burning as pastimes. Our people get their sport in other ways by running,
jumping, playing tennis and basketball, and helping the farmers till their fields.
You will not hear of a single case of rape by a Red soldier, either. Such a crime
is punished by death in the Red Army.

Most people by now know that Chiang Kaishek's tactics have consistently
involved the destruction of whole districts and the burning of villages taken back
from the Reds. Chiang himself has said that "it is impossible to tell a good citizen
from a Red-bandit" in the Red districts. It is a fact that only by murdering the masses
of the people in a Sovietized district-for the masses are the only real "base" the Red
army has can the Guomindang "reclaim" such areas for its own rule.

The Red Army does not burn any houses nor kill any innocent people. Common
sense should tell people that the Red Army has been able to survive for many years
only because it has had the complete sympathy and support of the masses in the
Soviet districts, and common sense ought to tell people also that you cannot win the
sympathy and support of the masses by burning down their houses and killing them.

We have not yet abolished the death sentence; this we cannot claim. But only
toward those persons who endanger national security, or endanger the revolution,
only the worst of criminals such as traitor-henchmen of Japan or active leaders of
counterrevolution are subject to severe punishment. Even among them the Soviets make a distinction, and their offenses are punished by sentences varying from
corrective education, public labor, detention and imprisonment, up to death. So
far as petty criminals are concerned, they are released after a brief questioning,
discussion, and educative detention. The basis of Soviet criminal law is the
interest of society as a whole.

Four months ago the Red Army captured a brigade commander and 1,500
men of the army under Ma Hongkui. After disarming them, the Red Army gave
them their freedom, and those who wanted to return to the White areas were
given traveling expenses. During the Shanxi expedition we captured many white
officers and men belonging to Yan Xishan's army, and they were treated in the
same way. Most of the men stayed with us, and one former major of Yan's army
is now working in our education department. During our wars with Chiang
Kaishek in the past we have captured a total of no less than 300,000 of his
troops. With the exception of three or four of his highest officers (for example,
General Zhang Huizhang [Zhang Huizan]), who were fiercely hated by the people for their oppression and brutality, we did not execute any of them. They were
given the choice of joining us, and submitting to Soviet law, or returning to the
White regions. This is now a widely known fact among the Guomindang troops,
despite all the lies which the White press is forced to publish.

Some propaganda says that the Reds kill the intelligentsia. This is an especially foolish lie. The intelligentsia we must have, and we try in every way to
win them to the revolution. Our mission is to liberate the intelligentsia, not to

destroy them. Just look around in the Soviet districts at the schoolteachers, the
technicians, the engineers, and the writers, and ask them whether it is true that
the Reds kill the intelligentsia.

It is also said that we kill the landlords. You can witness yourself how many
landlords we kill. It is not the Soviet policy to take the life of any landlord who
does not engage in counterrevolution. Big or small landlords who obey Soviet
laws, do peaceful labor, and do not engage in active counterrevolution, can
easily live in the soviet districts without oppression from the Soviets.
The discipline of Soviet law is to modify the conduct of criminals, to educate
and reform them, and not to destroy them. This is just the opposite of the
Guomindang's treatment of criminals.

There are two kinds of courts provided for in the provisional laws of the
Soviet republic. One is a juridical system, with judge and jury elected by the local
Soviet. The prisoner can make his own appeal to the judge and jury, and he can
discuss with the judge the sentence passed upon him. He can appeal for a hearing
from village soviet to xian soviet, from xian soviet to provincial soviet, and so to
the Soviet Supreme Court. He can also appeal to the Red Army, to his trade
union, or to the mass organization of which he is a member for intervention by
petition on his behalf.

Another kind of trial is held before a Comrades' Court. Here the accused
appears before his own fellows, for criticism or advice. These courts "try" only
very minor offenders, and they cannot impose anything except a disciplinary
sentence, with acceptance by the accused. Comrades' courts are found in all
government organs, and in all mass organizations.

Present Soviet law takes cognizance of the fact that there are some other parties
in China besides the Communist Party which wish to follow an anti-imperialist
policy. Such parties cannot exist freely in Guomindang territory. We offer them
asylum. We give all freedom to the people, granting freedom of speech, press,
assembly, and organization. We deny these privileges only to counterrevolutionaries, national traitors, and oppressors of the people.

The government of the Chinese People's Soviet Republic permits no official
corruption in its ranks. Severe punishment, including the death sentence in serious cases, is provided for anyone guilty of embezzlement or theft of public
property. Communists guilty of such offenses are much more harshly condemned
than non-Communists.

