Therefore, my mom and other siblings all agree with my suggestion of migrant back to Canton, where I hear from others that there are revolutionaries who against warlords. This makes me want to join them, because I want peace rather than war. Later, we pack up our valuable items quickly, leave the city at midnight, and continually travel for half of the year. Until the middle of 1925, we finally reach our destination, Canton’s biggest city: Guangzhou. My family were exhausting from the long distance of travel, plus, our property were forcefully taken by other local warloard, this sparks our anger towards the warlords over time. Since we don’t have any money left over, so my mom and my siblings are working in a local sweatshop to earn a living wage for survival. While my goal is seeking information about the revolutionaries I heard in Wuchang. Luckly, I found on the news that the Whampoa Military Academy is looking for young people who wants to be train and join the National Revolutionary Army. I shared this news with my family, they enbrace my decision of joining the Military Academy. In the fall of 1925, I join the Academy and began my training of become a junior officer. During this time, under Commander Chiang Kai-Shek’s training, I quickly adopted his ideology of creating a China that should be united, not divided. 

After a year of preparation, in the order of Chiang’s, our army started our plan of attack the warlords occupying the North. We are moving so quick in just a year to reach the Yanzi region, and the most bustling city in China: Shanghai. This is a victorious moment in my life and my comrades, as we celebrating the success of the army, a secrete order came from my leader: “Arrest and execute our communist comrades in Shanghai, this is an Irresistible order from Chaing. Reason: communists are anti-revolutionaries, they need to be removed.” I accept the order, and participating in the action of unarming the communists from streets to streets in the city, and order my soldiers to execute the communists on the ground. This wasn’t my will, but I trust my Commander in Chief’s order that the communists are destroying the revolution, moreover, in order for me and my family to have the peace, all people who are against the revolution will be our enemies. (The Oxford History, page 153, 159-162)

After the my commander Chaing declare Nanjing as the new capital of Republic of China, I got promoted to a senior officer because of my effectiveness of cleaning the communists. Additionally, the most important thing is that I am able to move my family to Nanjin for a better life.

It is hard to believe that, just five years ago, I could be described as a merchant, with some progressive sympathies but disengaged from politics and, ultimately, an exploiter of the people. I was certainly far from a Communist — in fact, I was, in the literal sense, a capitalist. Not that there were communists in Guangzhou regardless, the party having been eliminated in the cities during Generalissimo Chiang’s counter-revolutionary purges, well before I came of age. But, as I have come to learn, all life is a result of contradiction, and it was the contradiction between all Chinese and imperialist Japan that led me to where I am today.

I was living an ordinary bourgeois life in my home city of Guangzhou when the Japanese came, occupying it in days with minimal resistance. Though they were prepared to leave me be, I, despite my lack of political education, could not stomach collaboration, and ultimately fled the city, stripped of virtually all my possessions and seeking only to resist the imperialists in any way possible. I had seen the soldiers of the Kuomintang flee from the invaders, leaving Guangzhou to fall into the hands of Japan, and consequently had no desire to join them. Shortly after leaving, passing through the town of Dongguan, I encountered the Communists, organizing a resistance unit. I knew little of Communism — though, thankfully, I knew enough to conceal my background until they were assured of my loyalty! 

That moment began what has been both the most difficult and the most rewarding period of my life. Our group, the East River Column, is cut off from most fellow Communists and surrounded by enemies. We were attacked by the bourgeois KMT, in flagrant violation of the alliance against Japan, for refusing to accept integration into their armies, all while waging guerilla warfare against the Japanese, their foolish collaborators, and local bandits simultaneously. Weeks of constant fighting, supply shortages, and witnessing atrocities has only hardened my resolve. There is one thing that inspires me to fight, and it is the people. In every village where we make ourselves known, we find eager recruits to fight for a free China, looking to us as their only hope. I will not let them down. 

Yesterday, we raided a Japanese supply train, striking as it passed through an isolated area north of Guangzhou. It was a tremendous success, yielding several hundred guns, a large cache of ammunition, and crates of clothing. What I found particularly evocative, however, was a single jar of dried salted plums, a favorite snack of mine which, I realized, I had not so much as thought about in years. I teared up as we ate them around the campfire — how much has been lost to war! When peace comes again to China, the first thing I will do will be to buy a jar of plums, all for myself, and they will be all the sweeter with the knowledge that everyone will be able to have plums whenever they so desire. 

