Twentieth Century Chronicle

Page 196

Comrades in the industrial sector believe that Wuhan's industrial development has passed the period of basic infrastructure investment. The next step is to determine the key development direction of industrial development, so as to concentrate resources on strengthening and expanding one or two industries, thereby competing with the industrial capabilities of Europe and the United States.

China is a very large country; its population alone is close to the total population of Europe. Logically, we should develop all types of industries, since China has a large enough population to support such industrial development.

However, my country's natural resources are insufficient to support such a plan. Taking oil, coal, and iron ore as examples, we have not yet found a single major oil mine, coal is mostly located in the inaccessible north, and while there is a large quantity of iron ore, its quality is very poor. This means that if we want all industries to develop simultaneously, it will only be a waste of time, because many industries do not have an advantage in China and will instead consume the resources of potentially rapidly developing industrial sectors.

I believe everyone is now quite familiar with industrial development. Industry and agriculture are two different things. Good land yields high-quality crops, but crops from poor-quality land are still edible. So, as long as agriculture can produce, at least people won't starve. However, industry relies on exchange to survive. If the goods produced cannot be sold, then the workers will starve.

Why do our products fail to sell? Because the more technologically advanced an industrialized country is, the better its manufactured goods are not only in terms of performance but also at a much lower cost than those of less developed countries. Who would buy inferior, overpriced goods in the market? Therefore, industrial development cannot be achieved through isolation; we must catch up with the technology of advanced industrialized countries as quickly as possible and develop supporting industries. Only in this way can we survive in the international market.

Therefore, the industrial sector emphasized concentrating resources on one or two key industries to break the monopoly of advanced industrialized countries on industrial technology. The Party's decision was to prioritize the development of the automobile manufacturing, agricultural machinery manufacturing, and chemical industries. Why these three industries? Because these three industries all use large amounts of steel, which would absorb our investment in the steel industry's production capacity; other industries simply couldn't absorb the planned steel production capacity we were building.

The automotive manufacturing, agricultural machinery manufacturing, and chemical industries all ultimately cater to the agricultural market. Automobiles have improved the efficiency of short-distance transportation. I think everyone understands that the transportation situation between Wuhan and surrounding counties and cities has greatly improved in the past year or two, not because we invested in railway construction, but because of the combined effect of highway construction and automobile transportation.

The increased grain yield on the Jianghan Plain is due not only to water conservancy projects, but also to the use of imported fertilizers and pesticides, while agricultural machinery has greatly improved farming efficiency. In the past, the proportion of arable land with two harvests a year on the Jianghuai Plain was less than one-tenth, but last year it rose to three-tenths. This is the result of production cooperatives and new agricultural machinery.

The regions we are currently developing—Outer Northeast, Northeast, and Inner and Outer Mongolia—are all extremely difficult to access and largely uncultivated wasteland. Developing these areas requires not only migrating a large labor force, but also significant support in the form of automobiles, agricultural machinery, fertilizers, and pesticides. However, until these areas are developed, we must raise these funds ourselves. Without foreign capital, how will we produce automobiles, agricultural machinery, and fertilizers?

The committee member in charge of industry fell silent, and Lin Xinyi then spoke up, saying, "Although the Northeast has now returned to peace, this peace is not secure. If everyone wants to enclose the Northeast and develop it slowly, then they are only giving the great powers hope."

The peace in Northeast China today is not due to China's own strength suppressing the unrest of various parties, but rather to the confrontation between the two major European camps, which made the Western powers unable to pay attention to the East, and thus forced them to acknowledge the peace in Northeast Asia.

The current conflict between China, Japan, and Russia was itself a result of the confrontation between two major European camps. The Germans wanted the Russians to focus their attention on the Far East, while France and Britain wanted us to drive the Russians back. This is why, apart from Germany, the other major powers supported China and Japan against Russia during the war.

Japan's acceptance of the current status quo in Northeast Asia is not due to a desire for peace, but rather because its national strength is insufficient for continuous warfare. This war has forced Japan to relinquish all the gains from the previous war and has also eroded the industrial development achievements since the Meiji Restoration. Although Japan won on the battlefield, it has become a debtor nation to Britain and the United States.

Having received no reparations from Russia, the Japanese government naturally dared not easily launch another continental war. However, once the situation in Europe stabilized and the confrontation between the two major European camps ended, whether it ended peacefully or in war, European capitalism would not let go of a market of 450 million people.

At that time, European capital, just as it does today, will support Japan in launching a war against China, thereby opening up China's domestic trade protectionism. The key factor that will provoke Japan to take risks and go to war with China lies in the extent of development of Manchuria and Outer Northeast China. If China lacks the power to protect this region, then Japanese militarists will choose war.

The adventurous nature of Japanese militarism has been fully exposed in this war. As long as there is a glimmer of hope for victory, Japanese militarists will instigate a war against China. Suppressing Japanese militarists does not rely on friendly figures within Japan, but rather on the extent of China's development in Manchuria and Outer Northeast China.

