Chapter 33 Take off winter clothes and wear summer clothes—better soldiers and simpler administration

In the early 1940s, unprecedented and severe material difficulties occurred in the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region and the anti-Japanese base areas behind enemy lines, and the problems of large institutions and heavy burdens on farmers were more prominent. At that time, the population of the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region was less than 1.5 million, and the number of off-duty workers showed a linear upward trend. After 1939, mainly in 1900 and 1941, the Kuomintang launched two anti-communist frictions, surrounded the border area with heavy troops, and waited for an opportunity to attack on a large scale.The Central Committee of the Communist Party of China was forced to withdraw troops from the front line one after another to defend the border area.The number of off-duty personnel (mainly the army) in the border area increased sharply: in 1938, it was only 160,000, in 1939 it increased to 490,000, in 1940 it reached 610,000, and in 1941 it reached 730,000.With the increase in personnel, expenditures have increased significantly.In October 1940, the Kuomintang stopped paying the Eighth Route Army's military pay, and at the same time cut off postal services. Most foreign aid was cut off, and fiscal revenue dropped sharply.

Increased expenditure and reduced income will inevitably increase the burden on the people. The Party Central Committee once stipulated that the party, government and military off-duty personnel should not exceed 3% of the total population, but by this time the actual number had reached 54%. In 1941, 200,000 shi of public grain was expropriated, accounting for 138% of the total grain output in the border area, which was only 128% in 1937, an increase of more than 10 times; times. In order to overcome difficulties and lighten the burden on the people, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, in addition to carrying out mass production campaigns, solving financial problems from economic development, and "opening up sources of income", another method is to reduce expenditure.Mao Zedong said: "We must overcome this difficulty, and one of our important methods is to streamline our administration."

Better troops and simpler administration were proposed by Li Dingming and others. In November 1941, the second Senate Council was held in the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region. Inspired by the Communist Party's principle of "self-reliance and overcoming difficulties", Li Dingming thought of the historical fact that "the success of Han Gaozu was the promotion of better troops and simpler administration in Guanzhong". To tide over the difficulties, the only way is to increase income and reduce expenditure, and implement better troops and simpler administration.After discussing with several senators including Ji Boxiong, he resolutely put forward a proposal to the General Assembly:

"The government should thoroughly plan the economy, implement the principle of streamlining the army and streamlining the administration, so as to avoid the phenomenon of making ends meet and economic disorder." "Soldiers must be refined, government officials must be simple, and administrative agencies must be superior in quality to improve work efficiency." After this proposal was put forward, the response was great. Some congressmen said: "Now is the critical moment of resisting Japan and saving the country. The enemy is attacking us with a large number of troops. At this time, we need to improve our troops and simplify our administration in the border areas. Isn't this telling us to arrest ourselves?"

These people see the proposal as having an ulterior motive. The majority of MPs believed that this proposal was very useful for solving the financial and economic difficulties in the Border Region.Therefore, when the General Assembly voted, it was approved by a majority of votes, and it was decided to "hand over to the government for expedited handling." After the proposal of streamlining troops and simplifying administration was sent to Mao Zedong, Mao Zedong admired and approved it very much. He read it repeatedly, picked up a red pen to circle the important passages, and copied them down word by word, with annotations beside them:

"This method is very good, and it is precisely the right medicine to change our institutionalism, bureaucracy, and formalism." The next day, Mao Zedong attended the Senate, fully affirmed the proposal, and personally talked to Li Dingming to ask for his opinion further. After discussion by the Party Central Committee, on December 13, 1941, instructions were issued to all anti-Japanese base areas to streamline the army, streamline administration, and develop the economy, and they were widely implemented. In September 1942, Mao Zedong wrote an editorial entitled "An Extremely Important Policy" for the Yan'an "Liberation Daily", stating:

It is an extremely important policy to regard streamlining troops and simplifying administration. He illustrated this policy with a vivid example of "the climate has changed, and clothes must change at any time".He said: Streamlining a huge organization is like taking off winter clothes and putting on summer clothes, so as to fight against the enemy lightly and quickly. He also said: "Our Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army are Sun Xingzhe and little tigers, and they are very capable of dealing with this Japanese goblin or Japanese donkey. At present, we have better troops and simpler administration. We have changed our bodies and made our bodies smaller but more solid. , we will become invincible.”