References:

OHMC, p. 162 

OHMC, p. 172 

https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-1/mswv1_17.htm

https://hkupress.hku.hk/image/catalog/pdf-preview/9789622091931.pdf

What a terrible dilemma these last few months have been for our nationalist cause. First, despite the dogged resistance of our fellow compatriots in Shanghai, the city fell to the Japanese in November of last year (with over 187,000 of our men lost). Then in December, the Japanese occupied our capital city of Nanjing inflicting a brutal reign of terror upon the civilian population. To hear of the atrocities committed in our former capital and the toll being extracted from the civilian population is utterly heartbreaking. For instance, I have heard of my fellow soldiers left unarmed and being used as living targets for rifle as well as bayonet practice. Moreover, drunken mobs of Japanese soldiers are roaming the streets looting and murdering as they go. However, good news came in April, when generals Li Zongren and Tang Enbo carried out a major counterattack helping our forces to hold off (seemingly for now) a Japanese advance toward the small town of Taierzhuang, allowing a much-needed morale boost for the men.

Nevertheless, as I write, I am reminded of the comrades who will never return home to see their family and friends. Thinking about my former compatriots brings me back to my days as a young cadet at the Whampoa Military Academy during the early 1930s while also giving me a chance to reflect on why I had decided to join the Kuomintang and side with Chiang Kai-shek’s wing of the party. Ever since my youth, my father, a former Qing bureaucrat (Dai Li), had instilled in me a sense of duty and nationalism as a way to deal with the realities of a China divided up amongst warlords and other factions. Then along came a man named Sun Yat-sen who greatly inspired me with his wisdom, and from that point forward I knew I had to take action. I had never fully trusted the Communists, nor the more left-wing factions within the Kuomintang, as it seemed the government under Chaing Kai-shek was making good progress during the “Nanjing Decade.” Furthermore, Chiang had labeled the Communists to be “anti-revolutionaries.” Thus, I have decided to cast my lot with Chiang Kai-shek and his supporters not only because we now fight the Japanese but because I find the work of Chaing Kai-shek and his wing of the Kuomintang utterly inspiring.

(OHMC p. 161-163, 179-181; “The Rape of Nanjing” p. 324-325).  

My name is Li Suyin — I am not sure if your daughter has told you about me. Hong and I have been friends for over ten years, since our days in the Whampoa Military Academy’s Wuhan branch for young women. Our growing friendship was seemingly brought to an end with the great purge, when the First United Front was ended and we found ourselves at opposite sides of a civil war.

I know from Hong that you are strong in your convictions, and I want to make it clear that I have nothing against communism. My mother was a nationalist, but she raised me to have an open mind and not let political boundaries get in the way of progress. She supported Wang Jinwei’s government at Wuhan while I was at school with Hong. Her sympathy to communism got her killed by General Chiang’s forces during the counter-revolutionary coup. It was because of her openness to collaboration that I was even able to befriend Hong in the first place; I did not let the fact that Hong is a communist dissuade me from spending time with her. But for that same reason my mother was killed.

Though Hong escaped the purge, we did not see each other for many years after that. The Second United Front changed that. We were able to not only see each other again, but to fight together against a common enemy here in Wuhan where our friendship first began.

But more than a week ago now, we were separated once again at Madang, where the Japanese devils claimed a victory. Despite the ongoing battle here, I have tried in vain to locate her. This letter is a plea for help —please, please write to me if you hear from her. Write to the fortress of Tianjiazhen, where I will be stationed for the next couple weeks. It will take that longer than that for any letter to reach me, but the troops there will forward it to me wherever I may be stationed after. Even if it is not the news I want to here, it would be better than no news at all.

Li Suyin

(Daughter of Yang Jin)

(OHMC ch 6, “Battle of Wuhan” from Wikipedia, “Soul mates, sisters and soldiers” by Zhao Xu for China Daily)

Thank you, oh thank you. I never thought I’d meet another friendly face. My name is Altan. Do you have any food? Thank you.

Life hasn’t been the same since my father died. I was born in Mongolia, nearer to here than anywhere else, but I had to leave quickly after he died because we had no prospects. My brother got so deep into Mongolian independence that I never saw him. I was starving, so I made the trip to Shanghai to try and find a better life, or at least some work. I did, for a while. I worked on the docks unloading cargo, and even made some friends who convinced me to join the union. The city was so beautiful. I was there when the foreigners murdered the protesters in 1925. I wept for them. Their deaths drove me to join the fight for workers rights. It wasn’t fair that the foreigners could come in and make money off of our hard work without doing any themselves. The fact that they believed they had the right to murder our workers with impunity sickened me. 

I’ll never forget the screams of the crowds in the streets as we watched our brothers die like dogs. It was disastrous. Even after I was made to join their party, which I did because I believe so much in our cause. Don’t ask how I escaped, friend, because I don’t remember. We were under martial law and our leadership had disappeared violently, and I knew I had to disappear silently. Since that day I feel as though Chiang himself has been chasing me through the countryside, and my hatred for him grows. So does my commitment to the cause.

