写在前面：这段历史很沉重、请做好心理准备，再进行阅读。
4-D: 沁园春·长沙
独立寒秋，湘江北去，橘子洲头。
看万山红遍，层林尽染；漫江碧透，百舸争流。
鹰击长空，鱼翔浅底，万类霜天竞自由。
怅寥廓，问苍茫大地，谁主沉浮？
携来百侣曾游，忆往昔峥嵘岁月稠。
恰同学少年，风华正茂；书生意气，挥斥方遒。
指点江山，激扬文字，粪土当年万户侯。
曾记否，到中流击水，浪遏飞舟？
这首词写于1925年，毛泽东31岁时，长沙、橘子洲头。此时，毛泽东刚从广州返回湖南长沙，在湖南省立第一师范学校担任国民党湖南省党部主事。1924–1927 是第一次国共合作时期，即中国共产党与国民党为了“联俄、联共、扶助农工”共同对抗北洋军阀，实现国家统一的一段短暂合作。
1924年，共产党的规模还非常小、非常弱，据说只有千人级别，力量远不能推翻北洋军阀，顶多算个小支队。当时据说苏联建议中国共产党采取“党内合作”的方式，让共产党以个人身份加入国民党，在国民党内部进行合作和渗透，推动左派政治。共产党的目标是推翻封建制度、反资本主义、建立无产阶级政权，主张土地革命、社会主义、苏联式组织模式。而国民党初期，中间偏右，汪精卫支持与中共合作、倾向苏联援助、支持一定的土地改革和劳工政策；而蒋介石排斥共产党，强调民族主义、军权集中，但又怕共产党动员“农民造反”，破坏社会秩序，更依赖军队、商人、地主阶层。事实证明，蒋介石担忧的全都发生了。而共产党最后也夺取军权，到现在也牢牢控制土地、军队，和时不时打击商业。说是反右，但自己最后也夺去了所有右派的权，获得了所有所谓的“右权”。
毛泽东的文笔不错。那时候的橘子洲头，确实想他说的这样，往岸边看，确实可以枫叶红遍山，各类鸟鱼飞游，场景肃杀清冷；不像现在挤满游客。读完通篇，可以感觉到他当时的迷茫。虽然“指点江山”，满怀抱负，但也不确定谁可以主沉浮。他都31岁未满32了，和我现在的年龄刚好一般大，还想主导历史沉浮。而这问题对我来说没含义：没人可以主导历史的沉浮，大家都是时间长河里的必然。
他这种行为，在我看来，有过大的看重个人的选择给结果带来的影响的意思。不管所有人怎么选，结果都一样。不是某人、某事件、某物在主天地沉浮，是所有的事件一起、堆积起了必然。不管是共产党也好、国民党也好，梁启超也好、戊戌变法也好。不管是什么方式，需要暂时放弃一些旧的、已经不适应当时社会的行为规范、社会交流模式，取尝试一些新的、可以带动社会发展的结构。
4-E: 错误
长征、饥荒、大跃进、文革、上山下乡、计划生育不属于这个范围。任何的改革，如果到了牺牲两三千万人的性命作为代价了，相关事件的发起人都应该再考虑、不然就是草菅人命。这些事件任何一件，单拎出来，都是和平时代的巨大灾难。我问chatgpt，中国历史上是否有和这些事件能相提并论的灾难，它回答说，极少，并且帮我列举了具体数字。长征发生于1934年到1926年，八万红军最后存活下来不到一万。八分之一的生存率。而大跃进和三年饥荒，一共加起来大概死亡1500至4500万人。文化大革命造成的直接死亡大概一百万到两百万人，但实际“非正常死亡”人数更高。上山下乡，死亡人数不详，但牺牲代价极高。计划生育，“非正常死亡”数据无法统计，堕胎和女婴被杀害大量存在。在我出生之前，我也曾有过一位被流产掉的姐姐。因为计划生育，我差点也没能站在这里给你写这篇文章，想到这里，毛骨悚然。
我非得问chatgpt，具体有哪些事件可以比肩这些事件的伤亡人数。它说，14世纪，元朝中期的“丁口户税改革”，以此带来的瘟疫、强制迁徙也曾造成大量“色目人”与汉人被强制调遣、贬为“贱籍”。大量人口迁徙去漠北、岭南等地区，导致死亡广泛发生。chatgpt评价为，结构性暴政，和种族、身份歧视性管理。还有北宋，王安石“青苗法”局部实行，导致农民大量破产和暴毙，虽然是非主观屠杀，但因为政策理想主义、脱离现实，导致民生惨重。某些地区因强制贷款，和暴力催收而大幅人口锐减。
