Chinese sources
Part I: Eat the Buddha!
Part III: Tibetan sources
Part IV: Documents issued by the Central CCP Leadership
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[6] Another source published last year (General Huang Yongsheng: A Biography.
Hong Kong: New Century Press, 2010 ) also
mentions this incident, but with a different ending: when they did a body check
they didn’t find the commander. It turned out that he had escaped from the
scene. They searched and found him hiding in a cave. He was arrested and
confessed that he didn’t order resistance because he was afraid of “breaking
the nationality regulation”. In the end he was executed. They buried all the
bodies in a mass grave. They seem to have had better luck when they advanced
into the Muslim area, mostly because the Muslims were ethnically Chinese and
spoke the same language.
Lin Wei - (9th
corps, 4th Red Army) occupation of the Choktsé palace
Chen Chanfeng - with Mao
in Songpan
Li Yaoyu - with Zhu De,
under fire near Rongdrak
Heishui county govt. - 1st
and 4th armies in Heishui
Tong Xiaopeng - (1st division, 1st
Group army) diary of the march from Choktsé to Mugé
Wu Faxian - (2nd
regiment, 2nd division, 1st army) the march to Mugé
Source 1:
Lin, Wei. Yi
wei lao hong jun de chang zheng ri ji. Beijing: Zhong Guo Dan Shi Chu Ban She, 2006. (Lin Wei, Long March Diary of an Old Red Army Soldier.
Beijing,
Chinese Communist Party History Publishing House, 2006. )
During the Long March,
the author was a surveyor on the operational staff of the 9th Corps
of the 4th Red Army, commanded by Zhang Guotao. Lin Wei was awarded
the rank of Major General (shao jiang) in 1955 and later became Deputy Commander of PLA’s Communication
Division. This is what he wrote in his diary (pp. 215-216)
June 29
(1935), Sunny
...We established our
headquarters (command office) in Suo Guanyin’s palace, one of the so-called 7
big Tu si (local lord) in Da Jin Chuan.[1] This monastery-palace
stood at the confluence of the Da Jin Chuan (‘big gold river’) (Chu chen) and Somang river, with fast-flowing water
in front and high mountains behind. The 7-storey structure was built with large
square cut stones and thick bricks, as high as ten zhang (30 meters), and comprised over 400 rooms. It was a huge
structure whether seen from near or far. It was the first time we had seen such
a strange, magnificent and splendid building, and we felt very curious.
The Central (Party)
command, followed by the 2nd
Red Division, were ahead of us, and had been living in this building for a few
days. Our (staff) department and the (higher ranking) officers all stayed on
the 3rd floor, right across from the Political Department.
…Tonight, we spent the
night in this famous palace of the Zhuo Ke Ji (Cog rtse)
tu si.
June 30,
Cloudy
…
Today our troops divided into two and moved out
from Zhuo Ke Ji in various directions. Since there are no provisions in Zhou Ke
Ji, the 8th Platoon fight their way to Ma Tang, the team directly
under the command of the (9th ) corps, together with the 9th
platoon march toward Dang Ba (Brag bar) on the
east bank of Da Jin Chuan River, and the 7th platoon stayed near
Zhou Ke Ji. In the morning we crossed over two big mountains, arriving at Dang
Ba at 3 p.m. On arriving, we fought with the reactionary Tibetan forces for
half an hour. (They) were scattered by our 9th platoon. At night,
those reactionary Tibetan forces fired sporadic shots at us.
No food here either. A few days ago,
reactionary elements moved all the grain and cattle to the west bank of the Da
Jin Chuan River. Our only way out is to find the reactionaries’ pastures, to
obtain yaks and sheep for food. The 8th platoon telegraphed, informing (us) that Ma
Tang was on the edge of the great grassland, and was a wasteland, without any
provisions, where (they) have to survive by hunting wild animals, fishing, and collecting
pea seedlings and wild celery. Now the
days of food shortage are starting for the whole army.
July 1, Sunny
(p. 217)…
1 p.m. (we) returned from Dang Ba to Zhou Ke Ji,
crossing the same two big mountains again. Hard to walk on empty stomach, got back to the huge temple after 8 p.m. After
dark, several thousand men came back to the rooms (they) had stayed in before,
making tremendous noise in this huge temple, which didn’t quiet down till about
10 p.m. Heard there was nothing to eat tomorrow, and everybody was panicking
and frightened.
