Mao's Road to Power

By January 1939, following the Sixth Plenum, Mao had emerged as the most important single leader of the Chinese Communist Party, but had not yet reached the towering status that he achieved following the Rectification Campaign and the Seventh Congress. During the years 1939-1941, conditions became increasingly difficult for the Communists, both because of intensified Japanese efforts at "pacification", and because of deteriorating relations with the Guomindang. This volume contains extensive documentation about the Guomindang onslaught against the New Fourth Army in 1941, and Mao's response to it. It also examines foreign affairs, as Mao struggled to come to terms with contradictory developments such as the Nazi-Soviet pact of August 1939, the Soviet-Japanese non-aggression pact of April 1941, Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union, and war between Japan and the United States.