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From Labor Action, Vol. X No. 10, 11 March 1946, p. 2.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for the Encyclopaedia of Trotskyism On-Line (ETOL).
Dear Comrade:
In a recent issue of Labor Action, an article by Comrade Gates on the subject of the alleged “civil war” in China refers to Yenan Province (that section of China dominated and controlled exclusively by the Chinese Stalinists) as an extension of Soviet Russia; that is, presumably, a bureaucratically collectivized territory similar to the Baltic states in Europe.
This statement, as can be verified, is not correct. In their area of China, the Stalinists have not nationalized (or even distributed) the land; they have not collectivized the slight industry that exists; nor have they expropriated the local landed gentry or bourgeoisie. They have treated their areas in much the same manner as traditional Chinese War Lords, retaining the social structure of semi- feudal, capitalist China. I refer the interested reader to a lengthy article in Science and Society, Fall 1945, pages 309 to 317, The Government of Yenan, by Yung-Ying Hsu; also, the various books of Edgar Snow on China. The Chinese Stalinists operate in a political and social “bloc” with the landowners and merchants.
Of course, this has nothing to do with the political correctness of Comrade Gate’s article, in which it was demonstrated that the “civil war” in China had nothing whatever involved in it worthy of the support of China’s workers and peasants, but it is important to understand fully what the Chinese Stalinists are up to, and how they conduct themselves even at “home.” Now that they have fully capitulated to Chiang Kai-shek on the question of the new government (even to the point of endorsing the phoney “Democratic Assembly” appointed by Chiang’s party!), and the question of a possible “civil war” has vanished, it is worth knowing that these people have not the slightest claim to any pretext of “progressiveness.”
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| Comradely, |
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Last updated: 13 August 2018