Situation is unclear, plus
exhausted and hungry. Attacked by
reactionary Tibetans.
(p. 217) July 2, Sunny
Before daybreak, (we were) attacked by 7 or
8 thousand reactionary Tibetan soldiers coming from Song Gang and Ma Er Keng.
As soon as they reached Zhou Ke Ji, they laid a tight siege to this huge Lamaist
palace. They were on the high spots shouting battle cries loudly, firing Mauser
guns, single shot 79 rifles and shotguns at the same time. We didn’t understand their language, had no translator, no idea what they were
saying. We were surrounded on all sides, but
all we needed to do was to guard the windows, no shooting back necessary,
just watch the gate in case they got close and set it on fire. Telegraphed the
1st corps stationed nearby, asking them to dispatch cavalry to our 8th
platoon in Ma Tang, ordering it back to Zhou Ke Ji immediately to our rescue.
Around 10 o’clock we fired a few 37 mortars from the building top, which landed
among them and exploded. This frightened them. At this time, our 31 Army arrived
from the south of Kang Ma Monastery, threatening them from front and rear. From
11 o’clock, they started retreating toward Da Jin Chuan. In this battle we had
over 10 casualties, and Chao Da Ao, head
of Reconnaissance department, was wounded.
(p. 218) July 3, Sunny
Today we were still resting in Zhou Ke Ji.
Very hungry, only have 2 to 3 little steamed buns made of corn flour to eat,
plus one or two bowls of pea seedling soup.
There are fish to be hooked, but people say they refused to swallow the
bait. Watching teams of fish swimming in the Somang River, we had no real fish
hooks, and had to heat needles in the fire and bend them, but the ends were too
smooth, and there was no counter hook, so as soon as the fish were lifted out
of the water, they would slide back in, very hard to make any catch, really
annoying.
…
It is quite hot in this narrow basin, and
swarming with mosquitoes and flies. Big red-headed flies everywhere, a
sickening sight. It is said that Aba (rNga ba),
less than 120 km north of here, is a large Tibetan area, and it is quite rich.[2]
Source 2:
Chen, Changfeng. Gen sui
Mao zhu xi chang zheng. Revised ed. Beijing: Zuo jia chu ban she, 1961. (Long March with Chairman Mao)
Chen Changfeng worked as an
attendant for Mao Zedong from 1930 to 1936. The book was originally published
in 1958. A revised edition came out in 1961.
p. 67 ff:
…We arrived at Mao Er Gai (dMu dge). Here we halted, preparing for the crossing
of the grassland...(He had been sick for a while.)
At this time, comrades were busy going out harvesting barley, bringing
it back and grinding it into flour, getting ready to cross the grassland. I had
to stay at home (Chairman did not allow me to go out, forcing me to rest), and
I was not in a good mood.
The
building we stayed in was a Lamaist temple, and I slept in the main hall,
surrounded by some strange-looking gods that kept me company. When I was bored,
I would stare at them. One day, I suddenly found that they were made of wood,
and solidly built, but each had a small hole in the small of the back. The hole
was covered by a piece of wooden board.
Out of curiosity, I climbed up behind a large “god”, and scrutinized the
hole. I removed the board without much effort. Something happened right way:
Pop! A little red bead fell down, blocking the hole. I took it out, and another
bag fell out. Ha! Now I saw what was going on: one out, another one off, I took
out several in a row! I opened the bag
and peeked inside: it contained all
kinds of grains, sesame, beans, rice, wheat and so on. This was truly like the
saying “After wearing out a pair of iron shoes trying to find it, it comes to
you without any effort”!
...In this way I got 20 to 30 jin
of grains….Now there was no worry for the Chairman’s provisions crossing the
grassland. However, the Chairman had no idea about this, because it was against
regulations. Had he known, he wouldn’t have agreed.
Source 3:
Li, Yaoyu, and Dongping Li. Yi
ge Zhongguo ge ming qin li zhe de si ren ji lu. BeiJin Shi: Dang dai Zhongguo chu ban she,
2006. (Private Record of a Chinese
Revolutionary)
The author was a teenager during the Long March,
working as a paramedic.
