Labour Monthly, June 1944
Source: Labour Monthly, June 1944, p. 184-189, “China’s Destiny,” Chen Pai-ta;
Transcribed: by Ted Crawford.
The following critique, published last July-August, in Yenan capital of the North-West semi-autonomous Border Region of the Chinese Republic, reached us only a few weeks ago, via the U.S.A. The depth of the political crisis in China here disclosed (and raised in the Dean of Canterbury’s article in our April issue) has hitherto been withheld by war-time censorship. As the full text of Chen Pai-ta’s critique runs to more than twenty thousand words, we print this month and next certain of the more important sections, omitting Chapters I (“On the Chinese Nation”) and II(“On Chinese History”). – Ed. L.M.)
Since the publication of China’s Destiny in the name of Chiang Kai-shek, Director-General of the Kuomintang, many people in Chungking have suspected that the book was really written by Tao Hsi-sheng. Many people wonder Why, Mr. Chiang, as the leader of the Kuomintang should have allowed his work to be written by a person so widely infamous for his association with the Nanking traitors, his constant advocacy of fascism, his opposition to the United Nations, and his continuing ideological links with Wang Ching-wei.
Since China’s Destiny was published over the name of Mr Chiang, his prestige attracted the attention of the people to the book. People thought at first that since Mr. Chiang had published such a book at so critical a moment of the war of resistance, it would contribute greatly toward the solution of such questions as how to prepare the counter-offensive against the enemy, or how to co-ordinate the operations of the Allies to win final victory, because, as everybody knows, the factor that determines China’s destiny today is the war of resistance and nothing else. But after reading China’s Destiny they were greatly disappointed, because the questions brought out in the book were entirely unexpected ones. Out of the 213 pages of the book, only twelve and a half deal with the war problem, while the bulk of the book deals with internal problems – opposition to liberalism and Communism and advocacy of compradore-feudalist fascism or the New Absolutism (formally still wearing the mask of the Three People’s Principles).
Since Mr. Chiang’s book concerns. China’s destiny and questions of life or death, existence or destruction, for the 450,000,000 people of China, every patriotic citizen of China, which includes all Communists, should give it his full attention.
At present, the Kuomintang is plotting to dissolve the Communist Party and to abolish the Border Region. The official Central News Agency actually broadcast such news on July 6, 1943. It may be said now that we are approaching a period characterised by a welter of peculiar opinions. We Communists cannot remain indifferent to these opinions, especially when they really play a part in events, as can be seen by reading China’s Destiny. The criticisms here are limited, to a few fundamental propositions of the book.
As we know, in their aggressions against China, the imperialists have wanted the Chinese people to preserve all the old things, and have not wished them to be modernised economically, politically, or ideologically. They have not wanted the Chinese people to accept the: advanced development of the West, or to have science, democracy and national consciousness, because these would turn China into a strong modern nation, which would be disadvantageous to the aggressors. Therefore the unequal treaties became fetters on the Chinese people to prevent them from accepting and developing the advanced ideas of the West. However, the theory of the author of China’s Destiny is the opposite of this. It seems to hint that it was only through the unequal treaties that the Chinese people became able to receive the advanced thought of Europe and America, and that for this reason the unequal treaties were bad. The author has tried his utmost to curse and scorn all the new culture that came after the May Fourth Movement of 1919, and his talk of the “deepening of the influence of unequal treaties” is aimed mostly at this point.
What was the May Fourth movement? Let us quote a paragraph from the New Democracy by Comrade Mao Tze-tung: –
The May Fourth Movement was an anti-imperialist as well as an anti-feudal movement. The outstanding historical, significance of the May Fourth Movement lies in the effect that it possessed a feature that was not present in the 1911 Revolution, i.e., that it opposed imperialism and feudalism in the most thorough and uncompromising way.
The reason the May Fourth Movement possessed this characteristic is that the capitalist economy of China had made new steps in its development at that time, and that the revolutionary intelligentsia of China had personally witnessed the disintegration of three big imperialist countries, Russia, Germany and Austria the wounding of two of them, Britain and France; the construction of the socialist state by the Russian proletariat; and the grip of proletarian revolutions on Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy. All these things gave the new hope for the liberation of the Chinese nation. This, the May Fourth Movement broke out at the call of the world revolution, of the Russian Revolution and Lenin, and was a part of the world proletarian revolution of that time. Although we did not have a Chinese Communist Party, during the May Fourth Movement many intellectuals did possess primary Communist thoughts and approved the Russian Revolution. At its beginning, the May Fourth Movement was a united front revolutionary movement of three kinds of people, the Communistic intelligentsia, the revolutionary petit-bourgeois intelligentsia, and the bourgeois intelligentsia (which formed the Right Wing). ....
The cultural revolution of the May Fourth Movement opposed feudal culture in a thoroughgoing way, and there was never such a great and thorough cultural revolution in the history of China. it achieved success under two banners: opposing the old morality and promoting the new morality, and opposing the old literature and promoting the new literature.
