Brothers in Arms (107 page)

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Therefore, we believe that should we act properly, the imperialists might not venture upon direct military intervention in China. We must be careful not to give the imperialists pretexts for carrying out open armed intervention in China. Simultaneously, we must wipe out the imperialist agents, the remnants of the Guomindang forces, as soon as possible, which in its turn would confront the imperialists with greater difficulties should they risk armed intervention in China.

It is highly probable that the imperialists will resort to a policy of blockade against the Chinese Revolution. In fact, they have already embarked on it. Such a policy will present certain difficulties for us, especially in shipping and foreign trade, but it will be unable to delay the early victory of the Chinese Revolution.

The victories of the Chinese people in the revolutionary struggle are taking place after the Second World War when the world proletariat and the people's democratic forces, the Soviet Union in particular, are giving assistance to the Chinese people, which is a decisive condition for the Chinese people's victories. The Communist Party of China is using these conditions. The Chinese Revolution has experience in the successful organization of a single anti-imperialist national front, the experience of an agrarian revolution, of the long conduct of armed struggle in rural areas, of the siege of cities and of their subsequent seizure. The Chinese Revolution has the experience of waging illegal and legal struggle in cities and of combining these straggles with the operations of our armed forces. Finally, we have gained experience in building a Marxist-Leninist Communist Party in a country like China. All this experience might be useful for other colonial and semicolonial nations.

2. The New Political Consultative Council and the Central Government

The revolutionary war in China has culminated in victory by and large, and it will culminate in ultimate victory in the near future. Our further task consists in ending the war the faster, in clearing from the country the leftovers of Jiang Jieshi's Guomindang, in rehabilitating and developing the national economy as soon as possible, and in learning to build and govern the country.

We have decided to
convene in August a new Political Consultative
Conference and set up a coalition government. At present we are active in carrying out preparatory work. The new PCC is being convened not only by the Communist Party alone or by several parties, it is being convened by all democratic parties, people's organizations, representatives of ethnic minorities, and representatives of Chinese citizens living abroad altogether by twenty-three organizations that have joined up in preparing the convocation of the PCC. Democratic and unaffiliated public figures are quite satisfied with such a method.

A Preparatory Committee on PCC Convocation has already been set up. It comprises 134 members, among them 43 Communists, 48 progressive figures who will certainly

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support us, 43 centrists, with 12 centrists with rightist leanings among them. The progressives include 15 undercover Communists. The leadership of the Preparatory Committee is securely with the Communist Party. A standing presidium of 21 has been set up within the Preparatory Committee. Leadership in this presidium has likewise been secured for the Communist Party.

The Preparatory Committee has decided to admit to the forthcoming PCC yet another 14 democratic parties and groups that could send 142 representatives. There will be 102 delegates in the PCC from various districts, 60 from the army, and 206 from mass popular organizations, ethnic minorities, and Chinese citizens resident abroad. All told, 45 organizations will be represented in the PCC by 510 delegates. The Communists will make up a majority.

We believe that the PCC of China is a suitable organizational form for a single national front in the Chinese Revolution, a form that is well known to the popular masses. Therefore, we are preparing to let the PCC continue as a standing body, and on the local level, where necessary, local PCCs will be established.

At the PCC we intend to adopt a common political program which will be adhered to by all parties, groups, and organizations. The PCC will elect a
Central Government,
draft and publish a declaration, approve the new national anthem, emblem, and flag.
(But
will
there also be provincial governments?)

The organizational composition of the new Central Government has not yet been determined. Besides the Military Council, the new Central Government, its cabinet of ministers, will also include: a Financial and Economic Committee, a Committee on Culture and Education, an Administrative and Juridical Committee (this committee will be concerned with matters of state security, internal affairs, and justice); also to be established are ministries for railways, agriculture, forestry, trade, metal industry, textiles, fuels, communications and roads, the post, telegraph,
etc.
Comrade Mao Zedong has been nominated chairman of the central government.
and Comrade Zhou Enlai prime minister.
(What's that:
president
in fact?)
Comrades Liu Shaoqi and Ren Bishi will not be within the government.

We perceive the nature of the new democratic state and the nature of new government in China in this way:

This state is a people's democratic dictatorship based on the class alliance of the workers and peasants under the guidance of the proletariat.

This dictatorship is directed against the imperialists, feudal forces, and
bureaucratic capital.
(What is ''bureaucratic capital"?)

The working class is the leading force of this dictatorship. The working class in alliance with the peasantry and the revolutionary intelligentsia constitutes the core of this dictatorship. Simultaneously, being drawn in every way into participation in this dictatorship are the petty bourgeoisie, the liberal bourgeoisie, their representatives, and polit-

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ical groups that can cooperate with us. Such is the organizational pattern of this dictatorship.