Snow: What industries will the Soviet government place under state ownership or
control at once? Which will be allowed to remain temporarily under private control?

Mao: Generally speaking, it is not our present policy to take over private industry, nor place it under State ownership. Naturally, however, all Japanese-owned
industries and enterprises must be confiscated immediately and operated for the
benefit of the people.

Snow: Do you think the development of socialism in China, once power had
been seized, would take place at the same rate of speed and along the same lines
of progress, as in the U.S.S.R.?

Mao: As I have emphasized, our most urgent problem is national liberation. At
present our objective cannot be communism, nor even socialism; what we demand and hope for is the establishment of a national people's democratic republic, which is the essential framework in which a struggle for independence must
be conducted. The setting up of Soviet power throughout China and the realization of socialism remains, of course, a goal in the future. The construction of
socialism, if the Soviets are given power in the democratic republic, must be a
thing of common consent and the demand of the majority of the people.

Even if we succeed in realizing the creation of a democratic republic
throughout China, we cannot insist upon the immediate commencement of socialism, which must remain a distant perspective. Realization of socialism in
China probably will not occur so quickly as in the Soviet Union, because China
has a longer and more difficult road to follow, as a semi-colonial and semi-feudal country. Certainly our main task demands the struggle for national independence, combined with the continued struggle for democracy for which the Red
Army has been fighting ever since 1927.

Snow: Does the Red Army welcome to its ranks all those who want to fight for
the revolution, and against imperialism, regardless of their class origins?

Mao: Yes, the only condition we make is that they be willing to fight for
national liberation.

Snow: What correctives does the Soviet government offer for the chronic problems of China? Could you give me a brief statement of policy concerning problems such as (1) land poverty redistribution or collectivization? (2) famines
and floods, (3) unemployment, (4) opium and narcotics, (5) usury, (6) official
corruption, (7) illiteracy, (8) child slavery, (9) prostitution, (10) militarism, (11)
lack of communications? Were these reforms realized in Jiangxi? How are they
being carried out in Shaanxi, Gansu, and Ningxia? Is it possible, in this stage of
the revolution, which is chiefly military preparation for the anti-imperialist struggle, to carry out such reforms in Soviet areas?

Mao: I will answer these points one by one. First, concerning the land problem.
The immediate question is not one of collectivization but of redistribution. The
revolution gives land to the landless peasants not only so that they can utilize it
to increase productivity, but so that they can own it.
Collectivization must be a thing of the future and can only be realized if the
whole national economy is in Soviet power.

Some people ask, why don't we make a commune, and hold land in common? Our answer is that the demand of the peasants just now is for land ownership, and not for a commune, and we are therefore meeting their mass demand.
The peasants and the whole agrarian economy advances very much by the redistribution of land. Peasants own land and they have not owned land before, and
this is already a great victory for them. They are not ready for collectivization, a
step for which the road can be created only by an economy planned on a national
scale, and by educational efforts that can be realized only when a democratic
people's government has been achieved in China as a whole.

Snow: Other things in the Soviet program having been postponed in the interest
of the United Front, is it not possible to delay land redistribution also?

Mao: Without confiscating the estates of the landlords, without meeting the
main democratic demand of the peasantry, it is impossible to lay the broad mass
basis for a successful revolutionary struggle for national liberation. In order to
win the support of the peasants for the national cause it is necessary to satisfy
their demand for land. This is not true only in China. The French revolution built
its success on the broad basis of the peasantry. Economically, also, it is stupid to
keep the peasants in their present oppressed condition. The peasantry is too
heavily exploited, cannot increase land productivity, and cannot develop the
necessary purchasing power for an expanding market of industry and commerce.
As regards "famines and floods," these have long been considered "Acts of
God." In reality they are mostly caused by men and can be prevented by men.
The Soviet government makes every effort to combat these evils. Freed by the
Soviets, the peasants have ample resources with which to fight both flood and
famine. In Jiangxi we not only built dykes wherever necessary, so that our Soviet
districts did not suffer from a single important flood, but we also harvested
bumper crops and in no single year was there any famine. There we lacked only
salt, which was not produced in the Soviet districts, and which, due to Nanjing's
blockade, could not enter. There is now no shortage of salt in the Soviet districts,
however. We have some of the finest salt reserves of China, especially in and
around the Yanchi district, where the lakes produce the purest crystal salt. In
our present position we have no fear of the Guomindang blockade against us,
due to an ample supply of good salt. Everything else we need we can produce in
our own Soviet areas.

