Left Wing Nationalists

"As a matter of fact, we must clearly see that imperialism is the foremost enemy of our people, because it is the more brutal. It brings troops to invade our country and massacre our fellow countrymen. For this reason, the anti-imperialist and anti-feudal tasks are twin main tasks, but the anti-imperialist task is the foremost task."

"The regime of feudal and semi-feudal exploitation must be abolished, and “land to the tillers” must be realized. So far, the Vietnamese Revolution has only restricted that feudal and semi-feudal exploitation. It must progress further to realise land reform and wipe out all vestiges of feudalism. In brief, the Vietnamese Revolution must fulfil both the anti-imperialist and anti-feudal tasks to realize independence, freedom and happiness for the people. In other words, it must complete the task of democratization to pave the way to the socialist revolution in the future: to socialize all means of production, abolish from Vietnam the regime of exploitation of man by man."

"Ever since the US imperialists ousted the French colonialists from South Vietnam and rigged up a puppet Saigon administration to their devotion, then sent troops for direct aggression against the South of our country, our entire people have been waging a sacred war of resistance against US aggression, for national salvation, in order to liberate the South, defend the North and proceed to the peaceful reunification of the country."

"Starting from the Leninist thesis on the possible success of the revolution in a single country, even one that was economically underdeveloped but constituted the weakest link of the imperialist system, our Party asserted that the Vietnamese revolution was closely related to the revolution in the metropolitan country but was not subordinate to it. Moreover, owing to the concrete conditions of Vietnam and the world in the era of imperialism, it was possible for socialist revolution to triumph in Vietnam before it would in many a developed capitalist country."

"Our people's patriotic war of resistance against US aggression has achieved great victories in all fields, compelling the American imperialists to unconditionally end their war of destruction against the North, withdraw part of their troops from the South and come to the four-party conference in Paris."

"The working class' invincible strength is due to its vanguard party which leads the revolution according to a judicious line. the Marxist line, and sets up a firm worker-peasant alliance to serve as the basis for uniting all popular forces with a view to isolating the enemy to the utmost and overthrowing him."

"The collapse of world imperialism is a long historical process comprising different types of revolutions in various countries, determined by their unequal level of economic, political and social development."

"The triumph of socialism in the Soviet Union and the other socialist countries proves that it is entirely possible to realize it in one country or in a number of countries even in conditions of encirclement by world capitalism."

"The Machiavellian machinations of the US imperialists against Vietnam and Indochina betray a passive character on the strategic plane, being conceived in a posture of weakness and defeat and fraught with insolvable contradictions. They arouse increasing opposition from the peoples of Vietnam, Indochina, the United States and the world. They have met with initial setback and are bound to fail completely."

"Leninism is the Marxism of the era of imperialism and proletarian revolution, of the period of transition from capitalism to socialism on a world scale."

"The powerful attacks which are taking place on the South Vietnam battlefields show that our people have the required determination and strength to defeat the US aggressors, liberate the South, defend the North and advance toward the peaceful reunification of the country."

"Marxism-Leninism is the acme of human thought in our time. It not only explains the world thoroughly, but transforms it radically. It is the beacon lighting the path of the international working class, the oppressed peoples and the whole of progressive man-kind, who are struggling to rid themselves of all oppression and exploitation and to build a new world, a world of genuine peace, freedom and happiness."

"Let our entire people and armed forces advance on the impetus of their victories and completely defeat the US aggressors and their stooges!"

"If we strive only for national reconstruction but neglect to struggle for sovereignty and territorial integrity, national independence will certainly not be recognized and our country will be reduced to an autonomous state."

"The French reactionary colonialists hoped to solve the Vietnamese problem by armed force according to their own will. But the Resistance war carried out by the Vietnamese people has shattered their illusions, The Vietnamese people are ready to wage a long struggle to overcome all difficulties and obstacles and resolutely fight all brutal plunderers and their stooges until they recover the integrity of their territory and gain complete independence, liberty and happiness."

"We should ally ourselves not only with the French people, but also with all peace-loving and democratic peoples, particularly with the Chinese people, our great neighbours who are resolutely struggling for democracy, unification and independence. In a word, we must unite with all the oppressed peoples who are fighting to liberate themselves."

"Soldiers, our brothers! Turn your guns in the opposite direction and fight to overthrow imperialism and the Kuomintang, which exploit, oppress, and butcher the Chinese labouring masses; fight to establish the Soviet Government and the Red Army of the workers, peasants, and soldiers! We your brothers, the hundreds of thousands of soldiers of the Red Army, truly welcome you to our ranks."

