Mao Tse-Tung

Author Code: OMTT

The son of a well-to-do peasant, Mao was educated at Changsha, but left his formal education in 1911 to join the revolutionary army under Sun Yat-Sen. He returned to his studies in Hunan after a short period and took a teaching certificate. In 1918, he worked as a librarian in Peking. The following year he joined with Li Ta-chao and professor Chen Tu-hsui in founding the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). In 1920, Mao became the party's General Secretary for Hunan. On the death of Sun-Yat-Sen in 1925, general Chiang Kai-Shek took control of the Kuomintang (KMT), the Nationalist party. At this stage, Mao was still a member of the KMT. By 1927, the CCP had attracted 60,000 members and was seen by the KMT as a threat. Chiang ordered the massacre of Communists and militant workers, beginning in Shanghai. Mao seized the opportunity and launched an attack with CCP forces on Changsha, but was soundly defeated and retreated to the mountains of Chingkanshan. In 1930, Mao set up the South-West Soviet Provincial Government. In 1934, Mao's forces were surrounded by the KMT and Mao broke through with 100,000 followers and began the "Long March". When he finally reached Yenan a year later, there were only 20,000 survivors. In 1935, he was elected Chairman of the CCP. Because of the outbreak of the World War and the invasion by Japan, Mao used the war years to further enhance and consolidate his position. At the end of the war, his forces had grown to over a million in the Red Army, with an additional two million guerillas, or People's Militia. In spite of the aid and equipment that Chiang had received from the U.S., his forces were finally defeated with the fall of Peking in 1949. Chiang retreated to the island of Formosa and Mao declared the People's Republic of China. Many purges then followed with estimates of the killed running in the millions. By the early 1950's, Mao's position as head of party and state was solidified. During his lifetime, Mao had written some poetry (usually of a political nature) and a huge amount of Marxist-Leninist philosophy and theory.