After the great victory at Longyuankou, the Red Fourth Army seized the short-term opportunity of the Kuomintang army, which had suffered heavy losses and had not yet launched a counteroffensive, and decided to divide its troops in a short period of time to mobilize the masses: the 28th Regiment headed for Anfu, the 29th Regiment headed for Lianhua, and the 31st Regiment carried out the work of deepening the agrarian revolution, building Soviet power, purging the remnants of feudalism, creating workers' and peasants' arms, and developing the party organizations in the area of Lime Bridge in Yongxin and Ji'an, with a view to consolidating the victories that had been won
At a time when the Jinggangshan revolutionary base area was full of vigor and the situation was in a very good situation, heavy blows followed one after another, that is, the collapse of the 29th Regiment of the Red Fourth Army and the brutal destruction of the Hunan and Jiangxi borders suffered by the main force of the Red Army after it left Jinggangshan.
On June 30, 1928, Yongxin County Chamber of Commerce Building.
Mao Zedong presided over a joint meeting attended by the CPC's Hunan and Jiangxi Border Special Committee, the Military Commission of the Red Fourth Army, and the Yongxin County Party Committee. Present at the meeting were Zhu De, Chen Yi, Wan Xixian, Wang Erzhuo, He Tingying, Zhu Yunqing, Tan Zhenlin, Chen Zhengren, Liu Zhen, Liu Zuoshu, Liu Jiaxian, Wang Huai, He Minxue and others.
The meeting had already been held for a day, during the day it studied the work of dividing troops to mobilize the masses and carrying out the agrarian revolution, and after dinner, it began to discuss the instructions of the Hunan Provincial CPC Committee and the future direction of action of the Red Fourth Army. Yuan Desheng, a member of the Xiangdong Special Committee of the Communist Party of China, who went to Yongxin to convey the instructions of the provincial party committee, attended the meeting.
After Zhu and Mao joined forces, the strength of the Red Army grew day by day, but its ties with the CPC Central Committee and the Hunan Provincial Party Committee were cut off for a time. In April, the work of the Hunan Provincial Party Committee, which had been damaged several times, gradually became normal. The secretary of the provincial party committee is Liao Baoting, a worker from Anyuan, and the actual work is in charge of He Chang and Lin Zhongdan (Lin Yuying), members of the Standing Committee of the provincial party committee. Soon after, the provincial party committee organs moved from Xiangtan to Anyuan, and Anyuan was only four or five days away from Ninggang, and the ties with Jinggangshan became closer.
In late May, Hunan Province sent Du Xiujing to Jinggangshan and brought a letter of instruction to Mao Zedong. The letter proposed that the Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army should have a place to rest and recuperate, that "Ninggang should be used as its military base camp," and that the struggle on the Hunan and Jiangxi borders should be waged in greater depth, resulting in the division of the masses. Mao Zedong was very happy after reading the letter and said: "Yes, it should be so. Then, Mao Zedong accompanied Du Xiujing to convey the message to the troops, and led him to visit the hospital, mint, and clothing factory in Jinggangshan. During this period, Mao Zedong also showed Du Xiujing many of the rural surveys he had conducted in Jinggangshan. These surveys were recorded in account books, decorated with blue cloth, and there were more than 10 copies, more than a foot thick, which described the political, economic, land, population, and social customs of Ninggang, Yongxin, Lianhua, and other counties. But Du Xiujing did not look at it carefully, and he later said: "At that time, my level was too low to understand, and after watching it for a few hours, I handed it back to him (Mao Zedong)." ”
In mid-June, Du Xiujing returned to the Hunan Provincial CPC Committee to make a report, but the contents of the report "focused on the simple military situation, and as for the line and policy of the border party, the basis of the work of the party and the masses, the role of the masses in the war, the building of political power, and the deepening of the agrarian revolution, I hardly mentioned it in the report, and thus caused the provincial party committee to make a rude and erroneous decision."
On 19 June, under the chairmanship of He Chang, the Hunan Provincial Party Committee adopted the "Resolution on the Work of the Hunan Provincial CPC Committee to the Special Committee for the Hunan and Jiangxi Border and the Military Commission of the Fourth Army" drafted by Lin Zhongdan and a letter of instruction, and sent Yuan Desheng to Jinggangshan. These two documents will be discussed at the Yongxin joint meeting.
