Chinese Red Army


The Chinese Red Army, formally the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army or just the Red Army, was the military wing of the Chinese Communist Party from 1928 to 1937. It was formed when Communist elements of the National Revolutionary Army splintered and mutinied in the Nanchang Uprising. The Red Army was reincorporated into the NRA as part of the Second United Front with the Kuomintang to fight against the Empire of Japan during the Second Sino-Japanese War of 1937–1945. In the later stages of the Chinese Civil War the Red Army splintered off once again and was renamed the People's Liberation Army.

History

Formation (late 1920s)

In the summer of 1927, the CCP took over the two divisions of the Chinese Nationalist Party forces and led a military mutiny. Nationalist forces General He Long commanded the 20th Corps to join them. They had a total of 20,000 soldiers and planned to occupy Guangzhou. However, they were defeated before they reached Guangzhou with only a few thousand men surviving the battle. Zhu De led a column of survivors to Hunan to fight in the Autumn Harvest Uprising where they were defeated again. After the revolt, Mao Zedong organized the rebels into a guerilla army, establishing a revolutionary base area in the Jinggang Mountains. The two armies joined forces in the following year. In the winter of 1927, the CCP planned to conquer Guangzhou; however, the uprising failed and thousands of insurgents were killed by the Nationalist forces of General Li Jishen.
Between 1928 and 1929, the CCP launched multiple uprisings. Mao Zedong and Zhu De led the organization and training of the Communist military, including the Fourth Army, which totaled about 6,000 men in the summer of 1928 and fought in Jiangxi. Also in the summer of 1928, Peng Dehuai, the Nationalist forces Regimental Commander, led a military mutiny. A Nanchang uprising survivor, He Long, also created an army in his hometown, with former government soldiers as the main fighting force.
In the late 1920s, the Communist forces lacked resources and relied on guerilla tactics such as hit-and-run operations to compensate for their material limitations.
In late 1929, the Fourth Army organized the Gucheng Uprising and the establishment of Soviet administrations, peasant organizations, and militias.

Early success (early 1930s)

In early 1930, more red armies were created and the number of red soldiers grew rapidly. By the summer of 1930, the Chinese Red Army had grown to more than 100,000 soldiers and had several base areas, such as in southern and northern Jiangxi, western Hubei, and eastern Hunan, among others. Peng Dehuai's Fifth Army and Yang Youlin's 16th Red Army attacked and occupied Changsha, the capital of Hunan. After the attack, Jiangxi became the largest base area of the Chinese Red Army. In the autumn of 1930, Deng Xiaoping's Seventh Army left its base area in Guangxi.
In 1931, the Chinese Red Army defeated the Nationalist forces three times with a large-scale attack, causing the Nationalist forces to lose nearly 100,000 soldiers. Several smaller red armies came together and formed a group army. In the summer of 1931, General Zhang Guotao arrived at the Fourth Red Army's base area and took over the army. Most of the Fourth Red Army's senior officers were killed by him, including Xu Jishen, Zhou Weijiong, and Xiaofang. Similar movements also occurred in western Hubei; in the spring of 1931, Xia Xi took over He Long's army and killed most of his senior officers including Duan Dechang.
In the fall of 1932, the Nationalist forces gathered 300,000 soldiers to attack the Fourth Red Army. Most of the Nationalist forces' future generals participated in this battle such as Huang Wei, Du Yuming, Sun Li-jen, and others. Having lost more than half of its soldiers, the Fourth Red Army was defeated and had to retreat from its base area. He Long's Third Army also sustained significant loses, with more than 10,000 soldiers losing their lives after leaving western Hubei. During this time, there were also several battles between the Nationalist forces and Jiangxi's First Red Army.
In the spring of 1933, the First Red Army defeated the Nationalist forces' fourth large-scale attack and eliminated two and a half of its elite divisions. Several of the Nationalist forces' generals were also captured. In 1933, the Fourth Red Army arrived at Sichuan and recruited more than 80,000 soldiers. This caused Sichuan's warlord Liu Xiang to gather 200,000 troops to attack the Fourth Red Army in autumn.