1959年，中国的人口大概为6.6亿。如果按照三千万人死亡，相当于每22人个人中死去一位。纳粹大屠杀大概死亡了六百万犹太人，而苏联大清洗和乌克兰饥荒，大概死亡了一千万到一千五百万人。按照三年是1095天算，三年饥荒，则是每天平均死亡快三万人，也就是每天有一个县城的人口被活活饿死。而我之前查到的，我妈出生那年，她的村里才一万多人。这直接造成了大量农村直接断代，也就是一整个generation的人直接死亡。全村人饿死，仅剩极少数老人、小孩，他们丧失生育能力或者没有生育条件。兄弟姐妹互吃、父母弃婴、老人自绝不是夸张，是真实存在的事件。存活着失语，像我妈一样不再主动讲述上一代。后代甚至改姓、逃亡，断绝原身份。我才知道，我这代的人家里如果还有族谱也是种privilege，说明你祖上完美避开了所有这些人间惨剧。
当时，河南、安徽、四川也是重灾区。这些省本来是农业大省、人口大省，却因为生产任务极端虚高，动不动就要“亩产万斤”，导致粮食被统统上交国家，地方无粮。中央强制征粮，不顾生死，即使颗粒无收也要完成“征购任务”，口粮也被拉走。原本人口稠密，一旦缺粮，死亡就是按照百万计发生。同时，当时还修“户口墙”，不准“粮民”掏出乡村。很多人饿死在村里，不得动弹。在安徽，尤其以凤阳、宿县为重，死亡率极高，部分地区超过60%。有近40万人口的农村，最后只剩下10万人。有村庄整村小时，地图上今天还能看到“无主空村”的痕迹。很多人口耳相传，“饿到吃土、啃树皮、吃人尸体”。
其中“信阳事件”，是三年大饥荒时期最早、最严重、也最被研究者关注的地方性灾难之一，饿死人数在百万到三百万之间，有乡镇全村饿死或只存一两人。当地干部竞相“争红旗”，虚报亩产数万斤，但实际上收成极差。为了按照报上去的产量上交粮食，老板姓连种子粮、口粮都被拉走。而地方干部怕“饿死暴露问题”，下令封锁村庄、阻止逃荒。《墓碑》（杨继绳）详细记录了信阳事件，是目前最系统的资料来源之一。《圣殿：1959–1961信阳大饥荒沉思录》、《信阳事件：一个沉痛的历史教训》、《痛忆“信阳事件”全程》、《“信阳事件”的历史、社会根源及经验教训》也有大量幸存者回忆。据说，内部文件曾称信阳“是一次严重的政策执行灾难，应引以为戒”，但无官员被真正追责。
5-0: 沁园春·雪
北国风光，千里冰封，万里雪飘。
望长城内外，惟余莽莽；大河上下，顿失滔滔。
山舞银蛇，原驰蜡象，欲与天公试比高。
须晴日，看红装素裹，分外妖娆。
江山如此多娇，引无数英雄竞折腰。
惜秦皇汉武，略输文采；唐宗宋祖，稍逊风骚。
一代天骄，成吉思汗，只识弯弓射大雕。
俱往矣，数风流人物，还看今朝。
从上次写沁园春长沙，又过去了11年。这时候毛泽东大概42岁了。十一年过去，他从一个在湘江边写词的青年，变成了一个开始在雪地上评点帝王的历史构建者。他不再感慨“谁主沉浮”，而是直接说：“还看今朝。”这一“看”，是掌控，是支配，是宣言。
清朝末期，清政府签订了很多条约，要把铁路等重要国家产业卖给外国，四川、湖北等地爆发保路运动。同时，南方革命党人、如孙中山早已秘密筹划武装起义。武昌新军中有大量同盟会成员，在气氛高涨之下，决定提前发动起义。1911年10月10日晚，新军工程营首先起义，占领武昌城。随即成立了“湖北军政府”，宣布脱离清廷、建立中华民国。起义成功循序激励全国各省：四川、湖南、遇难、广东、福建，纷纷宣布独立。两个月内，十四个省宣布脱离清廷控制。当时清政府惊慌失措，紧急召回在外的“北洋大臣”袁世凯，也就是实际军权掌握者，回来镇压起义。但当时局势已经失控，北洋军战斗力强，但不想为清廷卖命。于是1912年，孙中山任刚成立的南京临时政府大总统，提出“民族、民权、民生”三民主义。但为了避免内战，孙中山决定compromise，让位给袁世凯，条件是溥仪退位。记住孙中山这个决定。这个决定标志清朝灭亡，中国两千年的君主制结束。
虽然推翻了清朝，但中国并未统一。袁世凯为北洋政府，以北京为中心，控制名义上的政权。但刚刚也说了十四个省都脱离清廷宣布独立了，他们不认袁世凯。而且北洋政府离南方较远，也无能为力。中央管不到地方地头蛇。这时，孙中山又来了，在广州成立国民政府，誓言北伐。他成立黄埔军校，这个时候蒋介石从军校崛起了。国民党也开始接受苏联援助，与中共开始第一次合作，毛泽东写下了沁园春长沙。他正苟在国民党里，正在等待时机。
5-1: 北伐
