Central Instructions on Guangzhou’s Five-Against Campaign (April 5, 1952) To Comrade Luo Ruiqing [1], the South China Bureau, with copy to the Central-South Bureau: We have received Comrade Luo Ruiqing’s report of April 3 concerning the Five-Against Campaign in Guangzhou [2]. The Central Committee finds the views set forth in this report to be correct. The Ten Lessons Learned from Shanghai’s Five-Against Campaign [3] have already been transmitted to you; we trust you have received them. Please study these lessons carefully and apply them, paying particular attention to ensuring that production and business operations continue uninterrupted throughout the campaign. In conducting the Five-Against Campaign in Guangzhou, it is essential to maintain a positive influence on Chinese industrial and commercial enterprises in Hong Kong and Macao. Your emphasis on this point is entirely appropriate. A major shortcoming in Guangzhou’s Five-Against Campaign has been the paucity of reliable factual information at our disposal. This problem must be addressed during the course of the struggle by winning over senior employees. In this regard, Shanghai’s experience is also highly instructive. Another lesson from Shanghai is to prioritize action against large-scale operators for economic reasons. Whether this approach is applicable in your region should be carefully considered. Furthermore, the Five-Against Campaign should not be allowed to drag on excessively. To achieve this, it is necessary to exercise strict control over and provide thorough training for the work teams, organizing their activities in ten-day phases—with adequate preparation beforehand—and setting firm deadlines for completing each phase. Issued by the Central Committee on April 5, based on Mao Zedong’s handwritten draft.

Notes [1] Luo Ruiqing was at the time Minister of Public Security of the Central People’s Government and a member of the Economy Inspection Commission. He had been dispatched by the Central Committee to the Central-South Region to assist in the Three-Against and Five-Against campaigns. [ ] In his report of April 3, 1952, addressed to Mao Zedong, the Central Committee, and copied to the Central-South Bureau, Comrade Luo Ruiqing outlined the general situation of the Five-Against Campaign in Guangzhou and the planned deployment. He proposed that, given the specific conditions of Guangzhou’s industrial and commercial sector, confining the primary targets—the fourth and fifth categories of businesses—to approximately four percent of the total number of enterprises would be both appropriate and advantageous. His reasoning was that many Guangzhou merchants, especially large import-export firms, effectively maintained a dual presence, with one foot in Hong Kong or Macao and the other in Guangzhou; some even kept their principal assets and management in the two Special Administrative Regions. Moreover, the businesses they operated currently lacked readily available substitutes. If pressed too hard, these entrepreneurs might simply choose not to return. Therefore, it would be advisable to adopt a more lenient stance toward such individuals, allowing them to perceive continued profitability, thereby increasing the likelihood of persuading a portion of them to resume operations in Guangzhou. With regard to the campaign’s organizational plan, the report indicated that pilot work in four key industries was nearing completion. The next step was to convene a mass rally involving forty thousand participants, both to launch a large-scale Five-Against drive and to announce the results of the pilot phase in those four sectors. Following the rally, the campaign would be extended to eighty additional industries, with the aim of essentially resolving the issues affecting the first three categories of businesses by the end of April, while seeking to address only part of the problems among the last two categories. By May, the Five-Against Campaign was to be fully rolled out across all remaining industries, numbering over one hundred. It was projected that the entire campaign in Guangzhou could be concluded within two months from that point. The report also noted that, in light of the intensification of mass mobilization, greater attention was being paid to winning over senior personnel and exploiting divisions among capitalists, as well as to ensuring that the Five-Against Campaign did not disrupt production—matters currently under study and arrangement in accordance with central directives. [3] See note [1] on page of this volume.