Comrade Tao Zhu's Report on the Bandit Suppression Work in Guangxi: Comments and Reply Telegram (January 7 and 9, 1951)

1

Comrades Chen [Yi], Rao [Shushi], Deng [Xiaoping], He [Long], Xi [Zhongxun], Zhang [Zongxun]:¹

Tao Zhu's telegram of December 31² is hereby forwarded to you for reference, and please relay it to the localities and army units under your jurisdiction where the bandit suppression situation remains serious. We believe that Guangxi's recent experience is very good and merits study.

Mao Zedong
January 7

2

Comrade Tao Zhu, with a copy to the Guangxi Provincial Party Committee and the Central-South Bureau:

(1) Your report of December 31 on the smooth progress of the bandit suppression work in Guangxi has been read and noted. It is excellent and most reassuring. It has been forwarded to the East China, Southwest, and Northwest regions for reference.

(2) Since the bandits in the two key areas³ can be cleared out before March, please consider whether it is possible to send only the 21st Corps, and not the 45th Army, to suppress the bandits in the northwestern region, so as to free the 45th Army from bandit suppression duties and have it move to the Wuzhou area in March for reorganization, training, and standby, in preparation for any contingency in Guangdong.

Mao Zedong
January 9

Printed from the manuscript.

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**Notes**

¹ Chen refers to Chen Yi, then Second Secretary of the East China Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and Commander of the East China Military Region of the PLA. Rao refers to Rao Shushi, then First Secretary of the East China Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and Political Commissar of the East China Military Region of the PLA. Deng refers to Deng Xiaoping, then First Secretary of the Southwest Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and Political Commissar of the Southwest Military Region of the PLA. He refers to He Long, then Third Secretary of the Southwest Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and Commander of the Southwest Military Region of the PLA. Xi refers to Xi Zhongxun, then First Secretary of the Northwest Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and Political Commissar of the Northwest Military Region of the PLA. Zhang refers to Zhang Zongxun, then Deputy Secretary of the Northwest Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and First Deputy Commander of the Northwest Military Region of the PLA.

² Refers to Tao Zhu's report of December 31, 1950, to the Central-South Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, the South China Sub-Bureau, with a copy to Mao Zedong, on the bandit suppression work in Guangxi. The report summarized two basic lessons from Guangxi's recent bandit suppression work: first, achieving a greater concentration of forces and better organizing the coordination of Party, government, civilian, and financial resources; second, greater clarity and better implementation of several key bandit suppression policies, including suppression, confiscation of firearms, opposition to local despots, and the building of local armed forces.

³ Refers to the two areas in Guangxi Province with more serious bandit problems: the region south of the Yujiang and Zuojiang rivers (i.e., the entire area along the river south from Wuzhou and Nanning to Longzhou, extending to the coastal areas of Qinzhou and Lianzhou) and the Greater and Lesser Yao Mountains and their surrounding counties.