Chapter 3 1. Civil war or peace

In August 1945, the arduous eight-year war of resistance against Japan finally achieved a great victory.When ethnic conflicts are eased, domestic class conflicts are becoming increasingly acute.The Chinese Communist Party strives to establish a peaceful and democratic new China, but the Chiang Kai-shek regime insists on dictatorial "unification" in an attempt to combine the Chinese Communist Party with the liberated areas led by the Chinese Communist Party, which have nearly 1 million square kilometers of land and a population of more than 100 million, and have more than 1 million people. The regular army and the people's army of more than 2.2 million militiamen swallowed it all at once.Although Chairman Mao Zedong personally went to Chongqing to negotiate with Chiang Kai-shek with great wisdom and courage, and signed the "Double Ten Agreement" on peaceful nation building.However, Chiang Kai-shek, who was bent on launching a civil war, had no intention of implementing this agreement at all. Before the ink on the "Double Ten Agreement" was dry, the Kuomintang troops began to attack our liberated areas.After a series of attacks were shattered, the U.S. government expressed its willingness to intervene in the civil war. U.S. President Truman issued a policy statement on China, declaring that "the civil war in China must stop and the one-party dictatorship of the Kuomintang must end."Truman decided to send Marshall, a famous World War II general and former US Army Chief of Staff, to China for mediation.

In January 1946, the Kuomintang and the Communist Party reached an armistice agreement, and a three-member committee was formed by Zhou Enlai, the representative of the Communist Party of China, Zhang Qun, the representative of Chiang Kai-shek, and Marshall, the representative of the United States. In order to mediate the conflicts that have occurred many times in various places, the Military Mediation Executive Department (referred to as the "Military Mediation Department") was established as the administrative organization under the three-person committee.The Military Dispatch Department was established in Peking Union Medical College Hospital, and the main personnel involved in the work of the three parties are:

On the American side: Robertson, Chargé d'Affaires of the US Embassy in China, is the committee member, Heske is the chief of staff, and Schloss is the secretary. On the CCP side: Ye Jianying, chief of staff of the Eighteenth Army, is a member, Luo Ruiqing is chief of staff, Geng Biao is deputy chief of staff, and Huang Hua is secretary. For the Kuomintang: Zheng Jiemin, director of the Second Department of the Ministry of National Defense and director of the Military Control Bureau, is a member, Cai Wenzhi is a vice member and chief of staff, and Tang Baohuang is a secretary. In order to fight for peace and democracy, and to fight effectively and earnestly with the other party in a reasonable and disciplined manner, to ensure that our interests are not lost, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China has also dispatched a large number of elite soldiers and generals to participate in the work of military mediation, such as Wu Xiuquan, Zhang Aiping, Song Shilun , Zhang Wenjin, Han Xu, Gong Peng, Wang Guangmei, etc.

At the same time that the armistice agreement was signed, according to the agreement reached in the "October 10th Agreement", the Political Consultative Conference attended by all Chinese parties and democrats without party affiliation was also held in Chongqing on January 10, 1946. The Chinese Communist Party sent a Seven representatives: Zhou Enlai, Dong Biwu, Wang Ruofei, Ye Jianying, Wu Yuzhang, Lu Dingyi, Deng Yingchao.Thanks to the efforts of the representatives of the CCP and the pressure of the people all over the country to yearn for peace, the five resolutions passed by the CPPCC meeting are conducive to the peaceful establishment of the country and not conducive to the reactionary rule of Chiang Kai-shek.

With the signing of the Armistice Agreement, the establishment of the Military Adjustment Department, and especially the convening of the Political Association, many people felt that peace could be achieved and civil war could be avoided.History has entered a confusing period. The Chinese Communist Party is unwilling to fight another civil war.While the Chinese Communist Party is always preparing to repel the enemy's invasion, it is also taking seriously and implementing the resolutions of the CPPCC, striving to take the road of peaceful nation-building, and even preparing for the possible emergence of a coalition government.For this reason, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China drew up a list of members to participate in the coalition government (eight people including Mao Zedong, Lin Boqu, Wu Yuzhang, Zhou Enlai, Liu Shaoqi, and Zhang Wentian), and considered moving the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China from Yan'an to Qingjiangpu (Huaiyin), Jiangsu.

