We Will Be Able to Completely Overthrow the
Guomindang within About One Year
 (November 11, 1948, 7:00 P.M. to 9:00 P.M.)
To Lin [Biao], Luo [Ronghuan], Liu [Yalou], and Tan [Zheng],1 and for the information of the comrades responsible for the Northeast Bureau, all other bureaus,
and all front committees:
	 1.	 Your report of November 8th on the course of the battle has been received,
and we have read it with great satisfaction. It has been transmitted for reference to the front committees of all our field armies. Please print and distribute the Central Committee’s congratulatory telegram on your victory to the
entire army to raise morale.
	 2.	 You have also had many new experiences and lessons. Please write a report
via telegram for wide distribution.
	 3.	 The entire Guomindang army, except for the rear units, is divided into six
groups: Xuzhou, Shenyang, Beiping, Hankou, Xi’an, and Taiyuan. Of these,
Xuzhou and Shenyang are the two biggest groups and serve as the main
force. Now we have finished off the Shenyang group. If we can destroy the
greater part of the Xuzhou Group, the Guomindang will have lost its main
forces. Our army’s victories of September and October, especially the victories in the Northeast and in Ji’nan, have fundamentally changed the situation
between the enemy and ourselves. Battling during the period of a little more
than four months from July to the present, we have destroyed enemy forces
totaling nearly 1,000,000 men. The entire Guomindang army (including
recruits of recent months) now has fewer than 3,000,000 men, and our army,
moving in the opposite direction, has increased to more than 3,000,000 men.
The estimates and tasks we put forward at the Central Committee meeting
during the first ten days of September (before the Ji’nan Campaign), in which
we planned to build our army to 5,000,000 within five years and to destroy
500 regular divisions of the enemy, thereby overthrowing the Guomindang
completely, are manifestly out of date due to the great victories in September
and October. Completion of the task will probably require only one more
year. That is to say, the Guomindang is already incapable of mobilizing
3,000,000 men once again. Therefore, our army will not need three more
years (counting from July of this year) to destroy 300 regular divisions of the
enemy to reach our goal of completely overthrowing the Guomindang. Our
army will probably be able to wipe out 100 more divisions and thereby reach
this goal within one more year. But we will still need more time to finish off
the Guomindang completely and to take control of the entire country. Our
Party and our army will have to continue to advance steadily, without being
arrogant or impatient, to gain a final victory. Our slogan is, “Our army is
advancing, our production is growing, we are strengthening our discipline,
and the revolution cannot fail to be victorious.” Please announce this at the
cadre meeting.
 Mao Zedong

--- Notes

Our source for this text is Mao Zedong junshi wenji, Vol. 5, pp. 202–3, where it is reproduced from the handwritten manuscript preserved in the Central Archives.

1.  Lin Biao, Luo Ronghuan, Liu Yalou, and Tan Zheng were commander, political
commissar, chief-of-staff, and head of the Political Department, respectively, of the Northeast Field Army.
DOI:  10.4324/9781315719436-182