No matter how fanatical Japanese militarists became, they couldn't directly attack the densely populated North and East China regions, because Japan couldn't swallow China whole. However, following the history of the Manchu conquest of China, first securing the Manchu and Mongol regions as a base, and then gradually expanding the war, it was possible to replicate the Manchus' successful experience of conquering China.

Therefore, don't assume that peace in Northeast Asia is permanent, or that time will allow you to develop gradually. In fact, peace is fleeting. As long as China lacks the ability to resist invasion by foreign powers, China will face another war once those powers have amassed their strength. If today's war can maintain peace for twenty years, then we should be grateful.

Lin Xinyi's analysis of peace in Northeast Asia shattered the illusions of many committee members. Apart from a few members who knew little about military and diplomatic matters, the other members actually viewed Sino-Japanese relations with a sense of wishful thinking. After all, these members knew that the Workers' Party and Japan had a fairly close relationship, and some even knew that Lin Feng was actually Japanese. Therefore, they felt that the possibility of cooperation between Japan and China was greater than confrontation.

However, Lin Feng's personal statement that peace between Japan and China was fragile greatly undermined the committee members' confidence in such a peace. This forced them to abandon their ideal path, succumb to reality, and reconsider the development and construction of Outer Manchuria, Manchuria, and Inner and Outer Mongolia under the premise of Sino-Japanese confrontation.

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As the military leader of the Workers' Party, Cai E generally refrained from expressing his opinion on non-military matters at political meetings, a tacit understanding he shared with Tian Junyi, Qin Lishan, and others. Collective leadership is not a dictatorship. If someone tries to control everything, it will either cause a split within the collective or lead to complete subservience to one person, ultimately resulting in a tyrannical regime.

In the early stages, a tyrannical regime can indeed improve administrative efficiency, since all matters, large and small, are decided by one person. However, the dictator will soon make maintaining his own power his top priority, and the interests of the nation will have to give way to the interests of the tyrant. The most obvious characteristic of this is engaging in secret diplomacy and treating national affairs as personal relationships. This was the case with the State Council led by Yuan Shikai.

Cai E saw it very clearly: Yuan Shikai's personal reputation continued to rise with the fall of the Qing Dynasty, but the progressiveness of the Beiyang clique gradually declined. If the Beiyang clique during the Qing Dynasty still had some sense of defending the country and being loyal to the monarch, then the current Beiyang clique was only loyal to Yuan Shikai for the sake of promotion and wealth. Anyone who raised objections to this would be ostracized by the clique.

Yuan Shikai did not attribute the decline of the Beiyang clique to his own usurpation, but instead believed that his subordinates were not loyal enough. Therefore, he wanted to rebuild a model officer corps to replace the old man. However, it is clear that he prescribed the wrong medicine for his own illness.

If, during the war, Yuan Shikai's orders could at least be carried out with 20% leniency—after all, the war against Russia was a national war, and Yuan Shikai still possessed a moral high ground—this was the basis for Wuhan's recognition of the legitimacy of the State Council led by Yuan Shikai. However, Yuan Shikai's post-war attempts to strengthen his personal dictatorship were rapidly causing him to lose the loyalty of the Beiyang clique.

As an army funded by the Qing Dynasty, even though the officers and soldiers received their pay from Yuan Shikai, those in the know understood that it was money from the court; Yuan Shikai merely handled the distribution, not taking money from his own pocket. The soldiers were grateful to Marshal Yuan for two reasons: first, his personal involvement in distributing the money fostered a personal relationship between him and the lower-ranking officers; second, his personal involvement prevented officers from embezzling funds, naturally making them like him.

However, the Beiyang officers and soldiers' affection for Marshal Yuan was based on the noble cause of loyalty to the imperial court. If Yuan Shikai were to lead them in rebellion against the court, then things would be different. Therefore, Li Hongzhang and Ronglu were able to easily control Yuan Shikai because they knew that the Beiyang Army was not Yuan Shikai's private army.

It was only after Ronglu's death that the Manchu nobles adopted the same behavior as the Manchu nobility within the Beiyang Army, causing the Beiyang forces to lose their reverence for the imperial court and harbor much discontent. However, this discontent was limited to their inaction in the face of the court's demise. In foreign wars, the Beiyang Army was still willing to obey the court's orders and go to the battlefield. It was just that Yuan Shikai, harboring selfish motives, refused to allow this army to fight against the foreigners, thus shattering the last shred of morale within the Beiyang leadership.

So when Russia attempted to annex the entire Northeast region and declared war on Beijing, the lower-ranking officers and soldiers of the Beiyang Army were willing to go to the battlefield. After all, wasn't the purpose of eating military rations to fight desperately at this time? However, the upper echelons of the Beiyang Army generally wanted to conserve their strength. As a result, some positional battles that could have been held turned into routs, allowing the Russian army to capture Shanhaiguan with almost no setbacks.

