(June 2, 1938)

Comrade Xiang Ying:

We have taken note of your telegram of May 4.
1. Gu Zhutong1 is relatively enlightened, and I hope that you will try to establish good contacts with him.
2. Since your territory has expanded, you are no longer worried about the lack
of room for maneuver. I hope that, on the basis of concrete experience of war, you
can send our troops to maneuver in all the regions in the enemy's rear where there
are none of our friendly armies. In the future, when we have the time and the
strength, we should be prepared to send small detachments not only to the large
area to the north of Lake Tai and west of the Wusong River, but also to the area
north of the Yangzi.
3. The overall goal of the enemy is to attack Wuhan. You can go all out in your
actions in the enemy's rear.
4. As far as the weapons are concerned, instead of spending a huge amount of
money to buy them from distant places, you can obtain large numbers of them
from the localities as well as from the enemy.
5. Strengthen the instruction of the training battalion, and recruit more soldiers,
so as to be prepared for the future expansion of our forces.
6. Lai Chuanzhu2 can be appointed either as deputy brigade commander or
brigade political commissar, or you can ask him to take charge of instruction for
the training battalion for the time being. Please give some thought to this.
7. We have asked the Third Bureau to try to find a transmitter operator for you.
8. The document from Hankou has arrived.

Mao [Zedong]

Our source for this text is Mao Zedong junshi wenji, Vol. 2, pp. 351-52, where it is reproduced from a copy in the Central Archives.
1. Gu Zhutong was at this time the commanding officer of the Guomindang army's Third
Battle Area.
2. At this time Lai was chief of staff of the New Fourth Army.