P. 31:
Medical unit and Red Army HQ left Danba (Rong brag), advancing westward, crossing a ridge, and
walking down into a valley with a rapidly flowing river, breaking into snow
white waves. Suddenly gunshots were fired from the hillside across the river, the
bullets flying over our heads. Everyone in the column, men and women, old and
young, hid behind rocks.
Suddenly, a teenager stood up, facing the gunfire,
fearlessly walking to the riverside. Everybody was shocked by his action,
shouting “Get down!”, “Come back!” Gunshots sounded again, and the youth fell
down onto the riverbank.
The tribal chief (serving as interpreter for the Red
Army) shouted: “They are Red Army, they are on their way north to fight the
Japanese!”
The Tibetans on the hillside across the river replied,
and the chief translated for General Commander Zhu De: “How many Red Army are
there? Last time the Red Army passed our area, they herded all our cows and
sheep away, and now you have come to steal our cattle again!”
I happened to lie down next to General Commander Zhu
De, and heard him saying to the chief: “We are real Red Army, we don’t take even
a needle and thread from the people!”
The chief shouted some words, and gunshots were fired again
from the other side of the river, with shouting in Tibetan. The chief
translated: “We don’t believe you are Red Army, we don’t want you to take our
cattle again.”
Fu Zhong said anxiously: “Send the troops up, fight
them off!”
Zhu De said: “Better not to open fire. Tell the men to
go around from the side. It would be best if we can scare them away.”
The standoff across the river went on for the whole
morning, shouting and shooting alternately. Zhu De asked the chief to shout
again: “If you don’t allow us to pass, let us cross the river and negotiate
with you. We will make peace with you, no fighting.”
Finally the Tibetans shouted: “If you really are Red
Army, we will not shoot.” For a time they stopped shooting. The Red Army tried
to move on, and in the sights of Tibetan guns, we walked downstream.
Source 4:
Chen
Bojun…[et al], Hong jun chang zheng ri ji. Beijing: Dang an chu ban she, 1986.
(Diary of the Red Army’s Long March. Beijing:
Archival Publishing House, 1986)
This book is
a compilation of four people’s diaries. This section is the diary of Tong
Xiaopeng. Tong was Secretary of Political Department and Political Security
Bureau, First Division, First Group Army, also known as the Central Red Army,
one of the three main Red Army forces on the Long March. From June 1977 to
April 1982, Tong was
Deputy Director of the United Front Work Department of CPC Central Committee.
Selected
translation:
p.133:
(1935)
June 28
Entering Zhuo Ke Ji. (15 li )[3]
The masses here are all Tibetans, our vanguard had contact with
them, so they all ran away.
p. 134-135:
July 3
Originally planned for Cha Ba, but the bridge was damaged by
Tibetans. Half way we met the vanguard division detouring back. We detoured to
the mountains as well, spending the night in Cang De (about 30 li).
Tibetans in this place once captured and killed the rear of our
vanguard platoon.
p. 135:
July 4
(Because) all the masses ran away, (we) were unable to find the
route, so we rest here and look for guides.
July 5
Still resting.
Difficult to find grain in this area, but found and brought back
many cows, sheep and pigs. Eating meat every day is more nourishing than the
time when we were not short of grain.
July 7
This place isn’t far from Song Pan (Zung chu). The troops
started moving, planning to annihilate enemies in Mao Er Gai (dMu dge), also planning to camp outdoors tonight.
Everybody brought food rations. We are the rear (last?) segment, resting here.
p.
136:
July 9
After daybreak, each unit lit fires to
warm up, and after that we started moving, and walked 20 li to Zha Wo. [4] This place had about 100 families, but most
houses were burned down by trouble makers. The Tibetans really hated us for
this, constantly shooting in (our direction). In the afternoon (we) continued
to move and camped at (a place) some 10 li
from Mao Er Gai. (30 li)
p. 138
July 30
…
Heard the troops ahead are sending us 100 cows (he didn’t specify yaks) and
30 sheep, and we have dispatched people to receive (the animals). Extremely
happy.
p. 40
Aug. 4
The troops in front of us are still building the bridge
(destroyed by local Tibetans), so we stayed here. Masses all ran away, taking all the grains
with them. Can’t find one grain of wheat.
