The Strategic Task of the Central Plains
Army Is to Establish Base Areas behind
Enemy Lines
(July 15, 1946)
To the Central Plains Bureau:1
Hu Zongnan’s2 powerful military forces are blocking our strikes at every turn
and it is very difficult to pass through to the north. Pinning down a large contingent of the enemy army and establishing bases behind enemy lines is therefore the
glorious strategic task of our Central Plains Army. The entire Central Plains Army
should abide by the Central Committee’s telegram of July 13th,3 and in the area
within the five provinces of Hubei, Henan, Anhui, Sichuan, and Shaanxi carry out
flexible and mobile warfare, smash the Guomindang’s ruling organizations, pin
down a large portion of the Guomindang armies, and coordinate with our main
forces for battle in North China and Central China. At present, to avoid engaging
in battle with the two large army units of Hu Zongnan and Liu Zhi4 and secure
some time to rest, you can enter Bashan from the south and proceed to occupy the
Tong[jiang]-Nan[jiang]-Ba[zhong] area and the vast area of northeastern Sichuan
and create base areas. Our columns under Wang [Shusheng] and Liu [Zijiu]5 will
establish base areas in western Hubei; Pi [Dingjun] and Xu [Zirong]6 will operate
Our source for this text is Mao Zedong junshi wenji, Vol. 3, pp. 344–45, where it is
reproduced from Mao’s handwritten manuscript preserved in the Central Archives.
1.  Mao Zedong drafted this telegram on behalf of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party.
2.  Hu Zongnan was commander-in-chief of the Guomindang army’s First War Zone.
3.  See “The Central Plains Army Should Pin down the Enemy by Flexible Mobile
Action on the Exterior Lines,” July 13, 1946, in this volume.
4.  Liu Zhi was director of the Guomindang army’s Zhengzhou Pacification Office.
5.  Wang Shusheng was commander and Liu Zijiu was deputy political commissar,
respectively, of the First Column of the Central Plains Military Region, which with the
Second Column’s Fifteenth Brigade (minus one regiment) broke through the encirclement
by the Guomindang army. At this time, these troops were in the region of Yicheng, Nanzhang, and Baokang in Hubei Province.
6.  Pi Dingjun (1914–1976, native of Anhui) and Xu Zirong (1907–1969, native of
Henan) were commander and political commissar, respectively, of the First Brigade of
the First Column of the Central Plains Military Region. At this time, their troops were in
Anhui’s Feixi Guanting region.
DOI:  10.4324/9781315719511-203

in western Anhui and neighboring areas; troops remaining in the original base
areas east and west of the [Bei]Ping-Han[kou] railway are to hold their original areas. In the future, you should prepare to dispatch a portion to develop the
great southwestern region. In short, to fundamentally demolish Chiang Kaishek’s
reactionary plan of employing massive military forces to attack the Northeast,
North China, Central China, and the Central Plains, and to develop the Liberated
Areas toward the Central Plains and the upper reaches of the Yangzi River, our
Party must adopt the plan laid out in the July 13th telegram and the deployments
detailed in the present telegram. Inform us quickly of your opinions.
The Central Committee