1926年，国名党开始北伐，蒋介石是总司令。北伐了大半年，从夏天发到到冬天，节节胜利，工农运动高涨，共产党力量上升。中共开始没收土地、动员罢工、攻击旧有权威；同时号召工人、农民反抗地主、资本家，并且主张工人农民组织直接管理地方政权。对国民党来说，他们“动员太过激进”，已经“威胁到了社会秩序“，出现想夺权的苗头。据chatgpt说，毛泽东在湖南农民运动中推行激进政策，激怒当地地主阶级。工人罢工影响城市经济，引起国民党右派和商人阶层强烈不满。这我可以理解，毕竟打仗的是国民党，共产党当时可能顶多算外联。外联给联出这么大事，我要是蒋介石，我也不合作了。但大屠杀这种事，我也做不出。只能写写、吐槽一下。
后来蒋介石就发动了“四一二政变”，联合军警和上海黑帮，一夜之间大批共产党员、工会成员、左派被屠杀。几天内死亡人数上千，全国左派震惊。共产党转入地下和农村，开启武装斗争。毛泽东尝试以武装起义应对，发动秋收起义，但失败。那是他第一次指挥武装暴动。他被党内批评为“机会主义”，逐步被边缘化。他意识到城市暴动不可持续，那是蒋介石的地盘，他认识军警和黑帮。毛泽东转向农村游击战。
1927年，共产党大概有五万党员。政变之后，锐减至一万人到一万五左右（胡绳《中国共产党的七十年》）。
Notes for Non-Chinese Readers
This essay includes references to historical, political, and ideological contexts specific to 20th-century China. Below is a brief explanation of key terms:
Orange Isle Head (橘子洲头): A narrow island in the Xiang River in Changsha, Hunan. Known for its scenic beauty and political symbolism, it was where a young Mao Zedong wrote Qinyuanchun · Changsha in 1925.
Changsha (长沙): The capital of Hunan Province in southern China. It was Mao’s hometown and an early center of intellectual and revolutionary activity during the May Fourth and early Communist periods.
Beiyang Warlords (北洋军阀): Military factions that controlled northern China after the fall of the Qing dynasty (1912–1928). The Beiyang government was nominally national but fragmented by warlordism and personal rivalries.
Land Revolution (土地革命): A radical policy promoted by the Chinese Communist Party beginning in 1927. It involved confiscating land from landlords and redistributing it to peasants, often accompanied by class-based violence and public denunciations.
Wang Jingwei (汪精卫): A senior Kuomintang (KMT) politician who initially supported leftist alliances and cooperation with the Communist Party. Later defected to the Japanese during WWII, leading a collaborationist regime in Nanjing. His name has since become synonymous with “traitor” in Chinese discourse.
