April 15, 1947

[This telegram was sent by Comrade Mao Tse-tung to the Northwest Field Army,
which was then composed of the People's Liberation Army forces of the
Shensi-Kansu-Ningsia and Shansi-Suiyuan Liberated Areas and commanded by
Peng Teh-huai, Ho Lung, Hsi Chung-hsun and other comrades. ]


1. The enemy is now quite tired, but not yet tired out. He is in considerable
difficulties with his food supply, but not yet in extreme difficulties. Although
our army has not destroyed any large number of the enemy's forces since wiping
out his 31st Brigade,[1] in the last twenty days we have
achieved the objective of tiring him and considerably reducing his food supplies,
thus creating favourable conditions for tiring him out completely, cutting
off all his food supplies and finally wiping him out.

2. At present, despite the enemy's fatigue and shortage of food, his policy
is to drive our main force east across the Yellow River, then seal off Suiteh
and Michih and divide his forces for "mopping-up" operations. The enemy troops
reached Chingchien on March 31 but did not advance north immediately; their
purpose was to leave us a clear passage. Their advance west towards Wayaopao
was designed to drive us to Suiteh and Michih. Having discovered our troops,
they are now veering to the south and west of Wayaopao and then they will
again advance towards that town to drive us northward.

3. Our policy is to continue our former method, that is, to keep the enemy
on the run in this area for a time (about another month); the purpose is
to tire him out completely, reduce his food supplies drastically and then
look for an opportunity to destroy him. There is no need for our main force
to hurry north to attack Yulin or south to cut off the enemy's retreat. It
should be made clear to the commanders and fighters and also to the masses
that this method of our army is the necessary road to the final defeat of
the enemy. Unless we reduce the enemy to extreme fatigue and complete starvation,
we cannot win final victory. This may be called the tactics of "wear and
tear", that is, of wearing the enemy down to complete exhaustion and then
wiping him out.

4. As you are now in localities east and north of Wayaopao, it would be best
to induce the enemy to move to the north of Wayaopao; then you may attack
the weaker part of Liao Ang's[2] forces and induce the
enemy to move east; afterwards you may turn towards Ansai, and induce the
enemy to move west again.

5. But within a few days you must order the entire 359th Brigade to complete
its preparations for a southward drive, so that a week from now it can be
sent southward to make a surprise attack on the area south of the Yenchang-Yenan
line and north of the Yichuan-Lochuan line and cut the enemy's food transport
line.

6. Please reply whether you consider the above views sound.
NOTES

1. Having withdrawn from Yenan on its own initiative, the
Northwest People's Liberation Army sent out a small force to lure the enemy's
main force as far as Ansai, northwest of Yenan, while leaving its main force
to ambush the enemy in the Chinghuapien sector, northeast of Yenan. On March
25, 1947, a Kuomintang regiment of the 31st Brigade of Hu Tsung-nan's Reorganized
27th Division, led by the brigade headquarters, walked right into this trap
and was completely destroyed in a battle lasting just over an hour.

2. Liao Ang, Commander of the Reorganized 76th Division
of the Kuomintang forces under Hu Tsung-nan, was later captured in a battle
at Chingchien on October 11, 1947.

Transcription by the Maoist Documentation Project.