I don’t know how long I’ve been running, but I’m so glad that I met you out here. I must admit I have been searching for Jinggangshan for a long time now. I heard that a great man lives here. Do you know him? Wow. I’ve never been so close to greatness before. Maybe his power will stop Chiang from hunting me again. Thank you for not shooting me, friend. It's been so long since I could rest. 

(OHMC ch 5, Mao Zedong ch 6, Weeks 5+6 lectures)

Journal Entry from Mei Wang, daughter of Shijie Hao - (January, 1928)

I have been studying medicine in Shanghai for the past year now. The city life has been exciting and different from rural life in Yunnan. In the city however, I notice many communist sympathizers are being arrested and several have been shot by the KMT. Still, I hear whispers of the communist movement among my peers at university and ideas of a new classless society. I remain ambivalent on both the communists and the KMT. They are two parties with pros and cons and that is all. Many Hui Muslims in my community have supported Chinese nationalism in the past during the late Qing and Republican era and some Hui have even fought in the boxer rebellion. The Hui Ma family from the northwest have also long been loyal to the KMT. Three families of warlords have ruled in that region and created favorable conditions for the Hui people. My father was a nationalist who wanted a united China. He even fought against Yuan Shikai who he despised. The communist party has offered more rights to women like me and could benefit the Hui people through land collectivization and they may recognize Hui as an official national minority group.

The communist party offers many promises, but I still am skeptical if they will be kept. Communist ideologies often create atheism and religious repression. There has been great disunity forming in China and I do almost wish for a unity and stability under the nationalists, but the party has handled foreign imperialists poorly and remains questionable in protecting Chinese nationalism itself and is still fractured in my opinion due to warlordism in many areas. I simply want what is best for Hui people and I see no party that will best serve our interests. Politics is only a distraction for me, Therefore I want to dedicate my efforts to my studies and be able to help others through medicine. This is the best we can do for China. We must all do our parts to help China and then our state will be strong.

(OHMC 155 - 156)

(OHMC 164 - 174)

Ma clique - Wikipedia

Today I feel despair. The Japanese have been pushing the Nationalist forces further and further back into the country since the beginning of the war over a year ago. Yesterday, we finally learned of the government's temporary headquarters in Wuhan had fallen, even after they had drowned hundreds of thousands of our innocent brothers and sisters in an attempt to stop the invaders. While I would love to celebrate the deaths of these nationalist for all they have done to me, the prospect of losing the country I so love deeply pains me.

For context, I was born in Shanghai in 1912. My parents, who were both wealthy tea merchants during the early 20’s, provided me with a life full of luxuries, and interacting with the many French, American, British, German and many other foreigners allowed me to learn how good life is in many other places. In my schooling and with friends, I learned of the workers struggle and wanted to contribute more to the forwarding of the communist movement, even at such a young age, and my parents who were also sympathetic with the movement chose to turn a blind eye to my radical behavior. 

At the age of thirteen I decided to take part in a protest to release the men who had shot a foreman. The police opened fire on all of us, and while I managed to escape, tragedy would not escape me and my family. Due to their sympathies and my communist activity, the nationalist party would take my parents from me, and I never saw or heard from them again. I lost everything with the reign of White Terror that the KMT dealt upon Shanghai, and I would have to spend the next years of my life with nothing, working to survive.

The Communists' arrival at Yan’an in 1935 was finally the change that I was seeking in life. The Communists were always on the run between the years of my parents' deaths until recently, so I could only wait and harbor hatred towards the nationalists with no outlet. It was not until 1936 when I managed to travel with a group of fellow party members to Yan’an to join the fight. Our merger with the nationalist party shortly after filled me with great anger, some of which I still havent let go of today, but I will persevere for the health of my country. Today, I am stationed as a soldier near Jinan, and our battles with the Japanese are brutal, we do not have the strength to fully fight back against our aggressors and seem to have been locked into a stalemate, but I believe that we will fight to win some day.

OHMC: Ch 5/6 (146,161,172,182,187)

In class lectures week 6

I see myself grow increasingly in favor of the Communists and their vision for a new China. I learn about a man named Mao Zedong and his compassion towards others. I hear stories of how he takes his shoes off because others do not have any and how he makes sure everyone around him has enough to eat even if it means he does not eat as much. I also began to read his ideas for political reform. He promises a land reform where rich landowners will have their land taken away and it will be distributed to everyone. I never liked those landlords who thought they could do whatever they pleased because they owned the land, and I would like to see them have that land taken away. I also like that Mao is in favor of marriage reform and plans on abolishing arranged marriage. I had always found it silly that parents got to decide who their child will marry, and individuals often have no say on the matter. I hope the Communists can push back against the Nationalists once this war is over and ends their reign of power. They have done no good for China and at the rate they are going, China may cease to exist in a few years.  

