Over the ten-year period from the Zunyi Conference in January 1935 to the present Seventh National Congress in May 1945, what was the nature of the Central Committee? The core membership was elected at the Fourth and Fifth Plenary Sessions, not at the Sixth Congress; of those originally selected at the Sixth Congress, only four remain today. Out of the twenty-five members, the vast majority were chosen at the Fourth and Fifth Plenums—those two sessions during which we had experienced our famous “somersaults.” Working alongside these comrades within such a Central Committee, and precisely during those ten years when we turned fewer somersaults and stirred up less turmoil, our work nevertheless made some progress. Is this not an extremely important lesson? Indeed, it is a very significant one.

At the Zunyi Conference in January 1935, a group of cadres who had either actively led or supported the Fourth Plenum—that is, individuals who had previously committed errors in line during the Third “Left” Deviation—joined forces with other comrades to oppose that very same Third “Left” Deviation. Now, everyone tends to attribute this outcome solely to me. Let me make it clear: without the support of these comrades, as well as of many others who opposed the “Left” Deviation—including several highly prominent figures who had themselves erred in adopting that line—the success of the Zunyi Conference would have been impossible.

When studying the Party’s history and its lines, we must recognize that there have been two pivotal meetings in the Chinese Communist Party’s history: the Zunyi Conference of January 1935, and the Sixth Plenary Session of 1938. The Zunyi Conference was a turning point of immense significance for the Chinese revolution. Yet it is crucial to understand that, had Comrades Luo Fu and Wang Jiaxiang not broken away from the Third “Left” Deviation, the conference could never have been convened successfully. Our comrades have rightly credited me with this achievement, but we must never forget the indispensable roles played by those two men. Of course, many other comrades also participated in the Zunyi Conference, and the preparations had been long in the making. Without their collective support, even the efforts of Luo Fu and Wang Jiaxiang alone would not have sufficed. Nevertheless, their break with the Third “Left” Deviation proved decisive, and they exerted a powerful influence. From the very outset of the Long March, Comrade Wang Jiaxiang had already begun to oppose that “Left” line.