(Apparently they got stuck for nearly a week)
Aug. 8
Moved to Zha Wo (Tsa bu) (about 30 li). Crossed a river on the way. Failed
to build the bridge, the whole army had to cross on foot. Saw a few people
carried away by the current and drowned. Really scary! I crossed the river on
horseback, luckily I didn’t encounter any danger.
Aug. 10
Rest. Called to thresh wheat. Beating wheat on the
threshing ground all day long. Everybody was working
hard to meet the quota of 30 jin of
flour per person.
p. 141:
August 20
(They reached Mao Er Gai the previous day)
Rest here.
Army is going to take action soon,
advancing toward Gan Nan (today’s ‘Southern Gansu’ Tibetan Autonomous
Prefecture), completing our task to communize Sichuan, Shaanxi and
Gansu.[5] However,
we have to cross grassland on the way, so we need to carry enough grain. Today
the troops are adding more grain. Since the old wheat (last year’s wheat) has
all been eaten up, (we) had to cut wheat in the fields with our own hands. The
whole day everybody was cutting and threshing wheat, very tiring!
(They entered the grasslands on Aug. 24th, and reached
Ban You (Ban yul) on Aug. 28, without any incident. According to his
description, Banyul had about 200 low, flat-roof “cow barns”.)
Source
5:
Sichuan
Sheng Aba Zangzu Qiangzu Zizhizhou Heishui Xian di fang zhi bian zuan wei yuan
hui. Heishui Xian zhi. [Chendu
Shi]: Min zu chu ban she, 1993.
(Hei Shui
Country Gazetteer. Compiled by Local History Compilation Committee, Hei
Shui County, Ngaba Prefecture, Sichuan. Chengdu: Nationalities Publishing
House, 1993)
P. 2:
From
June 1935 to August 1936, the First and Fourth Group Armies of the Red Army entered
Hei Shui (Khro chu) three times, spending
altogether over one year and two months there. The Central Committee (of the
Party) held two important meetings in Luhua (rDo kha) (near the present county seat). Mao Zedong, Zhu De, Zhou
Enlai, Xu Xiangqian, Liu Bocheng and other important leaders attended the
meetings. …In Hei Shui, the Red Army raised about 710,000 jin of grains, extracted about 5000 jin of salt, borrowed over 30,000 cattle of all kinds, (weighing)
over 1 million jin, borrowed over
10,000 jin of animal fat as food and
a large quantity of cattle fur, yak wool, sheep wool, linen and wild animal
skins to protect against the cold.[1]
[1] 1 Chinese jin
= 0.5 kg, so the Red Army raised 355,000 kg grains, 2500 kg salt, etc. 30,000 cattle,
meaning domestic animals, including yak, sheep, goat, etc. From the context, it
seems to say that those animals weighed over one million jin = 500,000 kg.
Judging by the weight, it must have been mostly yaks that they “borrowed”.
Source 6:
Wu,
Faxian. Sui yue jian nan: Wu Faxian hui yi lu. Xianggang: Bei xing chu ban she, 2006.
(Hard Times:
Memoirs of Wu Faxian. Hong Kong: North Star Publishing Co., 2006)
Wu Faxian was a high level military figure. He was
Political Commissar, 2nd Regiment of 2nd Division in
First Army during the Long March. He was Lieutenant General in 1955.
In 1967 he was appointed Chief of Staff and Commander in Chief of the Air Force.
He was believed to be one of the accomplices in Lin Biao’s ill-fated 1971 coup.
After Lin Biao’s death, he was arrested and sentenced to 7 years in jail.
Chapter
Three
Section
17 - Entering the Tibetan Area
pp. 77-80
After crossing the snow
mountain, (the army) entered the Tibetan area.
Gradually problems were getting more and more serious, mostly due to
provision shortage, hunger and hostility from the minority people.
