Chapter 87 Soviet troops opened the way and assisted in the capture of Northeast China 1945-1946

Journalist: “The Soviet Union helped you acquire the Northeast?”

Mao: “Yes, as soon as the Double Ten Agreement was signed, a full- scale civil war broke out. After the Japanese surrendered, the Soviet army kept pushing southward, occupying a large part of northeastern China in a few weeks. Soviet paratroopers parachuted into Baotou, Inner Mongolia, near the Shaanxi-Gan Ning border area. By the end of August 1945, with the help of Soviet troops, the Chinese Communists occupied most of Chahar and Jehol, including Zhangjiakou and Chengde. I considered moving the base camp to Zhangjiakou.”

Journalist: “Soviet airborne troops helped you gain Zhangjiakou?”

Mao: “Yes, but the most important thing for me was the Northeast. The Northeast accounted for 70 percent of the country’s heavy industry. The Northeast borders the Soviet-controlled areas on three sides: Siberia, Mongolia, and North Korea. At the 7th Congress, I said: ‘With the Northeast, we will have a solid foundation for our national victory.’

At that time, neither the Communists nor the Kuomintang had an army in the Northeast, which had been occupied by the Japanese for 14 years. But our guerrillas were near Shanhaiguan, and they immediately went out of the customs and got in touch with the Soviets, who opened the Japanese arsenal. The Shenyang arsenal, we received 100,000 guns, thousands of cannons, ammunition, cloths, and countless grains. A few months ago, the entire 8th Route Army had only 154 guns in total.”

Journalist: “Wow, the Soviets gave you the received Shenyang arsenal, several thousand artillery pieces?”

Mao: “Yes. 200,000 Japanese surrendered troops, the Soviets gave them to the Chinese Communist Party for integration. There were thousands of newly unemployed workers who joined the army, and the Soviets dismantled and shipped back to the Soviet Union a large number of factory equipment and machinery, dismantling and even destroying entire factories. According to expert estimates, the Soviets took away $858 million worth of equipment, and $2 billion was needed to reinstall it. Many individuals lost their jobs and some had to become soldiers. The initial 60,000 troops sent into the Northeast by the Chinese Communist Party soon grew to 300,000.”

Journalist: “Your army in the northeast, which quickly increased from 60,000 to 300,000?”

Mao: “Yes. When I returned to Yan’an on October 11, 1945, the first thing I did was to deploy military operations to stop Chiang’s troops from entering the Northeast. Lin Biao was ordered to be the commander-in-chief of the Northeast. Tens of thousands of cadres who had been ordered to leave the country were already on their way. Members of the newly established Northeast Bureau had been secretly transported to Shenyang by Soviet planes in mid-September.

I ordered troops to be deployed at Shanhaiguan to block the exit of the national army from the pass. I asked the Soviet troops to guard the port and airfield to stop the landing of the national army. With the encouragement of the Soviets, the Chinese Communist forces posed as up bandits and opened fire on the U.S. warships carrying the National Army, forcing them to turn around.”

Journalist: “Your decision to dress as bandits in Jinzhou to fight the U.S. warships?”

Mao: “Yes, the U.S. ship later docked at Qinhuangdao, where Chiang’s army landed and captured Shanhaiguan on November 15, 1945. I ordered the troops to ‘hold Shanhaiguan’ and ‘hold a decisive battle.’ But the Chinese army swung in and drove us out of Shanhai Pass and the railroad junction. Our troops were routed.

The Communist army had no experience in regular warfare, while the Kuomintang Army had fought big position battles with the Japanese. Our army Lin Biao only commanded an ambush at Pingxingguan in 1937, and I was bent on preserving my strength and hiding from the Japanese. Huang Kecheng reported to me that Chiang’s army had been trained by the United States, participated in the Indo-Burma campaign, and carried the proud attitude of an expeditionary force, a standing army, and indeed fought tenaciously.”

Journalist: “Your army obviously could not beat Chiang’s army?”

Mao: “Yes, many soldiers of the Chinese Communist army wanted to go home and did not want to go out to fight. In order to bring the troops out of the pass, Chen Yi told the cadres of the New Fourth Army, ‘When I left Yan’an, Chairman Mao told me to tell you that you have to go to a good place. That place is a world of flowers, with electric lights, buildings, out of gold, out of silver. What kind of place is that? Chairman Mao did not tell us, I can not tell you,’ said laughing. Some cadres felt that mobilization was not useful and simply did not tell the troops below where to go until they boarded the sea ship to the northeast and could not get down.