There is no need to explain that the people's democratic dictatorship is not a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, but it is not a dictatorship of the proletariat either.
(Yes!)

The people's democratic dictatorship in China has certain points in common with "the democratic dictatorship of the workers and peasants," or what Lenin said with reference to the Revolution of 1905-1907. Yet it has a certain distinction as well.

What they have in common is that guidance is exercised by the proletariat and that the basis of this dictatorship is an alliance of workers and peasants. However, the people's democratic dictatorship in China also encompasses representatives and political groups of the liberal bourgeoisie who wish to fight against imperialism, feudalism, and bureaucratic capital.
Herein lies the distinction.
(Yes!)
The point is that China is
a semicolonial state and that during the revolution and after its victory
we shall still need concerted action by all forces in the struggle against imperialism and its agents.
(Yes!)
Another point is in the specifics of the Chinese national bourgeoisie. This is quite in keeping with what Comrade Stalin said in 1926 in his speech at a meeting of the China Commission of the Comintern Executive Committee when he pointed out that a revolutionary government in China would be a "predominantly anti-imperialist government."

In form, the people's democratic dictatorship in China is a regime of people's congresses, but it is not another form of the regime of bourgeois parliamentarism. It comes closer to the regime of Soviets, but is distinct from dictatorship of the proletariat in the form of Soviets, for representatives of the national bourgeoisie are within the people's congresses.
(Yes!)
The people's democratic dictatorship in China has its internal and external contradictions, and it has to wage an internal and external struggle.

The so-called external contradiction and the external struggle mean that the dictatorship has contradictions with imperialism, feudalism, bureaucratic capital, with the remnants of the Guomindang forces and thus has to wage a struggle against them. These contradictions will continue to be fundamental contradictions and a fundamental straggle for a relatively long period after the overthrow of the Guomindang government.

The internal contradiction and the internal straggle mean that within this dictatorship there are contradictions and a straggle among various social classes and various parties and groupings. These contradictions and this struggle will be intensifying in the future, but they will be of secondary importance, compared with the external contradictions, for a fairly long period.

Some people say that "after the toppling of the Guomindang rule or after the completion of land reform the contradictions between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie will immediately become fundamental contradictions and the struggle between the workers and the capitalists will instantly come to the forefront as the main struggle." We consider this interpretation of the problem erroneous because should this government direct its

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main fire against the bourgeoisie, this would mean it was a dictatorship of the proletariat or was growing into one, and such policies would push the national bourgeoisie, still capable of cooperating with us, away from us into the imperialist camp. Pursuit of this policy in China
at the present time would be tantamount to a dangerous adventurist policy,
(Yes!)
Last February Comrade Andreev in a talk with Mao Zedong approved the policy of the CCP [Chinese Communist Party] in enlisting support from the national bourgeoisie, and then the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party likewise pointed to the need for us to draw support from the national bourgeoisie. We fully agree with these instructions.

With the overthrow of the Guomindang government the contradictions between labor and capital will persist as an objective phenomenon, and will intensify. Therefore, the working class should wage a corresponding struggle with the bourgeoisie. It is thus that the interests of the working class and the people's democratic dictatorship could be safeguarded. But simultaneously we still have to work toward an appropriate compromise agreement and a bloc with the national bourgeoisie in order to concentrate forces against the external enemy and also to overcome China's backwardness.
(Collective agreements excluding strikes.)

From now on and until complete nationalization of national capital many measures will have to be carried out which will take a long time. The length of this period will depend on various conditions of the international and domestic situation. We believe this job may take from ten to fifteen years.

The people's democratic dictatorship in China will effect the country's unification. This would mean great progress for China. The country's unification will occur under the leadership of the proletariat. Yet because of China's backwardness, its underdeveloped road system, the presence in the past of spheres of imperialist influence and remnants of feudal division, China still lacks an integrated economy. Therefore, at present we are compelled to vest local governments with fairly broad rights of self-government so as to stimulate activity and initiative on the local level.
(Local provincial governments, will be ?)
We consider it wrong and harmful to carry into effect a system of excessive centralism.
(Yes!)

We would like Comrade Stalin and the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party to point out to us whether our views expounded above are correct.

The majority of the leading figures of the Chinese democratic parties and groups have already arrived in Beiping [Beijing]. There are over ten such democratic parties and groups in China. These are small organizations engaged in political activity. The total membership of all these parties and groups does not exceed 30,000. Among them, the Democratic League alone has 20,000 members. This league wields a relatively strong influence among a part of the intelligentsia. These parties and groups are not active among workers and peasant masses. They are organizationally weak and lack inner cohesion. For example, all these parties and groups were unable to present a list of their represen-

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