Xie Youtian | The Mystery of the CCP’s Growth – The Hidden Truth of the Chinese Anti-Japanese War

Hong Kong Mirror Publishing House launched Mr. Xie Youtian’s new book “The Mystery of the CCP’s Growth” this August, with the subtitle “The Truth of the Chinese Anti-Japanese War Covered Up.” The book has a total of 405 pages and is divided into twenty-three chapters, with a preface written by the author himself.

    In the Mao Zedong era, official history books firmly stated that the Anti-Japanese War was led by the CCP, while the Nationalist government headed by Chiang Kai-shek was passively resisting Japan and actively opposing the CCP. In the 1980s, relevant books and articles published in China began to acknowledge the positive role of the Nationalist government in the Anti-Japanese War. However, as Xie Youtian pointed out, “For the study of the history of the Anti-Japanese War, ‘the Nationalist government’s resistance to Japan’ is only half of the problem. The other half is what the Communist Party of China was doing?” The above works still mention: ‘The Anti-Japanese War was jointly led by the Kuomintang and the Communist Party’, which is a considerable step forward compared to the ironclad conclusion of the Mao Zedong era: ‘The Anti-Japanese War was led by the Communist Party of China’. But how exactly did the Communist Party of China lead? Moreover, the historical records of the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army in the Anti-Japanese War repeatedly only mention the Battle of Pingxingguan and the Hundred Regiments Offensive. Other major battles seem to have been fought by the troops led by the Nationalist government. What was the army led by the Communist Party doing? How did the CCP army grow stronger during the Anti-Japanese War?