However, after Wuhan sent troops to support Shanhaiguan, the lower-ranking officers and soldiers of the Beiyang Army quickly formed a solid position relying on the Wuhan army. This shows that as long as the higher-ups are determined and the allied forces are reliable, the Beiyang Army can still make good use of the results of its usual training.

The poor performance and political weakness of the Beiyang clique in the early stages of the war taught Cai E and others a profound lesson, which led to a deeper understanding of the democratic centralism system among the top leaders of the Workers' Party.

Although Cai E's research into the theory of scientific communism was not in-depth, and he actually admired militarism more, he also acknowledged that militarism could not change the face of China, while laborism completely transformed the people of Wuhan. Those who had previously toiled like oxen and horses at the docks, never daring to complain even when bullied by managers and secret societies, displayed an extremely tenacious revolutionary spirit under the organization and education of the Labor Party.

In battles against the Qing court and against Russia, large numbers of dockworkers formed armies known for their tenacity and fighting spirit. They even engaged in brutal hand-to-hand combat with the Russian army during battles for positions, leaving the Russians astonished. According to the Russians' understanding of the Qing army, while Qing soldiers were competent at holding their positions and firing cannons, the Qing army would quickly abandon their positions and flee once Russian infantry approached, even if it was just a small squad.

Therefore, the Russian commanders believed that Easterners were not suited to close combat, and that as long as the Russian army engaged in close-quarters bayonet fighting with the Chinese and Japanese armies, victory would inevitably be theirs. However, both the Chinese and Japanese armies taught the Russians a profound lesson during the war. Leaving aside the Japanese army, they actually routed the Russian army in bayonet fighting, a result that the Russians had not anticipated.

The Chinese, who have always been weak, were caught in the crossfire of the Russian army's expansion of its territory in the Far East from the mid-19th century. During this period, the Russian army clashed with the Qing army many times. The incompetence of the Qing army was evident in these conflicts. Therefore, the Russian army's poor impression of the Eastern army actually came from the Qing army. They simply applied the image of the Qing army to the Japanese army.

In this war, the Chinese not only taught the Russian army a lesson with their well-trained artillery, but their use of barbed wire and Maxim machine guns also demonstrated that the Chinese were more astute than the Russians in absorbing advanced European military technology. However, what shocked the Russians the most was the bravery displayed by the Chinese army, something the Russian army had not seen in the past century, and even in the Boxer Rebellion a few years earlier, it was only seen in a few individuals.

Cai E clearly understood how a group of people, numb and afraid to resist under the Qing Dynasty, could be transformed into a working class and courageous fighters building the nation under the organization of the Labor Party. Under the Party's leadership, the dockworkers formed trade unions to protect their own interests and had the right to elect worker representatives to join the Workers, Peasants and Soldiers Committee, turning the workers' ideas and demands into law.

Militarism pursues national wealth and military strength, demanding that individuals fulfill their duties to the state, but never describing the state's responsibilities to individuals. They simply say that as long as the country becomes strong, individual lives will naturally improve.

However, based on Cai E's experience studying in Germany, even in the most advanced industrial country, the fate of the working class was quite tragic. There were no fewer homeless people and prostitutes on the streets of Berlin than in China. The German upper-class elites often talked about morality, but they were notorious in Europe for their abuse of boys.

In Western Europe, the heart of European civilization, English and French nobles had a penchant for women, and the number of prostitutes in Paris and London far exceeded that of other countries. Meanwhile, Germany and Spain, supposedly conservative nations known for their asceticism, preferred innocent young boys. Even now, Cai E struggles to understand how Germans could convince themselves that the state represented the interests of the people. In Germany, where secondary education is compulsory, ordinary people can even calculate the laws governing celestial movements, yet they cannot fathom the proportion of national interests held by the common people and the nobility.

Laborism did not demand loyalty to the state; it merely called on the proletariat to rise up and defend their rights. Once the working class realized the truth of this statement, they erupted with boundless enthusiasm. While the Beiyang Army was still trying to project loyalty to Yuan Shikai or a country that did not belong to them, the army organized by the working class in Wuhan clearly understood that they were not fighting for the country, but for the proletariat, and were fighting to defend their own livelihoods.

It was precisely because of this level of awareness that the initiative of the Wuhan army was something Cai E had never seen before. On the battlefield, they had almost no other thoughts besides victory. Whether they were holding their positions or launching an attack on the enemy's positions, they were all for one purpose: to end the war, restore peace, and return to their lives as soon as possible.

