The Party must unite all forces at home and abroad that can be united, and strive for the building of a great socialist China.

On summing up experience: Our experience is very rich, but we must not list a multitude of matters; instead, we must grasp the key points, proceed from reality, and sum them up according to the Marxist viewpoint. Such a summation will give our whole Party a driving force, enabling us to do our work better than in the past.

Our Party is a great, glorious, and correct Party—this is recognized by the whole world. In the past, some foreign comrades had doubts: What exactly are you doing? Many people did not understand our policy toward the national bourgeoisie, nor did they quite understand our rectification movement. Now, I think more people understand, and it can be said that generally they understand. Of course, there will still be some who do not understand. At home, even within the Party, there will also be some who do not understand, thinking that the line since the Seventh Congress is not necessarily so correct. But the facts are before us: We have carried out two revolutions—one was the bourgeois-democratic revolution, seizing political power throughout the country; the other was the proletarian socialist revolution, carrying out socialist transformation and building a socialist country. In the eleven years since the Seventh Congress, our achievements have been very great, recognized by the whole nation, recognized by the whole world, and even the foreign bourgeoisie cannot but admit them. The two revolutions prove that from the Seventh Congress to the present, the line of the Party Central Committee has been correct.

The October Revolution overthrew the bourgeoisie, which was a new thing in the world. Regarding this revolution, the international bourgeoisie, regardless of the whys and wherefores, mostly cursed it, always saying it was bad. The Russian bourgeoisie was a counter-revolutionary class; at that time, they would not go along with state capitalism—they engaged in sabotage, destruction, and took up guns to fight. The Russian proletariat had no other choice but to eliminate them. This angered the bourgeoisie of various countries, and they cursed us. Here, our treatment of the national bourgeoisie has been somewhat more moderate, so they feel a bit more comfortable and see some benefits. Now, Eisenhower and Dulles do not allow American journalists to come to China; in fact, this is an admission that our policy has this advantage. If things here were a complete mess, they would let those people come, and they would simply write articles cursing us. They are afraid that the articles written might not exclusively curse us but also say a few good things—that would make things difficult.

In the past, China was called the "old and feeble empire," the "sick man of East Asia"—economically backward, culturally backward, not paying attention to hygiene, unable to play ball games, unable to swim, women with bound feet, men wearing queues, and even eunuchs; the moon in China was not so very fine, while the moon in foreign countries was always a bit clearer. In short, there were quite a few bad things. But after these six years of reform, we have changed the face of China. Our achievements are undeniable by anyone.

The core leading our revolutionary cause is our Party. In summing up experience at this congress, we must first make the whole Party more united. As of June, our Party has 10.73 million members. Among these over ten million Party members, we must carry out extensive educational work, persuasive work, and unity work, so that they may better play the role of the core among the people. The Party alone is not enough; the Party is a core, and it must have the masses. In all our specific work—including industry, agriculture, commerce, culture, education, and so on—90 percent is done not by Party members but by non-Party people. Therefore, we must properly unite with the masses, unite with all people who can be united, and work together with them. In the past, we still had many shortcomings in uniting the whole Party and uniting people outside the Party. We must carry out propaganda and education at this congress and after it, and properly improve our work in this regard.

Internationally, we must unite all forces in the world that can be united—first of all, unite with the Soviet Union, unite with fraternal parties, fraternal countries, and peoples, and also unite with all peace-loving countries and peoples, and draw on all useful forces. This time, representatives of communist parties from over fifty countries have come to attend our congress; this is a very good thing. In the past, we had not yet seized political power throughout the country, had not achieved victory in the two revolutions, and had no achievements in construction; now it is different. Foreign comrades have greater respect for us.

