WELCOME, COMRADES-IN-ARMS OF
THE U.S. MILITARY OBSERVATION GROUP*
{August 15, 1944)
The U.S, Military Observation Group dispatched by the General Headquarters of the U.S. Armed Forces in China, Burma and India (i.e., General
Stilwell's headquarters) has now arrived in Yan'an. This is the most exciting
major event since the start of China's "War of Resistance. We should like to
extend our warm welcome to all members of the observation group from afar!
In receiving the comrades-in-arms of the U.S. Military Observation
Group, we cannot help thinking of the brilliant achievements scored by the
United States in the anti-fascist world war and the American people's great
spirit of readily taking up cudgels for a just cause and bearing sacrifices. In
Europe, Africa and Asia there are heroic American officers and men ready to
lay down their lives on the battlefield, bleeding and fighting for the liberation
of the people under the fascist iron heel. On our China's battlefield of
resistance to the Japanese invaders, American soldiers are fighting shoulder to
shoulder with our people and becoming our closest comrades-in-arms. On this
occasion of welcoming the friends of the U.S. Military Observation Group,
we should like to express our heartfelt thanks to the U.S. government, the
American people, the American officers and men in the navy, the army and
the air force, and their wise leader. President Roosevelt.
The arrival of the comrades-in-arms of the U.S. Military Observation
Group in Yan'an has a great significance for victory in the War of Resistance
Against Japan. Over the past seven years nearly 500,000 troops of the Eighth
Route and New Fourth armies and over 80 million liberated people have been
fighting bravely on three major battlefields behind enemy lines in northern,
central and southern China. For a long time the battlefields behind enemy
lines have been the most important ones in China's War of Resistance. It is
there that we have taken on five sixths of all the Japanese and their puppet
* This article is the main part of an editorial of Yan'an's Liberation Daily, finalized by
Mao Zedong.
troops in China; nearly all the major cities in China have been under siege by
the Eighth Route and New Fourth armies; and most of the enemy-occupied
coastlines have come under our control. This situation remains unknown to
friends in allied countries.
Past information received by the governments and peoples of the allied
countries about China's "War of Resistance is completely otherwise. Their
impressions have been that the Kuomintang was the main force in the war in
China, that the Kuomintang played the greatest part in the War of Resistance,
that the Kuomintang resisted the majority of the Japanese and their puppet
troops, and that the Kuomintang should naturally be the major force to rely
on in future counteroffensives against the Japanese invaders. Even now such
impressions remain unchanged and dominant in the minds of the majority of
the officials and citizens of the allied countries.
The reason for such deception, flying completely in the face of truth, is
the policy of fraud and blockade adopted by the Kuomintang rulers. They have
deceived foreigners by saying how the Kuomintang exerted itself in combating
the Japanese, whereas for five and a half years since October 1938, they have
basically followed a policy of "doing nothing but sit on top of the mountain
to watch the tigers fight"; up to now this policy remains unchanged in most
of the theaters of operation except for Hunan and Burma. Again they have
deceived foreigners by saying that the Communist Party not only "combated
no Japanese," but always "tried to sabotage the War of Resistance and
endangered the nation." In actuality, it is just this Communist Party that took
on five sixths of the Japanese and their puppet troops, while the Kuomintang,
shouting everyday about the "superior interests of the nation," faced no more
than one sixth of the enemy troops. Since the Communist Party allegedly
"combated no enemy," "sabotaged the War of Resistance," and "endangered
the nation," the Kuomintang should long ago have called for large numbers
of foreigners and Chinese to visit the Communist regions in order to check
that what the Kuomintang gentlemen said were not lies. But they never did
so. Instead, they sealed those areas like an iron bucket. For more than five
years they banned, first, the Communist Party from issuing battlefield reports;
second, the border region newspapers from circulating in other areas; third,
any visit by Chinese and foreign journalists and, last, any crossing in and out
of the border regions. In a word the Kuomintang is free to fabricate, vilify,
abuse, rumormonger and mudsling all over, while the Communist Party and
the Eighth Route and New Fourth armies are forbidden to release even a bit
of their true conditions to the world. The difficulties and hardships the
journalist delegation had to overcome before they were able to travel to the

U.S.
border regions show clearly how the Kuomintang rulers racked their brains
trying to vilify us on the one hand and ban people from visiting us on the
other, proving themselves self-contradictory.
Facts speak louder than words, however, and truth is superior to all. The
day would come when foreigners and Chinese saw clearly, and now that has
happened, though gradually, as the Chinese and Foreign Journalist Delegation
and the U.S. Military Observation Group visited Yan'an one after the other
after breaking through the Kuomintang's blockade line. This issue is concerned
with 450 million Chinese people combating the Japanese invaders to liberate
all of China, with which of the two propositions and two lines in China is
right, and with the allied countries defeating their common enemy and
establishing a lasting peace. The Kuomintang said, "The disputes between the
Kuomintang and the Communist Party are the private affairs of China,"
which is nothing but a fig leaf for the crimes committed by the Kuomintang
in the War of Resistance. It has now become the public opinion of both
Chinese and foreigners that this dirty leaf should be thrown into a latrine.
As for the Kuomintang's ineffective fighting in the war, its corruption
and its incompetence, they have been conclusion of both foreign and Chinese
public opinion for over half a year, but as for the Communist Party's true
situation, the majority of foreigners and Chinese in the great rear area do not
yet have a clear understanding, owing to the long-time counterrevolutionary
propaganda and blockade policy of the Kuomintang. Nevertheless, things are
changing. Foreign public opinion for more than half a year has shown the
beginning of such a change. The arrival of the journalist delegation and the
observation group in Yan'an will open up a new stage.
Thanks to the coverage of the foreign journalists visiting Yan'an, foreigners will gradually know the truth about the Communist Party of China, the
Eighth Route and New Fourth armies and the anti-Japanese base areas, as well
as their importance in supporting the war of resistance of the allied countries.
Now not only the Foreign Journalist Delegation, but also the U.S. Military
Observation Group has arrived in Yan'an. We believe that the comrades-in-arms of the group will surely observe the situation here carefully and keenly
and make plans for close cooperation of the two sides to defeat the Japanese
invaders. It has already proved difficult for the Kuomintang to shut out the
truth from the masses for long.
We wish success for the work of the U.S. Military Observation Group.
We hope that such success will help the U.S. supreme command understand
that the Communist Party of China has from the beginning persisted in the
policies of unity in the "War of Resistance and of democracy, and appreciate
the strength of the Communist-led forces of resistance in the rear of the
enemy, and that it will, on the basis of such understanding and appreciation,
decide on a correct policy. We hope also that such success will promote unity
between China and the United States, the two great allies, and speed up the
final defeat of the Japanese invaders.
(From Liberation Daily, August 15, 1944, Yan'an)