Telegram to Zhou Enlai
(October 11, 1958)

Comrade Enlai:

The Soviet letter [1] need not be replied to in haste; let's talk about it first.

Cao Juren [2] has arrived; keep him cool for a few days, don't talk to him immediately. Whether I will meet him is to be considered.

Tell Ke Cheng to accurately investigate and tally the number of enemy aircraft we annihilated and the number of our aircraft the enemy annihilated in the more than fifty days since the Shantou air battle on August 19th, and prepare to tell the Soviet side. They believe the enemy's false reports and are unclear about the actual situation. Ground-to-air missiles should be sold to me, for me to use, and they should send a small number of people to teach. I am inclined towards this approach. Whether it is appropriate can be decided tonight or tomorrow night.

Mao Zedong
October 11th

[1] Refers to the letters from Khrushchev, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR, to Mao Zedong on September 27, 1958, and October 4, 1958.
[2] Cao Juren, historian and journalist, served as a professor at Jinan University, Fudan University, and other schools in the 1920s and 1930s. After the victory of the War of Resistance Against Japan, he served as an editor of the *Qianxian Ribao* in Shanghai and a special correspondent for the *Sing Tao Daily* in Hong Kong. He moved to Hong Kong in 1950 and successively served as an editor of the *Sing Tao Daily* in Hong Kong and a special correspondent for the *Nanyang Siang Pau* in Singapore stationed in Hong Kong. He returned to the mainland for interviews in 1958 and was received by Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai, Chen Yi, and others.