The Northeast Must Prepare Sufficient
Provisions to Meet the Requirements of a
Large Army
 (May 31, 1948, noon)
To Lin [Biao], Luo [Ronghuan], and Liu [Yalou], and for the information of the
Northeast Bureau:1
	 1.	 To prepare for the main northeastern forces to fight along the Jin[zhou]-
Yu[guan]-[Tian]jin-[Bei]ping line, and along the [Bei]ping-Zhang[jiakou]-[
Gui]sui-Bao[tou] line, you must carefully plan all logistical issues involved
in transporting provisions from the Northeast to these two lines. At least find
a few relatively good highways from Tongliao to Chifeng and from Chifeng
to northern Chahar, Suiyuan,2 the [Bei]ping-Zhang[jiakou] railway, and
eastern Hebei. It is even more important to repair the railroads from Tongliao
to Yi county and from Yi county to Chengde. Please check and report on
the conditions of the above highways and railroads. We must anticipate the
needs of a drawn-out battle in which enemy forces will be amassed in several
large strongholds. Our armies will need to fight with them for a long time,
until they run out of supplies and reinforcements and the situation changes.
Only then will we be able to overpower the strongholds. Under such conditions, we will win the battle only if we continue to have sufficient provisions
for our armies. The crops produced in Rehe3 and eastern Hebei, and especially those in northern Chahar and eastern Suiyuan, are insufficient for the
long-term demands of a large army; you must therefore prepare sufficient
aid from the Northeast. Last April, two columns of our Yang [Dezhi]-Luo
[Ruiqing]-Yang [Chengwu] forces4 moved to eastern Suiyuan and lost a
good opportunity to annihilate the enemy because they did not have sufficient provisions to remain there for long. You must learn from this example.
	 2.	 We received your telegram sent at 11:30 P.M. on the 29th5 about the plan of
action and we are now studying it.
The Military Commission

---

Notes

--- Notes

Our source for this text is Mao Zedong junshi wenji, Vol. 4, pp. 470–71, 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 Military Commission.
Lin Biao was commander and political commissar, Luo Ronghuan was deputy political
commissar, and Liu Yalou was chief-of-staff of the Northeast Field Army.

2.  Chahar Province, abolished in 1952, governed what is today northwestern Hebei and
Xilinguolemeng in Inner Mongolia. Suiyuan Province, abolished in 1954, governed the
central region of what is now Inner Mongolia.

3.  Rehe Province, abolished in 1955, governed parts of today’s northeastern Hebei,
southwestern Liaoning, and southeastern Inner Mongolia.
DOI:  10.4324/9781315719436-122

4.  Yang Dezhi was commander, Luo Ruiqing was first political commissar, and Yang
Chengwu was second political commissar of the Second Corps of the North China Military
Region.

5.  The telegram from Lin Biao et al. stated their decision to change their firm plan to
attack Changchun by instead sending some of the forces besieging Changchun to pick off
enemy forces in retreat, and then to transfer the main force of the Northeast Field Army to
southern Rehe.