What if the Long March decimated the CCP’s operational units?

[Sam R.]

Gidday

the Long March was a historical “retreat” by Chinese Communist Party operational light infantry forces under GMD strategic/political pressure. It resulted in force preservation and “retreat” into Yennan as a “safe” area where CCP forces had to cooperate with actual Chinese communists.

but what if the CCP had been decimated by the long March?

what if they had lost 10% of their forces in a retreat?

instead of 90% of their forces in a rout?

 

[raharris1973]

First of all, I want to congratulate you for stepping out of your usual Marxist-Leninist comfort zone, which seems to mainly include Vietnam, the USSR, Hungary, Yugoslavia somewhat, Australia, and some Anglosphere labor politics generally, to include China [though I noticed you commenting lately on the 1989 Shanghai Soviet to be fair].

Still, I am a slow learner and feel a little whiplash or confusion about whether you are trying to make the situation better or worse for the Chinese Communist Party, and/or its military at this moment in history (the mid-1930s). I'll diagram out my confusion.

What if the Long March decimated the CCP’s operational units?

To me 'decimate' sounds like making the TL worse for the CCP, or at least its military, than OTL, since decimate sounds bad, like killing alot of, and in OTL, the CCP military took over the country only 15 years later. On the other hand, technically, decimate going back to its latin root does just mean something like "kill a tenth" not the "kill em all" it evokes.

the Long March was a historical “retreat” by Chinese Communist Party operational light infantry forces under GMD strategic/political pressure.

Good description - it certainly wasn't an advance, or a "growth" or expansion in a military sense.

It resulted in force preservation and “retreat” into Yennan as a “safe” area where CCP forces had to cooperate with actual Chinese communists.

I don't get the inclusion of the words I bolded. Were the inhabitants and supporters of the party in other CCP controlled Soviet areas in south and central China besides Yennan/Yan'an that existed before the Long March not filled with "actual Chinese communists" but with fake Communists, foreign Communists, posers, unwilling hostage populations or something more than was the case in Yan'an?

but what if the CCP had been decimated by the long March?

what if they had lost 10% of their forces in a retreat?

instead of 90% of their forces in a rout?

This makes it sound like you interpret OTL's Long March as a *rout* of the CCP military, costing 90%, which is the typical estimate of losses, and your what-if is, what if they lost much less, only 10%.

So, in the end, I think you mean your what if to be about "what if the CCP was better off?," but 90% of readers will take away the opposite meaning, like "what if they were all killed off?"

But what do I know, it's not my idea, and I'm not a mind reader, just a word reader.

 

[Sam R.]

Perhaps I should have been more circumspect. Prior to the Yennan period the CCP were a result of Shanghai soviets of urban workers and intellectuals forced into momentary coalitions with rural workers and peasants, much like most Central American revolutionaries. After the Long March they were forced into a momentary coalition where rural workers and peasants had the CCP by “the goolies” and were thus made to act far less like the FARC and far more like the EZLN. The scale and nature of cooperation; the power relation between post-peasant or rural worker praxis (self-organising economic activity / post capitalism / etc) and a bunch of rich feudal intelligentsia in charge of a proto-nomenklatura party is really interesting. Who is in charge and do the nomenklatura learn anything about praxis is a major question.

Sub-commander Zedong. Imagine.

Historically the rout resulted in 90% losses.
Allohistorically what if they successfully retreated with force preservation suffering 10% losses?

 

[Carl Schwamberger]

Been a long time since i read on this subject, the 1980s actually. Did a few quick checks which confirmed my memory. Maos army was worse than decimated. Less than 10,000 soldiers remaining out of 100,000 claimed at the start of the movement in 1935. The other Communist armies were not much better off. Zhangs 4th Army was essentially destroyed, with out even token survivors to train new recruits in any number. Zhang survived, but this ended his political power. Zhidans local army in Shannxi province was in the best shape having only to fend off Kuomintang probes and not making a 'long march'. The numbers may vary with other sources. I recall one claiming the consolidated armies in Shanxi about doubling in strength during 1936 from stragglers arriving in Shannxi. This still left the official strength less than a third the claimed and estimated strength of 1934 or early 1935. The actual recovery of the Red Army and Communists in General came after 1937 when the inability of Chiangs armies to fend off the Japanese triggered a slow but steady political shift among the masses and caused surviving Communists to become active again.

Losing significantly fewer brings into question the need to retreat for far. There is also the question of if Yenan provinces could support a effective Army of 300,000+

Assuming Maos and Zhangs armies remain near their early 1935 strength, in or outside Yenan this probably leave the Kuomintang armies without a recovery period of 1936-37 before Japan attacks. It also means the Communists are not just a distant weak enclave & future insurgency but a actual threat to the Japanese flank. Constituting effectively a second major front for Imperial Japan.

 

[raharris1973]

Losing significantly fewer brings into question the need to retreat for far.

Bingo - for instance, will formations keep hanging out and set up Soviets in Yunnan, or maintain them in the Sichuan-Shaanxi border region (as I think Zhang Guotao wanted to do), or maintain them in the Hubei-Henan-Anhui region?

What could be happening to Chiang Kai-shek's forces that is allowing the CCP forces to move without facing the losses it faced historically? About the only thing I could think of would be a Japanese invasion of Yangtze Valley in 1934, some weeks *after* the CCP forces have staged their breakout from the Jiangxi Soviet area, or a civil war between central KMT factions that remains unresolved for months, or a supremely unlikely deep Soviet invasion of northwestern China. Even in that last case, non-Communist and anti-Communist Chinese forces rather than rushing toward direct contact with the Soviets may prioritize killing CCP forces even closer to them, thus not easing the situation for that generation of CCP cadre and forces at all.