Because of their focused and unwavering resolve, the Wuhan army's effectiveness on the battlefield was several times that of the Beiyang Army and the Russian army. Cai E also realized that war is essentially a large-scale organizational undertaking, and victory is a result, not a process. Victory lies in the army's mobilization capacity, logistical support capabilities, and execution efficiency. When an army can be used as one and a half or two armies, victory is already within reach, because most armies are already doing well if they can achieve even half their intended effectiveness on the battlefield.

Although Laborism opposed militarism, in reality, the army mobilized by Laborism was essentially the purest form of militaristic army, because the interests of the state and the army were highly unified, reaching an optimal state of national consensus. Therefore, Cai E, who did not have a deep understanding of scientific communism, naturally became a staunch supporter of the Labor Party, advocating for this highly efficient party-state system.

This is why, although he remained silent during the discussions on the workers' and peasants' issues at this political conference, his stance was still aligned with Tian Junyi and Lin Feng. While rural soldiers were the best source of manpower for the army, without the leadership of the working class, they were nothing more than self-serving Beiyang warlords. Those officers and soldiers from small peasant families naturally had a tendency to be loyal to their superiors, which essentially created factions within the army—something Cai E deeply abhorred. If the warlords acted independently, who could he, as a military commissioner, actually supervise?

However, Cai E would not relinquish his power on military matters. Therefore, when Lin Xinyi judged that the peace in Northeast Asia was only a temporary phase and that China must develop the Northeast region as much as possible before the peace in Northeast Asia was broken in order to deter the powers’ attempts to invade the Northeast, Cai E consulted Lin Xinyi on this issue after the meeting.

The meeting, ostensibly a consultation, was in reality a closed-door discussion between Cai E, Tian Junyi, and Lin Xinyi in Tian Junyi's office. Cai E sought confirmation from Lin Xinyi, saying, "I know that some Japanese soldiers have always harbored ambitions towards Manchuria and Mongolia. For example, the Black Dragon Society, which has been quite active in our country in recent years, has many veterans involved, and even some active-duty soldiers mixed in. Their advocacy is to unite with our country against Russia, seemingly to protect Asian nations. However, the Black Dragon Society has never declared whether these regions still belong to China after the Russians are driven out of Manchuria and Mongolia."

It seems the Black Dragon Society views the Manchu and Mongol peoples as independent nations separate from China, their status similar to that of a vassal state like Korea. Therefore, after driving out the Russians, these regions also seek independence from China. Is my guess correct?

Lin Xinyi replied without hesitation, "Your deduction is correct. Based on the intelligence you've gathered about the Black Dragon Society, this is exactly the logic they have for the Manchuria and Mongolia regions. First, they want to separate Manchuria and Mongolia from China, and then try to annex them. Isn't that exactly what they did with the Korean Peninsula?"

The only difference is that in the past, the Korean issue involved only China and Japan, while the Manchuria and Mongolia issue involved major powers such as Russia and the United States. Compared to the resource-poor Korean Peninsula, the major powers could not tolerate any single power monopolizing this region. Therefore, Japanese militarists did not openly declare that Manchuria and Mongolia were not part of China, but instead attempted to first unite with China to expel Russia, and then discuss the status of Manchuria and Mongolia with China.

This is why I advocate that a republic should be established with the authorization of all ethnic groups, rather than simply inheriting the legal system of the Qing Dynasty. Because the Qing Dynasty was a minority regime that enslaved and oppressed all ethnic groups, attempting to inherit its legal system would mean that the new regime would inherit the Qing Dynasty's history of oppression of the various ethnic groups within the country.

Resistance to tyranny is the root of the rise of modern democracy. Attempting to inherit the legal system of the Manchu Qing dynasty only placed the Han people in opposition to other ethnic groups and alienated them from the support of their own people. Emphasizing that the republic's territory originated from the Manchu Qing dynasty essentially denies the legitimacy of the people's territorial sovereignty and the legality of the people's right to defend themselves.

If a nation's sovereignty derives from the ruling class, then whoever becomes the ruling class naturally possesses that nation's sovereignty. This is the logic behind the British invasion of India and their ascension to the throne, and it is also the legal basis for Yuan Shikai's attempt to justify his rule. Behind this legal basis lies the denial that the nation belongs to the people, but rather to the rights of a minority.

The reason Japanese militarists argued that Manchuria and Mongolia were not part of China was because Japan was not powerful enough to conquer the entire country. Once they annexed Manchuria and Mongolia, they would then claim that the Yuan and Qing dynasties were part of China, thus establishing a legal basis for Japan's annexation of China. Therefore, regardless of whether Manchuria and Mongolia were not part of China or the Yuan and Qing dynasties were, the underlying issue remains the same: does the nation truly belong to the people or to a minority?

When Cai E raised this question, he was somewhat uneasy about Lin Xinyi's answer, because the other party was, after all, Japanese. He was worried that if Lin Xinyi took a Japanese stance and denied the Black Dragon Society's actions, then the conversation would be unlikely to yield any results. However, Lin Xinyi's frankness relieved him. Although Lin Xinyi's answer did not quite align with his own views on the country, it was the most suitable response for this occasion.