OHMC (175-178)  

In class lectures week 6  

1925 march

My name is Liu Jianqi since my father joined the revolution and overthrew the Qing dynasty, I’ve always had an idea of joining the army. Nowadays, our state has fragmented, with different warlords taking each part of China. The wars are happening every day, destroying villages and fields, and killing livestock and people, Chinese people. It is because we are constantly fighting against each other that the imperialist state would take our territories as part of a melon. I am actually happy that KMT is working with the CCP so that we can unify all the power we have to remove the imperialism out of our nation.

1926 April

I have heard from my father that the Soviet Union betrayed us, they turned to support Chiang Kai-shek, and Chairman Wang would probably need to leave Guangzhou. I can’t believe that our union is about to break, and Sun Yat-sen only died for about a year.

1926 July

My father was wrong about Chiang; he had just ordered the Northern expedition and fight against the warlords. I don’t care who came to power, President Wang or President Chiang, as long as we are removing those warlords and imperialists from our state. We will eliminate the army of Wu Peifu first and all the warlords and then target Britain. We would eventually strengthen our state out of this expedition.

1931 December

I finally achieved my dream of becoming a soldier, but I am not happy at all. The Imperialists, especially the Japanese, are taking our land and killing our people, but what we are asked to do is to eliminate the communists – those who should have been our allies. They told me that to resist foreign aggression, we must first stabilize the internal affairs. But I have started to question the inability of Chiang. We had a union after all before Sun Yat-sen’s death.

1937 December

I've never felt more strongly about quitting the military than I do today after hearing what the Japanese have done to our people in Nanjing. We could have stopped everything as long as we united with the communists and fought against the Japanese six years ago. Instead, we have spent the time against the communists, against the Chinese just like us. Our party should not be called the Nationalist Party because our leader is not even a nationalist.

1939 February

I am in the army led by Chiang, even though I never liked him and regret from time to time for being in his army. However, I would commit suicide if I followed Wang, who used to represent the left-wing faction of our party. I always thought if he had not been couped by Chiang, would

Inherited the will of Sun. How dare he compromise with the Japanese after knowing the massacre? My son always said that I am too emotional and complain too much, but I just cannot believe that the two leaders of our party are a man who would compromise with our enemies and another man who cannot tolerate our allies.

OHMC p.131-139, p.141-142, p.157-163

“The Rape of Nanjing”

Some of what I know of Qin Yingjie I learned after he disappeared. He was a factory worker who had joined a labor union. He had once accidentally killed a nationalist during a drunken tavern brawl, and had decided to lay low in Jiangxi.

What I knew of him during our time during the Long March was that he was tall, strong, and popular among our comrades. His broad, childish face was always flushed from his stash of Baijiu that miraculously never ran out. He was quick to anger and prone to fits of high, cackling laughter. Either outburst would turn his pink face into a deep crimson.

“Get up, why don’t you,” he said to me as I lay nestled in a snowbank. Our retreat from the Chiang Kai-Shek’s armies had brought us to some nameless mountain range where snow always fell and wind blew in incessant gusts.

“I feel warm now,” I explained wearily. “The cold doesn't bother me so much as long as I lay here.” And it was true—the pain of the cold had faded away.

When we stopped for the night, he rubbed life back into my frostbitten hands and feet. Next, he gave me his own supper and forced me to wash it down with a swig of his foul Baijiu.

He took great pride in my recovery, and bragged good-naturedly of his heroics to me and his friends.

A day had passed before I noticed he had disappeared—we had escaped the mountains and were traveling through miles of bogs. Men would fall into the muck, and if they fell up to their chests, there was no way to save them. I think this must have been Qin’s fate.

It was miserably quiet when he was gone.

There were still many miles to go before we reached a friendly stronghold in the impoverished province of Shaanxi. I felt my dread deepening with each step, knowing that our march was taking me farther and farther from wherever Qin fell, waiting for me to pull him from the muck as he had plucked me from the snow.

Mao spoke, declaring we are stronger now than we were before our journey, despite our losses. He said that those who remained were gold. I cheered with the rest, yet cannot see the truth of our leader’s words. None of the men I stand with now could hope to match the honor and endurance of my friend Qin Yingjie.

