ON TACTICS AGAINST JAPANESE IMPERIALISM
The petty bourgeoisie is also demanding resistance. Have not the
student youth and the urban petty bourgeoisie already started a broad anti-Japanese
movement?[8] This section of the Chinese petty bourgeoisie took part in the
revolution of 1924-27. Like the peasants, they are small producers in their
economic status, and their interests are irreconcilable with those of
imperialism. Imperialism and the Chinese counter-revolutionary forces have done
them great harm, driving many into unemployment, bankruptcy or semi-bankruptcy.
Now, faced with the immediate danger of becoming slaves to a foreign nation,
they have no alternative but to resist.
But how do the national bourgeoisie, the comprador and landlord
classes, and the Kuomintang face up to this question?
The big local tyrants and evil gentry, the big warlords and the
big bureaucrats and compradors have long made up their minds. They maintain, as
they have done all along, that revolution of whatever kind is worse than
imperialism. They have formed a camp of traitors, for whom the question of
whether to become slaves of a foreign nation simply does not exist because they
have already lost all sense of nationality and their interests are inseparably
linked with imperialism. Their chieftain is Chiang Kai-shek.[9] This camp of traitors are deadly enemies of the Chinese people.
Japanese imperialism could not have become so blatant in its aggression were it
not for this pack of traitors. They are the running dogs of imperialism.
The national bourgeoisie presents a complicated problem. This
class took part in the revolution of 1924-27, but terrified by the flames of
revolution, it later deserted to the enemy of the people, the Chiang Kai-shek clique.
The question is whether there is any possibility that this class will undergo a
change in the present circumstances. We think there is. For the national
bourgeoisie is not the same as either the landlord or the comprador class;
there is a difference between them. The national bourgeoisie is less feudal
than the landlord class and not so comprador as the comprador class. The
section having more ties with foreign capital and the Chinese landed interests
form the right-wing of the national bourgeoisie; and we shall not, for the
moment, consider whether it can change or not. The problem lies with those
sections which have few or no such ties. We believe that in the new situation
in which China is threatened with being reduced to a colony these sections may
change their attitude. The change will be marked by vacillation. On the one
hand they dislike imperialism, and on the other they fear thorough revolution,
and they vacillate between the two. This explains why they took part in the
revolution of 1924-27 and why, in the end, they went over to Chiang Kai-shek's
side. In what respect does the present period differ from 1927 when Chiang
Kai-shek betrayed the revolution? China was then still a semi-colony, but now
she is on the way to becoming a colony. Over the past nine years the national
bourgeoisie has deserted its ally, the working class, and made friends with the
landlord and comprador classes, but has it gained anything? Nothing, except the
bankruptcy or semi-bankruptcy of its industrial and commercial enterprises.
Hence we believe that in the present situation the attitude of the national
bourgeoisie can change. What will be the extent of the change? The general
characteristic of the national bourgeoisie is to vacillate. But at a certain
stage of the struggle, one section (the left-wing) may join in, while another
section may vacillate towards neutrality.
Whose class interests does the 19th Route Army led by Tsai
Ting-kai [10] and others represent? Those of the national bourgeoisie, the
upper petty bourgeoisie, and the rich peasants and small landlords in the
countryside. Did not Tsai Ting-kai and his associates once fight bitterly
against the Red Army? Yes, but they subsequently concluded an anti-Japanese and
anti-Chiang alliance with the Red Army. In Kiangsi they had attacked the Red
Army, but later in Shanghai they fought the Japanese imperialists; later still,
in Fukien they came to terms with the Red Army and turned their guns against
Chiang Kai-shek. Whatever course Tsai Ting-kai and his associates may take in
the future, and despite their Fukien People's Government's adherence to old
practice in failing to arouse the people to struggle, it must be considered
beneficial to the revolution that they turned their guns, originally trained on
the Red Army, against Japanese imperialism and Chiang Kai-shek. It marked a
split within the Kuomintang camp. If the circumstances following the September
18th Incident could cause this group to split away, why cannot the present
circumstances give rise to other splits in the Kuomintang? Those Party members
who hold that the whole landlord and bourgeois camp is united and permanent and
will not change under any circumstances are wrong. They not only fail to
appreciate the present grave situation, they have even forgotten history.
Let me speak a little more about the past. In 1926 and 1927,
during the time when the revolutionary army advanced on Wuhan, captured it and
marched into Honan, Tang Sheng-chih and Feng Yu-hsiang [11] took part in the revolution. In 1933, Feng Yu-hsiang co-operated
for a time with the Communist Party in forming the Anti-Japanese Allied Army in
Chahar Province.
Take another striking example. Did not the 26th Route Army, which,
together with the 19th Route Army, had attacked the Red Army in Kiangsi, stage
the Ningtu Uprising [12] in December 1931 and become part of the Red Army? The leaders of
the Ningtu Uprising, Chao Po-sheng, Tung Chen-tang and others, have become
steadfast comrades in the revolution.
The anti-Japanese operations of Ma Chan-shan [13] in the three northeastern provinces represented another split in
the ruling class camp.
All these instances indicate that splits will occur in the enemy
camp when all China comes within the range of Japanese bombs, and when the
struggle changes its normal pace and suddenly surges forward.
Now, comrades, let us turn to another aspect of the question.
Is it correct to object to our view on the ground that China's
national bourgeoisie is politically and economically flabby, and to argue that
it cannot possibly change its attitude in spite of the new circumstances? I
think not. If weakness is the reason for its inability to change its attitude,
why did the national bourgeoisie behave differently in 1924-27 when it did not
merely vacillate towards the revolution but actually joined it? Can one say
that the weakness of the national bourgeoisie is a new disease, and not one
that accompanies it from the very womb? Can one say that the national
bourgeoisie is weak today, but was not weak in 1924-27? One of the chief
political and economic characteristics of a semi-colonial country is the
weakness of its national bourgeoisie. That is exactly why the imperialists dare
to bully them, and it follows that one of their characteristics is dislike of
imperialism. Of course, so far from denying it, we fully recognize that it is
the very weakness of the national bourgeoisie that may make it easy for the
imperialists, landlords and compradors to entice them with the bait of some
temporary advantage; hence their lack of revolutionary thoroughness.
Nevertheless, it cannot be said that in the present circumstances there is no
difference between the national bourgeoisie and the landlord and comprador
classes.
Therefore, we emphatically assert that when the national crisis
reaches a crucial point, splits will occur in the Kuomintang camp. Such splits
have revealed themselves in the vacillation of the national bourgeoisie and the
emergence of such anti-Japanese figures as Feng Yu-hsiang, Tsai Ting-kai and Ma
Chan-shan, who have become popular for a time. Basically, these splits are
unfavourable to the counterrevolution and favourable to the revolution. Their
possibility is increased by China's uneven political and economic development,
and the consequent uneven development of the revolution.
