Changsha was the only provincial capital the Reds took, and Peng held it for eleven days, proclaiming a Communist government, with his HQ in the American Bible Institute. His success rang alarm bells in Western capitals, especially Washington, which now, for the first time, registered the Chinese Communists as a serious force. One reason was the death in combat of Seaman 1st Class Samuel Elkin, the first US serviceman to die fighting Chinese Communists, killed on the USS Guam on the Xiang River by shelling from Peng’s forces en route to Changsha — on the Fourth of July. Gunboats of four foreign powers, particularly the USS Palos, played a critical role in driving Peng out of the city on 6 August.
In mid-August, Peng received a message out of the blue saying that Mao was coming to “help” him. Mao wrote simultaneously to Shanghai, on 19 August, to say that he had abandoned his assignment to attack Nanchang in order to go to Peng’s rescue, claiming that Peng was in deep trouble—“suffering considerable deaths and losses.” Peng told Mao flatly that he was not in trouble and did not need help, but this was not enough to shake off Mao, who cunningly countered by telling Peng to come and help him, as he was about to attack a town called Yonghe, located in between them, about 100 km east of Changsha.
When Peng joined up with him, on 23 August, Mao announced that Peng’s corps was now merged with his own, under his own command, leaving Peng as mere deputy military commander, under Zhu De. Mao tried to blow smoke at Shanghai (and Moscow) by claiming that the goal in merging the armies was to attack Changsha a second time — a move opposed by both Peng and Zhu De, who argued that it had no prospect of succeeding, as the element of surprise, essential to Peng’s capture of the city, had been lost.
But Mao insisted, and assured Shanghai that together the two corps could easily “occupy Changsha … then attack Wuhan … to trigger a general uprising in the whole of China.” Mao stoked Shanghai’s delusions by suggesting that the occupation of Wuhan was imminent, and with it the establishment of a Red government: “Please could the Centre instruct on taking Wuhan,” he wrote in his most ingratiating style, “and start preparations for organising a government …” In fact, Mao had no intention of going anywhere near Wuhan.
Nor did he really think he could seize Changsha. Still, to cement his absorption of Peng, he ordered Changsha to be attacked. The result was “huge human losses,” Moscow was told. These were much greater for Peng’s units than for Mao’s, as Mao had avoided a genuine strike at Changsha, whereas Peng had faithfully carried out orders and attacked the city directly The GRU chief in China, Gailis, told Moscow that “Mao just looked on.”
At the end of three weeks, Mao called off the siege, insisting that Peng’s army should move off with him. This met with resistance from Peng’s officers, and some even tried to break away. (The Chinese Red Army, like Chinese forces in general at this point, was not like a modern army where orders were obeyed unconditionally and unquestioningly.) Mao soon launched a bloody purge against them.
Mao also used the siege of Changsha, which made headlines, to promote himself to the top job, and raise his profile further. When he started the siege, on 23 August, he proclaimed an All-China Revolutionary Committee, put it in command of all Red Armies, governments and Party branches, with himself as chairman, and sent an announcement to this effect to the press.
Two months before, on 25 June, Mao had already issued two press releases giving himself this title. No newspapers seem to have carried these, but Mao pasted them up as notices. Shanghai’s reaction had been to announce on 1 August that the post of chairman belonged to the Party’s (nominal) general secretary, Hsiang Chung-fa. Mao was now reiterating his self-appointment over Hsiang’s head, in defiance of Shanghai.
But Mao received no punishment. The new Red state that Moscow had decided to install in China needed power-hungry leaders, and Mao was the hungriest around. On 20 September his second-level membership of the Politburo was restored, paving the way to top jobs in the coming Red state. Moscow had rejected Wuhan as the location, ordering the state to be established in “the Red Army’s largest secure region”—which was Red Jiangxi.
The defeat and heavy casualties inflicted by Mao’s siege of Changsha were blamed on the impulsive Li Li-san. Li-san had told the Russians it was their “internationalist duty” to send in troops to help the Chinese Reds in their fight. During the Russian invasion of Manchuria the year before, he had gladly called for the Chinese Reds to “defend the Soviet Union with arms.” Now he proposed that Moscow should reciprocate, and this riled Stalin, who suspected Li-san of trying to drag him into war with Japan. Li-san had also incurred Stalin’s ire by saying that Mongolia, which Soviet Russia had annexed from China, should become part of Red China. The Comintern condemned Li-san on 25 August for being “hostile to Bolshevism, and hostile to the Comintern,” and in October a letter arrived ordering him to Moscow. There Stalin turned him into a kind of all-purpose scapegoat, and he was repeatedly called on to stand up and denounce himself.† Li-san entered history books as the man responsible for all the Red losses in the early 1930s. High on the list of losses were those suffered during the siege of Changsha, which were in fact entirely Mao’s responsibility, incurred for his own personal power.
MAO’S QUEST FOR POWER also brought tragedy to his family. In 1930 his ex-wife Kai-hui and their three young sons, the youngest three years old, were still living in her family home on the outskirts of Changsha when Mao laid siege to the city.
Mao had left them exactly three years before, when he set off, ostensibly to take part in an “Autumn Harvest Uprising,” but actually to poach his first armed force. Barely four months after his departure, he had married somebody else.
Although Changsha was ruled by a fiercely anti-Communist general, Ho Chien, Kai-hui had been left alone, as she was not engaged in Communist activities. Even after Peng De-huai had taken Changsha and nearly killed him, Ho Chien took no reprisals against her. But after Mao turned up and subjected the city to a second lengthy assault, the Nationalist general decided to take revenge. Kai-hui was arrested together with her eldest son, An-ying, on An-ying’s eighth birthday, 24 October. She was offered a deaclass="underline" her freedom if she would make a public announcement divorcing Mao and denouncing him. She refused, and was executed on the cloudy morning of 14 November 1930. Next day the Hunan Republican Daily reported her death under the headline “Wife of Mao Tse-tung executed yesterday — everyone claps and shouts with satisfaction.” This undoubtedly reflected more loathing of Mao than of Kai-hui.
When Kai-hui was brought into the “court” in army HQ, wearing a long dark blue gown, she showed no sign of fear. There on a desk were placed a brush, some red ink, and a sticker with her name on it. After asking a few questions, the judge ticked the sticker with the brush dipped in the red ink, and threw it on the floor. This was the traditional equivalent of signing a death warrant. At this, two executioners peeled off her gown as spoils. Another found a bonus—2.5 yuan wrapped in a handkerchief in one of the pockets.
And so she went to her death, on a winter day, wearing a thin blouse, at the age of twenty-nine. As she was taken through the streets, tied up with ropes, which was the normal treatment for someone about to be executed, an officer hailed a rickshaw for her, while soldiers ran along on both sides. The execution ground lay just beyond one of the city gates, among the graves of the people executed who had no one to take their bodies home. After they shot her, some of the firing squad took off her shoes and threw them as far as they could: otherwise, legend went, they would be followed home and haunted by the ghost of the dead.