Telegram to the Shanghai Municipal Committee Regarding the Campaign to Suppress Counterrevolutionaries (January 21, 1951)

To the Shanghai Municipal Committee, with copy to Rao and Chen [1]: Your comprehensive report of January 6 covering November and December 1950, forwarded by the East China Bureau, has been received.

It is most satisfactory and reassuring. The report also identifies several central tasks for January and February of this year, which is commendable.

In particular, it notes your plan to deliver a powerful blow against counterrevolutionary elements in January. I urge you to carry out meticulous reconnaissance and make thorough preparations for this operation. Once everything is in place, launch coordinated actions and effect a series of precise arrests.

Thereafter, conduct careful investigations and interrogations, and execute a large number of counterrevolutionaries who are truly guilty of heinous crimes.

In a major city like Shanghai, it will probably be necessary to execute one to two thousand persons within the course of this year in order to resolve the problem.

It is highly desirable to execute three to five hundred individuals during the spring, thereby suppressing the enemy’s morale and boosting the people’s confidence.

Under the direct leadership of the East China Bureau, please consider the specific circumstances and handle the matter appropriately.

As for Nanjing, I instruct the East China Bureau to guide the municipal committee in making proper arrangements for surveillance, arrest, and interrogation, with the aim of executing two to three hundred of the most important reactionary elements in the spring.

Mao Zedong January 21 Based on the manuscript. Notes [1] Rao refers to Rao Shushi, then First Secretary of the CPC East China Bureau. Chen refers to Chen Yi, then Second Secretary of the CPC East China Bureau and Secretary of the CPC Shanghai Municipal Committee.