Our Principle is that the Party Commands the Gun

The Fundamental Principles of the CPC for Strengthening the Construction of the People's Army. Mao Zedong's imaginative expression of the principle of absolute leadership of the Party over the army. The principle that the Party commands the gun was established and gradually perfected by the Chinese Communists, represented by Mao Zedong, during the long revolutionary struggle.

After the defeat of the Revolution, the Communist Party of China realized the extreme importance of independently mastering the army and independently leading the armed struggle, and organized more than one hundred armed uprisings, such as the Nanchang Uprising, the Autumn Harvest Uprising and the Guangzhou Uprising.

The Nanchang Uprising marked the birth of the People's Army and the beginning of the Communist Party's leadership of the army. The Communist Party was established in the insurrectionary army, and the highest leading organ was the Front Enemy Committee of the Communist Party of China, of which Zhou Enlai was the secretary, and it was clearly stated that "the Party organization in the army is the root of all organizations."

In September 1927, the troops of the Autumn Harvest Uprising led by Mao Zedong arrived at Sanwan Village in Yongxin County, Jiangxi Province, and carried out the famous "Sanwan Adaptation", the core of which was to implement the principle of "building branch on the company", building the Party branches on the company, and the Party was led by the Front Enemy Committee, and the battalions and regiments were led by the Party committees at all levels. This laid a solid organizational foundation for realizing the absolute leadership of the Party over the army.

In December 1929, Mao Zedong presided over the resolution of Gutian Conference, which theoretically clarified the principles of the Party's leadership of the army, laid down the fundamental nature and purpose of the Red Army, and established some basic systems and measures for the Party's leadership of the army from the political, ideological and organizational points of view.

The resolution stated: "The Red Army is an armed group that carries out the political tasks of the revolution.” “Before the construction of high-level local power organs, the military and political organs of the Red Army, under the guidance of the front committee carried out their work in parallel.”

When he criticized the idea of subordinating the political work organs of the Red Army should be subordinated to the military work organs and the slogan "the headquarters is external", he once seriously pointed out: "There is a danger that it will become detached from the masses, that the army will control power, and that it will leave the leadership of the proletariat.”

In the "Instruction of the General Political Department of the Chinese Workers’ and Peasants' Red Army on the Party's Work in the Red Army", issued on September 12, 1932, it was clearly stated that “the absolute leadership of the Party in the Red Army should be guaranteed.”

On November 6, 1938, Mao Zedong, in his report on “Problems of War and Strategy” to the Sixth Plenary Session of the Sixth Central Committee of the Communist Party, in response to the historical lesson of Zhang Guotao's struggle for personal military power and splitting the Party, pointed out that Communist Party members must not fight for personal military power, and must no longer follow Zhang Guotao's example, but must fight for the military power of the Party, the military power of the people, and the military power of the nation.

He vividly expressed the principle of the absolute leadership of the Party over the army as follows: “Our principle is that the Party commands the gun, but never allows the gun to command the Party."

During the Anti-Japanese War, the CPC Central Committee and Mao Zedong resolutely opposed and corrected Wang Ming's erroneous proposition of abandoning the Party's absolute leadership over the army, and once again put forward the principle of "the Communist Party absolutely leads the Eighth Route Army”.

In the War of Liberation, the KMT attempted to abolish the leadership of the CPC over the People's Army, but Mao Zedong firmly pointed out that the people's armed forces, every gun and bullet, should be preserved and not handed over. At the same time, he responded to the tendency of individual dictatorship and decentralism and reiterated that the people's army should adhere to and improve the party committee system.

After the founding of New China, the CPC Central Committee and Mao Zedong have always emphasized the absolute leadership of the Party over the army. Adhering to the absolute leadership of the Party over the army was a fundamental principle of army building established by Mao Zedong in the years of revolutionary war. This principle must still be consistently adhered to in the period of socialist revolution and construction.

The basic spirit of adhering to the principle of absolute leadership of the Party over the army was as follows:

Firstly, the Chinese People's Liberation Army (including the armed police forces, militias and other armed forces in China) must be completely, absolutely and unconditionally under the leadership of the CPC, and under no circumstances will the army be allowed to become independent or allow any individual to compete with the Party for military power; the army must resolutely adhering to the leadership of the CPC Central Committee, and obeying the leadership of the Party Committee at the same level.

Secondly, the Party established Party committees at all levels in the army as the core of the unified leadership of the army, and determined the system of division of labor and responsibility of the leaders under the unified collective leadership of the Party committees, for providing the leadership system of the Party to the army. Except for the CPC and its assistant, the Chinese Communist Youth League, which can work in the army according to the instructions of the Central Committee of the Party, no other political party was allowed to establish organizations, develop members and carry out work in the army.

Thirdly, all activities of the People's Liberation Army must be subordinate to and serve the Party's program, lines, guidelines and policies. In the new period of socialist modernization, the CPC Central Committee and the Central Military Commission have reaffirmed the principle of absolute leadership of the Party over the army, emphasizing that "the Party commands the gun" is the foundation of the People's Army and the soul of the army, which cannot be shaken at any time.