Therefore, Cai E quickly put aside his wariness of Lin Xinyi and sincerely stated his position: "Indeed, as you said, the ultimate question still boils down to whether the country belongs to the people. As long as the people believe that they own this country, then the claims that Manchuria and Mongolia are not China, or that the Yuan and Qing dynasties were China, cannot shake their hearts; they will only provide more topics for casual conversation. However, when the people no longer believe that the country belongs to them, they will naturally consider the source of the country's legitimacy, and these claims will have the potential to sway people's hearts. The only question is, how can we make the people of other countries understand this?"

Lin Xinyi could discern Cai E's underlying meaning. While Cai E appeared to be inquiring about the legal principles of the nation, he was essentially asking how to avoid conflict between Japan and China. He could understand Cai E's thinking. For contemporary China, Japan wasn't the primary enemy. Even though the Treaty of Shimonoseki had cost China the Korean Peninsula and Taiwan, and imposed hefty war reparations, for a traditional continental nation, the Korean Peninsula and Taiwan were essentially superfluous, as continental nations lacked a strong sense of maritime power.

What Chinese people are concerned about now is how to rebuild China's position in East Asia after the Qing Dynasty and reintegrate into the world. Such a choice is a question that only the elites of great powers would consider, because small countries do not view issues from a global perspective; they only care about their own peripheral interests. Therefore, when the international order changes, small countries usually decline rapidly, while great powers have the opportunity to weather the decline and make a comeback when the international order changes again.

Cai E was indeed a remarkable figure of his time. Even though his education did not instill in him a complete modern worldview, he astutely recognized that a nation's status depends not only on its own strength but also on the recognition it receives from the international order. A nation not recognized by the international order is essentially forced into isolation.

After a moment's thought, Lin Xinyi said, "Under the current global colonial system dominated by Britain and France, there is no need for a strong China to manage East Asia. Britain would prefer to see Japan and China maintain a certain balance of power."

Russian expansion in the Far East disrupted the balance of power in East Asia, which was the fundamental reason why Britain supported Japan and China in launching a war against Russia. However, from Britain's perspective, whether Japan or China controlled Manchuria would be a disruption of regional peace.

With Manchuria, China would naturally become the continental hegemon of East Asia, forcing Japan to abandon its continental policy and pursue maritime power, inevitably leading to conflict with British maritime hegemony in East Asia. Similarly, Japan, possessing Manchuria, would inevitably attempt to dominate China, thereby establishing a unified land and sea hegemony in East Asia, which would also drive British power out of East Asia.

Therefore, Western public opinion would support the independent status of Manchuria and Mongolia as non-Chinese entities, but Western governments would recognize the Chinese government's ruling power over these regions. The advantage of this is that it eliminates Japan's ambitions regarding Manchuria and Mongolia, while providing a point of entry for Western support of Manchurian and Mongolian peoples opposing the central government…

653

Cai E and Tian Junyi agreed with Lin Xinyi's analysis because it aligned with the psychology of the great powers and was in their best interest. Since shifting to a materialist view of history, the upper echelons of the Labor Party had completely broken away from the traditional Confucian morally centered world order, and had gained a deeper understanding of Lord Palmerston's famous diplomatic saying: "There are no permanent friends, no permanent enemies, only permanent interests."

Those who accept historical materialism generally dissect moral diplomacy and so-called personal relationship diplomacy. They naturally believe that an organization's actions are driven by its fundamental interests, and that individuals within an organization cannot resist the organization's collective psychology. Lin Xinyi's description of the psychology of the great powers perfectly aligns with their interests in East Asia, making it a logically sound judgment.

Having trusted Lin Xinyi's judgment, they naturally sought to discuss solutions with him rather than treating him as an outsider to be wary of. And Lin Xinyi did indeed offer a suggestion that gave them both pause for thought.

"...From the current situation in East Asia and the world, the various ethnic groups in East Asia are actually facing two fundamental problems. The first is how to maintain independence and promote industrialization under the threat of developed capitalist countries; the second is how to unite the various ethnic groups in East Asia so as not to waste their strength on regional struggles."

These two problems are intertwined; solving one will inevitably have a positive impact on solving the other. Similarly, if one problem remains unresolved, the other will recur and may even become more severe.

Currently, the most effective way to solve these two problems is to develop social productivity. Some problems will disappear on their own with rapid social development. For example, the military invasions of East Asia by the great powers were based on the overwhelming industrial and technological capabilities of industrialized countries over agricultural countries. As soon as East Asian countries achieved initial industrialization, the great powers would abandon direct military invasion.

Because the world's center is now in Europe, especially Western Europe, no great power would be willing to devote all its strength to the East and lose its voice in Europe—that would be a foolish choice. As for those second-tier powers that have little say in Europe, they are even less capable of sending troops to invade a nascent industrialized nation with an absolute population advantage; their national strength cannot sustain such a war.

