Liu Shaoqi
Liu Shaoqi
Delivered: July 1, 1951
Source: People's China July 16, 1951; Vol. IV, Number 2
Online Version: Liu Shaoqi Internet Archive, December 2008
Transcribed/HTML Markup: Mike B.
COMRADES! Today is the 30th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China. Thirty years ago when our Party was just founded, there were in China only some small groups, with very few members, which studied and publicised Marxism.
But today our Party has developed into a big party leading the great People's Republic of China. Our Party now has 5,800,000 members. Among these more than 2,700,000 are serving in the armed forces, state organs, factories, mines and schools and over 3,000,000 are distributed throughout the countryside. There are over 600,000 women members and over 1,200,000 young members under the age of 25. These members have built about 250,000 Party branches, the primary organisations of the Party.
Many members of our Party are shouldering leading tasks in various spheres of work of the State. Still more are engaging in various physical labours or mental work side by side with the labouring people and fighters in various factories, mines, villages, government offices, schools and army units. They are closely linked with the broad masses of the people. The great majority all possess a high standard of political consciousness, and therefore, too, a spirit of selflessness. Whether on the battlefield, in physical labour or in any other kind of work, they are full of courage, with no thought for themselves; they are intelligent and resolute and very capable in giving over all consideration to things and in abiding by the discipline of the people. They are, therefore, able to win the trust of the masses and the masses treat them as their most intimate and trustworthy friends. In other words, our Party has already become a universally recognised leader of the people throughout the country and, at the same time, a public servant whole-heartedly at the service of the people.
This summarises the situation of our Party today.
Our Party is the greatest, most glorious and most consistently correct party in the history of China.
Our Party, which started with a few individual Marxist groups, has traversed a superlatively brilliant path of historical development in the past 30 years.
However, in these 30 years of great revolutionary struggles, our Party has also been through unimaginably hard, complicated and circuitous struggles.
For 30 years, the enemies facing the Communist Party of China and the Chinese people have included almost all the imperialist countries in the world and the strong forces of feudalism and of the bureaucratic, comprador, big bourgeoisie of China. These have been most diabolical enemies. They did not give the Communist Party of China and the Chinese people any freedom of action. They dealt out savage slaughter and torture to the Communists, attempting to kill them all off. In the face of such enemies, if the Chinese Communists had not taken up arms and entered on a persistent and unswerving armed struggle against the enemy it would have been impossible to carry on revolutionary activity. Because of this, the Chinese Communists and the revolutionary Chinese people long ago took to arms in the struggle against their enemies, waged four great revolutionary wars over the course of more than 20 years and finally overthrew the rule of these enemies on Chinese soil and achieved the victory for the Chinese revolution. This victory is of great significance in China's history and also in world history.
The winning of this victory must, first of all, be ascribed to those countless martyrs, whether Party members or not, known or unknown, who have bravely sacrificed themselves in the revolutionary struggles.
Comrades! It would have been impossible to defeat our powerful and vicious enemies and achieve the victory for the revolution without the struggle of the countless martyrs who kept up the fight and sacrificed themselves bravely. Our martyrs' selfless, courageous spirit of sacrifice on the execution grounds of the enemy, on the fields of battle and in all kinds of struggles crystalises the best traditions of our nation and our Party and provides the loftiest pattern for all our Party members and the people of the whole country. To liberate the people and fulfill the tasks entrusted to them by the Party, they shed their last drop of blood and exhausted their last energies without stint or hesitation. It is mete that we learn from their spirit and commemorate it forever. Eternal glory to the spirit of the martyrs!
I propose that we all stand and observe three minutes' silence in memory of the martyrs, both members of the Party and non-members, who sacrificed themselves bravely in the revolutionary struggles of the past 30 years.
Then again, in celebrating the 30th anniversary of the founding of our Party, we must not forget those comrades who have lost their health as a result of tortures in the enemy's lawcourts and of long, grinding imprisonment, and those comrades who were maimed after being wounded on the battlefield and in the struggle. Here let us pay them our respects.
The victory of our Party and the Chinese revolution is inseparable from the correct, Marxist-Leninist leadership of Comrade Mao Tse- tung, leader of our Party. Marxism-Leninism is the sole correct ideological weapon to guide our Party and the Chinese. people in uniting ourselves and triumphing over the enemy. Comrade Mao Tse-tung is learned in Marxism-Leninism and is most adept in applying it properly to solving the diverse problems of China's revolution.