Deserters appeared in large numbers. Huang Kecheng, who took the New Fourth Army to Shandong, telegraphed me on November 15, 1945, that ‘the three divisions set out from northern Jiangsu with a total of 32,500 men, and about 3,000 fled and fell sick along the way.’ Wan Yi reported, ‘Desertion is still serious, only last night that escaped more than 80 below the deputy platoon leader.’ There are two regiments of more than 4,000 people, less than 2,000 to Gubeikou.”

Journalist: “Your communist army a large number of deserters, soldiers do not want to fight?”

Mao: “Yes, local recruits in the Northeast also fled, and once they heard that the target of the battle was the central government, more fled. According to Northeast statistics, from late December 1945 to early 1946, about 10 days, defected and fled more than 40,000 people.

Liu Shaoqi had long seen that a Chinese Communist army with these weaknesses could not possibly hold off the Kuomintang Army from advancing into the Northeast. While I was still in Chungking, Liu instructed to concentrate troops and establish consolidated bases and train troops in places bordering the Soviet Union, Outer Mongolia, and North Korea. On October 2, 1945, Liu instructed, ‘Instead of first deploying the main force at the gates of Manchuria to hold off Chiang Kai-shek, first deploy the main force, with the Soviet, Mongolian, and North Korean borders at our backs, to gain a firm foothold, and then fight for the major roads of the big cities.’”

Journalist: “Oh, Liu Shaoqi saw that it could not hold back the national army? “

Mao: “Yes, Liu wanted to have entered the city of the Chinese Communist forces, ready to evacuate the city, scattered to the countryside to establish a base, Shenyang and other cities of weapons and materials, to the countryside and Jehol transport out.

But I returned to Yan’an and overruled Liu Shaoqi’s deployment. on October 19, 1945, I ordered: ‘Concentrate the main force on the line of Jinzhou, Yingkou and Shenyang’ and ‘resolutely stop the landing of Chiang’s army’ and ‘change the past decentralized policy.’ ‘Hog the entire Northeast.’ Unfortunately, I have more heart than strength.”

Journalist: “You have a big appetite and are in a hurry?”

Mao: “Yes, I rarely touch the troops. Never inspected the front, never toured the troops, and did not care about the sick and wounded. Now, I want the army to break through, not rely on the rear, and fight to the Kuomintang areas. The commanders asked: Without the rear, what about the sick and wounded? I replied, ‘Good, leave the sick and wounded to the masses, and the masses will take care of it.’ But the problem was that the people were having problems living on their own, so how could they have the money and food to feed the sick and wounded and treat their wounds and diseases?

The combat performance of the Communist forces, Stalin all agreed that there was no hope of immediately defeating Chiang Kai-shek, and Stalin quickly adjusted his strategy. on November 17, 1945, when the national army attacked South Manchuria, the Soviet Union said it would fulfill the Treaty of Friendship and Alliance between China and the Soviet Union and help the national army take over the northeast. The Soviet Union wanted to hand over the railroad junction and all the cities to Chiang and asked the Chinese Communist Party to give them up. This was a blow to my desire to immediately ‘take over the whole Northeast.”

Journalist: “Stalin also saw that you could not reach the goal by taking the risk to rush forward?”

Mao: “Yes, Stalin’s ideas were meant to comfort me. On November 18, 1945, a telegram from Moscow arrived in Yan’an: ‘Mao Anying requests your permission to return toYan’an.’ Stalin released him, which was certainly good news for me, but the situation in Northeast China was more important. I desperately pleaded with Moscow to reconsider and secure the key railway junction. I preached that the Nationalist Army had ‘no fighting spirit,’ that they were ‘deeply isolated, with discord between the military and civilians, and inadequate ammunition,’ and that they could be ‘largely or entirely wiped out.’”

On November 22, 1945, I moved into the cadre sanatorium. For some days I lay in bed with cold sweat, shivering, and spasms in my arms and legs. Shizhe suggested asking Stalin for help, and I nodded. Shizhe sent a telegram to Stalin, who followed up by sending a doctor to Yan’an.”

Journalist: “You were so anxious in Yan’an that you fell ill? Stalin sent you a doctor?”

