August 13, 1945

[This was a commentary written by Comrade Mao Tse-tung for the Hsinhua News
Agency.]


A spokesman for the Propaganda Department of the Kuomintang Central Executive
Committee has made a statement describing as "a presumptuous and illegal
act" the order [1] setting a time-limit for the
surrender of the enemy and the puppets, [2] which
was issued by Chu Teh, Commander-in-Chief of the Eighteenth Group Army, on
August 10 from the General Headquarters in Yenan. This comment is absolutely
preposterous. Its logical implication is that it was wrong of Chu Teh to
act in accordance with the Potsdam Declaration
[3] and with the enemy's declared intention of
surrendering and to order his troops to effect the surrender of the enemy
and the puppets, and that on the contrary it would have been right and legitimate
to advise the enemy and puppets to refuse to surrender. No wonder that even
before the enemy's actual surrender, Chiang Kai-shek, China's fascist ringleader,
autocrat and traitor to the people, had the audacity to "order" the anti-Japanese
armed forces in the Liberated Areas to "stay where they are, pending further
orders", that is, to tie their own hands and let the enemy attack them. No
wonder this selfsame fascist ringleader dared to "order" the so-called
underground forces (who are, in fact, puppet troops "saving the nation by
a devious path" [4] and Tai Li's
[5] secret police collaborating with the Japanese
and puppets) as well as other puppet troops to "be responsible for maintaining
local order", while forbidding the anti-Japanese armed forces in the Liberated
Areas to "take presumptuous action on their own" against enemy and puppet
forces. This transposition of the enemy and the Chinese is in truth a confession
by Chiang Kai-shek; it gives a vivid picture of his whole psychology, which
is one of consistent collusion with the enemy and puppets and of liquidation
of all those not of his ilk. However, the people's anti-Japanese armed forces
in China's Liberated Areas will never be taken in by this venomous scheme.
They know that Commander-in-Chief Chu Teh's order is precisely the resolute
fulfilment of the provision in paragraph 2 of the Potsdam Declaration, "prosecute
the war against Japan until she ceases to resist". On the other hand, Chiang
Kai-shek's so-called "orders" are precisely violations of the Potsdam Declaration
which he himself signed. One has only to make the comparison to see at once
who is not "adhering faithfully to the provisions of the common agreements
of the Allies".

Both the comment by the spokesman for the Propaganda Department of the Kuomintang
Central Executive Committee and Chiang Kai-shek's "orders" are from beginning
to end provocations to civil war; at this moment, when attention at home
and abroad is focussed on Japan's unconditional surrender, their aim is to
find a pretext for switching to civil war as soon as the War of Resistance
ends. In reality, the Kuomintang reactionaries are pitifully stupid. They
have sought their pretext in Commander-in-Chief Chu Teh's order for the surrender
and disarming of the enemy and puppet troops. Can this be considered a clever
pretext? No. That they seek a pretext in this way proves only that the Kuomintang
reactionaries are fonder of the enemy and puppets than of their fellow-countrymen
and that they hate their fellow-countrymen more than they do the enemy and
puppets. The Chunhua Incident [6] was plainly an
invasion of the Shensi-Kansu-Ningsia Border Region by Hu Tsung-nan's troops
to provoke civil war, and yet the Kuomintang reactionaries said it was a
"rumour offensive" by the Communist Party of China. The Kuomintang reactionaries
found their long-sought-for pretext in the Chunhua Incident, but Chinese
and foreign public opinion saw through it at once. So now they are saying
that the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army should not demand that
the enemy and puppet troops surrender their guns. In the eight years of the
War of Resistance, the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army have suffered
enough from the attacks and encirclements of both Chiang Kai-shek and the
Japanese. And now, with the War of Resistance coming to an end, Chiang Kai-shek
is hinting to the Japanese (and to his beloved puppet troops) that they should
not surrender their guns to the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army
but "only to me, Chiang Kai-shek". One thing, however, Chiang Kai-shek has
left unsaid, ". . . so that I can use these guns to kill the Communists and
wreck the peace of China and the world." Isn't this the truth? What will
be the result of telling the Japanese to hand over their guns to Chiang Kai-shek
and telling the puppet troops to "be responsible for maintaining local order"?
The result can only be that a merger of the Nanking and Chungking regimes
[7] and co-operation between Chiang Kai-shek and
the puppets will take the place of "Sino-Japanese collaboration" and of
co-operation between the Japanese and the puppets, and that Chiang Kai-shek's
"anti-communism and national reconstruction" will take the place of the
"anti-communism and national reconstruction" of the Japanese and Wang Ching-wei.
[8] Isn't this a violation of the Potsdam Declaration?
Can there be any doubt that the grave danger of civil war will confront the
people of the whole country the moment the War of Resistance is over? We
now appeal to all our fellow-countrymen and to the Allied countries to take
action, together with the people of the Liberated Areas, resolutely to prevent
a civil war in China, which would endanger world peace.

After all, who has the right to accept the surrender of the Japanese and
puppets? Relying solely on their own efforts and the support of the people,
the anti-Japanese armed forces in China's Liberated Areas, to whom the Kuomintang
government refused all supplies and recognition, have succeeded by themselves
in liberating vast territories and more than 100 million people and have
resisted and pinned down 56 per cent of the invading enemy troops in China
and 95 per cent of the puppet troops. If not for these armed forces, the
situation in China would never have been what it is today! To speak plainly,
in China only the anti-Japanese armed forces of the Liberated Areas have
the right to accept the surrender of the enemy and puppet troops. As for
Chiang Kai-shek, his policy has been to look on with folded arms and sit
around and wait for victory; indeed he has no right at all to accept the
surrender of the enemy and the puppets.