OHMC 169-171

Wikipedia

China, A Century in Revolution

Today I turned 18. Wow... Sometimes I thought I’d never see the day. Life has been hard without Wu Feng ever since he got conscripted, over 10 years ago now. We all thought he was dead up until we were shocked and overjoyed to receive a letter from him in 1927 saying he had joined a general down south in Canton named “Chiang Kai-Shek” planning to unite China! I hadn’t heard of him at the time but, according to my brother, he’s a great guy! I can’t help but question his “military genius” though… here in Shandong we don’t seem exactly “unified” with Nanjing, and the traders that come through town say that North of us say that the land up there is looking more like Japan than China, and the only good thing that they ever did was blow up Zhang Zuolin! We knew almost nothing besides the fear of the warlords back in those days, and although I know much more about the outside world than I did, it seems not much has changed up here. My brother always includes a second letter addressed to me, explaining in detail everything he’s learning about our great nation. Secretly, I always envied him running away, and now he’s living the highlife as some military general! Well, he won’t leave me out of it this time. Mom and dad have saved enough money from Feng’s salary that they can afford to go on without me for now. I’ve made up my mind, I’m going to find him, wherever he is. I’m going to be a part of the new China and finally free Shandong from anyone who would do her people harm. Let’s see him call me little Liang after that.

December 25, 1936

I made it to Nanjing! When I arrived a few months ago, at first they thought I was crazy; I imagine I would have too if I had seen a disheveled peasant boy asking for one of my top generals. I can still see the look on their faces when, medals jingling, Wu Feng greeted me at the front gate as his own brother! But what should have been a joyous reunion quickly turned into a conversation of dire importance. A Japanese attack on China was imminent. In fact, the urgency for soldiers was so great that the high command refused to allow me to train at Whampoa in Canton, I was to train directly Nanjing. I quickly dispatched letters back to our home village near Qingdao, urging them to flee southwest, away from the Japanese, but in my heart I know that dad would never abandon our farm. All I can do is hope that our training will be enough to save them… But hope is a thing I have never had so much of until now. Generalissimo Chang Kai-Shek has returned to Nanjing! The whole city was alive with celebration, I’d never seen anything like it. And what’s more, we’re finally taking the fight to the Japanese! However we’re doing it alongside those Communists… Somehow that doesn’t seem like a recipe for success. I’ve heard a million times from Feng about how the Communists can’t be trusted. I was a peasant once too, and it’s no secret that we suffer injustices that must be amended. But, at the end of the day, my loyalties lie with my brother and the KMT. I won’t just abandon following the traditional ideals that have guided China for centuries just for the sake of “progress”! The way I see it, we Nationalists here in Nanjing are the only hope of progress for China. 

January 10th, 1937

Dear mom and dad,

I’m writing to let you know that I, and as far as I know Feng, are safe. I hope one day to be able to give this letter to you in person, as I doubt the Japanese want to deliver it to Shandong for me. I pray every night that you both are safe from the ruthless tide of this Japanese foe. It may not seem like it from up there, but we’re doing everything we can… everything. But, somehow it’s still not enough. Since the outbreak of war, me and Feng were stationed to defend Shanghai. Any youthful illusions I had of wartime adventures were shattered when the fighting started. After a horrific first week of fighting in which our bombers accidentally bombed our own civilians, we fought street by street as the monstrous metal boats of the Japanese rained fire down upon the city. Soon our unit was forced to retreat, heading desperately to Nanjing. I long for our simple life in the village, for the sound of rushing water and the gleaming of the fireflies, but I fear those days are gone forever. This war is the likes of which the world has ever seen. As we desperately tried to evacuate the streets of Nanjing, collecting any last military equipment and food we could, I couldn’t help but laugh. How different from just a year ago, when the streets were clamoring with cheers FOR this very war! Be careful what you wish for, I thought bitterly. I was assigned under general Tang Shengzhi to defend the city, but that coward fled before the Japanese even arrived! Feng on the other hand was deployed to Wuhan to regroup the military. I wonder if I’ll ever see him again. When the Japanese breached the gates, it was anything but a battle - It was a slaughter. We were quickly driven further and further back into the heart of the city as the Japanese artillery exploded around us, blowing men to pieces left and right. I watched some of my fellow soldiers attempt to surrender, only to be shot as they dropped their weapons. I slipped behind a charred market stall in the square as Japanese soldiers shouted from close by, accepting that I would soon charge out into battle and meet my death. That was until I felt a hand on mine. I looked down to see two little girls, no older than 10, hiding together. Their mother, they told me, had been taken by “the bad men” and she hadn’t come back. Without a word I grabbed them and made my way quietly, yet frantically, away from the fighting. Somehow we managed to escape into the international zone established by the foreigners, but soon found that the conditions were not much better there. The Japanese soldiers roamed like wolves among the civilians, raping and murdering whomever they pleased. We hid in the basement of a foreign church, but I knew better than to stick around, and during the night we crept out into the forest to an abandoned farm. It is here where I write my letter. The two girls, Zhou Mei and Zhou Chun, are well fed but still shaken. I think I know a little of what it must be like to be a parent, and the pain you must have felt when both your sons were taken from you. I would give anything to be home with you both now, and I hope one day you can accept my apology. I’m sorry I ran away, and I hope one day we can be together again.