Yuan Desheng read out the "Resolution" and the letter of instruction. It said that the provincial party committee fully agreed with the Red Army's plan to "base itself on the central vein of Luoxiao Mountain, and the Qianqian letter also instructed so." In accordance with the instructions of the above, the brothers should actively develop the insurrection in the counties around the middle section of the Luoxiao Mountains, so as to create a situation of division with the workers and peasants as the main force; At the same time, it is necessary to actively develop to southern Hunan according to the guidance of the provincial party committee in the past, and to promote Pingxiang to connect with eastern Xiang"; He also said: "You should adopt a strategy of positive outward development, all economic (rice, grain, cloth......) Military (e.g., foreign) difficult problems can be solved. "In the past, we were indeed guilty of extremely serious conservative concepts and lacked the determination to develop positively. …… In the future, the four armies must concentrate their forces on developing in southern Hunan, which will be consistent with the workers' and peasants' uprisings in southern Hunan, and then lead to the secession of southern Hunan and realize the plan of separating the Jiangxi border and the Hunan and Guangdong Highways instructed by the central authorities. In short, your main strategy at present should be to actively develop outward, and you must break the old conservative ideas. ”
After Yuan Desheng finished reading, there was silence in the venue, and everyone was silent. After months of painstaking operation, he managed to carve out a world, but he was said to have "extremely serious conservative concepts," which many people found difficult to accept.
Mao Zedong was even more upset. The last time Zhou Lu, who had nothing to do, went up the mountain, he pulled his troops to southern Hunan at the request of the special committee for southern Hunan, and as a result, the border between Hunan and Jiangxi was occupied by the Kuomintang army for more than a month. The situation is just right, so why does the Hunan Provincial Party Committee want to develop in southern Hunan? Half a month ago, he wrote a letter to the provincial party committee, expounding the rationale for using Ninggang as his base camp and proposing that "we should fight the enemy with all our strength and never retreat and abandon it."
Chen Yi was the first to break the silence, and he said to Yuan Desheng: "You want to take away the Red Army and Mao Zedong, isn't this destroying the base area?"
Yuan Desheng explained: "The meaning of the provincial party committee is to go to southern Hunan to support the need for riots. ”
Zhu De said: "The "Resolution" says that the current focus is still on consolidating the base area in the middle of the Luoxiao Mountains, and the issue of the Red Fourth Army going to southern Hunan immediately has not been raised. ”
Mao Zedong reprinted a cigarette, glanced at Yuan Desheng, glanced at the venue again, and said:
"With regard to the construction of political power in the middle of the Luoxiao Mountains, a resolution was made at the First National Congress of the Border Party in May, and the provincial party committee also agreed to it. I believe there are three reasons for using Ninggang as the base camp to build a military base area: First, it is the middle section of the Luoxiao Mountains, and the terrain is extremely good, which is easy to defend and difficult to attack; Second, the party has changed from being disorganized to being organized, and the people have a relatively good foundation, and the Red Guards and Red Guerrillas have also been organized. Third, Shonan can only affect one province and only the upstream, while it can affect two provinces and reach the downstream...... ”
Mao Zedong wrenched his fingers and talked about the reasons for running the Jinggangshan Revolutionary Base Area. Wan Xixian, Tan Zhenlin and others spoke one after another to support Mao Zedong's opinions. As a result, the opinion of not going to Shonan prevailed.
While they were discussing, Long Kaifu came in to report, and the Hunan Provincial Party Committee sent someone again.
Mao Zedong said, "Hurry up, please come in." ”
The person who came was Du Xiujing.
Du Xiujing, also known as Du Huiyi and Du Fei, a native of Cili County, Hunan, was only 19 years old when he was the head of the Changsha City Student Federation, the secretary of the Huarong County Party Committee of the Communist Party of China, and the secretary of the Liling County Party Committee.
When Mao Zedong saw that it was Du Xiujing, he hurriedly greeted him and said: "You are here, okay, what good news did you bring this time?" The last time Du Xiujing came, he conveyed the Hunan Provincial Party Committee's opinion that Ninggang would be used as a military base camp, and Mao Zedong was very happy, but this time Du Xiujing brought out-and-out "bad news" -- abandoning Jinggangshan and immediately pulling troops to southern Hunan
It turned out that, under the influence of blind activism, the Hunan Provincial CPC Committee made another erroneous estimate of the changes in the situation and the comparison of forces between us and the enemy: overestimating the strength of the Red Fourth Army (which had something to do with Du Xiujing's report) and the situation of the mass struggle in Hunan, underestimating the strength of the ruling class in Hunan, and drawing up a plan for the second armed uprising in Hunan. Du Xiujing took two letters from the provincial party committee to the Military Commission of the Red Fourth Army and the special committee of the Hunan and Jiangxi border areas, and then went to Jinggangshan. Du Xiujing was accompanied by Yang Kaiming, who was sent to the Hunan and Jiangxi border special committees as secretaries. The two broke up in Lianhua County, Yang Kaiming went to Ninggang, and Du Xiujing came to Yongxin.