Since then, the Party Central Committee has included streamlined troops and simplified administration as a basic policy in the border areas and anti-Japanese base areas as one of the top ten policies. The Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region was the first to implement better troops and simpler administration, and took it as a major task of government work. At the end of 1941, the border region held a government affairs meeting and decided to set up a first-level reorganization committee, consisting of five people including Liu Jingfan, Gao Zili, Zhou Wen, Zhou Xing, and Nan Hanchen. and editorial plans.

The Border Region Government has successively formulated some organizational regulations, management regulations, reward and punishment regulations, and conventions for government agencies, specifying specific goals, tasks, and requirements for streamlining administration. The adjusted personnel have the following treatment principles: (1) All cadres who are educated, capable, and able to work should be moved down as far as possible to strengthen the county, district, and township organizations; (3) All cadres who are sick and unable to work or study should go through a certain system and be sent to school for study; (4) All those who are physically strong should go to participate in production; (5) Those who are backward Molecules, as well as chores who are too old and weak, should be helped to go home to farm, so that everyone has his own place.

From the end of 1941 to the end of 1943, the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region carried out three successive streamlining of troops and administration.By the beginning of 1944 inspection, the expected effect has basically been achieved. In the government system, the internal agencies of the departments, divisions, and courts were reduced by 1/4, the number of agencies directly under the border region government was reduced from 35 to 22, and the number of internal agencies of special agencies and county governments was reduced from 8 or 9 to 4 or 5. Etc., eliminated the backlog of top-heavy.

In terms of personnel, the personnel of various agencies of the border government have been streamlined according to the plan. Six units including the General Office, Civil Affairs Department, Finance Department, Construction Department, Education Department, and Materials Bureau have been reduced from the original 469 to 279, which is a reduction of 40%. many.The total number of government and civilian staff at all levels has been reduced to 7,500, achieving the goal of no more than 1% of the total number of residents in the border area. In terms of cadre deployment, some cadres were promoted from lower levels to work in the special agencies and border government offices, and some capable cadres were also sent to strengthen the work of district and township governments.For example, in Yan'an County, 10 county-level cadres were transferred to districts, 20 district-level cadres were transferred to townships, and Bianfu transferred 5 county chiefs to serve as division chiefs. Policies, decrees, orders, and instructions have been basically unified, and the phenomenon of multiple political parties is less, and the "unification" of the organization has been strengthened. Due to the streamlining of institutions and personnel, there are fewer "bureaucrats" from top to bottom. After streamlining, grassroots work has been strengthened, and work efficiency has been improved.For example, the average daily delivery volume of communication stations in the border area was 16,661 from January to April, and it surged to 30,078 from May to November, increasing the efficiency by more than 80%.In government-run industries the increase in efficiency is still more astonishing.Due to the opposition to bureaucracy and the improvement of leadership style in the streamlining of administration, there are more people's servants doing practical work in organs at all levels.In addition, the agencies and the army practiced strict economy and did it themselves, which contributed a lot to economic construction, and the mobilization of people in the border areas was also greatly reduced. For example, in Yan'an, more than 60,000 people were mobilized in 1941, and only 280,000 people were mobilized in 1942, which was doubled. many.Suide mobilized 750,000 people in 1941, and only 900 in 1942. At the same time, the left-behind troops of the Eighth Route Army implemented the policy of "elite soldiers" so that the number of troops should not exceed 2% of the total number of residents in the border area.The personnel cut down directly under the troops are transferred to the production front. According to this policy, the number of left-behind troops in the border area was reduced by 3,000 for the first time, and another 1,400 were reduced in 1943. The original self-defense force of more than 1,000 commanders and fighters were all transferred to rural production, and changed from being completely off-duty to not off-duty. The anti-Japanese base areas also followed this to streamline their troops and streamline their administration. The implementation of this policy solved the contradictions of "big fish and small water" and "top-heavy" existing in the anti-Japanese base areas, reduced the burden on the common people, and facilitated the overcoming of material difficulties; Work, "a new situation has emerged in which the government is simplified and the people are convenient, and the soldiers are fine and food is sufficient." In September 1944, at the memorial meeting for Zhang Side, Mao Zedong once again affirmed the streamlining of troops and administration.He said: "This suggestion was put forward by Mr. Li Dingming, who is not a party member; he made a good suggestion and is good for the people, so we adopted it."