Why did the Communists win the Chinese Civil War?

Geographer

Geographer

Junior Member
The KMT has maintained that the reason the Communists won the Civil War is because the KMT exhausted all its military strength fighting Japan. Of the 22 main engagements of the Second Sino-Japanese War, the KMT was the primary and usually only Chinese participant.

How much did Soviet support help the CCP? As I understand it, the USSR initially favored the KMT over the CCP in 1945 for an unknown-to-me reason. Is that right? How much support did the surrendering Japanese army give the Communists? How important was American support for the KMT?

Who did Chinese popular opinion favor in the Civil War? We can break it down by socio-economic class like business people, farmers, land owners, intellectual, urban workers, and government officials.
 
SampanViking

SampanViking

The Capitalist
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I think the obvious answer is that the Communists fought mainly a Guerilla war against the Japanese forces that went after them into the Hinterland, while the KMT as a formal army of State were trying to hang on to major Political/Economic Population centres and therefore fighting more formal battles.

As to the public support in the civil war, well the communists made a reputation for providing food to the peasantry, while the KMT Government would mainly have appeared for the purposes of taxation.

I am sure there is a huge amount of extra detail, but that it ultimately distils down to these basic points.
 
AssassinsMace

AssassinsMace

Lieutenant General
The communists had the people behind them. It wasn't about ideology. It was simply foreign occupation is the only thing everyone knew. The colonialists by their nature didn't favor anyone except those who served their interests. The KMT were seen as the lapdogs of the West. No different from the many warlords that did the bidding of the colonialist masters that enriched them. When it comes down to it, it's human nature. The KMT served the interests of the West more than the people. Therefore the KMT could only rule through oppression. Since the West was their main support and they were weakened by WWII, the KMT couldn't get the kind of support to rule by oppression. I know people are going to think the KMT was the opposite of the communists. No they were just as much a police state on Taiwan as the communists on the mainland from the start. So the people picked the lesser of two evils and not the one that cared more about the interests of the superiors that ruler over them.
 
solarz

solarz

Brigadier
Geographer said:
The KMT has maintained that the reason the Communists won the Civil War is because the KMT exhausted all its military strength fighting Japan. Of the 22 main engagements of the Second Sino-Japanese War, the KMT was the primary and usually only Chinese participant.

How much did Soviet support help the CCP? As I understand it, the USSR initially favored the KMT over the CCP in 1945 for an unknown-to-me reason. Is that right? How much support did the surrendering Japanese army give the Communists? How important was American support for the KMT?

Who did Chinese popular opinion favor in the Civil War? We can break it down by socio-economic class like business people, farmers, land owners, intellectual, urban workers, and government officials.
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While the second sentence of your first paragraph is more or less true, the claim in the first sentence is pure BS. The KMT were far from having exhausted its military strength by the end of WW2. On the very contrary, they were stronger than ever, flush with manpower and brand new equipment from the US.

The Soviets gave very minimal support to the CCP, as Stalin had an agreement with Jiang. The furthest the Soviets went to support the CCP was to give them sanctuary and equipment from the occupied NW China.

Do some research on the Chinese civil war. Once you get past the propaganda (from both sides), you'll see that the CCP won through popular support, a cohesive leadership, veteran officers among its ranks, and the internal rivalries between KMT generals.
 
Maggern

Maggern

Junior Member
IMO the communists just deserved to win that civil war, as they were beating the immensely larger and more well-equipped nationalists from quite meager beginnings. From what I've read and heard, the communists were much better at ensuring unity in soldiers and officers, partially through ideology, while the nationalist army was rather a loose alliance between various warlords that quickly started to crumble after the common enemy of Japan was out of the game. The nationalists were also infamous for rampant corruption and violence while the communists were famous for putting farmers first. The communists were thus more regimented and unified and also gained popular support.
 
Equation

Equation

Lieutenant General
Maggern said:
IMO the communists just deserved to win that civil war, as they were beating the immensely larger and more well-equipped nationalists from quite meager beginnings. From what I've read and heard, the communists were much better at ensuring unity in soldiers and officers, partially through ideology, while the nationalist army was rather a loose alliance between various warlords that quickly started to crumble after the common enemy of Japan was out of the game. The nationalists were also infamous for rampant corruption and violence while the communists were famous for putting farmers first. The communists were thus more regimented and unified and also gained popular support.
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Like the saying goes, there is no such thing as a bad army, just bad commanders and leaders. The nationalists were actually a pretty well trained army, but like you said, it has too many bad field commanders and officers that are too corrupted.
 
