It is already eight years since the September 18 Incident, and it is two years
since the War of Resistance of the whole country began after the Marco Polo Bridge
Incident, yet China is still wandering along two roads. One is the road of compromise, surrender, split, and retreat. This is the road to the destruction of our state.
The other is the road of persistence in the War of Resistance and opposition to
surrender, persistence in unity and opposition to splits, persistence in progress and
opposition to retreat. This is the road to national revival. Only by taking the second
road will we be able to regain all the lost territory, regain the Three Northeastern
Provinces, and realize our slogan, "Fight all the way through to the Yalu River and
regain all lost territory." If we take an opposite road, preferring surrender to persistence in the War of Resistance, preferring splits to persistence in unity, preferring
backwardness to persistence in progress, we will not be able to fight all the way
through to the Yalu River, nor will we be able to regain our lost territory. We will
not even be able to fight to the Marco Polo Bridge and Shanhaiguan. We have only
one slogan, and that is, "Fight all the way through to the Yalu River and regain all
our lost territory." The Three Northeastern Provinces must be regained. Now there
are some people who are opposed to regaining the Three Northeastern Provinces.
They will be satisfied merely with regaining Shanhaiguan or the Marco Polo Bridge.
What is more, the people who say this are not at all prepared to use their own
strength to regain these territories but intend to rely, rather, on foreign countries.
They hope that the signers of the Nine-Power Treaty will call a meeting to force
Japan to return our lost territory. It will be all right just to return the territory as far
as the Marco Polo Bridge; Japan does not have to return the territory north of the
Marco Polo Bridge. Is this view correct? No, it is completely wrong. We want to
fight all the way through to the Yalu River and regain all our lost territory! To
achieve this goal, we must rely first of all on ourselves. We should absolutely never
rely entirely on others. Comrades! Rather than helping China, some countries are
helping our enemy, Japanese imperialism. It has already become apparent that Britain
is such a country. Britain and Japan are plotting to create a "Far Eastern Munich,"
they are bargaining with each other in order to carve up China.
At present, confronted with the German invasion launched by Hitler in Europe,
Britain and France have declared war on Germany. The United States is still looking on. But in the future, the war between the imperialists may stop, and they may
unite to attack the Soviet Union, attack the national revolution in China, and attack
the people's liberation movement and the national liberation movement in the
whole world. Great changes have already taken place in today's world, especially
in the past two weeks. That is, the capitalist countries in the whole world under the
rule of the reactionary bourgeoisie are already standing on the same front to deal
with the world revolution. Although there are problems and contradictions among
them, the present war in Europe is the result of the conflict between the German
bourgeoisie and the bourgeoisie in Britain, the United States, and France. Yet we
must know that no matter where these bourgeoisies come from, all blackbirds under
the sky are black, they are all reactionary. Therefore, although there are many

contradictions among them, as far as dealing with the revolution, they can often
achieve counterrevolutionary unanimity.
If we want to regain our lost territory and the Three Northeastern Provinces, the
comrades from the Northeast should first unite. The comrades from the Northeast
should not distinguish among provinces and xian, should not distinguish between
those who made revolution first and those who made revolution later. Everyone
should unite and form a big group. The comrades from the Northeast, whether
they are Communist Party members or comrades from other parties and groups,
should all unite together to establish a firm united front. The same applies to the
people in all the enemy-occupied areas. Nobody should create disputes; the big
enemy is in front of us, we are in danger of losing our state, so how can we still
clash about differences of opinion? We have only one enemy-the Japanese imperialists. We have only one objective-to regain all our lost territory. The comrades
from the Northeast should first unite closely with the common people in the Northeast, form a united front with their 30 million fellow countrymen in the Northeast,
and then unite with the people of all China and form a national united front. The
slogan the Communist Party has raised is to persist in the War of Resistance and
oppose surrender; persist in unity and oppose splits; persist in progress and oppose
retrogression. These three slogans are the three medicines against disease, for some
people in China are suffering from very dangerous diseases. They are infected
with three serious diseases, namely the disease of surrender, the disease of splits,
and the disease of retrogression. We have prepared three kinds of medicines for
them. The first is "persist in the War of Resistance and oppose surrender"; the
second is "persist in unity and oppose splits"; the third is "persist in progress and
oppose backwardness." This is giving out the prescription according to the disease; once the medicine is taken, the diseases will be gone. It is very good that you
comrades support these three slogans. You should go everywhere throughout the
country and tell the common people, tell your fathers and mothers, your brothers,
and your friends, whether close or distant, about these three slogans. In this way,
one tells ten, ten tell a hundred, a hundred tell a thousand, and a thousand tell ten
thousand. In this way the message will continue to be propagated, so that the 30
million compatriots in the Northeast and the 450 million compatriots in the whole
country will all understand and support these three slogans, and everyone will
unite to form a solid united front. All the common people, and all the patriotic
elements who participate in the War of Resistance, should be organized into this
solid united front. This is the basic force. Consequently, without the united front,
there will be no hope of regaining all our lost territory. If we want to regain all our
lost territory, we must definitely form a united front.
Comrades! When you go out, you should all organize small united fronts. For
instance, if you become a teacher you should organize your students and their
families into a united front; if you become a company commander, you should
organize a united front in your company; if you become a journalist, you should
organize all the people around you, including your relatives and friends, into a