When Du Xiujing heard Mao Zedong say this, he really didn't know how to answer well. He later recalled: "During the day, on the way to Yongxin, I took into account the decision of the provincial party committee, and it was made on the basis of my report. The current situation, due to the great victory at Longyuankou, has changed greatly, and the decision of the provincial party committee is no longer appropriate. This ideological activity and understanding of mine only looks at the problem from the perspective of the temporary war situation, and does not raise it to the consideration of building a consolidated base area. ”
After Du Xiujing sat down, he introduced his intentions, and then took out a letter of instruction from the Hunan Provincial CPC Committee to the Special Border Committee and the Military Commission of the Red Fourth Army. Mao Zedong said: "Then ask Comrade Du Xiujing to read it to everyone." ”
Du Xiujing began to read the letter:
Special Commission on the Hunan and Jiangxi Borders:
After the provincial party committee decided that after the Fourth Army attacked the enemy army in Yongxin, it immediately advanced to southern Hunan, leaving Comrade Yuan Wencai's battalion to guard the mountain, and the 28th Regiment allocated 200 guns to arm the peasants of Lianhua and Yongxin, vigorously expanding the organization of the Red Guards, imposing martial law on the Red Army, and using the strength of mass combat to prevent the invasion of the enemy army, thus creating a division of Hunan and Jiangxi borders with workers and peasants as the main body. Among the comrades, that is, the correction of the point of dependence on the Red Army. It is necessary to actively enhance the self-confidence and creativity of the masses. Essential! Essential!
Comrade Zedong had to set off with the army, and the province appointed Comrade Yang Kaiming as secretary of the special committee, Comrade Yuan Wencai to join the special committee, and designated Lianhua to send two of the most capable comrades to work in the special committee, and the rest remained.
For details, please refer to the notice of the provincial party committee. and was narrated by Comrade Du and Comrade Yang Kaiming, inspectors of the Provincial Party Committee
All.
Sincerely
salute
Hunan Provincial Party Committee
June 26
The second letter was addressed to the Military Commission of the Red Fourth Army. The letter said that the Sixth Army of the Kuomintang Army stationed in Hunan was "extremely panicked." According to the plan for the second armed uprising in Hunan, the Red Fourth Army was required to "first solve the enemy army in Yongxin, and then fight a bloody road and develop to Zixing, Weiyang, Yongxing, and Chenzhou in Hunan." …… Only by adopting such a positive development policy can we resolve all military, financial, and political difficulties. Moreover, it can solve the situation of the enemy's two 'encirclement and suppression'." The letter categorically demanded that the Red Fourth Army "carry it out immediately without hesitation!"
The Hunan Provincial CPC Committee also decided: "Establish a committee of former enemies of the four armies to direct the party affairs and mass work of the four armies and southern Hunan, and the provincial party committee will designate (above) the following comrades to organize it: one comrade Zedong, Zhu De, Chen Yi, Gong Chu, (Song) Qiao Sheng, and one comrade soldier, and one comrade peasant comrade in southern Hunan to organize it, Comrade Zedong will serve as the secretary of the former party committee, and the standing committee will be organized by three people: Zedong, Zhu De, and Gong Chu, and Comrade Du Xiujing will be sent to be an inspector of the provincial party committee to help the front committee in its work." In fact, this was to ask Du Xiujing to supervise the Red Fourth Army to strictly implement the decision made by the Hunan Provincial Party Committee to "immediately develop to southern Hunan."
After reading the letter, Du Xiujing turned his head to look at Mao Zedong, Mao Zedong was already frowning and his face was gloomy. For Mao Zedong, the decision of the Hunan Provincial Party Committee came too quickly and too suddenly, and Mao Zedong could not bear it, let alone accept it. He was most afraid of the unrealistic blind command of the Hunan Provincial Party Committee, and he was most afraid that the "ministers of the Qin Mission" would fly all over the sky.
