3. STRATEGIC RETREAT -9
It is extremely difficult to convince the cadres and the people of
the necessity of strategic retreat when they have had no experience of it, and
when the prestige of the army leadership is not yet such that it can
concentrate the authority for deciding on strategic retreat in the hands of a
few persons or of a single person and at the same time enjoy the confidence of
the cadres. Because the cadres lacked experience and had no faith in strategic
retreat, great difficulties were encountered at the beginning of our first and
fourth counter-campaigns and during the whole of the fifth. During the first
counter-campaign the cadres, under the influence of the Li Li-san line, were in
favour not of retreat but of attack until they were convinced otherwise. In the
fourth counter-campaign the cadres, under the influence of military
adventurism, objected to making preparations for retreat. In the fifth, they at
first persisted in the military adventurist view, which opposed luring the
enemy in deep, but later turned to military conservatism. Another case is that
of the adherents of the Chang Kuo-tao line, who did not admit the impossibility
of establishing our bases in the regions of the Tibetan and the Hui peoples [35] until they ran up against a brick wall. Experience is essential
for the cadres, and failure is indeed the mother of success. But it is also necessary
to learn with an open mind from other people's experience, and it is sheer
"narrow empiricism" to insist on one's own personal experience in all
matters and, in its absence, to adhere stubbornly to one's own opinions and
reject other people's experience. Our war has suffered in no small measure on
this account.
The people's lack of faith in the need for a strategic retreat,
which was due to their inexperience, was never greater than in our first
counter-campaign in Kiangsi. At that time the local Party organizations and the
masses of the people in the counties of Kian, Hsingkuo and Yungfeng were all
opposed to the Red Army's withdrawal. But after the experience of the first
counter-campaign, no such problem occurred in the subsequent ones. Everyone was
convinced that the loss of territory in the base area and the sufferings of the
people were temporary and was confident that the Red Army could smash the
enemy's "encirclement and suppression". However, whether or not the
people have faith is closely tied up with whether or not the cadres have faith,
and hence the first and foremost task is to convince the cadres.
Strategic retreat is aimed solely at switching over to the
counteroffensive and is merely the first stage of the strategic defensive. The
decisive link in the entire strategy is whether victory can be won in the stage
of the counter-offensive which follows.
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