Thirty years of prodigious effort by Comrade Mao Tse-tung has, step by step, integrated the universal truth of Marxism-Leninism with the concrete revolutionary struggle of the Chinese people. These efforts have thus built our Party, in ideology and organisation, on the example of the Bolshevik Party of the Soviet Union. And they have, step by step, linked our Party with more and more of the masses of the people.
Moreover, at each of the stages of the revolution, Comrade Mao Tse-tung put forward correct principles, tasks and policies for the revolutionary struggle for our Party and the people; and, in extremely complicated and difficult circumstances, he defeated the erroneous principles, tasks and policies put forward by the various kinds of opportunists within the Party and the various sects outside the Party. In this way, he fashioned and strengthened the People's Liberation Army as the cardinal instrument of the Chinese people's revolution. In this way, he formed, consolidated and expanded the United Front of the Chinese people's revolution.
It is only because our Party and the Chinese people have had this correct leadership of Comrade Mao Tse-tung that we have been able, step by step, to defeat the strong enemy in serious, long and complicated struggles and gain the present victory. The correct leadership of Comrade Mao Tse-tung has been decisive for the victory of our Party and the Chinese people in the revolutionary struggle. Without Comrade Mao Tse-tung's correct leadership at each of these various stages, it can be said that it would have been impossible for our Party and the Chinese people to win the present victory. Comrade Mao Tse-tung's correct leadership guarantees that our Party and the Chinese people will continue to win more and bigger victories in the revolutionary struggle ahead.
Therefore, in celebrating the 30th anniversary of the founding of our Party, we must express o thanks to Comrade Mao Tse-tung. our leader. We salute our leader, Comrade Mao Tse-tung
The victory of our Party and the Chinese revolution is inseparable from the gallant 24 years' struggle of the Chinese Peoples Liberation Army. Founded and instructed by Comrade Mao Tse-tung himself, the Chinese Peoples Liberation Army has fought for 24 years under his personal command The Chinese Peoples Liberation Army is the major instrument with which our Party and the Chinese people have triumphed over imperialism. feudallsm and bureaucratic capitalism and have founded the People's Republic of China. Without the 24 years of gallant fighting and selfless work on the part of all the commanders, fighters and other personnel of the People's Liberation Army, our Party and the Chinese people could not possibly have won their present victory. Similarly, without the brave fight of the Chinese peoples volunteers alongside the Korean People's Army on the Korean front, it would be impossible to resist and repulse American and British imperialist aggression against China and Korea.
Therefore, in celebrating the 30th anniversary of the founding of our Party, we must express our thanks to the Chinese People's Liberation Army, the Chinese people's volunteers in Korea and the Korean Peoples Army. We salute all the commanders, fighters, workers in the rear services and other personnel in the Chinese People's Liberation Army, the Chinese people's volunteers in Korea and the Korean Peoples Army!
The victory of our Party and the Chinese revolution is inseparable from the long-term, arduous work and brave struggle of our Party's numerous cadres and members; it is inseparable from the support for and trust in our Party and the People's Liberation Army of the broad masses of workers and peasants and revolutionary people of other strata and their heroic efforts in the revolutionary struggles; it is inseparable from the co-operation and assistance given to our Party by the other Chinese democratic parties and non-party democratic patriots in the struggle against imperialism, feudalism and bureaucratic capitalism and in the various kinds of work for building up the new China.
Obviously, without all these, our Party and the Chinese people could not possibly have won their present victory; nor could we possibly build up the new China after this victory was obtained.
Therefore, in celebrating the 30th anniversary of the founding of our Party, we should express our thanks to the numerous cadres and Party members who devote themselves to the work and have fought with courage! We should express our thanks to the labouring masses of workers and peasants and the revolutionary people of other strata who have supported and trusted our Party and the People's Liberation Army in the revolutionary struggle and in production. We should express our thanks to the democratic parties and democrats who have provided our Party with sincere co-operation and assistance in the revolutionary struggle and the work of construction.