Chen Yi said angrily: "Okay, the last letter is still 'develop to southern Hunan in the future', and now it has been changed to 'immediately'." ”
Mao Zedong said: "I see that this instruction of the provincial party committee is not to understand the actual situation here. After defeating the 'two sheep (Yang) in Jiangxi, the enemy is preparing to retaliate, so how can the main force be transferred to southern Hunan at this time?"
Du Xiujing wanted to speak and stopped, but he couldn't find the proper language for a while. He understood that the reason why the Red Army Brigade was wanted to go to southern Hunan was because the Hunan Provincial CPC Committee had no contact with the Jiangxi Provincial CPC Committee at that time, and from Hunan's standpoint, it was natural to let the Red Fourth Army go to southern Hunan to facilitate the work of the provincial party committee. Yuan Desheng later said that when the Hunan Provincial Party Committee decided to go to southern Hunan through the troops, it was "as easy as drinking rice soup," so Mao Zedong later called the Hunan Provincial Party Committee "a provincial party committee that drinks rice soup."
Du Xiujing later recalled the course of the meeting. He writes:
The meeting ended late in the morning, and Comrade Zhu De's guards were all asleep, and when the meeting was dismissed, Comrade Mao Zedong stepped forward and pushed him and said, "Your army commander is gone." At this meeting, I first expressed the inappropriateness of the decision of the provincial party committee, and then conveyed the decision of the provincial party committee...... When Comrade Mao Zedong heard this, his face suddenly became dull. However, the meeting continued to be chaired. As for the decision of the provincial party committee, because of my statement, there was no debate at the meeting, but only the inappropriateness of the decision of the provincial party committee was discussed, and a resolution was adopted not to implement the views of the provincial party committee. In addition, the discussion focused on how to speed up the establishment of grassroots political power, the agrarian revolution, the development of armed forces, and fund-raising in the whole territory of Yongxin within a week.
The Yongxin joint meeting withstood the pressure, rejected the idea that the "provincial party committee drinking rice soup" should go to southern Hunan, and still decided to stick to the plan of building a workers' and peasants' political power in the middle of the Luoxiao Mountains. Yuan Desheng and Du Xiujing finally agreed with the decision of the meeting.
Late that night, Mao Zedong asked He Zizhen to find paper and polish the ink.
"Do you want to stay up late again?" He Zizhen asked with concern.
"Oh, I'm going to write a letter to the provincial party committee."
A few days after the end of the joint meeting, Mao Zedong felt the need to write a letter to the Hunan Provincial CPC Committee explaining the results of the discussions at the joint meeting and again stating the reasons why the main force of the Red Fourth Army could not sail to southern Hunan, so that the provincial party committee could change the inappropriate decision. He consulted with Zhu De, Chen Yi, and others, and everyone agreed, and proposed to write it in the name of the special committee and the Military Commission of the Red Fourth Army.
"Isn't it a matter of not going to Shonan?" He Zizhen also heard about the joint meeting a few days ago, and as a Yongxin person, of course she did not want the main force of the Red Army to leave Jinggangshan.
"Yes, going to Shonan is the instruction of the superiors, if you don't follow it, you will disobey it, and if you know that you will fail, it is really not good." He looked at his new wife's beautiful face, and a trace of guilt welled up in his heart, "However, I am a person who is unwilling to sacrifice my true self, and my temperament is not good to restrain me." I'm afraid that I will suffer you in the future and bring you trouble. ”
"It doesn't matter." He Zizhen said while grinding ink.
He Zizhen feels very happy to be Mao Zedong's wife, and she is not afraid of hardships and hardships. She was worried that she might lose herself. He Zizhen has her own career, her own pursuits, and her own independence, and she worries that this independence may be limited in the future. Later facts proved that He Zizhen's concern was not superfluous, but completely correct...... That was years later, though.
He Zizhen studied the ink, Mao Zedong picked up the brush, dipped it in thick ink, and wrote a long letter to the provincial party committee.
