Long March - reasons for winning, Mao role, challenges

Question 1

LM - support of warlords

Answer 1

• Chiang could not wait to get into the warlords’ turf and
  attack the Red Army at the same time; the warlords wanted
  to speed the Red Army on its way to deny Chinag just such
  an excuse
• Chen Jitang, warlord of Guandong, signed a secret treaty
  October 6, 1934 that arranged for a ceasefire, exchange
  of intelliegence, free trade and right of way for the Red
  Army

Question 2

LM - Young Marshal (Zhang Zueliang)

Answer 2

• wanted Chiang to stop fighting Communists and help him
  repel the Japanese instead to reclaim his homeland –
  Chiang insisted on finishing off the Communists before
  taking on the Japanese
• the only people strong enough to help repel Japnese were Russians
• approached Communists - plan for an alternative
  government based in Northwest, with Young
  Marshal as the head and Soviet Union as backer:
  rejected by Stalin, wanted China to unite and Mao
  to talk to Chiang
• ordered his men to keep a safe distance from the Red Army making sure
  that all his troops’ movement and Chiang’s military plans were cabled to the
  Communists
• practically keeping Red Army alive with the
  supplies he received from Chiang
• 10,000 winter outfits
• 1936 alone he gave over 700,000 fabi (Nationalist currency) (1937 the Communists’ total expenses were
  560,000)

Question 3

LM - snow visit

Answer 3

• greeted by banners, military band
  and top echelons of Red leaders
• luxury goods were made available
• questions that Snow would ask had to be submitted in
  advance, and the Polituro carefully coordinated their
  answers
• “changed Western opinion of Mao and the Communists” Sun
• “Many young radicals in the
  Nationalist-controlled areas joined the
  Communists in Shaanxi as a direct result of
  reading Snow” Sun Shuyun
• Thomas “It was no less than a political instrument that brought
  the Chinese Revolution and its makers to life in the minds of
  readers around the world”

Question 4

LM - propaganda methods

Answer 4

• December 1929 Mao laid down the rules for propaganda in the Red Army - told the soldiers that they were
  not just any army, but an army with a political purpose
• Red Star newspaper - 28 issues over course of march, reached 40,000
• used folk tunes and set propaganda songs to them
• at the grass roots there was a propaganda team in every unit, 10-20 people
• had a minimum quota of 50 posters a day, sometimes as many as 200
• in Zunyi, propaganda team wrote 18,400 slogans in 2 days
• “to a large extent responsible for the successful conclusion of the heroic trek” Sun

Question 5

LM - use of bribery

Answer 5

outside Zunyi caught a battalion of the local militia and bribed
them to call out to the guards and open the city gate

Question 6

LM Mao role - outset

Answer 6

• decided by Zhou Enlai (Commissar of RA), Bo Gu (Party Secretary) and Braun (Comintern adviser)
• “Mao has not been consulted, nor had his advice been sought about what to do” Sun Shuyun
• the decision to abandon the Jiangxi Soviet was made in the
  strictest secrecy - Mao himself did not learn of it until August, two
  months before the departure (decision made in May)

Question 7

LM Mao role - army leadership

Answer 7

• 1st Amry under Mao “All the flesh is gone, leaving only a skeleton” Zhu De
• skeleton was 10,000 men- Zhang’s army had 70-80,000 men, well fed, clothed and rested
• from 30,000 men when he took over at Zunyi, he had now just 22,000 left - a loss of almost a third of his force
• March 21, 11935 led his men across Chi for the 4th time - covered 1,250 miles in 5 weeks
• Zhang Wentian, the new Party Secretary, could not make sense of Mao’s plan and
  complained bitterly about “the catastrophic military predicament engendered by Mao’s
  reckless strategy and tactics ever since Zunyi”

Question 8

LM Mao role - Zunyi general

Answer 8

• 7 January 1935 captured Zunyi
• conference Jan 15-17
• Braun and Bo Gu blaimed for the failures that led to having to
  undertake Long March and the fiasco at Xiang River (used defence
  versus defence instead of blockhouses against blockhouses)
• Edgar Snow: “it is almost impossible to believe that under any genius of
  command the Reds could have emerged victorious from the Himalayan
  obstacles which faced them”

Question 9

LM Mao role - Zunyi outcomes

Answer 9

• Mao made Party Secretary
• 28 Bolsheviks no longer in control of the party
• troops now given explanations of their movements, used catchy slogans
• marked a return to guerrilla warfare for themarchers,
• Kampen - “This turning point in the chinese revolution [ Zunyi
  conference] has been an embarrassment for nearly everyone
  involved.. Mao’s rise was never as dramatic and final ashis supporters
  would have liked”

Question 10

LM challenges - resources

Answer 10

• 5 bullets for each assault, 3 grenades
• whole platoon shared a rifle
• In 1933-34 Chiang spent nearly 60 million silver dollars importing state-of-the-art
  rifles, artilery and planes from America and Europe, most of these ended up in the
  hands of the Communists
• Chiang was equipped with the latest weapons from Germany, Britain and
  America and supported by 200 planes with 150 American and Canadian
  pilots

Question 11

LM challenges - logistical

Answer 11

• marching columns were up to 80 km long
• Mao’s idea for the 5 corps to carry the CC to perserve the Party officials
• “Before the departure, the three-man group [Bo, Braun and Zhou]
  wanted the Party and government officials to be intergrated into the
  army proper, but Mao suggested not so we were not dispersed” Zhang
  Wentian
• Central Column covered barely 6 miles a day

Question 12

LM challenges - lack of training

Answer 12

• “many of our soldiers do not know how to shoot accurately or use a
  bayonet” Liu Bocheng, the Chief of Staff of the Red Army and
  Commandant of its academy
• accounted for up to 50% of the casualties suffered by the Red Army

Question 13

LM challenges - desertion

Answer 13

• some divisions lost 1/3rds of their men
• • claim = Xiang river - 1st Army reduced from 86,000 to 30,000 in the first six weeks of March - at most
    15,000 died “the majority almost certainly deserted” Sun Shuyun

Question 14

LM challenges - Tibet

Answer 14

• entered August 1935
• no food
• sniped at RA when tried to cut barley
• 1935, the area that the Army passed through had a population of 220,000 with just
  about enough frain and cattle to feed themselves and leave a small reserve
• armies = 100,000 men, nearly hald of local population
• the RA left money or IOUs in the fields they harvested or for the animals they took away - no food to buy
• “There is no doubt the Tibetans suffered at the hands of
  the Red Army”- “they were taking from the very poor, 10
  months before their next harvest”