Problems of Strategy in China's Revolutionary War

The speech by Mao Zedong, in December 1936, which further summarized the experience of the Agrarian Revolutionary War and criticized Wang Ming's “Left” dogmatism, at the Chinese Anti-Japanese Red Army Military and Political University, in Northern Shaanxi (herein after referred to as "the Red Army University", which was later changed to "the Chinese Anti-Japanese Military and Political University").

First printed on mimeograph in May 1937. Later in 1941, the whole work was published in the Military-Political Magazine (a periodical) of the Eighth Route Army. It is included in the Selected Works of Mao Zedong Volume 1.

The full text is divided into five chapters: the first chapter, how to study war; the second chapter, the Communist Party of China and the Chinese revolutionary war; the third chapter, the characteristics of the Chinese revolutionary war; the fourth chapter, "encirclement and suppression" and "counter-campaigns against it"—the main pattern of China's civil war; the fifth chapter, strategic defense.The chapters on the strategic offensive, political work and other problems were drafted but left undone because Mao Zedong was too busy in consequence of the Xi’an Incident.

The lecture systematically expounded on the manifold questions of strategy in China's revolutionary war.

(1) The laws of war are developmental. Mao Zedong pointed out that there are laws of war, and the laws of war are developmental. To study the questions of strategy means to study the general laws of war, but we must study not only the laws of war in general, but the specific laws of revolutionary war, and the even more specific laws of revolutionary war in China. The aim of war is to eliminate war. The victory or defeat in war depends not only on the military, political, economic and natural conditions of both warring sides, but also depends on the subjective guidance ability of both sides.

(2) About the leadership of Revolutionary War. Mao Zedong pointed out that the proletariat and its political party, the Communist Party of China, should be the leaders of the Chinese revolutionary war and strongly contend for the leadership

Only the proletariat and the Communist Party can lead the peasants, the urban petty bourgeoisie and the national bourgeoisie, overcome the narrow mindedness of the peasants and the petty bourgeoisie, the destructiveness of the unemployed masses, and also (provided the Communist Party does not err in its policy) the vacillation and lack of thoroughness of the bourgeoisie can lead the revolution and the war on to the road of victory. In this process, the Party should fight both “Left” opportunism and the right opportunism.

(3) About the characteristics, strategies and tactics of Revolutionary War. Mao Zedong summed up the characteristics of China's revolutionary war as follows: firstly, China is a vast, semi-colonial country which is unevenly developed politically and economically and which has gone through the revolution of 1924-1927; second characteristic is that our enemy is big and powerful; third characteristic is that the Red Army is small and weak; fourth characteristic is Communist Party’s leadership and the agrarian revolution. The speech emphasized that we should determine our strategic orientation correctly, oppose adventurism when on the offensive, oppose conservatism when on the defensive, and oppose flightism when shifting from one place to another.

(4) About the main pattern of China's Civil War. Mao Zedong argued that the main forms of China's civil war were "encirclement and suppression" by the KMT and counter "encirclement and suppression" campaigns against it by the CPC; the only entirely correct proposition is that a revolution or a revolutionary war is an offensive but also involves defence and retreat.

(5) About the strategic defense. Mao Zedong proposed that we should adopt the policy of active defense; under certain conditions, we must retreat and lure the enemy in-depth for the purpose of attacking; we should use the method of concentrating our forces to defeat the enemy and win battles; we should regard mobile warfare as the main form of operation of the Red Army; we should adopt the tactic of protracted war, and the tactic of quick decision, and take the war of annihilation as a fundamental guiding approach the Red Army's operations. This work is an important mark of the formation of Mao Zedong's military thought system and one of the major works which embodies Mao Zedong's military thought which has enriched and developed Marxist theory of revolutionary war.