"The Chinese people are extremely indignant at the outrages of the U.S. authorities in the Panama Canal Zone in infringing on the national sovereignty of Panama and killing its patriotic people. They pay heartfelt tribute to the Panamanian people who are fighting heroically. The Chinese people firmly support the just struggle of the government and people of Panama to safeguard their national sovereignty and dignity and to regain their sovereignty over the Panama Canal Zone. We are deeply convinced that the Panamanian people will certainly win final victory in the struggle."

"The Tibetan nationality is one of the nationalities within the Chinese boundaries with a long history. It has performed its glorious duty in the work of creating and developing our great Motherland. But during the recent century, imperialist forces penetrated into China and also into Tibet, carrying out provocations and sowing discord."

"The Central People's Government will certainly help the Tibetan people in wiping out the influence of imperialism in Tibet; it will achieve the unification of the territory and sovereignty of the People's Republic of China, and defend the national frontiers of our great Motherland, so that the Tibetan nationality and people will achieve liberation, return forever to the family of our great Motherland and, helped by the Central People's Government and the Han nationality, develop its own political, economic, cultural and educational work and improve and raise its standards of living step by step."

"Genuine patriotism means fervent love or one’ s own fatherland, its people, language, culture, literature and best traditions, behind which lie thousands of years and generations of historical development. This kind of patriotism has no connection whatsoever with self-centred, selfish, and anti-foreign bourgeois nationalism, nor with such national prejudices as narrow-minded exclusivism, isolationism, sectarianism and provincialism, which reflect the sentiments of the small peasant and backward patriarchal system"

"Marxism-Leninism considers all questions in their historical settings. Marxism-Leninists view bourgeois nationalism under the given historical conditions. Drawing a distinction between its different objective roles, they decide what different attitudes the proletariat should take toward it. In the early period of capitalism, the national movement led by the bourgeoisie had as its objective the struggle against oppression by other nations and the creation of a national state. This national movement was historically progressive, and the proletariat supported it. In the present period, such bourgeois nationalism still exists in the colonial and semi-colonial countries. This variety of nationalism also has a certain objective progressive historical significance."

"Liu was a great Marxist and a great Proletarian revo-statesman and Proletarian theorist, one of the main leaders of the Party and the country, one of the founders of the state, and an important member of the first generation of the Party's leading group."

"The liberated peoples already exceed one-fourth of the population of the globe. This signifies a regeneration of the world and bears testimony to the scope and level that mankind has already attained in its struggle for emancipation. Undoubtedly the number of the liberated peoples from now on will grow day by day. It will not be long before the whole of mankind will be freed from imperialist domination. No matter what setbacks the struggle may sustain, its general trend toward liberation is an inevitable and irresistible law of history."

"In China, it was the party of the Chinese proletariat, and not the party of the bourgeoisie or the petty-bourgeoisie, that first raised a clear-cut programme for fighting against imperialism and for national independence. Our Communist Party of China has always been the leader and organiser of the anti-imperialist national united front of the Chinese people. The scale of this national united front embraces workers, peasants, intellectuals, the petty-bourgeoisie, the national bourgeoisie and even the progressive gentry. This revolutionary national liberation movement is not in contradiction to proletarian internationalism, but it is entirely consistent with it. It constitutes an extremely integral part of the movement of proletarian internationalism, constituting its broadest direct ally. The victory of this national liberation movement is a great step forward along the path of the proletarian internationalist cause, for it gives great aid and impetus to the socialist revolution of the proletariat throughout the world."

"That is to say: in directing the national liberation movements and proletarian socialist movements of the world today, the Communists and the peoples of all countries must base themselves on proletarian internationalism, must discard bourgeois nationalism, and must closely link together the national democratic revolution of the oppressed nations and the socialist revolution of the proletariat, before these two kinds of revolution can both win victory, before we can liberate every nation of the world, and before we can solve all national questions of the world today. Otherwise, not only will we be unable to win any socialist victory, we will also not be able to win real victory in any national liberation movement."

"The Chinese people fully understand that it is only with the help of the Soviet Union and the people of other countries, and the international solidarity against imperialism, that the victory of the Chinese revolution could be achieved and can be consolidated. The Great October Socialist Revolution links the revolutionary struggle waged by the proletariat in the West with that waged by the oppressed peoples in the East, thus creating a revolutionary front against world imperialism. This revolutionary front was the most important guarantee for the Chinese people that they could achieve and consolidate the victory of their revolution."