G

getready

Senior Member
1 they really had the support of the people especially in the countryside.
2 brilliant tactics and generals
3 corruption and decay of kmt government

These are just some factors I can think of
 
Geographer

Geographer

Junior Member
What did the CCP do and tell the peasants to win their support? Did Mao say, "I plan to collective the entire agricultural sector and wipe out all private land"?

If the farmers supported the CCP because conditions under the KMT and landlords were so bad, why didn't they revolt during the Great Leap Forward when conditions were much worse?

It is ironic that Mao won because of farmer support and it was the farmers who were treated the worst under Mao. During the Great Leap Forward urban residents did comparatively well while rural residents were starving to death. Mao threw his key supporters and power base under the bus.

The KMT were seen as the lapdogs of the West. No different from the many warlords that did the bidding of the colonialist masters that enriched them.
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This is hard for me to understand. Chiang Kai-shek bullied Chinese and foreign businessmen in Shanghai as much as the communists. When the KMT sent an army into north Vietnam in 1945, Chiang only withdrew when France gave up its concessions in China. I don't see how Chiang Kai-shek could be seen as a lapdog of foreign powers while Mao Zedong wasn't. Russia historically had concessions in China, fought the Boxer Rebellion. Russia was as much an imperial power in China as Britain or France. Why wasn't Russian support to Mao considered bad foreign influence?
 
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solarz

solarz

Brigadier
Geographer said:
What did the CCP do and tell the peasants to win their support? Did Mao say, "I plan to collective the entire agricultural sector and wipe out all private land"?

If the farmers supported the CCP because conditions under the KMT and landlords were so bad, why didn't they revolt during the Great Leap Forward when conditions were much worse?

It is ironic that Mao won because of farmer support and it was the farmers who were treated the worst under Mao. During the Great Leap Forward urban residents did comparatively well while rural residents were starving to death. Mao threw his key supporters and power base under the bus.


This is hard for me to understand. Chiang Kai-shek bullied Chinese and foreign businessmen in Shanghai as much as the communists. When the KMT sent an army into north Vietnam in 1945, Chiang only withdrew when France gave up its concessions in China. I don't see how Chiang Kai-shek could be seen as a lapdog of foreign powers while Mao Zedong wasn't. Russia historically had concessions in China, fought the Boxer Rebellion. Russia was as much an imperial power in China as Britain or France. Why wasn't Russian support to Mao considered bad foreign influence?
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1. Land reform: you can't understand this because you don't understand what the situation was for peasants in that time. Peasants did not own the land they worked. They were basically extremely exploited employees of land owners: a pittance of wages (often not even that), zero security, zero rights. The CCP basically told them: if you support us, you will earn a much better living and we will protect your rights.

The rights I'm referring to are things like not having your wife/daughter raped/abducted by the landowner.

2. As bad as farmer conditions were in the GLF, they are still a step up from when they were peasants under the old regime. Famines were a common event during the war years. In any case, it's irrelevant to the topic because peasants don't have oracular abilities.

3. Jiang was hated for his weak position against the Japanese. Mao was supported primarily because of his land reform policies. The fact that Mao came to be known as the defender of Chinese integrity happened after the Korean War.
 
Geographer

Geographer

Junior Member
1. Land reform: you can't understand this because you don't understand what the situation was for peasants in that time. Peasants did not own the land they worked. They were basically extremely exploited employees of land owners: a pittance of wages (often not even that), zero security, zero rights. The CCP basically told them: if you support us, you will earn a much better living and we will protect your rights.

The rights I'm referring to are things like not having your wife/daughter raped/abducted by the landowner.

2. As bad as farmer conditions were in the GLF, they are still a step up from when they were peasants under the old regime. Famines were a common event during the war years. In any case, it's irrelevant to the topic because peasants don't have oracular abilities.
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I see. So the farmers didn't know anything about Marxism? What did the CCP tell them about their plans for the future? Did the farmers expect to own the land they were living on, or did they have an idea the government would nationalize and collectivize it?

I doubt conditions for the farmers between 1958-1961 were a step up from anything experienced in peacetime pre-PRC rule.
 
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