Love, 

Wu Liang.

Sources:

Pages from HMC: (173, 178, 166-167 maps, 179, 180) + lecture notes

sources:

Mao’s Report on the Investigation of the Peasant Movement in Hunan (March 1927)

Class Slides : Communism in china

OHMC, ch. 5

Cai Xinguo arrived in Yan’an emaciated and penniless in late 1939, but with expectations of renewed hope and a deeper understanding of class war and anti-imperial resistance, as well as a role in them. What she was met with felt more like a continuity with her lonely path northward. Since the Japanese arrival in Wuhan Cai had felt her oppression and dispossession as the fabric of her lived experience. She had nothing for most of her way. Where she had hoped for a sense of return to comfort and civilization she found in Yan’an a shocking simplicity of domestic life that felt profoundly unacademic, profoundly new. Getting her first meals with comrades in more than a year felt like a new lease on life to her, and as she regained her strength she felt a sense of development from her hardship that made her feel so much more powerful than she had ever felt before. To her, a new realization of her real self was now forthcoming, with her scientific understanding of class dialectics being joined by a true alignment of her material conditions with the revolutionary classes. What shocked her, however, was that the socialism and ideology she found around her was subtly uncomfortable with her understanding of socialist science from her own past. Discussions of Soviet state policy and models of proletarian class dictatorship tended to end in criticisms of Li De and other representatives of Stalin, even of his policies. To Cai, this was astounding. Despite these hangups she was eventually granted a position of substantial prominence in the base area’s government: she was charged with educating workers in the city of Yan’an on worker-peasant solidarity. She excelled in her position, encouraging the workers to understand their vanguard role in the future of world revolution, but in 1942 she was recalled from the city for reeducation. Over the course of her thought reform Cai Xinguo changed profoundly, from being self-assured and skeptical to uncertain and intellectually unadventurous. By 1943 the shame she had felt during her comrades’ criticisms and during her self-criticisms began to feel like a thing of the past, but they left a sense of bitterness towards her past self that she could not leave behind. As the war ended Cai was rehabilitated, reintegrated and more respected than ever, but for years she would feel that in the grand scheme of things she had lost some of her fleeting and beautiful respect for herself from 1940 and 1941. Much later Cai Xinguo would feel the same sense of self-doubt and renunciation of her past, but this second transformation decades later would come in a completely different form.

Resources consulted:

OHMC, The Rise of Nationalism

Mao, Crafting the Image

Lecture on party ideology of CCP and KMT

It was an especially cold day, and An Xiao was reorganizing the tools in the back room of his uncle’s tailoring shop. He straightened the bolts of fabric on the shelf and cleared off the cutting table, tucking the loose jars of paste into the cupboard.

When Xiao had moved to Shanghai five years ago to stay with his aunt and uncle, he had no idea what lay in his future. His parents had promised him a good education and a chance to learn the tailoring trade, and he had been too young to understand the political currents stirring under the surface of his country.

Now, though, he was sixteen, and old enough to know that things were changing fast. As Xiao carefully sharpened the blades on his uncle’s snake-handled scissors, he glanced out the small window, noting the soldiers swarming the streets. The Revolutionary Army had arrived just a week ago, and their presence made the air thick with tension, like a thread pulled taut, about to snap.

Uncle Mo insisted that it was an honor to serve them—their arrival had heralded the end of the rule of the Zhili group, and besides, they brought new business in, but Xiao couldn’t help the clenching in his stomach whenever the soldiers were around. He thought back to the protests turned bloody two years ago, and how everything had shifted after that. People had been incensed, taking to the streets to demand change, and the last few weeks had proven that they were getting what they wanted.

Xiao swore he could still hear the gunfire echoing in his ears, even though the fighting had died out. They were safe now, his aunt said, with the combined efforts of the Communists and the Guomindang finally wresting the city from the hands of the warlords, but Xiao wasn’t so sure. 

His friend Lin Lai had told him there was unrest in the Communist Party, that Lin Lai himself wasn’t certain he wanted to be a Communist anymore. He believed in their goals, but he also had a sister and mother to take care of. Xiao had tried to comfort him, but his reassurances had tasted bitter in his mouth. 

Xiao’s hand slipped, and a spark of pain flared in his thumb. A bright drop of blood began to well up, and he cursed, grabbing a scrap of fabric off the table to wipe it away. As he pressed the cloth against the pad of his thumb, he wondered if there was anything he could do to help his friend. Lin Lai’s birthday was on April 12th; maybe Xiao could make him a gift.

A moment later, the bleeding had stopped, and Xiao picked up the scissors and sharpening stone again. Yes, that was what he would do. Making something would keep his mind off his worries, and hopefully Lin Lai would be pleased.