Troops continued to
advance after crossing the snow mountain, marching northward along the Big Gold
River. The river was deep and flowing rapidly, and the water icy cold as it
came down from snow mountains. Before long, the troops arrived at Zhuo Ke Ji
and Two River Mouth via Mao Gong (Tib: bTsan lha - now Xiao Jin county). This and the surrounding areas were
entirely inhabited by Tibetans, with not a single Han person to be seen. Tibetans
usually built their houses on hilltops, at least one km from the foot of the
mountain. There were no villages on the valley floor. After a day’s march, we would have to walk an
additional 1 to 2.5 km uphill to reach a village campsite. The next morning we would walk downhill and continue
marching in the valley. We walked up and down like this all the way to Shua Jin
Si (lHa rgyal gling, now in
Hong Yuan County). Our regimental
HQ was stationed in a village on the hillside. Lhagyal Ling was a big temple, I
hadn’t seen such a big Lamaist temple thus far on the Long March. It was truly
magnificent.
Since the Tibetans did not know us, all
the villagers nearby ran away. However, they did not take their property with
them. They left not only grain, but also pigs, chickens, cows and sheep. In the
beginning, we strictly followed the “three disciplines and eight notices”, and didn’t
touch anything inside the temple or the peoples’ homes. But after a few days’ marching,
we encountered difficulties. We ran out of provisions. What could be done?
People all ran away, not a single Tibetan around. All the food brought with us
from Tian Quan and Lu Shan (both
in present Ya’an county, Sichuan Province) was consumed, and the whole troop was on the edge of starvation.
At that time, everyone had contradictory feelings. On the one side, rules had
to be followed, on the other side, troops were truly out of food. Red Army
soldiers were humans too; they had to eat as well. Without food they could not
survive, let alone march and fight.
It all began with word
that eating pea seedlings in the field was allowed. But these alone were not sufficient
to ease hunger, so it was extended to eating the grain in people’s homes. Some
claimed that they left money; some claimed that they left an IOU (written
acknowledgement of a debt) when they took grain from Tibetans’ homes. However,
as far as I know, in the majority of cases it was not like this, for even if
payment was intended, we did not have much money at that time. Some did leave
IOUs, saying they would pay back in the future, but everybody understood that
this was like “tiger borrowing pig, only take, no return”. “In future” - when would
that be! Later on, some (units) did not even bother to leave IOUs. Paying back
was impossible. All the army units were the same, eating whatever they laid
their eyes on, taking whatever they found, eating all the food in Tibetan
homes, leaving neither money nor IOUs.
As the army advanced,
things got even harder. The Tibetans probably knew of our previous behaviour;
they moved all the provisions from their homes, hiding and burying them in the
mountains, and even hid their utensils. Without provisions, what could we do?
In order to survive, we had to break the rules openly. We took whatever was
available; if nothing was available we searched around; if searches yielded
nothing, we dug the ground. Sometimes when we dug, wow!, stores of barley could
be found! Whenever such a “big one” was unearthed, one unit could not take all
the contents, and urgent notice would be sent to another unit to share it. Occasionally
oil and salt were unearthed too. In that case, neither money nor IOUs were left
- once the stuff was found, it would just be shared out among us.
Tibetans were always
hostile to the Han, and with the Guomindang’s instigation, it was only natural
that they feared and hated the Red Army. On the way through the Tibetan region,
the First Group Army saw nothing but empty mountain dwellings and villages. Along
the route almost all homes were abandoned. We came to such a sparsely populated
place, no houses to sleep in, no one to be found who could give us directions. Not
a single soul could be seen, nothing to eat. Once in a while we did find
something, but it was only a little barley, and our cooks did not even know how
to prepare it. In order to survive, the troops had to go all over to round up cattle,
and used all their wits to dig up the grain the (inhabitants) had buried.
Tibetans felt that the Red Army were out to take away their property, so they
were even more hostile.
One day, our troop, the 3rd regiment, came
to a place near Zhuo Ke Ji. We had to cross a cold river, planning to spend the
night in the mountain village on the other side. The water was bitingly cold.
After crossing the river, we stationed ourselves in a hillside village, about 1
km climb above the valley. That day we happened to run out of food. Neither the
regimental HQ nor ourselves, the Political Department, had anything to eat.
Therefore I took a couple of comrades
from the Political Department and walked up into the mountains looking for
food. Below, there was cultivated land with growing crops, and above, dense
forest. We brought weapons with us, and found a large basket of salted meat.
This was great, I thought, now we had something to eat. Further up we found a
yak. Now everybody was really excited. At that time it was 4 or 5 o’clock in
the afternoon. A couple of staff members suggested to me that we gather some
twigs to build a fire and roast some salted meat for dinner, as we hadn’t eaten
anything since a little breakfast in the morning. “Fine,” I agreed, “let’s fill
up our stomachs first before getting the stuff back.”