There is no unemployment problem in the Soviet districts. Just look around
for yourself and see whether there are any beggars or unemployed here. We have

6. Yanchi means simply "salt pond." Snow's footnote reads:

The salt of Yanchi, which is near the Great Wall at the borders of Ningxia, Shaanxi, and
Gansu, is famous in Chinese history. The Reds have divided the salt reserves with the
Mongol tribes of the region. E.S.

work for everyone to do. There were no beggars in Soviet Jiangxi and there are
now no beggars in the Soviet Northwest. Everyone can find work and we see that
everyone does work. There is land for all, and work to be done. In January, in
Wayaobao, the biggest city in North Shaanxi, we entertained a captured chief-ofstaff of a Dongbei division, at a New Year's feast. Many other Dongbei officers
were also present.

We had given this chief-of-staff freedom of movement and he could walk
anywhere, being on his honor not to attempt escape. At the feast he expressed his
astonishment that all day he had seen no beggars in the city. In the White
districts, he said, he could not pass down a street without being besieged by
beggars on New Year's Day.

In Jiangxi only those workers in enterprises which supplied the outside world
were thrown out of work because of the Guomindang blockade which closed the
market. They did not become unemployed, however, but were given jobs in
other branches of industry to which they were transferred.

What is our policy toward the cultivation and consumption of opium. Just ask
any peasant you meet the answer to this question. We prohibit the cultivation of
the poppy, and the purchase, sale, or use of opium except for medicinal purposes,
through Red Army hospitals. We prohibit the production and sale of narcotics of
all kinds. In the Jiangxi Soviet areas there had formerly been many areas famous
for their production of opium. In two years we completely eradicated the drug
from all Soviet districts. How did we achieve this? Not by force alone. We
educated the farmers, and gradually persuaded them to give it up, for the good of
their fellow countrymen, and for the good of their own land. The same thing is
true in Shaanxi and in the older Soviet regions in Gansu. Now you cannot find
opium sold or grown anywhere in the old Soviet districts of Shaanxi or Gansu.
Our suppression is not like the so-called opium suppression in the Guomindang
districts, where the Guomindang opium monopoly merely prevents others from
marketing opium and uses the death penalty for those who do not observe the
Guomindang monopoly. It is accomplished only after the peasants understand
the necessity for their own welfare of opium prohibition.

Snow: It must be a very powerful sort of education. How does it work out in
practice?

Mao: Of course opium smoking is closely connected with opium cultivation.
Without strict prohibition of opium cultivation, the eradication of opium smok-

7. Snow's footnote to Dongbei (Tungpei in the Wade-Giles transcription) reads as
follows:

The "Northeastern" army of Marshal Zhang Xueliang, composed of former Manchurian
troops. It was the Dongbei Army which recently seized Generalissimo Chiang Kaishek
at Xi'an to demand an end to 10 years of "anti-Red" civil war, and a united front against
Japan.-E.S.

ing cannot be achieved. A people's government does not need to depend on
revenues from opium cultivation and sale. It does not want to poison the people,
but to regenerate them. Only a government run by comprador-landlords is interested in destroying the people with opium, and only such a government finds a
use for the device of the opium monopoly. Thus, in Jiangxi, when the Reds left,
and the landlords returned, the peasants were again forced to grow opium in
order to pay the heavy rents and taxes and yet have enough left to live on. And
the landlords must urge them to grow it, and the militarists above them, in order
to squeeze more money from the people.

Neither usury nor usurers are tolerated in the Soviet districts. This does not
mean that we prohibit ordinary money-lending at reasonable rates of interest.
Money circulation and borrowing and lending are essential in our present economic plan, but no usury is permitted. Because money rates were formerly as
high as 70 or 80 per cent, our Soviet law of maximum interest rate, which is 10
per cent, greatly benefits the peasantry at once. The Soviet government itself
lends money to prosperous peasants at 5 per cent, and to the poorest peasants it
makes non-interest-bearing loans. Our Soviet bank in Shaanxi has made two big
loans this year, the first a Spring Cultivation Loan at no interest, to the peasantry;
the other a business loan to small merchants, at a very low rate.

