Comments and Revisions on Peng Dehuai’s[1] Draft Speech for the Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of China
(August 30, 1956)

Return to Comrade Peng Dehuai:
I have read it through and find it usable. I have made a few minor additions, deletions, and revisions—please consider them.
The writing is smooth and can be left without further cuts.

Mao Zedong
Morning, August 30

[1] Peng Dehuai was then a member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, a member of the Central Military Commission, Vice Premier of the State Council, and Minister of National Defense, in charge of the day-to-day work of the Central Military Commission.
[2] This first part was written on Peng Dehuai’s letter of August 29, 1956, submitting the revised draft of his speech on military work for review. The speech Peng Dehuai was preparing to deliver at the Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of China was originally titled “Struggle for the Modernization of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army.” When published in *Renmin Ribao* on September 20, 1956, the title was changed to “Victoriously Fulfill the Glorious Tasks of Military Work.” The second and third parts are two revisions Mao Zedong made to Peng Dehuai’s draft speech. The text printed in Song typeface represents the words added or rewritten by Mao Zedong.

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Comments and Revisions on Peng Dehuai’s Draft Speech for the Eighth National Congress of the CPC
Although the modernization of our army has not been under way for long, and the various services and arms have yet to attain full modernization, they have already reached a scale unprecedented in our country’s history. With the rapid development of national economic construction, the level of modernization of our army will certainly be further raised. Here, I wish to express our gratitude to our great fraternal ally, the Soviet Union, for its completely brotherly efforts in supplying military equipment and assisting us in building our military industry.

We should also study the military affairs of capitalist countries, so as to achieve the aim of knowing both ourselves and the enemy. As for their technical sciences, we should likewise study whatever is useful to us.

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