"We fully understand the decisive role which the vanguard of the masses can play throughout the people’s struggle for emancipation. The complete emancipation of the people is possible only when they have a vanguard of their own, such as our Party. Otherwise they would be without revolutionary leadership, and the people’s revolution would consequently meet with failure. Only under the firm and correct leadership of our Party and only by carrying on the struggle along the political orientation given by our Party can the Chinese people achieve their complete emancipation."

"What does it mean when we say that Party centralism is centralism based on democracy? It means that the leading bodies of the Party are elected by the membership on a democratic basis and enjoy their confidence. It means that the resolutions and policies of the Party are the crystallization of the ideas of the rank and file as expressed on a democratic basis, that they are decided on by the rank and file as expressed on a democratic basis, that they are decided upon by the rank and file or its representatives and that they are then adhered to and carried out by the leadership in conjunction with the rank and file."

"The nature of the Chinese society, the fact that the basic motive forces of the Chinese revolution is the proletarian-led masses who's main force is the peasantry, the existence of the powerful Chinese Communist Party and the prevailing international situation are all factors which have come together to determine that Chinese revolution can be neither a bourgeois-democratic revolution of the old type nor a proletarian-socialist revolution of the newest type, but that it must be a bourgeois-democratic revolution of a new type. In this revolution, though the basic motive forces are the proletariat, the peasantry and the petty bourgeoisie, other classes may join the revolution, and we also have numerous allies both at home and abroad."

"American imperialism is now starting a new aggression against the People's Republic of China. The flames of aggressive war kindled by American imperialism around China are spreading. The Chinese people have a deep love of peace, but in order to defend peace, they have never been, and will never be, afraid of resisting an aggressive war."

"When several imperialist powers seek to plunder the weaker nations of the world, the result is an imperialist world war for the redistribution of colonies. And this crime, the most monstrous in world history, is committed by the bourgeoisie under the banner of “nationalism.”"

"Now is the time to eliminate the remnants of Menshevism in the Party ideologically, politically and in our work, to analyse the historical experience of our Party, especially that of the struggle between the two lines, and to use the results to educate our cadres and Party members. This is the way to learn from past mistakes to avoid future ones, to "cure the sickness and save the patient", to achieve unity and discipline in our ranks, to guarantee continuous and correct leadership in our Party and to lead the Chinese revolution to future victory."

"We should regard the cities and villages as an integral whole. So far, we have been dealing with rural problems only but the addition of urban problems means we now must attend to the difficulties related to large industries, state-owned enterprises which are socialist in character, state capitalism, the relationship between the cities and the countryside, and so on. In guiding the work of our Party as a whole, we must focus on urban work by keeping these problems in mind and giving them due consideration. We must change the practice of concentrating on just one area at a time or we will make mistakes."

"You are advancing under complex conditions, with complicated tasks and duties to perform. To fulfill your tasks on time, you must take advantage of favourable opportunities and co-ordinate various kinds of work without loosing sight of the key link or upsetting the sequence of work. The leadership should assume overall responsibility, while specific work should be carried out through a division of labour."

"The Communist Party, representing the brightest and most progressive aspects of contempory human society, is the bearer and disseminator of Marxism-Leninism, the acme of human thought. The most politically conscious, progressive and developed people in the world, people with the highest sense of morality and justice, are gathered in the communist Parties, fighting unswervingly against all the forces of darkness and for the bright future and final emancipation of mankind."

"When opportunist ideas and differences of principle arise in the Party, we must, of course, wage struggles to overcome those ideas and errors of principle. This defiantly does not mean that when there are no differences of principles and no opportunist ideas in the Party, we should deliberately magnify into “differences of principle” divergences of opinion among comrades on questions of a purely practical nature."

"After all, it is not a bad thing that people turn to the Communist Party, enter it seeking a way out of their predicament and approve of its policy. They are not mistaken in coming to us. We welcome them - everyone except for enemy agents, traitors, careerists and ambitious climbers."