Long March (长征): A yearlong military retreat (1934–1936) by the Red Army to escape Nationalist encirclement. Of roughly 80,000 who began, fewer than 10,000 completed the journey. It became a foundational myth in Communist Party history.
Great Chinese Famine / “Three Years of Natural Disasters” (大饥荒 / 三年自然灾害): A mass famine from 1959 to 1961, caused not by nature but by the policy failures of the Great Leap Forward. Estimated to have caused between 15 and 45 million deaths.
Great Leap Forward (大跃进): A campaign launched in 1958 by Mao Zedong to rapidly industrialize China. It emphasized backyard steel production and collectivized agriculture, leading to widespread economic collapse and famine.
Rustication / “Up to the Mountains and Down to the Countryside” (上山下乡): A state-mandated movement during the Cultural Revolution that sent millions of urban youth to rural areas to perform manual labor. It disrupted education, careers, and family life for an entire generation.
One-Child Policy (计划生育): A population control policy implemented from 1979 to 2015. While it slowed demographic growth, it also led to forced abortions, gender imbalances, and deep generational trauma.
Whampoa Military Academy (黄埔军校): A military academy founded in 1924 near Guangzhou by Sun Yat-sen with Soviet support, intended to train officers for the National Revolutionary Army. It played a crucial role in the rise of both the Kuomintang (KMT) and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Key figures like Chiang Kai-shek (its first commandant) and Zhou Enlai were among its early members. The academy symbolized the brief period of KMT–CCP cooperation during the First United Front
April 12 Incident / 1927 Purge (四一二事件): A violent anti-Communist crackdown launched by Chiang Kai-shek on April 12, 1927, in Shanghai. With the support of military forces and local gangsters, hundreds (some say thousands) of Communist Party members, labor unionists, and leftist sympathizers were arrested and executed within days. The purge marked the official collapse of the First United Front between the KMT and the CCP and initiated a period of civil war and political repression.
Autumn Harvest Uprising (秋收起义): An armed insurrection led by Mao Zedong in September 1927 in Hunan and Jiangxi provinces. It was one of the Communist Party’s earliest attempts at rural-based revolution following the April 12 purge. The uprising failed militarily, but Mao retreated to the Jinggang Mountains and began developing the strategy of rural guerrilla warfare and peasant mobilization that would later define the CCP’s path to power.
Northern Expedition (北伐): A military campaign launched by the Nationalist Kuomintang (KMT) from 1926 to 1928 to unify China by defeating the Beiyang warlords. Led by Chiang Kai-shek and supported by the Chinese Communist Party under the First United Front, the campaign aimed to end regional fragmentation and bring the country under centralized rule. While initially successful, tensions between the KMT and CCP escalated during the campaign, leading to the April 12 Incident and the eventual outbreak of civil war.
4-D: Qinyuanchun · Changsha by Mao Zedong
Alone I stand in the autumn chill,
The Xiang River flows northward,
At the tip of Orange Isle.
I see myriad hills crimsoned through,
Forests layered in deep dye;
The river, crystal clear, hosts a hundred boats vying.
Eagles cleave the vast sky,
Fish glide in the limpid depths;
Under the frosty sky, all creatures compete in freedom.
Brooding over this immensity,
I ask, on this boundless land,
Who holds sway over man’s destiny?
I was here with a throng of companions,
Those crowded months and years vivid still.
Young we were, schoolmates,
At life’s full flowering;
Filled with student enthusiasm,
Boldly we cast all restraints aside.
Pointing to our mountains and rivers,
Setting people afire with our words,
We counted the mighty no more than muck.
Remember still,
How, venturing midstream, we struck the waters,
And waves stayed the speeding boats?
This poem was penned in 1925 when Mao Zedong was 31 years old, standing at Orange Isle in Changsha. At that time, Mao had just returned from Guangzhou to Hunan, serving as the executive of the Hunan Provincial Committee of the Kuomintang. The period from 1924 to 1927 marked the first cooperation between the Chinese Communist Party and the Kuomintang, aiming to “ally with Russia, ally with the Communists, and assist peasants and workers” to combat the warlords and achieve national unification.