Therefore, after this war, the Western powers will adopt a more conciliatory foreign policy toward East Asia. They will choose to abandon some of the unequal treaties they signed in the past in order to make Japan and China abide by treaties that seem fair. However, given the industrial and technological gap between the two sides, these treaties are still unequal in essence, and are intended to maintain the unequal trade between advanced industrialized countries and less developed industrialized countries.

Simply put, once the great powers realized that Japan and China possessed the strength to rival industrialized nations, they would proactively abandon unequal treaties that Japan and China could not possibly abide by, in order to prevent Japan and China from using force to break the treaties. This is the diplomatic game between nations based on strength.

We must seize this opportune moment, unite the strength of Japan and China, and force the Western powers to make greater concessions. Within the limits of their tolerance, we must compel them to make the greatest possible concessions.

For example, it could reclaim the Jiaozhou Bay leased territory in Shandong, limit the influence of foreign powers to the area south of the Yangtze River, support the independence movements of the Vietnamese, Filipino, and Southeast Asian island peoples, restrict the colonial power of France, the United States, and the Netherlands in the region, and lay the ideological and material foundation for the national liberation of these regions.

If France, the United States, and the Netherlands lost their colonial power in Southeast Asia, then Britain would not be able to maintain its colonial system in East and Southeast Asia. This would mean that most of Asia would be liberated from the current European colonial system, which would greatly inspire the anti-colonial and anti-imperialist struggles of people around the world.

To achieve this goal, Japan and China must cooperate, not confront each other. So what is the basis for cooperation between Japan and China? I believe it is the unity of the proletariat. The interests of the proletariat in Japan and China are aligned. Only when the proletariat of Japan and China respectively hold political power in their respective countries can there be a foundation for cooperation.

If the proletariat in Japan and China cannot win the power to govern their countries, then whether it is the feudal landlord class or the bourgeoisie in power, they will not have the ideal of liberating the people of Asia. They will only use such a thing as a banner and slogan for invading various parts of Asia, thereby satisfying the desires of their own landlord and bourgeoisie.

Therefore, the Workers' Party should not see itself as the representative of the Chinese proletariat, but rather as the vanguard of the proletariat based on a broader proletarian alliance. From a historical perspective, only when the proletariat of each country unites can it truly suppress the reactionary forces of the bourgeoisie and feudal landlord class. As the political representative of the proletariat, the vanguard should establish such an alliance before the proletariat itself.

We should note that the Second International established by socialist parties in various countries today actually violates the historical view of a great proletarian alliance. The alliance they advocate is merely to support socialist parties in various countries to gain ruling status in their own countries, but they avoid discussing the issue of international proletarian alliance after socialist parties come to power.

Judging from a series of documents from the Second International, socialist parties in various countries emphasized the interests of their own proletariat while avoiding discussions of the common interests of the entire proletariat. This emphasis essentially indicates that socialist parties in various countries considered national interests to be superior to class interests, and that the state had become a sacred and inviolable relic. Discussing the interests of the proletariat in the face of national interests was considered an offense against the people.

Taking the French socialist movement as an example, as the birthplace of the bourgeois revolution and the proletarian revolution, the French proletariat is the most class-struggle-conscious. Therefore, the socialist parties in France are much stronger than those in other countries. The fact that the Independent Socialist Party member Millerin was able to join the French cabinet was an unprecedented event.

However, this incident also demonstrates that the French socialist parties, which advocate legitimate struggle, acknowledge that national interests supersede class interests. Jean Jaurès, the leader of the French Socialist Party, defended Millerand, indicating that the French Socialist Party believed that the French proletariat should submit to the national interests of France, even if the country was owned by the bourgeoisie.

At the Second International Congress in Amsterdam in August 1904, German socialist Bebel clearly saw the crux of the problem, saying: Jaurès' support for Millerand was the most dangerous trap he had set for international socialism.

However, this was not a problem for Jaurès or any other individual, but a universal problem for the entire European proletariat. It was precisely because of the European proletariat's obsession with national and state interests that they betrayed their own class interests. Jaurès was merely echoing the sentiments of the French proletariat, not acting on his own subjective will.

This is the fundamental reason, in my opinion, that war in Europe was inevitable. It's because the proletariat of European countries placed national and ethnic interests above their own class interests. In other words, the trigger for war had been pulled; the bourgeoisie had the power to pull the trigger. When the war would begin depended on when the bourgeoisie pulled it. The proletariat abandoned any efforts to prevent the war; they were willing to slaughter the proletariat of other countries and nations for the benefit of the bourgeoisie.

The confrontation and cooperation between Japan and China also depend on how the proletariat of both countries views the nation and their classes. If the proletariat of Japan and China believe that going to war for the interests of the bourgeoisie is fighting for the motherland, then confrontation between Japan and China is inevitable.