I
did not dare to spend too much time in the mountains, for fear that Tibetans
might be hiding there to attack us. So I asked everyone to bring the meat and
yak down, and roast the meat at a spot approximately 200 meters from our camp.
Little did I know, but just at that moment, all of a sudden, a large group of
Tibetans showed up! Some of them held guns, some had swords, others had sticks.
We were frightened and ran away with only a few pieces of salted meat. The yak
was lost.
This was the first time I experienced the
minority people chasing and fighting against us. They could not be blamed
though. We ate their food, took their belongings, making their life harder, how could they not fight us? Seeing that
there were only three or four of us, why would they hesitate (to fight)? They
led the yak back and stopped chasing us.
…
After passing Zhou Ke Ji, we marched on
along the river. This river was called Black Water River. A tributary of the
Min Jiang, it was very long. One day, while
on the march, we saw some people belonging to the 2nd division ahead of
us turning back. We asked them why they had turned back, was it that there was
no way ahead? They said that was not the case. Then they told us that they belonged
to the 4th and 5th regiments of the 2nd division, and Liu Yalou, the political
commissar, had ordered them to deliver pork, beef, mutton and grain to the 6th
regiment.
We felt strange that a special delivery
should be sent to the 6th regiment. They explained that Zhu Rui, director of
Political Department of the First Group Army, together with Chen Guang,
commander of the 2nd division, marched up north on the left wing; the 4th
and 5th regiments and the division HQ marched up on the right wing. The
commander of the 6th regiment was Zhu Shuiqiu, the commissar was Wang Jicheng.
When the 6th Regiment closed in on Aba (rNga ba), it was
badly beaten by Tibetan horsemen. Fighting with both guns and swords, those
minority horsemen were quite powerful, and our troops could not fight them off.
They were not able to push forward, but could not find provisions if they retreated.
They had nothing but herbs to eat. They starved like this for seven days,
eating anything they could find. Even Zhu Rui, Chen Guang, Zhu Shuiqiu and Wang
Jicheng were starved out of shape, unable to walk. This regiment used to have
1300 soldiers, but only 500 or 600 made it back; more than half died, either
killed by Tibetans or of starvation. They lost quite a lot of guns as well. For
this reason Liu Yalou wanted the 4th and 5th Regiments to send them food, in
order to rescue Zhu Rui, Chen Guang and their surviving soldiers. It was really
hard at that time!
….
pp. 81-
Section 18 - Arrival at Mao
Er Gai
Around mid July 1935, we reached
Mao Er Gai (dMu dge), on the edge of the grassland. The village
was comparatively big, with 300 to 400 families and many Lamaist temples. The
area was rich in barley cultivation, but when we arrived there, the barley was
not ripe yet.
…
… There were no villages
in the camping area assigned to our three regiments, we had to camp in the
pasture where Tibetans keep their cattle. It was surrounded by mountains on all
four sides, and in the middle was a small basin with a stream, and a stone grinder
standing on the bank. We stationed ourselves in the shed the Tibetans used to
keep their animals. The walls of this type of building were made of wicker plastered
with yak dung, and the floor was just damp ground. This was the kind of place
the troops lived in, and lived for two weeks. Those two weeks were really
tough. The masses had all run away to the mountains, not a single one of them
could be spotted the whole day long. There wasn’t much grain to begin with, and
the number of soldiers was so big that before long, provisions ran out. Not
much could be done. Every day, teams of soldiers were dispatched to dig up buried
stores, trying every possible method. The barley unearthed was boiled with
water without even grinding it into flour. We ate it just like that, nothing to
go with it. Sometimes we had to eat herbs. …
Due to the large number
of people stationed there, before long even the herbs were eaten up. …
…Five days later, we
received orders. The headquarters of the 1st Corps, 2nd division and 1st division
were to shift to Bo Luo Che (a
place close to Songpan),
where we had to find provisions to feed ourselves.