Mao: “Yes, Dr. Arlov and the Soviet intelligence team in Yan’an, just recalled to the Soviet Union. After living in Yan’an for three and a half years, Stalin asked him to come back to Yan’an to take care of me. Reluctantly, Alov reboarded the plane and returned to Yan’an on January 7, 1946. He was accompanied by Dr. Mi. The two men examined me thoroughly and concluded that I was not seriously ill, but that my nerves were too tense. They told me to stay out of the way for a while, try to relax, go out into the fresh air, and let my nerves relax.”

Journalist: “Two Soviet doctors examined you, nothing serious, just nervous tension?”

Mao: “Yes, Mao Anying went back to Yan’an with the doctors, and Stalin gave him a pistol by hand. I haven’t seen my son for 18 years. When I went to Jinggang Mountain to be the king of the mountain, Shanying was 4 years old, and now he is a tall young man. At the airfield I hugged him and said, ‘You’ve grown so tall!’ That night I wrote to Stalin to thank him.”

Journalist: “Oh, Mao Anying came back from the Soviet Union, 22 years old?”

Mao: “Yes, I moved from the sanatorium into Wangjiaping, also known as Peony Pavilion, where I had my son as my companion every day, and sat outside the kiln at a side of a stone table to chat, in a joyful mood, my health improved, and when spring came, I returned to normal.

In April 1946, after nine months of occupation of the northeast, the Soviet army began to withdraw. The withdrawal was coordinated with the Chinese Communist Party so that it could make good arrangements and we went back into the big cities. I ordered once again to hold on, ‘at any sacrifice,’ to ‘defend Changchun to the death,’ and to ‘defend Siping to the death, and fight for every inch of land.’”

Journalist: “The Soviets relied for nine months before withdrawing, leaving you to fill the vacuum?”

Mao: “Yes, Liu Shaoqi believed that the Communist army still could not resist the Kuomintang Army, and most of the cities still had to be conceded. Lin Biao also said that it was unlikely to hold on to the cities, and that we should turn our attention from the big cities to the small and medium-sized cities and the countryside, and put a lot of effort into building the base areas. But in my opinion, only when there are big cities will there be a mountain, I want Lin Biao to ‘hold on to it.’”

Journalist: “You still have a big appetite and are anxious to swallow the big cities?”

Mao: “Yes. Within a few weeks of the Soviet withdrawal, the Kuomintang had recaptured almost all the major cities in the Northeast, leaving only Harbin, which was close to the Soviet Union. The Communist army was retreating northward, with planes strafing and bombing overhead and tanks and cars chasing behind them. Luo Ronghuan said: ‘This great retreat, the collapse of the army, nothing to do. One company went 42 days before they could stand on their feet. The Chinese Communist forces were defeated militarily, and the public sentiment was not as good as the Kuomintang. The Northeasterners had suffered enough from Japan and longed for peace, and saw the Kuomintang Army as the ‘right one.’ As Lin Biao reported to me, ‘The people said: ‘The 8th Route Army and the Central Army, both for the people, do not fight each other well, and think that the Kuomintang is the central.’”

Journalist: “You still can not beat the Kuomintang Army, and the hearts and minds in the Central Army?”

Mao: “Yes. The Chinese Communist Party has a disadvantage, people associate the Communist Army with the ‘old Maoist’ Soviets. The Soviets looted industrial facilities and broke into people’s homes to rob them and rape women. Anti-Soviet marches broke out in some major cities, chanting, ‘The Communist Party should be patriotic!’ The villagers also said: I heard that those guns of yours were exchanged for big girls with the old Maoists.”

Journalist: “Haha, the people said you traded big girls for old Maoist cannons?”

Mao: “Yes. The Chinese Communist army seemed to either withdraw into the Soviet Union or reopen guerrilla warfare in pieces. Lin Biao was ideologically prepared to go to the mountains of Liaonan to fight guerrilla warfare once Harbin was lost. on June 1, 1946, his telegram to me said, ‘Prepare for guerrilla warfare and abandon Harbin. I have told Soviet troops to prepare to withdraw.’ Twice I begged Stalin to intervene with troops, to make a “joint operation”, to put China under the Soviet military “umbrella”. Stalin politely refused, fearing that sending troops would cause an international reaction. On June 3, I had no choice but to tell the Northeast Bureau and Lin Biao: ‘I agree that you should prepare for the abandonment of Harbin and adopt the policy of movement and guerrilla warfare for long- term planning.’”