On February 1, 1946, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China issued "Instructions Concerning the Current Situation and Tasks" to the party, stating: "Since then, China has embarked on a new stage of peaceful and democratic construction, although there must be many tortuous roads. " However, Chiang Kai-shek, who was determined to implement dictatorial "unification", was unwilling to implement the armistice agreement and the resolutions of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. The reason why he made the above gestures was to buy time and implement a full-scale civil war.

In March 1946, the KMT held the Second Plenary Session of the Sixth Central Committee, and 87% of the attendees signed against the resolution of the CPPCC. Therefore, the closing declaration of this meeting completely negated the resolution of the CPPCC.Under this policy of the Kuomintang, the Chiang Kai-shek regime openly suppressed the people in the Kuomintang-controlled areas who demanded peace and democracy, created the famous "1.2.1 tragedy" in Kunming, the Jiaochangkou incident in Chongqing, and the Xiaguan massacre in Nanjing. Democrats Li Gongpu and Professor Wen Yiduo.On the other hand, it is actively mobilizing troops and generals to create friction and carry out local civil wars.From January 10, 1946, when the armistice agreement was signed to May 20, the Kuomintang army launched a total of 3,675 attacks on the liberated areas, using 2.58 million troops, and occupied 26 counties and 2,077 villages and towns in the liberated areas.The number of execution teams dispatched by the Military Adjustment Department increased from 3 to 36, but it still didn't help.

The U.S. government ostensibly mediates the civil war in China, but secretly helps Chiang Kai-shek prepare for the civil war.Just when Truman expressed support for the peace talks and Marshall came to China to mediate, in order to help Chiang Kai-shek prepare for the civil war, the US government transported more than 540,000 Kuomintang troops to the front lines of the civil war by sea and air, equipped 45 divisions of the army with American weapons, and trained In the first half of 1946 alone, it provided 1.35 billion U.S. dollars in aid to the Kuomintang government. On June 14, the U.S. State Department proposed to Congress the " The Military Aid to China Act gave the President of the United States broader powers to assist Chiang Kai-shek in an all-round way.

Under the skies of China, the atmosphere of peace has been swept away, and the dark clouds of civil war are everywhere.After only a few days of clear skies, black clouds appeared to overwhelm the city. Under such circumstances, the Chinese Communist Party, under the leadership of Chairman Mao Zedong, conducted full discussions and preparations, and believed that the immediate civil war was inevitable, and even if it wanted to strive for peace, it could only "achieve peace through victory in war" and never It is possible to achieve peace through compromise and concession, let alone be intimidated by the aggressiveness of the enemy.Therefore, while repelling the enemy's attacks many times with active defensive means, the Chinese Communist Party issued an instruction to the entire party on July 20, 1946, "Smash Chiang Kai-shek's Attacks with Self-Defense Wars", preparing to fully face the all-out civil war launched by Chiang Kai-shek. .In August of this year, Mao Zedong put forward the famous assertion that "all reactionaries are paper tigers" in a conversation with American journalist Anna Louise Strong.He said:

Take the situation in China as an example, what we rely on is millet plus rifles, but history will eventually prove that this millet plus rifles is stronger than Chiang Kai-shek's planes plus tanks.Although there are still many difficulties facing the Chinese people, and the Chinese people will suffer for a long time under the combined attack of U.S. imperialism and the Chinese reactionaries, the day will come when these reactionaries will fail and we will win. The reason for this is nothing else but that the reactionaries represent reaction, and we represent progress. Not many people believed these words at the time.However, history soon confirmed the prophecy of the genius of this historical giant.