(December 12, 1963)
The Communist Party of China began very small, consisting of only a few dozen intellectuals. Now very few remain—just a handful. The rest were either killed by the enemy, defected to the enemy, or became inactive and dropped out. Yet these few dozen people, over a period of several years, grew into an organization of fifty thousand members and launched a broad movement among workers and peasants. At that time, we were not prepared for armed struggle; we lacked awareness and had not made prior arrangements to deal with the betrayal of our ally, Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist government. Only after his treacherous coup did we realize that his method was simply to kill. All trade unions and peasant associations were shut down, leaving us with no choice but to take to the mountains and fight. Back then, none of us had any combat experience; we did not know how to wage war. Military affairs were entirely unfamiliar territory for us; we knew nothing about it. However, once imperialism and the Nationalists drove us into a corner, we had no alternative but to fight. Who taught us how to fight? It was our enemy. Even our weapons were provided by them. Not a single gun was ever supplied to us from abroad; every weapon we possessed had been handed over to us by the Nationalist forces. After each victory, we would seize more firearms and capture enemy soldiers. As for the captured troops, we would provide them with political education, encourage them to join our ranks, and release their officers. Certain technical personnel, such as doctors and radio operators, however, could be retained, since they still proved useful.


In short, whatever one does not know can be learned: if one cannot fight, one can learn to do so; if one does not know how to build base areas, one can master that skill as well. Our base areas served as our schools, where we could train cadres.
[1]
This is part of a conversation Mao Zedong had with José Sotomayor and other representatives of the Peruvian Communist Party (Left Wing).