Chinese Civil War

Zunyi Conference
Zunyi Conference ©Image Attribution forthcoming. Image belongs to the respective owner(s).
1935 Jan 1

Zunyi Conference

Zunyi, Guizhou, China

The Zunyi Conference was a meeting of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in January 1935 during the Long March. This meeting involved a power struggle between the leadership of Bo Gu and Otto Braun and the opposition led by Mao Zedong.


The main agenda of this conference was to examine the Party's failure in the Jiangxi region and to look at the options now available to them. Bo Gu was the first to speak with a general report. He acknowledged that the strategy used in Jiangxi had failed, without taking any blame. He claimed the lack of success was not due to poor planning. Next Zhou gave a report on the military situation in an apologetic style. In contrast to Bo, he admitted mistakes had been made. Then Zhang Wentian condemned the leaders for the debacle in Jiangxi in a long, critical oration. This was supported by Mao and Wang. Mao's comparative distance from power over the past two years had left him blameless of the recent failures and in a strong position to attack the leadership.


Mao insisted that Bo Gu and Otto Braun had made fundamental military mistakes by using tactics of pure defense rather than initiating a more mobile war. Mao's supporters gained momentum during the meeting and Zhou Enlai eventually moved to back Mao. Under the principle of democracy for majority, the secretariat of the Central Committee and Central Revolution & Military Committee of CCP were reelected. Bo and Braun were demoted while Zhou maintained his position now sharing military command with Zhu De. Zhang Wentian took Bo's previous position while Mao once again joined the Central Committee.


The Zunyi Conference confirmed that the CCP should turn away from the 28 Bolsheviks and towards Mao. It could be seen as a victory for those old CCP members who had their roots in China and, on the contrary, it was a great loss for those CCP members such as the 28 Bolsheviks who had studied in Moscow and had been trained by the Comintern and the Soviet Union and could be regarded as proteges or agents of Comintern accordingly. After the Zunyi Conference, the influence and involvement of the Comintern in CCP affairs was greatly reduced.


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