In 1924, the Communist Party was still very small and weak, reportedly with only about a thousand members, far from capable of overthrowing the warlords. At that time, it is said that the Soviet Union suggested the Chinese Communist Party adopt a strategy of “cooperation within the party,” allowing Communists to join the Kuomintang as individuals to promote leftist politics from within. The Communist Party’s goals were to overthrow the feudal system, oppose capitalism, establish a proletarian regime, and advocate for land revolution, socialism, and a Soviet-style organizational model. Initially, the Kuomintang leaned center-right; Wang Jingwei supported cooperation with the Communists, favored Soviet aid, and endorsed certain land reforms and labor policies. In contrast, Chiang Kai-shek opposed the Communists, emphasized nationalism and centralized military power, and feared that Communist mobilization of peasants would disrupt social order, relying more on the military, businessmen, and landlord classes. As events unfolded, Chiang’s concerns materialized. Eventually, the Communist Party seized military power and now firmly controls land and the military, occasionally suppressing commerce. While claiming to oppose the right, they ultimately usurped all the so-called “rightist” powers.
Mao Zedong’s literary talent is notable. At that time, Orange Isle was indeed as he described—looking toward the shore, one could see mountains covered in red leaves, various birds and fish in motion, a scene both solemn and chilling; unlike today, crowded with tourists. Reading the entire piece, one can sense his confusion. Although he “points to the mountains and rivers,” full of ambition, he is uncertain about who can dominate the tides of history. He was not yet 32, the same age as I am now, and still aspired to lead the course of history. To me, this question holds no meaning: no one can dominate the tides of history; we are all part of the inevitable flow of time.
His actions, in my view, overemphasize the impact of individual choices on outcomes. Regardless of everyone’s choices, the result remains the same. It’s not about a particular person, event, or object dominating the world; it’s the accumulation of all events leading to the inevitable. Whether it’s the Communist Party, the Kuomintang, Liang Qichao, or the Hundred Days’ Reform, any approach requires temporarily abandoning outdated behavioral norms and social interaction models to attempt new structures that can drive social development.
4-E: Mistakes
The Long March, famine, the Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution, the “Up to the Mountains and Down to the Countryside” movement, and the One-Child Policy do not fall into this category. Any reform that results in the sacrifice of tens of millions of lives should prompt its initiators to reconsider; otherwise, it’s a blatant disregard for human life. Each of these events, taken individually, constitutes a massive disaster in peacetime. I asked ChatGPT whether there were comparable disasters in Chinese history, and it responded that such instances are rare, providing specific figures.
The Long March occurred from 1934 to 1936, with fewer than 10,000 of the 80,000 Red Army soldiers surviving—a survival rate of one-eighth. The Great Leap Forward and the subsequent three years of famine resulted in an estimated 15 to 45 million deaths. The Cultural Revolution caused approximately 1 to 2 million direct deaths, with the actual number of “unnatural deaths” being higher. The death toll from the “Up to the Mountains and Down to the Countryside” movement is unknown, but the sacrifices were significant. The One-Child Policy led to countless “unnatural deaths,” with widespread instances of forced abortions and the killing of baby girls. Before I was born, I had a sister who was aborted due to the One-Child Policy. Because of this policy, I nearly didn’t have the chance to stand here and write this article, a thought that sends chills down my spine.
I insisted on asking ChatGPT for specific events comparable in death toll to these. It mentioned the 14th-century “Dingkou Household Tax Reform” during the Yuan Dynasty, which, along with ensuing plagues and forced migrations, led to the mass conscription and demotion of many “Semuren” and Han people to lowly statuses. Mass migrations to regions like the northern deserts and Lingnan resulted in widespread deaths. ChatGPT characterized this as structural tyranny and discriminatory management based on race and identity. Additionally, during the Northern Song Dynasty, Wang Anshi’s “Green Sprout Law” was partially implemented, causing many farmers to go bankrupt and die prematurely. Although not an intentional massacre, the policy’s idealism and detachment from reality led to severe hardships. In some areas, forced loans and violent collections caused significant population declines.
