Some people ask, since the Communist Party is good, why didn’t it emerge a hundred years earlier, so that communism could have been implemented earlier? You should know that in Chinese history, the Communist Party could not be found. The reason is that without a bourgeoisie, there is no proletariat, and thus no working-class political party—the Communist Party. A hundred years ago, there were only the peasant class and the landlord class. It emerges under certain social conditions and on an economic foundation; in feudal society, a Communist Party was impossible.

After you have studied the materialist conception of history, you must understand that we advance step by step, and when the conditions are met and the forces are prepared, we will steadily move toward socialism—communism. At that time, there will be no need for the People’s Liberation Army or the Communist Party. Some say, how can we do without the Communist Party? It is precisely because it has succeeded that we will no longer need it, that it will be abolished. At that time, there will also be police, but the nature of the police then will differ from today’s. Under Guomindang rule, the police were used to rule and suppress the people’s resistance; the so-called maintenance of order was the maintenance of a reactionary order. After liberation, our police have two tasks: first, to suppress counterrevolutionaries, and second, to maintain order. At that future time, their task will be only one—to maintain order, not to suppress reactionaries. Some fear that without suppression, the reactionaries cannot be dealt with, but that is precisely because there will be no reactionaries left—whom would you suppress?

Comrades, twenty years from now, when our industry has developed to a certain degree, we will see the situation and then transition to socialism.

Sorry to have kept you waiting so long. My speech today is concluded.