To Zhou Enlai and Lin Biao[1]

(July 10, 1943)

The matters raised in the Jiang[2] telegram are all trivial. From the evening of Jiang day, when we discovered that Hu was acting on Chiang’s order to complete all combat preparations by Hui day[3] and to await Chiang’s handwritten order to launch an offensive immediately, and was continuing to redeploy the First Army to Binzhou and Chunhua and the Eighth Division to Zhongbu, we have, since Zhi day[4], raised the tasks of opposing the crisis of civil war and defending the Border Region, and have appealed to Chiang and Hu for unity, requesting them to withdraw their troops and prevent civil war. Therefore, you should no longer raise the minor details mentioned in the Jiang telegram, but should focus on preventing civil war.

[1] This is the main content of Mao Zedong’s telegram to Zhou Enlai and Lin Biao.

[2] Jiang, i.e., the 3rd.

[3] Hui day, i.e., the 10th.

[4] Zhi day, i.e., the 4th.