Finally, the reason for the victory of our Party and the Chinese revolution which is even more unforgettable to us is the influence on China of the Russian October Revolution, the influence on the Chinese revolution of the theories of proletarian Socialist revolution and Marxism-Leninism created and developed by Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin, the sympathy and assistance to the Chinese revolution given by the Soviet Union and the proletariat and working people of the various countries of the world. Comrade Mao Tse-tung has said:
Before the October Revolution, the Chinese were not only unaware of Lenin and Stalin but did not even know of Marx and Engels. The salvoes of the October Revolution brought us Marxism-Leninism. The October Revolution helped the advanced people of China and of the whole world adopt a proletarian outlook as the instrument for looking into a nation's future and for considering one's own problems. To follow the path of the Russians was the conclusion.
He has also said:
'"The Chinese found Marxism-Leninism, a universal truth which is applicable anywhere. The face of China then began to change."
Clearly the theories of Marxism-Leninism brought to China by the Russian October Revolution are the most fundamental weapon with which our Party and the Chinese people defeated their enemies and achieved victory in the revolution. Without the October Revolution in Russia, without the creation and constant development of Marxism-Leninism by Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin, without the sympathy and assistance for the Chinese revolution given by the Soviet Union and the proletariat and countries of the world, it would have been impossible for our Party and the Chinese working people of the various people to achieve such a victory as the present.
Therefore, in celebrating the 30th anniversary of the founding of our Party, we cannot but express thanks to the heroes of the October Revolution, to Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin, to the Soviet Union and the proletariat and working people of the various countries of the world who sympathised with and assisted the Chinese revolution.
Salute the heroes of the October Revolution! Salute Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin! Salute the Soviet Union and the proletariat and working people of the various countries of the world!
We have already said that the victory of our party and the Chinese revolution has many profound and complicated causes in the development of the history of both the world and of China. Some of our comrades do not understand or do not fully understand these profound and complicated causes of the victory of our Party and the Chinese revolution; they think that this victory was simply due to their own individual efforts. They thus arrogantly plume themselves on their achievements and betray other wrong views. These comrades should be taught the history of world revolution and the Chinese revolution, so that their field of vision can be broadened and their arrogance and, other wrong views corrected. COMRADES! Through 30 years of hard, intricate and circuitous struggle, our Party and the Chinese people have gained a victory of great historical significance. But, as Comrade Mao Tse-tung has said, the victory we have so far achieved is "only the first step of a 10,000-li march." The Chinese revolution is far from complete. The view that the Chinese revolution has been completed is non-proletarian and utterly wrong. The revolutionary war we have carried out is also not yet finished. China's Taiwan has not been liberated, the Chinese people's volunteers are still heroically resisting the aggressive army of the American and British imperialists on the Korean ,fronts, the feudal forces in China have also not yet been finally cleared out. The difficult but great task of national economic and cultural construction is at our feet and is waiting for us to complete it; but day by day the imperialists and their lackeys are plotting to sabotage our cause and resume their sway. Therefore we still have to carry on long-term, intricate and hard struggles to safeguard and consolidate the victory we have already gained, complete the task of New Democratic construction and enable China to transform itself from an agricultural country into an industrial country, and then later to go on to a Socialist and Communist society and ultimately abolish all classes and arrive at world Communism.
Because of this, Comrade Mao Tse-tung has said:
"The Chinese revolution is great, but the path to be traversed after the revolution will be even longer, the work will be even greater and more difficult."
Hence Comrade Mao Tse-tung calls on us to
"make our comrades continuously maintain the modest, cautious, unconceited and patient style of working and to continue to uphold the spirit of hard struggle."
Only by heeding these precepts laid down by Comrade Mao Tse-tung and by further studying Marxist-Leninist theory and Comrade Mao Tse-tung's theories and style of work can we draw in still broader masses of the people to fulfill the still greater and harder revolutionary tasks that lie ahead of us.
It is to this end that all of us Party members should exert our efforts as we celebrate the 30th anniversary of the founding of our Party. We believe that the Party, tempered by the great revolutionary struggles of the past 30 years, and under the continuing leadership of Comrade Mao Tse-tung and the Central Committee of the Party, with the sustained efforts of the whole Party and the people throughout the country, will surely be able to accomplish the still more arduous, the still greater and more glorious tasks ahead of us.
Long live the great, glorious and consistently correct Communist Party of China!
Long live Comrade Mao Tse-tung, creator and leader of our Party, organiser and leader of the victory of the Chinese people's revolution!
Long live the victory of Marxism-Leninism in China and the world!
Long live the great revolutionary solidarity of the Chinese people, the revolutionary United Front of all nationalities, all democratic classes, all democratic parties and groups and democrats of China!