For what purpose do we unite all forces that can be united inside and outside the Party, at home and abroad? It is for the purpose of building a great socialist country. A country like ours can and should be described with the word "great." Our Party is a great Party, our people are a great people, our revolution is a great revolution, and our construction undertaking is a great construction undertaking. A country with a population of 600 million—there is only one on earth, and that is ours. In the past, it was reasonable for others to look down on us, because you had made no contribution; steel output was only a few hundred thousand tons a year, and even that was in the hands of the Japanese. Under the twenty-two-year dictatorship of the Kuomintang and Chiang Kai-shek, they only managed to produce a few tens of thousands of tons a year. We still do not have much now, but we have begun to produce some—this year it is over four million tons, next year it will exceed five million tons, during the Second Five-Year Plan it will surpass ten million tons, and during the Third Five-Year Plan it may exceed twenty million tons. We must strive to achieve this goal. Although there are nearly one hundred countries in the world, only a few have a steel output exceeding twenty million tons. Therefore, when our country is built up, it will be a great socialist country, completely changing the backward situation of the past hundred-plus years, the situation of being looked down upon, the miserable situation, and will catch up with the most powerful capitalist country in the world, that is, the United States. The United States has a population of only 170 million; our country's population is several times larger, our resources are abundant, and our climatic conditions are similar to theirs—catching up is possible. Should we catch up? Absolutely. What are you 600 million people doing? Sleeping? Should you be sleeping, or should you be working? If you should be working, then others with 170 million people have 100 million tons of steel; can't you 600 million people produce 200 million or 300 million tons of steel? If you cannot catch up, then you have no justification, then you are not so glorious, nor so very great. The United States has been a nation for only 180 years; sixty years ago, its steel output was only four million tons. We are sixty years behind it. If we have another fifty or sixty years, we should completely surpass it. This is a responsibility. You have so many people, you have such a vast territory, such abundant resources, and it is said that you have adopted socialism, which supposedly has superiority—yet after fifty or sixty years you still cannot surpass the United States; what kind of appearance would that be? Then you would be expelled from the earth's membership! Therefore, surpassing the United States is not only possible but absolutely necessary and completely justified. If it were not so, then we, the Chinese nation, would be letting down all the nations of the world, and our contribution to humanity would not be great.

Second point: On inheriting the Party's traditions. This congress should continue to carry forward our Party's fine traditions in ideology and work style, and earnestly combat the two things—subjectivism and sectarianism. In addition, we must also oppose bureaucracy. I will not speak about bureaucracy today; I will only speak about subjectivism and sectarianism. These two things, once swept away, arise again; once they arise, they must be swept away again.

What is called making mistakes is precisely that subjectivism makes mistakes, that the thinking is not correct. Many articles we have seen criticizing Stalin's mistakes either do not mention this issue or mention it very rarely. Why did Stalin make mistakes? It was because on some issues his subjective thinking did not conform to objective reality. In our work today, such things still frequently occur. Subjectivism means not proceeding from objective reality, not proceeding from real possibilities, but proceeding from subjective wishes. The things stipulated and discussed in the documents of this congress should, as far as possible, conform to and approximate China's reality. At the same time, based on our past experience, we must criticize those viewpoints that do not conform to reality, criticize this subjectivism, and strike at this subjectivism. This task was raised by us several years ago. Now, what we oppose is subjectivism in the socialist revolution and socialist construction. In the past, during the democratic revolution, we suffered from subjectivism for a very long time and were severely punished—the base areas were almost completely lost, and over 90 percent of the revolutionary forces were lost; it was only then that we began to awaken. Through the Yan'an rectification movement, with emphasis on investigation and study and proceeding from reality, we finally clarified this issue. The universal truth of Marxism must be integrated with the concrete practice of the Chinese revolution; if it is not integrated, it will not work. That is to say, theory and practice must be unified. The unity of theory and practice is one of the most fundamental principles of Marxism. According to dialectical materialism, thought must reflect objective reality and be tested in objective practice, proving to be truth; only then can it be considered truth; otherwise, it cannot. In our work over these past few years,

There have been achievements, but the malady of subjectivism exists everywhere. Not only does it exist now, it will still exist in the future. Subjectivism will always exist, for ten thousand years, for a hundred million years, as long as humanity is not destroyed, it will always be there. Where there is subjectivism, mistakes will always be made.