Xiao smiled to himself, looking forward to his friend’s birthday. Maybe there were a few good things left in Shanghai after all.

Sources: OHMC pp 160-162, How to Make a Mao Suit pp 35

OHMC 168-69

Mao 78-79

The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, Marx 1852

We didn’t move to the city when the movement did. They say the communists in the city aren’t really on our side of the cause anyway, the urban party members look down on us. While my mother used to think that us farmers were an essential part of the Chinese market, I have come to learn the realities of China’s hierarchy. Even the “oppressed” leaders of the CCP are benefitting from the systems that keep us, the real proletariat, impoverished. My mother is still fixated on her anti-foreign sentiment, and is getting increasingly worried about Japanese invasion. They heavily occupied Manchuria and attacked Shanghai, she’s worried they’ll go to Beijing and progress inland. I try to tell her this is exactly why a communist China would be so beneficial, Chiang Kai-shek wouldn’t get to ignore problems that the people desperately want resolved. The only way we as people can fight back against Japan in this hierarchical society is boycotting Japanese goods and holding protests. She finally started to understand my side of things when we got word of the Long March. Tens of thousands of CCP soldiers embarked on a journey and heroically fought off the emperor’s soldiers, and bandits, and nationalists. As much as I want to get my mother up to date on social change, things are becoming more radical by the generation. She was reprimanded for not following the conventional path of having an arranged marriage and stepping outside the traditional roles of a woman in society. But we aren’t just trying to change societal roles, this is much bigger than that. We want to eliminate the social classes that keep us oppressed and create a government that will actually do something about foreign influence. The voices of my family currently do not matter, there’s truly no choice for us rather than to support the rural side of the CCP. (OHMC ch. 5) (Mao pg. 36)

I want to let you know that I am doing alright in this war I am fighting against the tyranny of the Japanese. I left our home in Canton many weeks ago now, and I miss you and your mother everyday. The Japanese have begun to add more defenses to the places we have been attacking. We have fought many times in this "transportation war" through many different means. Our group has been in charge of attacking the railroad tracks to stop the movement of Japanese supplies, and so far we have been very successful. But do not worry about this old man, while I may be in my 50's I can still fight. Although Mao has been adamant about some of us to recruit the peasants to our cause, or more importantly their cause. I may be from the city but I know it is all about them. He is so charismatic, Mao. You see him speak and you understand why so many people follow him. He cares about the issues at hand having grown up in the countryside, and in addition to that, he wants to keep our country free. Which is why even though Chain Kai Shek is failing, we are still winning. Although I am more sympathetic towards him than I am people like Wang Jingwei who ally themselves with the tyrannical Japanese. I worry for the people who follow either of them, having a leader who cares not about them. I believe that through his leadership Mao is able to free our country and bring the revolution forward. I hope this letter finds you, and I hope to return home soon.

With Love Always,

Sun Li

Although I hope to one day see the red sun rise over a free China, I am well prepared and eager to lay down my life in sacrifice to that now tangible dream. Tonight, I leave Shanghai, the place of my birth and my entire world until this moment for mountain caves to the west in Yan’an. My father was a brilliant man, but in all his studies, in all his writings, he truly believed in the urban revolution that would bring an end to the reign of imperialists and corrupt strongmen. I now see that an urban revolution is not feasible in China. My father grew up in a different stratum, and, as he would have admitted, he was himself the offspring of the oppressive class. Following the Purge my family’s status has been greatly reduced, and I can now call myself a member of the proletariat. This has afforded me greater insight into the everyday dealings of workers, and though some are radicalized and ready, we are too few in number to throw off either the Japanese imperialist occupiers or the violent KMT thugs who continue to appease them in favor of systematically hunting the only people doing anything to help the people of China. The true and only remaining untapped power left in China is the masses of rural peasants enslaved by the feudal system we’ve maintained and encouraged for centuries.  

Although I am very young, you will never find a person more dedicated to the cause of freedom and justice. This city has lost its glamour in my eyes. It has come to represent all that is wrong with my beloved China. We cannot give any concessions to imperialists or capitalists if we hope to forge a better tomorrow. So tonight, I will sneak out of my occupied home to join the freedom fighters who wage guerrilla war on capitalists and imperial aggressors alike. I will fight with them in battle and aid in their land reform for the cause of justice while this war is raging and after it has ended. But know this, dear reader, though I leave you behind to face the grief of occupation, though they may take your bodies or the labors of your hands, your hearts will forever be free.  

Be safe until I return for you. 

(OHMC Ch.6, Mao Ch. 7). 

Li Xiaoping- Male 24 in the Communist Youth Outreach group

My parents moved to Shanghai at when I was at an early age. My father and mother sentiment were strictly towards a nationalist government.

