AQA: The Impact of Chairman Mao: China, 1946-1976

SOURCE A

Adapted from a report by an American official in China, May 1947.

There is good evidence that apathy, resentment and defeatism are spreading fast in nationalist ranks, causing surrenders and desertions. Main factors contributing to this are: Communists’ ever mounting numerical superiority; Nationalist soldiers’ discouragement over prospects of getting reinforcements; better solidarity and fighting spirit of Communists; losses and exhaustion of Nationalists; their growing indignation over disparity between officers’ enrichment and soldiers’ low pay, and their lack of interest in fighting far from home.

SOURCE B

Adapted from Mao, A Life by Philip Short, 2004.

The speed with which Nationalist resistance crumbled astonished even Mao. One factor was the deterioration in the quality of the GMD armies that had followed America’s entry into World War 2. In the words of one of Chiang Kai Shek’s commanders: ‘Our troops became soft and concerned only with pleasure. They lacked combat spirit and there was no willingness to sacrifice.’ Incompetent leadership made matters worse. The US commander in China called Chiang’s officer corps ‘incapable, inept, untrained, petty and altogether inefficient’. But Chiang’s constant interventions simply stripped his commanders of what little initiative they had.

SOURCE C

Adapted from The Mandate of Heaven by J.F. Melby, 1969.

The key factor in the Communist victory was morale. But one must ask why the Communists had high morale and the Guomindang did not. I believe the answer is simple. The Communists won in China because they correctly analysed and understood what it was that the mass of the people wanted, and they then proceeded to satisfy those wishes. Mao believed that in the end the people are the only real power. The people of China are peasants. The peasants will give their allegiance to the leader most likely to satisfy their wishes. Mao understood these wishes to be land reform, reasonably honest and efficient government, moderate taxation, minimum interference in the private lives of people and freedom from being attacked by marauding armies. Until 1949 the Communists gave them just this.