Tian Junyi felt the impact of Lin Xinyi's words more deeply, as he was primarily responsible for political work and therefore naturally understood the political philosophy Lin Xinyi expressed. While Cai E did not entirely agree with the argument that class interests superseded national and ethnic interests, he believed Lin Xinyi's conclusion was correct: whether Japan and China would cooperate or confront each other depended not on the decisions of one or two leaders, but on the mainstream social views of both countries.

As someone who had studied in Japan, Cai E was well aware that the Japanese now had a nouveau riche mentality. After winning the First Sino-Japanese War and successfully seizing control of the Kingdom of Korea, which had always been a tributary state of China, the Japanese had completely lost their former awe of China. They felt that China, as an ancient and powerful nation, had fallen behind in the face of Western civilization. They believed that if China wanted to learn from Western civilization, it would lag behind Japan, becoming Japan's junior brother rather than its master.

From the Japanese perspective, since China has fallen behind Japan, it should naturally treat Japan with the respect due to a disciple. How Japan treated China in the past should be how China should treat Japan now. From a certain perspective, what Japan wants is China's past suzerain status in East Asia—the so-called "Sino-barbarian transformation."

While Cai E disapproved of the Japanese nouveau riche mentality, he still acknowledged the success of the Meiji Restoration in transforming Japan. Although Japan treated farmers as mere resources in its industrialization process, its industrial development speed was still unmatched by the Qing Dynasty.

In 1886, a conflict broke out between sailors of the Beiyang Fleet and local residents in Nagasaki, resulting in deaths and injuries. The way the Japanese and Qing governments handled this incident, and the opinions of the people of both countries, illustrate the immense transformative impact of the Meiji Restoration on the Japanese nation.

After the Nagasaki Incident, the Japanese government's first reaction was that they couldn't win, followed by a request for a low-key approach. This was followed by a massive expansion of the Japanese navy, and the Japanese people were inspired to strengthen themselves by the incident. On the Qing side, apart from the British officer Lang Wei-li, who believed the Beiyang Fleet was far superior and strongly advocated for war against Japan, everyone else wanted to minimize the conflict. The Chinese people hadn't even heard of the Nagasaki Incident.

As can be seen from the Nagasaki Incident, the Self-Strengthening Movement did not reshape the national ideology of China in any new way. The Qing Dynasty's upper class only aimed to ensure its domestic rule and did not care at all about maintaining China's position in the new world system.

The differing perspectives of the two nations on the arrival of a new era have led to a shift in how Japan and China view each other. The Japanese public's past recognition of China as the suzerain of East Asia has transformed into a perception of China as the last rich continent in the world uncolonized by foreign powers. Meanwhile, the Chinese public's view of Japan has evolved from that of a small, insignificant nation to that of a new great power.

Therefore, Lin Xinyi is correct. If the proletariat of China and Japan cannot reach a common understanding, then confrontation between the two countries is almost inevitable. This is because the current relationship between China and Japan is not that of friendly neighbors, but rather a conflict between a rising power and a declining empire.

The people of the established empire wanted to maintain their former status, while the emerging powers sought to replace it; this was the root of many conflicts between the two sides. In such a period of dramatic change in international relations, it was clearly impossible to reverse the tide through the efforts of one or two leaders.

In this way, Cai E finally understood why Lin Xinyi had so strongly encouraged and supported the development of the Chinese revolution: Lin Xinyi supported the Chinese revolution from the perspective of a united proletariat. The best way to prevent a rising Japan from invading China was not to change Japan's perception of China, but to prevent China's decline. As long as China recovered and developed, as a massive continental country, no one would risk invading it.

From this perspective, Lin Xinyi's words and actions were indeed consistent; he did not deviate from his proposed theory of proletarian revolution. This was indeed a good thing for the Workers' Party and the Chinese revolution, because before understanding Lin Xinyi's fundamental goals, Cai E would have found it hard to believe that such a revolutionary saint truly existed.

This left the Workers' Party with only one question: how should the proletariat of China and Japan unite, how should they deal with the landlords and bourgeoisie in both countries, and how should they confront European imperialism and colonialism?

In response to Tian Junyi and Cai E's questions, Lin Xinyi confidently stated: "Protecting people's right to work, and protecting people's right to receive reasonable compensation through labor, I believe is the foundation of proletarian unity. Whether it is Japan, China, or other countries or nations, the proletariat all over the world would agree with this position."

From this standpoint, we can easily derive a shared understanding of opposing feudalism, colonialism, and imperialism. This is not only the basis for cooperation between the Japanese and Chinese proletariat, but also the basis for the unity of the people of Asia and the world. As long as we do not deviate from this fundamental position, the unity among the proletariat will not be undermined.