Pawnshops are completely abolished and their contents returned to the rightful
owners. But ordinary commercial banking is permitted, and there is a good deal of
this in Anbian, Dingbian, and Qingbian, the big trading towns along the Great Wall.
Embezzlement and official corruption are severely punished in the Red areas.
Our laws in this respect are very strictly enforced. There is also strict punishment
for wastage of public money or improper spending. Corruption is a serious crime
according to Soviet law. Only the Soviet Government permits no "squeeze" by
officials, and its rigid adherence to the letter of the law in this respect is very
well known even to Nanjing. Officials of the Soviet Government get no higher
living fee than soldiers of the Red Army. As a Soviet functionary 'I myself
receive less than the Red soldier, but as a Red Army commander I get an
allowance of $5.00 per month.

Hitler has claimed that he has no money in the bank, and about that we are
not so sure. We have heard that he has made millions of marks by compelling his
German subjects to buy his book, Mein Kampf. But we invite anyone to find a
bank account anywhere belonging to a Soviet official.

As for the problem of illiteracy, this is not a difficult task for a people's
government which really wants to raise the economic and cultural standard of the
masses. In all of the older Soviet districts the majority of the people is literate,
while in the non-Soviet districts of China the majority of the people is illiterate.
Why is that true? It is because from the first moment the Red Army occupies a
place it begins to organize mass schools and urge the people in every way to
improve themselves.

In Jiangxi our Society for the Liquidation of Illiteracy, under the leadership

of the Commissioner of Education, had astonishing successes. It built up in every
village groups led by young students, Young Communists, and Young Vanguards, to teach people how to read and write. These mass educational schools,
hundreds of them, were created by the organized peasantry themselves, and
instructed by the enthusiastic Red youths, who freely gave their time and energy
to this task, without pay. After three or four years the majority of the peasants in
our Soviet districts in Jiangxi knew several hundred Chinese characters and
could read simple texts, lectures, and our newspapers and other publications.

Our statistics were lost during the Long March, but my report before the
Second All-Soviet Congress contained a full account of the progress made in
education, both through the people's mass education movement, and through the
regular school system maintained by the Soviets. By that time, in the older
Soviet districts, illiteracy had been completely wiped out in the section of the
population between the ages of 10 and 30, and much progress was being made
with older people.

In Shaanxi and Gansu there has also been established a Society for the
Liquidation of Illiteracy. The cultural level here was formerly much lower than
in Jiangxi, and great tasks of education still face us today. But as you have seen
we have already made a beginning among the peasantry of North Shaanxi, where
formerly only about 3 or 4 percent of the population could read or write. Schools
have been established in villages where no teacher was ever seen before; newspapers have been published here for the first time, and books and magazines.
Now when you go through the countryside you can quite often find a little Soviet
book or a magazine in the home of the poor peasants, and you can see them
studying in little village groups at noon or in the evenings.

In order to hasten the liquidation of illiteracy here we have begun experimenting with Xinwenzi-Latinized Chinese. It is now used in our Party School,
in the Red Academy, in the Red Army, and in a special section of the Red China
Daily News. We believe Latinization is a good instrument with which to overcome illiteracy. Chinese characters are so difficult to learn that even the best
system of rudimentary characters, or simplified teaching, does not equip the
people with a really efficient and rich vocabulary. Sooner or later, we believe,
we will have to abandon the Chinese character altogether if we are to create a
new social culture in which the masses fully participate. We are now widely
using Latinization, and if we stay here for three years the problem of illiteracy
will have been largely overcome.

Child slavery is completely abolished in the Soviet districts, and will be in
the future wherever the Red banner is carried. Child slaves are immediately freed
and returned to their homes. If they have no homes they are given work to do in

8. Here a note by Snow gives the date of this congress, January 1934, and refers to a
translation of Mao's report published in London in 1934. For the text of the report, see
Volume IV of our edition, pp. 656-713; the section on education appears on pp. 694-97.

the Soviet factories, or in some productive enterprise. But many child slaves are
carried off by the landlords, along with their goods and money, when the Red
Army enters a new territory.

The Commissioner of the Interior looks after their welfare. They are given a
portion of land to cultivate, if they are old enough and able-bodied; if not, they
are entitled to a share of the products of certain lands held communally.