We declare to all our fellow-countrymen and to the people of the whole world:
The Supreme Command in Chungking cannot represent the Chinese people and
those Chinese armed forces which have really fought Japan; the Chinese people
demand the right of the anti-Japanese armed forces of China's Liberated Areas
under Commander-in-Chief Chu Teh to send their representatives directly in
order to participate in the acceptance of Japan's surrender and in the military
control over Japan by the four Allied Powers and also to participate in the
future peace conference. If this is not done, the Chinese people will deem
it most improper.


NOTES


1.On August 10, 1945, Commander-in-Chief Chu Teh issued
an order from the General Headquarters in Yenan to all armed forces in the
Liberated Areas concerning the surrender of the Japanese invaders. The order
reads as follows:

  Japan has announced her unconditional surrender, and the Allies will meet
  to discuss measures for accepting the surrender on the basis of the Potsdam
  Declaration. I hereby issue the following order to all our armed forces in
  the Liberated Areas:

  (1) In accordance with the provisions of the Potsdam Declaration, any
  anti-Japanese armed forces in the Liberated Areas may serve notice on enemy
  troops and headquarters in cities and towns or along communication lines
  in the vicinity, requiring them to hand over all their arms to our fighting
  forces within a given time; when they have handed over their arms, our forces
  will protect their lives in accordance with our regulations on the lenient
  treatment of prisoners of war.

  (2) Any anti-Japanese armed forces in the Liberated Areas may serve notice
  on all the puppet troops and puppet government organs in the vicinity, requiring
  them to come over with their troops to our side before the signing of the
  surrender by the Japanese invaders and to wait for reorganization and
  disbandment; those who fail to comply within the time allowed shall hand
  over all their arms.

  (3) All anti-Japanese armed forces in the Liberated Areas should resolutely
  wipe out all those enemy and puppet armed forces which refuse to surrender
  and hand over their arms.

  (4) Our armed forces have full authority to send their units to take over
  and occupy any city, town or communication line held by the enemy and the
  puppets, to set up military control, to maintain order and to appoint
  commissioners to take charge of all administrative matters there; in case
  of any act of sabotage or resistance, the culprits shall be punished as traitors.


Then, on August 11 the General Headquarters in Yenan issued six successive
orders, under which the armed forces of the Shansi-Suiyuan Liberated Area
(led by Comrade Ho Lung), the Shansi-Chahar-Hopei Liberated Area (led by
Comrade Nieh Jung-chen) and the Hopei-Jehol-Liaoning Liberated Area were
to march on Inner Mongolia and the Northeast, the armed forces of the Shansi
Liberated Area were to mop up the Japanese and puppet troops along the
Tatung-Puchow Railway and in the Fenho River valley; and the armed forces
of all the Liberated Areas were to launch vigorous offensives on all the
main communication lines under enemy control to compel the Japanese and puppet
troops to surrender. The units of the People's Liberation Army in all the
Liberated Areas resolutely carried out these orders and won important victories.

2. Here "enemy" refers to the Japanese invading forces,
and "puppets" refers to the puppet governments set up by the Japanese invaders
and to the troops of these puppet governments, consisting largely of former
Kuomintang officials and of troops who had surrendered to Japan.

3. This refers to the declaration made by China, Britain
and the United States at the Potsdam conference on July 26, 1945, requiring
Japan to surrender. The main points of the declaration were that Japanese
militarism must be eliminated for good and all, Japan's military forces must
be completely disarmed; Japan's war industries must be dismantled; Japanese
war criminals must be tried; the Cairo Declaration must be carried out, that
is, Japan must renounce the territories she had stolen, such as Korea and
China's Manchuria, Taiwan and the Penghu Islands, and Japan's territory must
be limited to the islands of Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu, Shikoku and various
minor islands; and that the armed forces of the Allies were to occupy Japan
until the establishment of a democratic Japanese government. The Soviet Union
also signed the Potsdam Declaration after it declared war on Japan on August
8,1945.

4. This refers to the dastardly practice of capitulating
to Japan and fighting communism followed by the Kuomintang reactionaries
during the War of Resistance Against Japan. The Kuomintang reactionaries
directed part of their troops and government officials to surrender to the
Japanese invaders and then, as puppet troops and officials, to join the Japanese
troops in attacking the Liberated Areas, this was what they cunningly named
"saving the nation by a devious path".

5. Tai Li was the Director of the Bureau of Investigation
and Statistics of the Military Council of the Kuomintang, one of the Kuomintang's
huge secret service agencies.

6. The invasion by Kuomintang troops of Chunhua, Hsunyi
and Yaohsien in the Kuanchung sub-region of the Shensi-Kansu-Ningsia Border
Region in July 1945. See "The Situation and Our Policy After the Victory
in the War of Resistance Against Japan", Note 12, p. 24 of this volume.

7. Wang Ching-wei's puppet regime was in Nanking and Chiang
Kai-shek's regime was in Chungking. The "merger of the Nanking and Chungking
regimes" was a political plot hatched by Japanese imperialism and the
pro-Japanese elements within the Kuomintang.

8. Wang Ching-wei was a notorious Kuomintang leader and
pro-Japanese traitor. He openly surrendered to the Japanese invaders in December
1938 when he was vice-chairman of the Kuomintang and chairman of its People's
Political Council. In March 1940 he became president of the puppet central
government then formed in Nanking. He died in Japan in November 1944.

Transcription by the Maoist Documentation Project.