It took about two days to
walk to Bo Luo Che. This time the 2nd division was also marching ahead as
vanguard, followed up by Group Army HQ. Along the way we saw some bodies of Red
Army soldiers in the woods by the trail. They were unable to keep up with the
troops and were killed by Tibetans. It was hot here, some of the bodies had
decomposed, and had maggots wriggling on them. We felt so sad to see this. Of
course, we couldn’t blame those Tibetans. In order to survive, we ate their
food, occupied their homes, and they had nowhere to go but fleeing into the
mountains, and suffering from the elements. They hated us for it. When the troops
were marching, our soldiers stayed close to one another, and they did not dare
to come down. Whenever they saw a gap in the line, or spotted soldiers falling
behind, they would dash down, capture a couple of them and hack them to death
before running back to the mountains. On the way, I saw with my own eyes about
100 Red Army soldiers killed by Tibetans. So many people sacrificed their lives
just for the sake of finding provisions. How miserable!
p. 83
The director of our
Supply Department was Xu Lin, a rather capable man from Jiangxi. One day, at
one digging, he unearthed a whole pot of butter, plus some sausages (pork
intestines filled with fat). He distributed these to the whole regiment, and
the commander, political commissar,
chief of staff and general branch secretary
each got a long sausage. It was really precious, even though it tasted awful.
For the next few days, we lived almost entirely on this sausage. First we cooked
some herbs, adding a small piece of sausage, then managed to get some barley to
stir fry or boil. Days were passed like this.
No serious battles were
fought during this time, but attrition was high, mostly due to the problem in resupply. When we reached a place, the first thing the commanders
and political commissars had to do was search for food in villages that other
troops had not already visited. I remember in one case, the political commissar
of the 5th regiment, 2nd division brought
the regiment’s direct team (a troop under the regiment’s direct command, not
belonging to any division) to look for provisions, only to be fought back by
Tibetans with tremendous loss. About 80 people were killed, including the
commissar, and about 20 were captured by the Tibetan villagers as well. Later,
Chen Guang, commander of the 2nd division, sent apologies to the Tibetans and
offered to pay a ransom for the captured men. The Tibetans replied that they
didn’t want money, but if we promised not to take their grain again, they would
release our people. This was a true story. We were not the only ones hunting
for provisions in this way. The Central Column (the troop commanded by Mao
Zedong and Zhu De during the Long March) did the
same. They also dispatched a working group to search for food as soon as they
arrived at a place. Comrade Liu Shaoqi once led a troop to hunt for food for
the Central Column.
There were many Lamaist
temples in Mao Er Gai area. The temples were quite big, with many Buddha (statues),
both big and small. The big statues were surely made of clay, and painted with gold.
The small ones were gray, covered with thick dust. The big ones were about one
foot in height, the small ones just a couple of inches. They were all nicely
made, with arms and legs.
One
of our quartermasters visited a Lamaist temple. He walked around, and somehow
he touched those tiny statues, then
licked one. To his surprise he found it tasted sweet. He licked again, and it
was indeed sweet. It turned out that all those dust-covered little Buddha
(statues), big or small, were sweet. It was wonderful, like Columbus
discovering the New World! He brought some of the small Buddha (statues) back,
washed them clean, then added water to boil. They were all made of flour, and tasted
really good.
Later
on, we learned that Tibetans made flour Buddhas with butter and honey as
offerings to temples on happy occasions, such as the birth of a child. Day by
day, year by year, the accumulation of flour Buddhas amounted to large
quantities. Some of them weighed as much as 3 to 5 jin (1.5 to 2.5
kg), some 1 or 2 jin, some a few ounces. Offerings
from local lords (Tu si), tribal chiefs and rich people were bigger, those
from poor people were smaller. Tibetans were highly respectful of those offered
statues, nobody dared to remove them. We shouldn’t have removed them either.
But as we were out of provisions and facing starvation, we had no other
choice. The quartermaster collected two
large basketsful of flour Buddhas, brought them back and boiled them up. Everybody was happily munching, saying “Look
what kind of food they have here!”
From then
on, whenever we arrived at a place, the quartermaster went everywhere searching
for Lamaist temples, and brought back flour Buddhas to eat. When the flour
Buddhas ran out, someone found that the yak hide was edible too. So we ate all
the drums. The drums in some Lamaist temple were quite big. When we couldn’t
find anything to eat, we just went to temples and tore down the hide used for the
drum skins, soaked and boiled it, then just ate it like that. When we ran out
of anything edible, we had to eat mutton if it could be found. Mutton was
greasy, and as we had no salt, it tasted awful. It was in Mao Er Gai that I
learned to eat mutton.