Defeats (mid 1930s)

In 1934, the Nationalist forces purchased new German weapons and launched a fifth large-scale attack on the Red Army's base area in Jiangxi. The First Red Army lost more than 50,000 soldiers in this battle and had to leave Jiangxi to establish a new base. This was the beginning of the Long March. About 30,000 soldiers were left to defend the base areas in southern China. During the same time, the Fourth Red Army defeated Liu Xiang's attacks, who lost more than 80,000 soldiers in battle. Before the First Red Army began the Long March, Xiao Ke's Sixth Legion arrived at eastern Guizhou and joined forces with He Long's Third Army. After this, the Third Army changed its designation to Second Legion.
In the autumn of 1935, the First Red Army arrived in northern Shaanxi with only 6,000 soldiers after losing more than 80,000 along the way. During this same time, the Fourth Red Army moved to northern Sichuan and planned to attack Chengdu. By the end of 1935, they had lost more than 40,000 soldiers and were defeated. Therefore, they were forced to move to southern Gansu and wait for He Long's Second Legion and Sixth Legion to arrive.

Formation of a new Army (late 1930s)

In the summer of 1936, the Second Legion, the Sixth Legion and the Thirty-Second Army formed a new group army. It was named the Second Red Army and He Long was tasked with being its commander. The Second Red Army and Fourth Red Army arrived in north Shaanxi in the autumn of 1936. Around the same time, roughly 21,000 soldiers from the Fourth Red Army attacked Gansu, wanting to find a way to the Soviet Union. By the end of 1936, they were defeated by the Nationalist forces' General Ma Bufang, with more than 6,000 soldiers being captured. Only Xu Xiangqian and other senior officers survived. Because of this great failure, the Fourth Red Army's Commander in Chief Zhang Guotao was stripped of his military power.
The Second Sino-Japanese War began on 7 July 1937 with the Marco Polo Bridge Incident. As part of the United Front of the Communists and Nationalists against the invading Japanese forces, the Red Army was incorporated into the National Revolutionary Army, forming the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army.
The First Red Army was integrated into the 115th Division of the Nationalist forces. The Second Red Army was integrated into the 120th Division of the Nationalist forces. The Fourth Red Army was integrated into the 129th Division of the Nationalist forces. These three divisions had 45,000 soldiers in all. 10,000 soldiers were left to defend the base areas in northern Shaanxi. In southern China, the New Fourth Army's 10,000 soldiers acted as a guerrilla force. At the time of the Second Sino-Japanese War, these two armies contained one million armed men.
The Red Army grew rapidly during the war, At the end of the Second Sino-Japanese War, the Red Army had 2 million militia members and 900,000 regular troops.

Re-organization into People's Liberation Army

In 1947, the Red Army was reorganized into the People's Liberation Army. It continued to operate as a guerilla army reliant on the support of the peasantry. By the time the People's Republic of China was established on 1 October 1949, the PLA had 5.5 million personnel, primarily light infantry.
After the Communist Party assumed power in 1949, veterans of the Red Army were venerated in mainland Chinese culture and are distinguished from those who joined to fight with the Communist Party after the integration with the Nationalists, or during the second civil war.
In 1954, the relationship between the Party and the military was further institutionalized by the establishment of the Central Military Commission.

Major events

In the view of the Communist Party, participation of the masses in the Red Army was significant beyond the direct concerns of manpower and material support. It was also viewed as a political process through which the masses would evolve into "masters of the state." According to Mao, "he Red Army is not an entity for fighting only. Its major task is to mobilize the masses. Fighting is only a means." This process involved the Red Army's significant responsibility for educating, organizing, and mobilizing the masses, functioning like the mobile embodiment of the Communist Party in addition to its military roles. Academic Cai Xiang writes that the Red Army's ability to function in this way helps explain why despite the weak industrial base in revolutionary China, a proletarian party nonetheless successfully developed.
These ideas developed at the 1929 Gutian Congress The June 1930 Program for the Red Fourth Army at All Levels and the winter 1930 Provisional Regulations on the Political Work of the Chinese Workers and Peasants Army, which formally established Party leadership of the military.
In the article The Democratic Movement within the Army, written during the Second Sino-Japanese War, Mao Zedong discussed the Red Army's political work and stated, "Through the democratic movement under centralized leadership, we were able to achieve a high degree of political unity, improve lives, and improve military technology and tactics, which are our three main purposes." This view of democracy in the military emphasized democratic centralism and avoiding what the Party deemed "extreme democracy or anarchism."