The bourgeoisie or landlords may use wage figures of the working class in different countries to prove that the working class in industrialized countries also shared the benefits of imperialism and colonialism, but they can never prove that the working class has unrestricted labor rights and receives compensation beyond the value of their labor.

The oppressed status of the working class in advanced industrial countries and backward agricultural countries is not different. What differs is the level of productivity in industrial and agricultural countries. After the working class creates more labor value, capitalists have to give the working class higher pay, but this is the result of the working class's struggle, not a gift from the capitalists.

As I said at the meeting before, the working class in Wuhan received less than 12% of the output they created. After deducting various costs, they couldn't possibly receive even a third of the value of their labor, yet their wages, in absolute terms, far exceeded those of farmers. Can we really say that workers exploited farmers to enjoy a better life?

Lin Xinyi's words were immediately agreed upon by Tian Junyi, who nodded repeatedly and said, "That's right. Some intellectuals inside and outside the Party are saying all day long that the Party's policies are too biased towards the working class. Although the lives of peasants have improved compared to the Qing Dynasty, compared to the workers, it's like heaven and earth. They feel that all the benefits of the revolution have fallen into the hands of the working class, and that the peasants have paid a lot but have not received a corresponding return for their efforts."

These remarks not only created a divide between workers and peasants, but also caused a split within the party between supporters of industry and agriculture. My request for you to discuss the relationship between industry and agriculture at today's meeting is precisely to correct the erroneous views held by party comrades on this issue.

Now it seems my perspective wasn't comprehensive enough. Not only are there contradictions between industry and agriculture within China, but the imbalance in productivity development between domestic and international markets is also creating contradictions among workers in different countries…”

654

Cai E and Tian Junyi's agreement with Lin Xinyi's proposition on worker-peasant relations laid a good foundation for their conversation. Although the Labor Party's theories largely originated from Lin Xinyi's introduction, the search for a way to save the country before the party's founding and the choice of a revolutionary path after its founding are two different things.

Cai E and Tian Junyi's gratitude and trust in Lin Xinyi began with the scientific socialism path that Lin Xinyi introduced to them, and his planning of the principles and organizational issues for the establishment of party organizations in the Chinese revolution. However, this did not mean that the leaders of the Workers' Party had unreserved trust in Lin Xinyi. Scientific socialists who advocated historical materialism would not allow emotions to interfere with practical issues.

If Hsin-yi Lin were to renounce his Japanese identity and join the Workers' Party, they could naturally trust him without reservation, because it would mean that Hsin-yi Lin had severed ties with his own country. In this case, he would no longer be able to resonate with the interests of Japan, because he would gain more within the Workers' Party.

However, Lin Xinyi believed that the Chinese revolution could not only focus on the internal revolution in China, but also needed the support of revolutionary movements in Japan and other parts of Asia. Although Cai E and Tian Junyi thought there was nothing wrong with Lin Xinyi's proposition, especially since the People's Committee established by Lin Xinyi in India gave the Labour Party a lot of support, the Indians could easily obtain a lot of detailed information about British foreign policy towards China from the British Indian government.

Although the Labour Party and the People's Committee had significant differences on issues such as land reform, the Labour Party preferred to forcibly expropriate landowners and redistribute their land, while the People's Committee preferred to expropriate landowners who did not support them and adopt a redemption policy for those landowners who were willing to cooperate with them.

Regarding the stance on the monarchical system, although both the Manchus and the Queen of England were foreign rulers, the invasion of foreign powers aroused a sense of impending doom among the Chinese people, a feeling of the world being lost due to the transformation of the Chinese and barbarians. Thus, the monarchical system, which was deeply intertwined with the Manchus, and Confucianism, which upheld the monarchical system, were seen as evils of the old society. To enter a new era, it was necessary to completely abandon and criticize the monarchical system and Confucianism.

However, for Indians, even the Mughal Empire before the arrival of the British was a foreign regime, and India's formal unification was completed after the British invasion. Even Hinduism, the carrier of Indian national consciousness, was a concept summarized by the British.

This means that the Indian people do not harbor the same deep resentment towards the monarchical system as the Chinese. Indian intellectuals also have complex feelings towards the British Empire. They hate the British for plundering India's wealth and causing numerous famines in the once-rich Indian subcontinent, but they also believe that the British brought civilization to India, otherwise India would be living in darkness today.

Therefore, although the Indian People's Committee chose the path of scientific socialism, its upper echelons preferred the London-style rule, referring to London's rule rather than the rule of the British Empire. Unlike the British Empire's brutal rule over its overseas colonies, at least the citizens of London still enjoyed British-style freedom and democracy.

As long as you are not a homeless person with no income, then London is the most civilized place for you. After all, as the birthplace of parliamentary rule, London is the place that emphasizes the rule of law the most. Even the king must obey the law. Without the guarantee of the law, Parliament cannot suppress royal power and become the power center of the British Empire.