There is another thing called sectarianism. A locality has the overall situation of that locality, a country has the overall situation of that country, a globe has the overall situation of that globe. For now we will not talk about beyond the globe, because the routes of communication have not yet been opened up. If it is discovered that there are people on Mars or Venus, at that time we will come back to negotiate the issue of uniting with them and establishing a united front. Now we are talking about the issue of unity within the Party, within the country, and throughout the whole world. Our principle is that no matter who you are, a foreign party, a foreign non-party personage, as long as you are of some use to the cause of world peace and human progress, we should unite with you. First of all, we must unite with the several dozen Communist Parties and unite with the Soviet Union. Because the Soviet Union made some mistakes, there has been much talk and much exaggeration about this, as if those mistakes were something terrible; such an observation is inappropriate. It is impossible for any nation not to make mistakes, let alone the Soviet Union, which is the first socialist country in the world and has gone through such a long period; it is impossible for it not to have made mistakes. What is the position of the mistakes made by the Soviet Union, like Stalin's mistakes? They are of a partial nature, of a temporary nature. Although it is said that some things have lasted twenty years, they are still temporary, partial, and can be corrected. The mainstream, the main aspect, the majority in the Soviet Union is correct. Russia produced Leninism, and through the October Revolution became the first socialist country. It built socialism, defeated fascism, and became a powerful industrial country. It has many things we can learn from. Of course, we must learn advanced experience, not backward experience. The slogan we have always put forward is to learn the advanced experience of the Soviet Union; who asked you to learn backward experience? Some people, regardless of the circumstances, even consider the farts of the Soviet people to be fragrant; that is also subjectivism. The Soviet people themselves say they are stinky! Therefore, analysis is necessary. We have said that Stalin's record should be assessed as seventy percent achievements and thirty percent mistakes. The main, the bulk of their things are good and useful; a part is mistaken. We also have some things that are not good; we ourselves must discard them, and even more so we must not let other countries learn these bad things. However, bad things also count as a kind of experience and have a great role. We have people like Chen Duxiu, Li Lisan, Wang Ming, Zhang Guotao, Gao Gang, and Rao Shushi; they are our teachers. Besides, we have other teachers. Domestically speaking, the best teacher is Chiang Kai-shek. People whom we could not convince were convinced once Chiang Kai-shek taught them. What methods did Chiang Kai-shek use to teach? He used machine guns, cannons, and airplanes to teach. There is also the teacher of imperialism, which has educated our six hundred million people. For over a hundred years, several imperialist powers oppressed us and educated us. Therefore, bad things have an educational role, a role as a cautionary reference.

In opposing sectarianism, one point particularly worth discussing is the need to unite with those who have struggled against oneself. He fought with you, knocked you to the ground, you suffered a loss, lost face, and although you were not so bad, he labeled you a "palace," calling you an opportunist. As for those who were right to strike, then they should have struck; if you were originally an opportunist, why shouldn't they have struck? Here I am talking about those who struck wrongly, who struggled wrongly. If those people later change their attitude and admit that they were wrong to strike you and that it was inappropriate to crown you king of the opportunist kingdom, as long as this one point is met, it is enough. If a few individuals still do not admit it, can we wait? We can also wait. What is meant by unity is uniting with that part of the people who have differing opinions from oneself, who look down on oneself, who do not respect oneself, who have had friction with oneself, who have struggled against oneself, and before whom one has suffered losses. As for those with the same opinions, they are already united, so the issue of unity does not arise. The problem lies with those who are not yet united. Those who are not yet united are those with differing opinions or with major shortcomings. For example, now within our Party, there are many people who have joined the Party organizationally but have not yet joined the Party ideologically. Although they have not fought with you or crossed hands with you, because they have not joined the Party ideologically, the things they do are bound to be not very appropriate, have some shortcomings, or even do some bad things. Toward this part of the people, we must unite with them, educate them, and help them. I have said before that for any person with shortcomings or who has made mistakes, we must not only see whether they reform but also help them reform—first, to observe; second, to help. If you only observe, standing there motionless, watching how you do, thinking if you do well, that's fine, and if you do poorly, you deserve to suffer—this kind of attitude is a passive attitude, not an active attitude. Marxists should adopt an active attitude, not only observing but also helping.

Third point, concerning the election of the Central Committee. Just now Comrade Xiaoping said that the number of members for the Eighth Central Committee is set at 150 to 170. The Seventh Central Committee had 77 members; this time it is increased by a little more than double, which is probably more appropriate. Waiting a few years, say five years, and then expanding it at that time is probably more advantageous. At present, many very useful talents were trained during the War of Resistance Against Japan; these are the so-called "March Eighth-style" cadres. They form a very important foundation for our current work; we cannot do without them. However, this group of cadres is very numerous; if they were to be placed, the number of members for this Central Committee would have to increase to several hundred. Therefore, we will not consider placing them this time. Whether the number of 150 to 170 proposed by the Central Committee is appropriate or not, and exactly what number is best, I ask comrades to consider.

