The Battle to Defend Siping Cannot
Represent Our General Battle Strategy1
 (May 27, 1946)
The primary reason why we have been able to defend Sipingjie2 in the Northeast
for so long is that the enemy did not anticipate that our army had a line of defense
and consequently repeatedly sent more troops, making it easy for us to destroy
them one by one and causing the enemy to suffer a serious blow by our army. The
battle to defend Sipingjie therefore was characterized by special temporary conditions and it cannot become the general strategy for our military operations. We are
currently making great efforts to defend the large cities while losing many small
and medium-sized cities, and we have not been able to take advantage of many
opportunities to destroy the enemy by mobile warfare. Therefore, if the enemy
continues to send more troops to encircle and attack our defending armies, we will
still have to abandon the large cities.
Our source for this text is Mao Zedong junshi wenji, Vol. 3, p. 236, where it is reproduced from a mimeographed copy preserved at the Academy of Military Science of the
Chinese People’s Liberation Army.
1.  Mao Zedong drafted this telegram on behalf of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party to all strategic regions.
2.  Sipingjie is the former name of the town now known as Siping in Jilin Province.
DOI:  10.4324/9781315719511-157