 

[Carl Schwamberger]

Bingo - for instance, will formations keep hanging out and set up Soviets in Yunnan, or maintain them in the Sichuan-Shaanxi border region (as I think Zhang Guotao wanted to do), or maintain them in the Hubei-Henan-Anhui region?

Its possible.

What could be happening to Chiang Kai-shek's forces that is allowing the CCP forces to move without facing the losses it faced historically? About the only thing I could think of would be a Japanese invasion of Yangtze Valley in 1934, some weeks *after* the CCP forces have staged their breakout from the Jiangxi Soviet area, or a civil war between central KMT factions that remains unresolved for months, or a supremely unlikely deep Soviet invasion of northwestern China. Even in that last case, non-Communist and anti-Communist Chinese forces rather than rushing toward direct contact with the Soviets may prioritize killing CCP forces even closer to them, thus not easing the situation for that generation of CCP cadre and forces at all.

This looks like it will weaken the KMT a lot. Which does not automatically help the Japanese. If the KMT is too weak by 1942 the US may not send a army and a air force worth of Lend Lease to the KMT, nor expend the effort to reopen the Burma supply route. Its even possible Japan has no incentive to close the Red River supply route to KMT China, reducing internal arguments for occupying French Into China. If that is a outcome in 1941 then it can waive away the embargoes and a Pacific war starting 1941-1942.

 

[raharris1973]

This looks like it will weaken the KMT a lot. Which does not automatically help the Japanese. If the KMT is too weak by 1942 the US may not send a army and a air force worth of Lend Lease to the KMT, nor expend the effort to reopen the Burma supply route. Its even possible Japan has no incentive to close the Red River supply route to KMT China, reducing internal arguments for occupying French Into China. If that is a outcome in 1941 then it can waive away the embargoes and a Pacific war starting 1941-1942.

Hmm. Japanese invasion of the Yangtze should morally strengthen and unite the Chinese at first, but yes, materially weaken them, and the KMT in particular.

Interesting comment that this "does not automatically help the Japanese." What do you mean by that exactly? (By the way I have thread exclusively dealing with an early Japanese invasion. ). I would tend to think that in terms of the balance of Japanese versus Chinese power, the Japanese are automatically helped. Also in terms of the balance of Japanese versus KMT power, the Japanese are automatically helped. But, with the Communists just 10% killed and not 90% killed like OTL, greater Communist strength allows the Communist forces to cause more trouble to the Japanese - I am assuming there would still be a United Front here as it was already COMINTERN and CCP proclaimed policy objectives before the start of the Long March, Chiang just wouldn't play ball. That could offset some but probably not all of the comparative weaknesses in the KMT position.

The Japanese in most ways probably have a better chance to grind down the Chinese in a war of attrition, capping the war with an "Ichigo" equivalent in the late 30s or circa 1940-41. That could lead Japan indifferent to occupying French Indochina

A way the Japanese "might not be helped" is that perhaps there could be a longer window for the Soviets to intervene in force in China after the Japanese are bogged down there and the Soviets are built up, but before the Nazis have busted loose in Europe.

@Sam R. - What on earth were you thinking the consequences in China might be. You'll note as usual my response was all military and diplomatic minded, no sensitivity to class struggle issues at all

 

[Carl Schwamberger]

Interesting comment that this "does not automatically help the Japanese." What do you mean by that exactly?

I was thinking in terms of larger occupation/administrative costs from having more former KMT territory to occupy. The Japanese Army was near or past its practical limits for expansion & both the field armies and occupation group were costly. Driving the KMT out of 20% more territory does not mean the IJA expands 20%, rather it one way or another is spread 20% thinner. That reduces efficiency of administration, collection of tax revenue, and ability to protect Japanese business expansion into the occupied regions.

In the longer run it makes it easier for this larger & presumably more capable Communist government to attack the Japanese directly, and develop resistance in the occupied regions. So while its easier to drive the KMT armies further towards defeat, the cost increases due to occupation overhead, and the much larger Communist activity.

 

[Sam R.]

(I'm having a fucked week, as you might tell, by having had the distate to suggest that Yanks and Poms might have to supply Widows instead of Soviets.)

If the Medium March supplied military safe areas for apparatchiks and nomenklatura and bureaucrats and intelligentsia before they reached the high north hills of nowhere:

1) the remnants of the old feudal liberal party are never transformed by a 90% selection process into a party which has to listen to workers and peasants to survive
2) the communist aligned advanced non-enclosed peasant regions of China (How else do you sustain 200 years of civil war: 500 years of growth in peasantry), will be more antagnostic to the party, but less able to state their will. This leaves a gap in the politics for the development of networks on non-CCP communist peasants. And that's going to be ugly. I mean the collapse of 100 flowers was ugly. But this is going to be "can you read" you are dead ugly. Because the CCP when successful*1 is going to police local knowledges.
3) If the march didn't kill them that means yet another anti-rightist campaign.

I do view CCP triumph as overdetermined, if ghastly. Like drainage ditch ghastly.

*1 Not if. The KMT was sitting around with its thumb up its bum. The Showa fascists were doomed to fail. There's only one major force in that power vacuum. One major force with 30+% of village areas with political engagement with their line.

 

[Sam R.]

Like drainage ditch ghastly.

How can you tell NATO SYMBOLOGY is a complete language for the purposes of history. There's a NATO SYMBOL for that. Yes and for *that* incident too. Thank you NATO.