"For 30 years, the enemies facing the Communist Party of China and the Chinese people have included almost all the imperialist countries in the world and the strong forces of feudalism and of the bureaucratic, comprador, big bourgeoisie of China. These have been most diabolical enemies. They did not give the Communist Party of China and the Chinese people any freedom of action. They dealt out savage slaughter and torture to the Communists, attempting to kill them all off. In the face of such enemies, if the Chinese Communists had not taken up arms and entered on a persistent and unswerving armed struggle against the enemy it would have been impossible to carry on revolutionary activity. Because of this, the Chinese Communists and the revolutionary Chinese people long ago took to arms in the struggle against their enemies, waged four great revolutionary wars over the course of more than 20 years and finally overthrew the rule of these enemies on Chinese soil and achieved the victory for the Chinese revolution. This victory is of great significance in China's history and also in world history."

"We Communists must not separate our study of theory from our ideological self-cultivation. We must remould ourselves and temper our proletarian ideology not only in the practice of revolution but in the study of Marxism-Leninism."

"As you know, a man's words and actions are guided by his ideology. And a man's ideology is inseparable from his world outlook. The only world outlook for members of the Communist Party is the communist world outlook. This world outlook is the philosophical system of the proletariat and also our communist methodology."

"For us it is most important to never divorce ourselves from the current revolutionary struggle of the masses, but to identify ourselves with it, in order to study, sum up and apply the revolutionary experience of the past. This means that we must cultivate and temper ourselves in revolutionary practice and that in turn our self-cultivation and tempering are undertaken solely for the sake of the people and of revolutionary practice."

"The modern revisionists, donning a cloak of Marxism-Leninism, are actually wantonly adulterating Marxism-Leninism, emasculating Marxism-Leninism of its revolutionary soul, repudiating the historic necessity for proletarian revolution and proletarian dictatorship in the period of transition from capitalism to communism, negating the leading role of the proletarian Party, substituting hypocritical bourgeois "supra-class" viewpoints for Marxist-Leninist viewpoints of class analysis, and substituting bourgeois pragmatism for dialectical materialism. They are trying their utmost to benumb the revolutionary will of the working class, to tamper with the essential contents of socialism and communism as strictly defined by Marxism-Leninism and in fact to restore or preserve capitalism. Under such circumstances, the militant task of all Marxist-Leninists is not to evade the challenge of modern revisionism, but to unite in defence of the purity of Marxism-Leninism, to smash this attack completely, to hold aloft the red banner of revolution, and to show the proletariat and the working people the correct direction for struggle and the road to victory."

"We Communists are the most advanced revolutionaries in modern history; to day the changing of society and the world rests upon us and we are the driving force in this change. It is by unremitting struggle against counter-revolutionaries that we Communists change society and the world, and at the same time ourselves."

"We should of course adopt a correct attitude towards learning from the qualities of the founders of Marxism-Leninism and towards the learning of Marxism-Leninism itself. Otherwise it is impossible to learn anything, let alone to learn it well. In fact, there are different kinds of people in our ranks with different attitudes towards such learning."

"The Communist Party is the political party of the proletariat and has no interests of its own other than those of the emancipation of the proletariat. The final emancipation of the proletariat will also inevitably be the final emancipation of all mankind. Unless the proletariat emancipates all working people and all nations - unless it emancipates mankind as a whole - it cannot fully emancipate itself."

"For the Chinese national revolution to succeed, the participation of the masses of all classes and the building of a united front of all classes are necessary. But among the classes taking part in the national revolution, the working class and the peasantry constitute the main force."

"The reason why our Party has been able to achieve these tremendous successes is that from the very beginning it had been a proletarian party of an entirely new type — a party dedicated whole-heartedly to serving the Chinese people and built upon the very solid theoretical foundation of sinified Marxism-Leninism."

"The General Programme of the Constitution begins by pointing out that our Party is the organized vanguard of the Chinese working class and the highest form of its class organization. It represents the interests of the Chinese nation and people. At the present stage it is striving for new democracy in China and its ultimate aim is the realization of communism in China. Is this character of our Party questionable? I think not."

"The 20th century produced a communist equivalent of the figure of Empress Wu, in the form of Jiang Qing, a.k.a. ‘Madame Mao’, ambitious, ruthless and dogmatic. An only child and the daughter of a concubine, Jiang became an actress after leaving university, acquiring an enduring belief in the importance of the arts. In the late 1930s, however, she met Mao Zedong, future founder of the People’s Republic of China, after joining the Communist side in China’s civil war, becoming his fourth and final wife in 1939 (see page 264). Since Mao was still married at the time, she had to keep a low profile for many years."