In Shanghai my parents' allegiance and compliance with the nationalist allowed my family to do well enough to send me off to college. Here I learned that although my parents may have been lucky many of my people are not.

"I on the other hand have educated myself on the matters of my people. I have seen the failure of the Nationalist. I have seen the growing encroachment of the Japanese. I have seen the failure to modernized China by the current Leadership and I have see what can change this..."- Li April 12 1927 11:25 am

"You CANNOT do this, you are traitors of the people, you have blinded them for your own corruption, you have deprived us of freedom and the ever-growing encroachment of the Japanese. The KMT will make China burn at the hands of the foreign. You have Faile- " shot fired - Li April 12 1927 4:13 pm

OHMC Chapters 5/6

Also, relocation of Avatars done in class and discussed. Avatar experience drawn from the April 12 1927 Communist purge in Shanghai.

(OHMC ch. 5; Mao pg. 83).

Chongqing, 1943

My father is a fierce Nationalist. Next to a wedding photo of him and my mother is a photo of Sun Yat-sen. And next to that photo is a photo of Chang Kai-shek. Myself, on the other hand…I am just a nationalist. I cannot see a China without compromise. Would I love to see a purely Nationalist China? Of course I would. Is that possible, now that we have Soviets watching our every move? Absolutely not.

My father, Cao Xuehuan, is proud of his actions during the Red Purge. He told me he once shot fifteen Communists and five Soviets in one day. I don’t believe him. I don’t want to believe him. I once thought my father was a superb storyteller: twenty slain in a day, dragons swimming in the seas, Uncle Bai’s Russian father. Now that I’m older, the scariest part of life is not the Japanese invasion, or the rapes, or the killings, or the Communists. The scariest part is finding out that my father’s stories are closer to the truth than even the daily news. The dragons are U-boats and submarines. Uncle Bai cries for Harbin every night from the room next to mine. And the twenty slain? Immortalized in death on the cover of Shen Bao. But my father is nowhere to be seen in the photograph.

I am not a follower of Chiang. I dislike most of his policies—especially his idea to destroy the Yellow River Dam. He killed so many and destroyed so much. That alone is good enough reason as to why Chiang’s Right cannot be in power. How could he let so many innocent Chinese suffer? I find myself closer to Wang Jingwei’s early ideas, before he became a Japanese puppet, of course. 

Yet, I am a student of Chiang and his ideas. This is because of my father and his idea of how he spends his money. The one thing my father and I do agree about, however, is our love for China. I am proud to be studying policy, even if it is under Chiang’s ideas, because it means I care about my nation and my people. When I was younger, much younger, when I still lived in Nanjing, I would daydream of being the President of China. How I would unite Nationalists and Communists, Han and non-Han, and make peace with Japan. And when I was even younger than that, I would tell my plans, although immature and fantastical, to my father. And when I was even younger than that, I would watch my father with wide eyes as he embroidered plum blossoms onto the cuffs of my jackets—the only design his grandmother taught him how to make—so I could look just like Chiang.

OHMC 157-164, 175-194

Upon the usurper Yuan Shikai's death in 1916, the KMT quickly seized the opportunity to try and grow their power, with Sun Yat-Sen attempting to move his base to Canton several times. My father stayed behind in Shanghai, growing the movement and working with the city's criminal element to smuggle weapons to Canton. In 1923, Sun Yat-Sen established his base of power in Guangzhou and my father headed there to help support the army. My father would support the growing KMT army after Sun Yat-Sen's death, helping to solidify Chiang Kai-Shek's reign over the KMT. Shortly afterwards, he would join the Northern Expedition, eventually meeting us in Shanghai shortly after the expedition took Nanjing. He told us little of his work during those days, but I remember the day of the Shanghai massacre like nothing else. For hours, we heard nothing from him while the city was thrown into chaos. Finally, in the late hours of the night, he came home. He said nothing, but the smell of blood on his clothes said enough. He told me soon after that I would soon have to make the same kind of decisions for the future of China.

I wasted no time. In 1933, I joined the KMT army, and by the following year I was fighting in the Fifth Campaign against the communists. They ultimately escaped in the Long March, but their power was destroyed. At that time, it seemed that victory was all but imminent for our side. Yet in 1934, the treacherous Xi'an incident ended those hopes, forcing our great Chiang Kai-Shek to stoop to cooperating with Mao. I had fought hard against the communists before, but for the sake of pushing the imperialist Japanese from China, I am willing to cooperate for a time. Once the threat is resolved, I am more than aware that the communists will have to be destroyed. For now, however, I bide my time, preparing to fight the Japanese as they bear down on my city, Shanghai, and dreaming of a free Chinese republic.

Wen Hong, June 1937

OHMC

Chapters 4,5,6