united front. However many people there are, we should organize that number
into a united front. These are all called small united fronts. The more such small
united fronts we have the better, for with these numerous small united fronts as the
basis we can form a big united front. The small united fronts are like the cells in a
human body or the bricks in building a house. Just as there can be no human
beings without cells, and no houses without bricks, there can be no large united
fronts without smaller ones. It is precisely from these numerous small united fronts
that the great national united front of 450 million people is formed. This large
united front of ours will in turn join the united front of the entire world, to form the
biggest united front on a worldwide scale.

At present, it is the era of the great world revolution. There are altogether 2
billion people in the world, but there are only about 200 to 300 million reactionaries. The remaining 1.7 to 1.8 billion will form a united front to struggle against
those 200 or 300 million. The 200 to 300 million reactionaries have in their hands
the army, political power, newspapers, and political parties; their weapons for
destroying us are numerous, while our weapons are very few. Nevertheless, we
have one thing that we can use to defeat them, which is that we all work as one. At
present, however, our hearts are still not united. Consequently, we should form a
great united front to oppose those reactionary governments and oppose the bandit
war they are fighting. At present, the worldwide united front is in the process of
formation. The common people of the whole world are arising to oppose imperialists, to oppose capitalist and bourgeois dictatorship. The outbreak of the present
great war has further accelerated the formation of the worldwide united front. The
common people of the whole world, the weak and small nations, and the Soviet
Union are joining hands to fight against counterrevolution, and this is the worldwide revolutionary united front.

If we want to regain all our lost territory, it will be impossible to do so without
the help of the worldwide united front. China is a piece of the world and will
assuredly never be able to survive if isolated from the rest of the world. Naturally,
we do not rely absolutely on foreign countries and on other people, abandoning
self-reliance. We continue to depend mainly upon ourselves, and we must still work
hard ourselves. We must certainly never be like some people whose eyes are fixed
only on the foreigners and are unaware of China's own great strength. Every day
they read from the testament of the Director General, "We must arouse the popular
masses," but they never arouse the popular masses. On the contrary, they oppress
the popular masses. They just mouth the words, but do not put them into practice.
Is it true that diplomacy is unnecessary once the people in the entire nation have
stood up and the united front has been formed? This is also entirely untrue. Of
course, it is unnecessary if the diplomacy is to communicate with the imperialists,
and participate in an imperialist war, for this kind of diplomacy is harmful to China,
and we reject it. In sum, we will oppose anything that hurts China and support
everything that benefits China. That is to say, we will adopt a friendly attitude
toward whoever helps us and a hostile attitude toward those who aid the enemy.

Comrades from the Northeast, you have already been working hard for eight
years in the process of organizing this great united front, and you should continue
to work hard in the future. You should act like Yu the Great. For the sake of the
public welfare, "he was eight years away from his home, and though he thrice
passed the door of it, he did not enter."¹ Now you have already been away for
eight years and have not once returned home. Comrades, you should still be prepared not to be able to go home for several years. You should be prepared to swear
never to go home if the enemy bandits are not wiped out! You should have the
spirit of sacrifice, of sacrificing yourselves for the sake of the public good. In what
year will you finally be able to go home? We cannot say definitely at present. It is
now 1939: we must wage a protracted war, we must continue to fight. Everyone
must be resolute, and we must absolutely drive the Japanese bandits out of China!
The focus of our work is to organize united fronts--the united front in the Northeast, in all the enemy-occupied territories, in all of China, and in the whole world.
Comrades, provided only that we are resolute and act in this way, we are sure to
succeed. The Northeast can definitely be regained, and we can definitely fight all
the way through to the Yalu River and regain all our lost territory. By then our
forces will be ready, and we will fight all the way back to the Northeast. Comrade
Stalin has already prepared a hammer, and he is going to hit the Japanese imperialists on the head. When Japanese imperialism has been defeated, instead of a
memorial meeting we will have a celebration meeting. By then, if China is liberated, we will have a meeting to celebrate the liberation of the whole country. At
present, every comrade must make great efforts; everyone should study hard and
try his best to participate in the national liberation movement. We will not rest a
single day until China is victorious!

1. The reference is to the Mencius, III, I, IV, 7 (Legge, Vol. 2, p. 251). Mao had already
used this allusion in his essay of 1917 on physical culture; see Volume I of this edition,
p. 120.