In 1959, China’s population was approximately 660 million. If 30 million people died, that equates to one in every 22 individuals. The Nazi Holocaust resulted in about 6 million Jewish deaths, while the Soviet purges and the Ukrainian famine caused 10 to 15 million deaths. Assuming the three-year famine lasted 1,095 days, the average daily death toll was nearly 30,000—equivalent to the population of a county being starved to death each day. I previously discovered that the village where my mother was born had just over 10,000 people that year. This led to numerous rural areas experiencing complete generational breaks, with entire generations perishing.
Entire villages starved, leaving only a few elderly and children who either lost the ability to reproduce or lacked the conditions to do so. Instances of siblings consuming each other, parents abandoning infants, and elders committing suicide were not exaggerations but real occurrences. Survivors became silent, like my mother, who no longer spoke of the previous generation. Descendants even changed surnames, fled, and severed ties with their original identities. I only realized that having a family genealogy in my generation is a privilege, indicating that our ancestors miraculously avoided these human tragedies. At the time, Henan, Anhui, and Sichuan were also among the hardest-hit regions. These provinces were originally agricultural and populous powerhouses, but due to wildly inflated production targets—claims like “ten thousand jin per mu” (roughly 15 tons per acre)—all grain was handed over to the state, leaving no food for local consumption. The central government enforced grain requisition with no regard for survival; even when harvests completely failed, the “procurement quotas” had to be fulfilled, and even subsistence grain was seized. In such densely populated areas, once food was scarce, deaths happened by the millions.
At the same time, authorities built so-called “hukou walls” (residency barriers) to prevent “grain refugees” from fleeing the countryside. Many people starved to death inside their villages, unable to move. In Anhui, especially in places like Fengyang and Sixian, mortality rates were extraordinarily high—some areas saw over 60% of the population perish. In one rural county with nearly 400,000 people, only about 100,000 remained. Some entire villages disappeared. To this day, maps still mark “ownerless ghost villages.” Oral histories recount: people starving to the point of eating dirt, gnawing on tree bark, and even consuming human corpses. Among these disasters, the “Xinyang Incident” was one of the earliest, deadliest, and most studied local catastrophes during the Great Famine. Between one and three million people are believed to have died from starvation. In some townships, entire villages died out, leaving only one or two survivors. Local officials competed to win “red flags” from higher-ups, fabricating reports of yields of tens of thousands of jin per mu—when in reality, harvests were disastrous. To match these lies, all seed grain and rations were taken from ordinary people. To avoid political fallout from starvation, local officials ordered villages to be sealed off and escape attempts to be stopped.
The book Tombstone by Yang Jisheng provides one of the most comprehensive records of the Xinyang Incident. Other important references include The Temple: Reflections on the Xinyang Famine, 1959–1961, The Xinyang Incident: A Painful Historical Lesson, In Memory of the Entire Xinyang Tragedy, and The Historical and Social Roots of the Xinyang Incident. It’s said that internal documents at the time labeled Xinyang as “a severe disaster of policy execution that must serve as a warning”—yet no officials were ever held accountable.
5-0: Qinyuanchun · Snow by Mao Zedong
The northern landscape,
A thousand miles sealed in ice, ten thousand miles wrapped in snow.
Looking beyond the Great Wall, only vastness remains;
Up and down the Yellow River, the surging waves are gone.
Mountains dance like silver serpents, high plains charge like wax elephants,
Intent on competing with heaven’s height.
On a sunny day,
The land is clothed in red and white—utterly enchanting.
Such beauty in our rivers and mountains
Draws countless heroes to bow before it.
Pity Qin Shihuang and Han Wudi, lacking literary grace;
Tang Taizong and Song Taizu, slightly short in style.
Even Genghis Khan, the pride of his age,
Knew only how to shoot eagles with his bow.
All are past.
Count the true greats—
We look to the present.
It had been eleven years since Mao last wrote Changsha. By then, he was around forty-two years old. In that time, he had transformed from a young man writing poetry by the Xiang River into someone who now, standing in the snow, was rewriting history and evaluating emperors. He no longer asked, “Who will rise and fall?”—he simply declared, “Look to today.” That act of “looking” was no longer reflection, but control. It was assertion. It was power.