Hunan Provincial Party Committee:
Comrades Yuan and Du arrived in Yongxin at the same time on 30 June, and received the circular of the provincial party committee and the resolution of the central authorities on the work in Hunan. The instructions in the two letters from the provincial party committee are quite different. The former wants us to continue to build up the political power of the counties in the middle of the Luoxiao Mountains as military base areas, and not change the instructions of the central and provincial party committees a month ago. The latter wanted us to rush to Hunan after attacking Yongxin in order to avoid the enemy's "repression" and solve our economic difficulties. …… That is, on the evening of 30 June, the Special Committee, the Central Military Commission, and the Yongxin County Party Committee held a joint meeting to discuss the letter from the provincial party committee, in which Comrades Yuan and Du both participated, and decided that the Fourth Army should continue to carry out in-depth mass work in the counties along the Hunan and Jiangxi borders and build a solid base area. With this base area, and then advancing to Hunan and Jiangxi, the Red Army will consolidate its separatist positions wherever it goes, and it will not be easy for the enemy to destroy. The reasons for this are set out below
(1) In the Fourth Army itself, many of them were accustomed to the life of wanderers in the past, and they did not like to live in one place, and they did the work of mass struggle arduously, which was full of the poison of the Red Army's adventures. In the past month, after many rounds of scrubbing, and at the same time the masses in Yongxin and Ninggang counties have become popular, they have gradually given up and understood that the policy of the central and provincial party committees to build a base camp in Ninggang last time was correct. If it is immediately changed now, so that the four armies will once again enter the road of migration and movement, the transformation of the four armies will certainly be even more difficult. The previous letter from the provincial party committee pointed out that the four armies had fought thousands of miles and were close to being rogues, and that they had to choose a place to rest for reform. This is a very correct intent, and it is being followed, and it should not be changed lightly.
(2) In terms of the enemy situation, the enemy in Hunan Province is very tough, solid and strong, and is not as easy to attack as the Jiangxi enemy. The enemy was defeated four times in a row by us, and his courage was broken, and under the influence of our release of prisoners, the morale of the army was shaken. …… The Hunan enemy, on the other hand, fought with us more than five or six times, and was only able to repel a small part of it, while the enemy suffered no damage and was as stubborn as ever. Therefore, in order to avoid a hard battle plan, it is not appropriate to rush to southern Hunan at this time, and the reversal will go deeper into the enemy's encirclement, lest the whole army be annihilated. ……
The provincial party committee does not seem to have taken this into consideration.
(3) If Ninggang can become our military base camp, that is, in the mountains are large and dangerous, the road leads to the two provinces, the victory can be defended, and the defeat can also be run, and the enemy will absolutely not be able to surround us, if we add the foundation of the party and the masses in each county, we can really wage a long-term struggle against the enemy. If it is easy to break away from (Ning) Gang at this moment, "the tiger falls in Pingyang and is bullied by dogs", the four armies are very dangerous.
(4) This kind of proposition is by no means a conservative concept, and in the past, there were national riots that flourished in various parts of the country for a while, but once the enemy counterattacked, it was like a river washed by water and completely defeated. This is not to consolidate the foundation, but to make a huge noise. We are now working with all our strength in Yongxin and Ninggang, making progress day by day, and advancing to the southwestern tip of Lianhua, Anfu, and Ji'an, deepening into the agrarian revolution and creating local armed forces...... The enemy attacked again, and he was quite sure of victory.
(5) Economically speaking, the number of the Fourth Army is so large that it requires 700 yuan in cash every day to be frugal. In addition to the burning of the counties in southern Xiangnan, the economy went bankrupt and the local tyrants were wiped out. Since Zhu (De) arrived in Leiyang in February, he has not been able to raise a single penny, and he has only relied on selling tobacco and soil for food, and it is absolutely impossible to go to southern Hunan to solve economic difficulties at this moment, and only in Hunan and Jiangxi can he really solve the current economic problems.
(6) The number of wounded soldiers increased to 500, and if they wanted to rush to southern Hunan, the morale of the army would collapse, and they would not be able to go, which was also one of the most difficult problems.
According to the above six practical reasons, before the outbreak of the war of the new warlords, it is not possible to leave Kaining, Yong, and Lian for southern Hunan. As soon as the foundation here is slightly solid, and there is an opportunity for the outside to take advantage of it, the four armies can take part in the general uprising in Hunan Province by themselves. At this time, we should communicate with Shonan, and try our best to do it, so as to echo each other and serve each other as horns.
The above opinion is requested to be re-discussed by the provincial party committee and a new decision will be made according to the current situation.
It is a prayer for the Solstance. ……
Special Commission, Military Commission
Yongxin, July 4, 1928
After writing the letter, Mao Zedong let out a sigh of relief, put down his pen, and shook his numb wrist......
Looking at this letter today, people will still be impressed by it. We love the enemy, the lessons learned, the political, economic, military, and the geographical...... Mao Zedong took all aspects into account, and all of them were analyzed realistically and reasonably, and his style of not blindly obeying, not fearing, independent thinking, and seeking truth from facts can be described as powerful through the back of the paper!