It should be affirmed that the previous Central Committee did its work and did not fail the trust of the Seventh Congress. Over eleven years, they correctly led China's democratic revolution, correctly led the socialist revolution and socialist construction, made no major errors, and struggled against various kinds of opportunist things, struggled against erroneous things, and overcame various factors detrimental to the revolution and to construction. They have achievements, which also include some comrades who made mistakes. This is speaking of the Central Committee as a whole. As for individual comrades, they cannot be assessed in that way. Especially Wang Ming, at the time of the Seventh Congress, for the sake of coping, wrote a written statement acknowledging that the Central Committee's line was correct, acknowledging the Seventh Congress political report, and expressing willingness to obey the decisions of the congress. However, later when I talked with him, he went back on it; he forgot that thing. He went back and thought it over, and the next day he said, I did write something acknowledging my mistakes. I said, if you acknowledged it then and do not acknowledge it now, you can also withdraw it. He did not withdraw it. Later, at the Second Plenary Session, we hoped he would talk about his own mistakes, but he talked about other things, only about how good we people were. We said, you can skip those words; talk about what mistakes you, Wang Ming, have made. He refused. He promised to write a self-reflection after the Second Plenary Session. But later he said he was ill, could not use his brain, and as soon as he started writing, his illness would flare up. Perhaps he did this deliberately; that is hard to say. He has been ill all along and cannot even attend this congress. Should we elect him? And what about Comrade Li Lisan? There are more people who understand Li Lisan, but fewer who understand Wang Ming. As Comrade Xiaoping said, if we elect them, the significance will still be the same as when the Seventh Congress elected them. At the time of the Seventh Congress, many delegates were unwilling to elect them (not only Wang Ming, but also quite a few other comrades). At that time we said that if we adopted that policy, we would be making a mistake. Why would not electing people who have made mistakes be called making a mistake? Because that would be handling things according to their method. Their method is that regardless of whether you truly made mistakes or falsely made mistakes, once you are declared an opportunist, you are discarded. If we also act in this way, we would be following their line, following the Wang Ming line or the Li Lisan line. We will not do such a thing; let us follow the Wang Ming line or the Li Lisan line—we will not do it. The intra-Party relations they created were just that kind of relationship, toward those who had made mistakes or had struggled against them.

They were denounced as opportunists, but they rejected this. They proclaimed themselves 100 percent Bolsheviks, yet upon later examination, they turned out to be 100 percent opportunists, while we, whom they branded as "opportunists," actually have a bit of Marxism in us.

Here, the most fundamental principle is that they were not isolated individuals but represented a fairly large segment of the petty bourgeoisie. China is a country with a vast petty-bourgeois population. A considerable portion of the petty bourgeoisie is vacillating. Take the well-to-do middle peasants, for example. As everyone can see, in whichever revolution, they are always wavering and unsteady—elated to the point of frenzy when things go well, and downcast to the point of despair when things go badly. Their eyes are constantly fixed on their meager possessions—no more than a couple of draft animals, a cart, or a dozen or so mu of land. They worry about gains and losses, terrified of losing these things. Such people are different from the poor peasants. In China, poor peasants account for 50 percent in the north and 70 percent in the south. Our Party, in terms of class composition, is basically made up of workers and poor peasants, that is, the proletariat and the semi-proletariat. The semi-proletariat is also part of the petty bourgeoisie, but its steadfastness is far greater than that of the middle peasants. Our Party has also absorbed a portion of intellectuals. Among the over ten million Party members, intellectuals of all levels—high, middle, and low—probably number around one million. It is not quite right to say these one million intellectuals represent imperialism, nor the landlord class, nor the bureaucrat-comprador bourgeoisie, nor the national bourgeoisie. It is more fitting to categorize them under the petty bourgeoisie. Which part of the petty bourgeoisie do they mainly represent? They represent that segment in the cities and countryside that possesses relatively more means of production, such as the well-to-do middle peasants. This segment of intellectual Party members is constantly wavering, fearing dragons ahead and tigers behind, plagued by the most subjectivism and no small amount of sectarianism. What does our election of these two representatives of the Wang Ming line and the Li Lisan line signify? It signifies that our treatment of such people who commit ideological errors is different from our treatment of counterrevolutionaries and splittists (like Chen Duxiu, Zhang Guotao, Gao Gang, and Rao Shushi). They practiced subjectivism and sectarianism openly and blatantly, beating gongs and drums, putting forward their own political programs to win people over. Wang Ming had a political program, and so did Li Lisan. Of course, Chen Duxiu also had a political program, but he engaged in Trotskyism, created splits, and carried out anti-Party activities outside the Party. Zhang Guotao engaged in conspiracies, created splits, and fled to the Kuomintang. Therefore, the issues of Wang Ming and Li Lisan are not merely personal problems; more importantly, they have social causes. The reflection of these social causes within our Party is that a considerable number of people in the Party tend to waver at critical junctures. This wavering is opportunism. What is called opportunism means doing one thing when it is advantageous here and another when it is advantageous there, without fixed principles, without fixed rules, without a fixed direction—being one way today and another way tomorrow. Wang Ming, for instance, was like this: previously ultra-"Left" to an extreme degree, and later ultra-Right to an extreme degree.