In the late Qing Dynasty, the government had signed numerous treaties, attempting to sell off national assets like the railways to foreign powers. This sparked the Railway Protection Movement in provinces like Sichuan and Hubei. At the same time, southern revolutionaries—figures like Sun Yat-sen—had already begun quietly organizing armed uprisings. The New Army in Wuchang was filled with members of the Tongmenghui (Revolutionary Alliance), and amidst the rising tension, they decided to strike early. On the night of October 10, 1911, the engineering battalion initiated the revolt, seized Wuchang city, and soon established the Hubei Military Government, declaring independence from the Qing and founding the Republic of China.
The uprising spread like wildfire: province after province followed. Sichuan, Hunan, Yunnan, Guangdong, Fujian… Within two months, fourteen provinces had declared independence from the Qing. Caught off guard and in chaos, the Qing court urgently recalled Yuan Shikai—the powerful Beiyang military commander—from retirement to suppress the uprising. But the situation was already out of control. Yuan’s troops were capable but had no real loyalty to the dying dynasty.
In 1912, Sun Yat-sen, then president of the newly formed Nanjing Provisional Government, proposed his vision of the “Three Principles of the People”: nationalism, democracy, and livelihood. But to avoid civil war, he made a compromise: he would step down in favor of Yuan, on the condition that Emperor Puyi abdicate. Remember that decision. It marked the end of the Qing dynasty—and with it, the fall of China’s imperial system after over two thousand years.
Although the Qing dynasty had been overthrown, China was far from unified. Yuan Shikai headed the Beiyang government, based in Beijing, and held nominal control over the country. But as mentioned earlier, fourteen provinces had already declared independence from the Qing—they had no intention of recognizing Yuan’s authority. Besides, the Beiyang government was geographically distant from the south and incapable of exerting real control. The central government couldn’t reach the local warlords. At this point, Sun Yat-sen returned and established a rival Nationalist government in Guangzhou, vowing to launch a Northern Expedition to unify the country. He founded the Whampoa Military Academy, where Chiang Kai-shek soon rose to prominence. The Kuomintang (KMT) also began accepting aid from the Soviet Union and entered into its First United Front with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Around this time, Mao Zedong wrote Qinyuanchun · Changsha. He was still embedded within the KMT, lying low, waiting for his moment.
5-1: Northern Expedition
In 1926, the KMT formally launched the Northern Expedition with Chiang Kai-shek as Commander-in-Chief. The campaign lasted over half a year, from summer into winter, achieving steady military success. Worker and peasant movements surged, and the Communist Party’s influence grew rapidly. The CCP began confiscating land, organizing strikes, and attacking existing power structures. At the same time, they called on workers and peasants to rise up against landlords and capitalists, and advocated for local self-governance by laboring classes.
To the KMT, this mobilization was becoming dangerously radical—it was already starting to “threaten public order” and showing signs of a Communist power grab. According to ChatGPT (yes, I asked), Mao’s aggressive tactics during the Hunan peasant movement deeply alarmed the local landlord class. Meanwhile, waves of labor strikes disrupted urban economies, drawing sharp backlash from the KMT’s right wing and business elites. Honestly, I can understand it. After all, it was the KMT doing the fighting, and the CCP at the time was, at best, their outreach team. If I were Chiang Kai-shek and saw my “outreach team” causing this much upheaval, I wouldn’t want to cooperate either.
But that said, organizing a massacre? That’s something I could never do. All I can do is write—maybe complain a bit.
Not long after, Chiang Kai-shek launched the April 12 Purge (the 412 Incident), coordinating with the military and Shanghai’s criminal underworld. Overnight, thousands of Communists, union members, and leftists were killed. In just a few days, the death toll soared into the thousands. The entire Chinese left was shaken. The Communist Party was forced underground and into rural areas, beginning its turn toward armed resistance.
Mao Zedong attempted to respond through an armed uprising: the Autumn Harvest Uprising. It failed. It was his first time commanding a military revolt. He was quickly criticized within the Party as “opportunistic” and gradually marginalized. He realized that urban uprisings wouldn’t work—cities belonged to Chiang, who had the police, the army, and even the mob. So Mao shifted strategy: rural guerrilla warfare.
In 1927, the Communist Party had roughly 50,000 members. After the purge, that number dropped dramatically—to around 10,000 to 15,000 (according to Hu Sheng’s The Seventy Years of the Chinese Communist Party).