Prostitution, like child slavery, is a product of the economic bankruptcy of the
poor. Those who have no other means of livelihood are compelled to market their
bodies for necessities. In the Jiangxi Soviets prostitution was entirely eliminated
in the villages and towns, and only in one or two large cities, like Dingzhou and
Changzhou, did it remain even a small problem. A few women continued to
practice prostitution in secret, but most of the women of this profession were
absorbed into useful work. Some of them married and settled down on land given
to poor farmers, some took work in the factories, and two or three became school
teachers. They mostly became good citizens, and as there was no discrimination
against them most people soon forgot that they had been prostitutes.

The problem of militarism is also largely a product of rural bankruptcy.
Professional and mercenary soldiers can easily be reabsorbed into the population,
if they are given land and work to do. We use intensive educative and propagandive methods to correct the anti-social habits of former mercenary soldiers,
and in the south these were very effective. Bandits, oppressed by poverty, can
also be eliminated if given a chance to earn an honest livelihood, and a little
teaching to correct their former habits.

In western Fujian, for example, there had for years been many small predatory bands of armed robbers. After the Soviets were established in those districts
where banditry had been worst, many of those bandits changed into good farmers, workers, and warriors in the people's army. The soviets provided them with
land or work to do in the factories. Western Fujian and Soviet Jiangxi after a
couple of years became entirely freed of bandits and robbers and people no
longer locked their doors.

Now that the Red Army has left those places, however, and the Guomindang
and the landlords have returned, you see that banditry has risen up again. Especially along the Fujian border thousands of mercenary troops are employed to
keep the bandits in check and to prevent many poor peasants from turning bandit
to attack their exploiters and seize back the goods and money which the landlords and the militarists are again stealing from them.

As for communications, it is now well known and it appears even in the
reports of the League of Nations' experts, that the Soviets in Jiangxi built many
people's roads and improved communication. We did not build motor highways,
which are useless to the farmers, although they must pay for them, but we built
many good solid cart-roads and barrow-roads.

For the Soviets, this kind of construction was simple to achieve and inexpensive. Our road-building plans were not devised by a few returned students who

had learned engineering in America, and wanted to get hold of big sums for
impractical projects, but they were plans drawn up by the soviet peasants themselves, who knew what they needed. Thus when a plan was made and accepted,
it was the peasants who carried it out. It was quite simple for the soviets thus to
mobilize thousands of volunteers to build these roads because they were the
people's roads which they knew would be of practical use to them, and not the
returned-students' roads for the use of the motor cars of militarists and their
concubines, but which a peasant cannot use.

In Shaanxi we have done less road-building because the soviets have not
been here long. But our soviets are already propagandizing and educating the
masses to awaken them to the need for cart roads and improved caravan roads.

Would an anti-Japanese war halt such construction projects and reforms as
we have mentioned above? We do not think so. In an anti-Japanese war it will
not only be possible, but absolutely necessary, to realize all these things on a
national scale as quickly as possible. The people cannot be mobilized for national defense without demonstrating its benefits to them. A war of independence
is in fact necessary to improve the people's condition.

Why do we demand a war? Because on the one hand it is absolutely necessary to preserve the life of the nation that we resist Japanese imperialism, destroy
all traitors, and achieve national independence, and on the other to raise the
economic and cultural level of the great mass of the people.

Even as the Red Army fights its revolutionary warfare in China it is able to
bring great benefits immediately to the people. A single month after the Red
Army occupies a district it has already begun to be transformed with many
improvements. Not only the political workers in the Red Army lead the tasks of
reconstruction, but every commander and every Red warrior participates in
awakening and leading the peasantry.

Every Red soldier assists in carrying out the land policy and the measures of
people's economy, the creation of people's mass organizations, etc. In Shaanxi
the Red Army has already realized most of the reforms indicated above. In the
Gansu and Ningxia soviets they have been begun.

As you may perhaps have noticed, every person in the Red Army is extremely
busy, whether in military action or not; in time of peace the Red Army assists the
people in many ways. People bring their problems to the Red Army and ask for
help. They trust it and believe in its justice. They gather in groups to welcome us.
Many join us; many voluntarily give everything they have to help us. Many
voluntarily help provision the Red Army. Many collect news for us, and help
guard against espionage. Peasants volunteer to help the Red Army in its battles as guides, sappers, cooks, bearers of all kinds. This intimacy between the masses
and the Red Army, this inseparability of the people and the Red Army, is one of
the fundamental reasons for our victories against the Whites, despite the latter's
present overwhelming superiority in numbers and material resources.

When the Red Army takes a xian it proceeds at once to begin to realize the

reforms mentioned already. When this work is successfully launched, soviets
created, and peasant workers trained to lead in carrying out the program, the Red
Army is freed for activity in new fields.