Therefore the May Fourth Movement initiated a great new epoch in the self-consciousness of the Chinese people. Without the May Fourth Movement, we could not have had the Great Revolution, the agrarian revolution and the war of resistance of the past six years. This is why the May Fourth Movement is so much hated by all reactionaries and counter-revolutionaries.
Imperialist aggression against China brought agony and bitterness to our people. It created within China a lot of imperialist lackeys, from Tseng Kuo-fan, Li Hung-chang to our disciples and grand disciples of Hitler, Mussolini and Tojo today. These lackeys have always served the foreign aggressors and can never avoid the stigma of traitors, no matter how hard they advocate the old culture, old ethics, and old moralities of China. On the other hand, this same imperialist aggression forced the Chinese peoples to wake up from their dreams and compelled them to study the advanced thought and techniques of the foreign countries – for the sake of opposing the aggressors and their lackeys. Such are the dialectics of history.
The reform of Chinese thought began from the ideas of liberty, equality and fraternity advocated by the Tai-ping Revolution. The “study of benevolence” preached by Tan Szu-tung represented a brave offensive against the spider-web of old Chinese ethics and morality. At that time, lackeys of the Empress Dowager, such as Yeh Teh-huei and Chang Chih-tung, and representatives of reactionary ideologies cursed the reform movement and shouted that “ethics” and “the way of the sages” were immutable. Their ideas have been inherited by all the subsequent traitors and reactionaries of China, even up to the present moment. The May Fourth Movement was a mass movement in ideology, and many stubborn elements, reactionaries and foreign lackeys, trembled like aspen leaves before this irresistible new force. However, a historical movement is never a straight line. Some of the participants of the May Fourth Movement continued going forward, others stopped midway, while still others changed their minds and ran in the opposite direction. Today, only the Communists and revolutionary democrats of China still remain as the pillars and shock fighters of the new culture. They are heading in the only direction that will revive the Chinese nation from its moribund state. These fighters do not change or compromise. They are the greatest source of the people’s national confidence and national self-respect.
The author of China’s Destiny writes:-
Since the May Fourth Movement, the ideas of liberalism and Communism have prevailed in China ... with the result that people generally consider that all western things are right and all that belongs to China is wrong. They worship this or that foreign country, all in a similar manner. Different cliques exist among them only because there is more than one country and one foreign theory in the world. Each clique imitates one particular country and worships one particular theory, forming a group of its own, proud before its countrymen but submissive before the foreigner. Since the theories of the various countries are forever changing, the theory of each of these groups has to change unceasingly in accordance with the foreign changes.
As to the struggle between liberalism and communism, it is merely a reflection of the opposition of Anglo-American thought to that of Russia. Such theories and. politics are not only unfit for the national life and the people’s livelihood of China and opposed to her original cultural spirit, but they also reveal that their promoters have fundamentally forgotten that they are Chinese and have lost the standpoint of learning for China and applying their learning for China.
No doubt, the advanced ideas of different countries are not the same. There is one kind of advanced thought (e.g. democracy) which reflects a certain advanced stage (the anti-feudal stage) and is needed by a certain advanced revolutionary class at that stage; there is another kind of more advanced, or the most advanced thought (e.g., communism) which reflects a more advanced stage (anti-capitalist stage) and is needed by a more advanced revolutionary class.
Modern China finds herself in a period of great world changes, and the struggles and various relations, internal and external, of the various classes and various kinds of people in Chinese society are interwoven one with another. Therefore, even at the same time, the various schools of advanced thought in the world may be accepted by representatives of our various social classes and co-operation of a certain type may arise among them. Here is one example. Dr. Sun Yat-sen, a revolutionary bourgeois democrat, accepted the western democratic ideas of Lincoln (of the people, by the people, and for the people), together with the experience of the Russian Revolution. He said: “I take Russia as my teacher,” while the Chinese Communists, as the representatives of the proletariat, accepted scientific communism – Marxism-Leninism. Dr. Sun and the Communists co-operated with each other after 1924. This co-operation was beneficial to the nation as has been proved by the Great Revolution.
Again, there, is another portion of our people, the liberals and the democrats, whose thoughts reflect the ideology of certain classes or strata, and who, according to their needs, may co-operate with the Communists in a certain period and on certain questions. Such co-operation is also beneficial to the nation, as has been proved by many facts. Whether this is fit for “the national life, and the people’s livelihood” depends upon one’s view of the benefits of the nation and the people. Other than these, all are false issues.
It is rather peculiar that Mr. Chiang would openly oppose the liberal-principles of Europe. and America and the communistic principles of Russia.. Do not all the fascist countries as well as their lackeys, like Wang Ching-wei, shout madly that everyone must oppose liberalism and communism? Can we help fearing that as soon as they see Mr. Chiang’s book, Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo, Wang Ching-Wei and others will think that Mr. Chiang is singing in unison with them, and that the book will shock and disappoint Roosevelt, Churchill, Stalin and all anti-fascist people?