At the Seventh Congress, we persuaded those comrades and elected Wang Ming and Li Lisan. So, in the eleven years since the Seventh Congress, have we suffered any losses? None whatsoever. It is not the case that because we elected Wang Ming and Li Lisan, our revolution failed to triumph or was delayed by several months.

Does electing them mean that those who make mistakes are rewarded? If those who make mistakes become members of the Central Committee, then should we all go ahead and make mistakes together, since there is always a chance to become a Central Committee member? Would that happen? No, it would not. Look, among our seventy-odd Central Committee members, none of them deliberately commit a few mistakes just to get re-elected to the Central Committee. As for those who are not Central Committee members—whether from before the "38-style," during the "38-style," or after the "38-style"—would they imitate Wang Ming and Li Lisan, engage in two-line struggles, and turn them into four-line struggles in order to vie for a seat on the Central Committee? No, no one does that. Instead, learning from their mistakes, they become more cautious.

Furthermore, there used to be a saying: "Better to join the revolution late than early, and better not to join the revolution at all." So, by electing them, would a problem arise within the Party where being correct is not as good as being mistaken, and making small mistakes is not as good as making big ones? Wang Ming and Li Lisan committed line errors, yet they were to be elected to the Central Committee, which meant that correct people or those who made small mistakes would have to vacate two seats to let them take the stage. Is such an arrangement the most unjust thing in the world? From this perspective, it is indeed very unjust: you see, those who are correct or have made only small mistakes have to give up their seats to those who have made major mistakes. This is clearly unfair; there is no justice in it. If we compare in this way, it must be admitted that it is a case of correctness being inferior to error, and small errors being inferior to big ones. However, from another perspective, it is not so. Their line errors are nationally and internationally renowned. The reason for electing them is precisely that they are famous. What can you do? They are famous, while the reputations of those who make no mistakes or only small mistakes are not as great as theirs. In our country, with its vast petty bourgeoisie, they are banners. By electing them, many people will say: The Communist Party is still patient with them, even willing to vacate two seats for them so that they can better correct their mistakes. Whether they actually correct them is another matter—a very minor one, concerning only the two of them. The issue is that our society has so many petty bourgeois, and within our Party there are so many vacillating petty-bourgeois elements, and among the intellectuals there are many such wavering individuals. They look to this example. When they see these two banners still standing, they feel at ease, they can sleep soundly, and they are happy. If you topple these two banners, they will panic. So, it is not a question of whether Wang Ming and Li Lisan correct themselves or not; whether they do or not matters little. What matters greatly is that the millions of easily wavering Party members of petty-bourgeois origin, especially the intellectuals, are watching our attitude toward Wang Ming and Li Lisan. Just as we treated the rich peasants during the land reform—by not touching the rich peasants, the middle peasants were reassured. If our Eighth Congress adopts the same attitude toward these two as the Seventh Congress did, then our Party can gain a benefit, an advantage: it will be somewhat easier to remold the vast petty bourgeoisie nationwide. This also has an impact worldwide. In foreign countries, there are very few, if any, examples of adopting our attitude toward those who make mistakes.

The preparatory meetings for this congress have only about ten days left, counting from today. But if well arranged, we can fully complete the preparatory work. We believe this congress can be held successfully, and the caliber of the delegates can ensure its success. However, we must be conscientious and meticulous, and everyone must exert their utmost efforts.