But the whole struggle of the Red Army is basically an anti-imperialist
struggle, and this is why its enlargement now into the necessary war of liberation, the anti-Japanese war, is a progressive war, and necessary in order to hasten
the regeneration and revolutionizing of the masses.

Snow: What would be the Soviet government's immediate industrial program?

Mao: War industries would be placed under Soviet control. By "war industries"
is meant all those industries directly concerned with the conduct of the war.
Other branches of industry would remain under private control with the exception, of course, of Japanese imperialist industries, which would be confiscated
forthwith by the state.

But besides state enterprises there would be built up people's cooperative
enterprises of various sorts, and this program offers very far-reaching perspectives.

It must be remembered that there are fundamental differences between the
condition of China today and that of Russia before the revolution. Our revolution
is primarily democratic and bourgeois in character, because China is still a
semi-colonial and semi-feudal society.

Snow: What about control of profits in time of war?

Mao: The question of a profit tax must, of course, be considered when war
begins.

At present the customs tariff enforced by the Soviet government is the only
one in China free from manipulation and control by the imperialist powers. Our
idea is that tariffs during the war should be adjusted independently to suit the
needs of the war against the invaders, and to satisfy the needs and demands of
the whole Chinese people. Only luxuries such as wines, tobacco, etc. should be
heavily taxed. Tariffs on imports of such essentials as gasoline, kerosene, etc.
should be very light, since China does not produce these things in quantities
sufficient for the national demand.

Snow: What is your opinion of the foreign policy of Nanjing?

Mao: As everybody knows very well, the policy of Nanjing under the leadership
of Chiang Kaishek has been a policy of compromise with imperialism and retreat
before the foreign invader. The dissatisfaction of the people with the Nanjing
government has therefore been widespread.

Under the pressure of Japanese imperialism the Chinese people, through

thousands of petitions, letters, demonstrations, and appeals of all sorts, have
demanded that the Nanjing government alter its mistaken policy and take up the
work of national salvation. This demand has existed for many years. Even in
Nanjing there are many who have begun to realize that their policy is one of
submission and self-subjugation, but there are as yet few signs that General
Chiang Kaishek has had a similar awakening.

If Chiang Kaishek continues in this way his crisis of personal power is
certain to sharpen, and out of it may develop a great internal crisis in China. He
may for a while buy over this general or that, he may purchase the adherence of
militarists in various parts of China until there is some kind of unity imposed on
China from above, but this will not solve his fundamental problem, nor that of
China, which is one of survival as a free and independent people.

There must be a day of decision, a day when he must either oppose Japan or
be overthrown by his own subordinates, who are not all ready to become the
slaves of Japan. Many of his own generals are now very restive, and demanding
a policy of resistance. Chen Cheng, for example, one of Chiang's ablest tacticians, recently urged the Generalissimo to begin war against the invader, and
stop the civil war. Hu Zongnan, the best general Nanjing has, 10 not long ago said
to Chiang, "Fighting the Red Army is a life sentence." Both of them were
rebuked by Chiang Kaishek, but this shows that there is a growing opinion in a
group of able young commanders in Nanjing that deplores seeing the country
partitioned while civil war goes on year after year. Even Tang Enbo, for instance, recently insisted upon resistance to Japan in Inner Mongolia and a united
front with all patriotic armies. 11

This increasing pressure from his own generals and from the anti-Japanese
mass movement may yet compel Chiang to realize his mistakes and grant the
demands of the people. If he stops civil war, begins to fight Japan, reestablishes
the union of the Guomindang and the Communist Party, we will welcome this
change and cooperate wholeheartedly. But this only Chiang Kaishek can determine for himself. The decision cannot much longer be delayed.

9. Chen Cheng (1897–1965), a native of Zhejiang, had served under Chiang Kaishek
as an artillery instructor at the Huangpu Academy in 1924. He had been closely
associated with Chiang ever since, in particular in the campaigns of "Encirclement and
Suppression" against the Communists during the period of the Jiangxi Soviet Republic.
10. For biographical information on Hu Zongnan, see the relevant note to the text of
June 16, 1935.
11. Tang Enbo (1899–1954) was a native of Zhejiang. At this time, he commanded the
Guomindang Thirteenth Army. He was a graduate of the Japanese Military Academy
(Shikan Gakkō); no doubt for this reason Mao stressed that even Tang was in favor of
resistance to Japan.