Moreover, the various countries of the world not only have their advanced and revolutionary ideas; but also reactionary and counter-revolutionary ones. Since there are progressives and reactionaries, revolutionaries and counter-revolutionaries in China therefore, reactionary and counter-revolutionary thoughts naturally find welcomers and worshippers among certain Chinese. There is no need for us to cite examples from afar. Here is a nearby one. Are not the official Kuomintang publications San Min Chu I Semi-Monthly and Central Weekly propagating on a great scale the fascism of Hitler and Mussolini, and describing Hitler and Mussolini as two of the “six great leaders” of the world? Yet this is only the surface. Besides this, there are certain groups who, fearing that fascism is too disreputable, too contrary to the national benefit, too unfavourable to the Allies, and too hand in glove with the German, Italian and Japanese robbers, dare not openly advocate it; but who try to smuggle it in as contraband under every kind of camouflage, and to peddle it everywhere. This is done, not only by the small men of the Kuomintang, but also by its important figures, as is now universally known.
As regard to the remark “proud before one’s countrymen but submissive before foreigners,” one should sometimes look in the mirror. There is a gentleman in China who thought, at the time of the Russian October Revolution and the Chinese Great Revolution, that the Soviet Union might be helpful to him. So he went to the Soviet Union himself, humbly asked for advice, sent his son to study there, and declared that “China’s revolution must be led by the Third International.” Later on, when he became anti-communistic and anti-Soviet, the same gentleman went to Tokyo to interview Mitsuru Toyama, the Japanese secret service leader, and declared that it was necessary for China and Japan to unite. After that, he was converted to the “foreign” Christian religion. Later yet, as soon as Hitler came to power in Germany, he sent another son and a great number of his followers to study there to learn fascism. For fully ten years, he relied on foreign funds and ammunition to fight against the revolutionary Chinese people in a war that was planned and directed by foreigners, among whom there was the famous General von Seekt, leader of the Reichswehr, and a German police chief whose special task was to teach secret service methods. Even after the outbreak of the war of resistance, he still relies on foreign powers and ammunition, and even expects the foreigners to fight the war for him. How shall we call this? Are not such actions and thoughts “proud before one’s countrymen but submissive before the foreigners” and “the great hidden trouble of the national spirit"?
Now let us say something about the Communists. The thought of the Chinese nation is the thought of Mao Tze-tung – i.e., Sinoized Marxism-Leninism. As far as theory of Marxism-Leninism is concerned, the Chinese Communists not only have the same ideology as the Russian Communists but also as the Communists of the various countries of the world. However, scientific Marxism-Leninism demands that the Communists of every nation work out their political programme and decide their policies according to their own national conditions, and rely on their own people for self-salvation. The Chinese Communist Party works according to this principle. It has created all kinds of progressive forces, entirely through its own efforts, without dependence on any “foreign country.” Not an item of ammunition was given it by foreign countries, nor has it ever relied on foreign funds to carry on its fight. It determines its own strategy, and is “self-resuscitating.”
The Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army, led by the Chinese Communists, have resisted more than half of the Japanese forces stationed in China, and have never dreamed that the foreigners would do all the fighting for our country. In the regions under the influence of the Chinese Communists, not a single unequal treaty, or even half of a treaty, has ever been signed with the foreigners – like the Tangkhu Truce, the Ho-Umetsu Agreement and the Shanghai Truce. The policies and actions of the Chinese Communists are welcomed everywhere by the Chinese people because they are identical with the interests of the nation and the people. The Chinese Communists have never relied on one country today and another country tomorrow, with an attitude as changeable as April showers, and have never been “proud before their countrymen but submissive before the foreigners.” These are the results of the thoughts of the Chinese Communist. Party, which is a hundred per cent. revolutionary Party of the Chinese people, “learning and applying their learning for China.” It finds no comparison in China.
It is evident that from the beginning there have been two kinds of traditional cultures in China. One belongs to the people and is revolutionary and bright; the other is against the people and is counter-revolutionary and dark. At the commencement of contemporary Chinese history, the Tai-ping Revolution, and Dr. Sun were the representatives of the former, while Tseng Kuo-fan and all the anti-Communist and anti-popular elements of the present time represent the latter. Despite the fact that there was foreign ideology in the Tai-ping Revolution, “liberty, equality and fraternity” truly represented the thoughts of the Chinese people. The Tai-ping leaders were real Chinese heroes. Despite the fact that Tseng Kuo-fan spoke constantly of “benevolence, righteousness, morality, and five ethical relations,” etc., he was still a “twofold slave” to the Manchurians and to the imperialists. The Chinese Communists have succeeded to all the superior revolutionary traditions of China from ancient times down to Hung Hsiu-chuan and Dr. Sun Yat-sen, while the reactionaries have inherited the traditions of Tseng Kuo-fan and Yeh Teh-wei. The reactionaries want to abolish the progressive traditions and preserve the backward ones, while we do exactly the reverse. This is where the difference lies in regard to the question of Chinese culture and thought.