Mao Tse-tung 1937
Source: International Press Correspondence, Volume 17, no 26, 19 June 1937. Scanned and prepared for the Marxist Internet Archive by Paul Flewers. This is a longer version of the article from Mao’s Selected Works, Volume 6.
To the Spanish people – Comrades-in-arms.
We, the Chinese Communist Party, the Chinese Red Army, and the Chinese Soviets, regard the war led by the Spanish Republican government as the most holy war in the world. This war is being fought not only for the life of the Spanish nation, but also for the oppressed nations of the world because the Spanish government is fighting German and Italian fascism which, with their Spanish henchmen, are destroying the culture and civilisation, and the human justice of the world. The Spanish government and the Spanish people are fighting German and Italian fascists who are actively in league with and giving support to the Japanese fascist invaders of China in the Far East. Japanese fascists are directing their full strength against China. After the occupation of our Manchurian Provinces, they advanced into North China. Were it not for the support they receive from German and Italian fascism they would never be so mad, so wild, as they are today in their invasion of our country.
The Communist Party of China fully sympathises with the different political parties united in the Spanish People’s Front, and is now calling on the different political parties in China to join in a national united front against Japanese fascism. Our work is advancing rapidly and, if we succeed, China can deal a blow to Japanese fascism which will be of great help to the Spanish government and people.
We do not believe that the struggle of the Chinese people can be separated from your struggle in Spain. The Communist Party of China is now supporting and emulating you, the Spanish people, by struggling against Japanese fascism. The Communist Party of China, the Chinese Soviets, the Chinese Red Army and the Chinese people are greatly encouraged by your defence of Madrid, and of your northern and southern fronts. Each day our press here in the Soviet regions publishes reports and articles about your struggle. Through our radios we receive the latest daily news about you. We firmly realise that the unity of your various parties in the People’s Front is the basis for your final victory. We have also read and fully support the ten-point programme proposed by the Spanish Communist Party and expressed in your manifesto.
Your struggle is similar to our own in the Far East because, apart from other similarities already mentioned, there are traitors and Trotskyists hiding in our ranks, just as they hide in yours. Only by the most determined measures against such traitors can we consolidate our Front. In struggling against our own enemies in China, we are giving support to you in Spain.
In China there are now over one hundred magazines and newspapers which publish regular reports, articles and pictures sympathetic to you in your heroic struggle for democracy and liberation. We know that your victory will directly aid us in our fight against Japanese fascism. Your cause is our cause. We read with enthusiasm of the International Volunteers organised by people from every land, and we are glad that there are Chinese and Japanese in their ranks. Many comrades of the Chinese Red Army also wish to go to Spain to join you, and not a day passes but that they discuss your struggle and the whole Spanish situation. Were it not that we are face to face with the Japanese enemy, we would join you and take our place in your front ranks.
As many of you know, the Chinese Red Army has carried on a ceaseless and hard struggle for ten years. We fought without resources, through hunger and cold, without arms and ammunition save that which we captured, until at last we won our present victory. We know that you and your army are also passing through great hardships such as we also have passed through, and that you will be victorious. Our ten years’ struggle has proved that if a revolutionary people and their revolutionary army are not afraid of suffering, but continue to fight heroically against the enemy, they will be victorious.
We, the Communist Party of China, the Chinese Red Army, the Chinese Soviets and the Chinese people, express our deepest solidarity and comradeship with you, the heroic men and women fighting for Spanish democracy. Also, we express our deepest solidarity and comradeship for the International Volunteers who are offering their lives for the emancipation of their Spanish brothers and sisters and, through them, for the oppressed nations of the world. As in the past, we will follow your struggle with daily and hourly interest, rejoicing in all your victories, confident that final victory will be yours.
Mao Tse-tung
Chairman, Chinese Soviet Government, Yenanfu (Fushin), North Shensi, China
15 May 1937