We were stationed there for over a month, and
went through many villages, but hardly saw any Tibetans. Wherever we went,
everybody, men and women, young and old, had run away. In Bo Luo Chi, I did see
one young Tibetan woman with all her hair down, walking on the road. We didn’t
speak a word with her. We didn’t know what to say to her. Due to the language
barrier, she wouldn’t understand us, and we wouldn’t understand her either.
....
pp. 88-
Section 19 - Crossing the
Grassland
…
In order to cross the grassland without incident, our superiors
wanted everybody to prepare 10 to 15 days’ food. Each one of us had to get
around 15 jin of food. We had to turn
over a certain amount to the Central Column and Military Committee Column as
well. Many high officials belonged to these two columns, and they were too busy
to prepare so many provisions. I remember our troop, the 3rd Regiment, handed
over 400 or 500 jin of grains.
Where could we find so much grain?
We had delayed our advance nearly two months moving around the Mao Er
Gai area, we had almost finished all the grain we could lay our hands on already,
and there were no local people around. Where could we find grain!
In order to get provisions, the entire division turned back to a place
near Mao Er Gai, spending three days there just for this purpose. Before this,
we had already eaten up practically everything the Tibetans had hidden in the
mountains, buried underground or offered to the temples, and even the nearly-ripe
barley in the fields was almost all gone.
The only grain left was some unripened
barley. We hand-picked the barley
heads one by one, then hand-rubbed the seed off. The barley heads were spiky,
and made your hands bloody. In this way we worked for three days, collecting
about one 2 to 3 jin each day at
most. I collected about 8 jin
(altogether). Some soldiers were stronger, and could get more, but on average
it was far less than the required 15 jin
each. Of course there were quite a few people who managed to collect more than
15 jin. But all the barley in the
area had now gone, and there was no way to get more.
We brought the barley seeds from the field, used washing basins to
roast them on the fire, then stored the roasted barley in our food bags. This
was the provision we counted on for crossing the grassland. Each person was
responsible for his own food, whatever he could collect.
…
p. 95
(They were about to walk out onto the grassland) About 4 or 5
o’clock in the afternoon, we reached a village. As soon as we arrived, the
first thing was to search for food. Little did they know that the local lords
and tribal chiefs had told the people to bring all their food up to the
mountains. Except for crops in the fields, everything was hidden away. The only
things left were a couple of chickens, one pig or two that were too slow to be
led away, and dogs. …Good thing that the fields were not empty; there were
peas, turnips, potatoes and garlic. Most important was potatoes, we dug up
piles of them. Without that we would be starving. Some troops ate sheep or cows
when they found them.
p. 97
(The third day of
crossing the grassland) Shortly after daybreak, a soldier from the 1st Company
stumbled into our room. He had been hacked in the head, and was soaked with
blood. He could not speak, just shouted “ah, ah” towards me. What had happened?
I immediately sent some people to find out. It turned out that before our main
force came back, the Tibetans took their opportunity. Over 100 Tibetans armed
with swords came down from the mountain, and killed the entire company posted
there as sentries, about 50 to 60 people, including the commander and the
political commissar. They took all the guns and ammunition, including two light
machine guns.[6]
Part I: Eat the Buddha!
Part III: Tibetan sources
Part IV: Documents issued by the Central CCP Leadership
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[1]
The 7th Cog rtse rgyal po bSod nams tshe ring / Zhuo Ke Ji Tu si Suo
Guanyin 桑郎泽让 was fluent in spoken and
written Chinese. Choktsé was one of the 18 kingdoms or principalities of
Gyalrong.
[2] Lin Wei
didn’t write about his own experience in Ngaba, but we can see what state the
Red Army were in by the time they reached there (JL).
[3] One Chinese li = 500 metres. The diary records the
number of li walked each day.
[4] Today’s Zawo Xiang (Tib: Tsa
bu), Hei Shui County (Tib: Khro chu), an agricultural area known as the “granary of Hei Shui”, where the
Red Army seized a large amount of grain. (JL)
[5]
The term is Chi Hua, “to make the area red”,
meaning to spread Communism in those areas.
