From "Mao Zedong's 1938 Letter to Chiang Kai-shek," On Mao Zedong's Recognition of Chiang Kai-shek's Leadership of the War of Resistance!

History is best told through history. Here let us use "Mao Zedong's 1938 Letter to Chiang Kai-shek" to see Mao Zedong's recognition of Chiang Kai-shek's leadership role in the War of Resistance Against Japan!

Respected Mr. Jieshi, for your kind consideration:

Comrades including Enlai have returned to Yan'an and spoke of your great virtue; my admiration is complete.

You are guiding the entire nation in an unprecedentedly great war of national revolutionary resistance. There is no one among our countrymen who does not look up to you.

In these fifteen months of resistance, the more setbacks we suffer, the harder we fight; we press on without slackening. Though the stubborn invader has not yet withdrawn its savage edge, the initial foundation of victory has already been laid. The road ahead is bright, and hope is boundless!

At this session, the Sixth Plenary Meeting of our Party Central Committee unanimously judged that the resistance situation is gradually entering a new stage. The feature of this stage will be this: on one hand it will be more difficult; on the other hand it will surely be more progressive. Its task is to unite the whole people, consolidate and expand the anti-Japanese front, persist in protracted war, mobilize new forces, overcome difficulties, and prepare a counteroffensive. In this process, the enemy will certainly exploit the events in Europe and our country's weaknesses to engineer all kinds of sabotage plots harmful to national unity and solidarity.

Therefore, we believe unity and solidarity in this period are more important than in any other period. Only if all parties and groups, together with the people of the whole nation, exert their utmost efforts under your unified leadership -- strictly guarding against and smashing the enemy's sabotage plots, cleansing pessimism from our people, raising national consciousness and confidence in victory, and implementing the necessary wartime policies of this new stage -- can we achieve the objective of halting enemy offensives and preparing our own counteroffensive. Because Wuhan is under urgent pressure, we wish Comrade Enlai, without waiting for the conference (note: the Sixth Central Committee's Sixth Plenum) to finish, to return to Wuhan at once, respectfully call on you, and discuss all matters with you. What remains unsaid is entrusted to Enlai for face-to-face presentation.

At this very moment, the Kuomintang and Communist parties share fate and fortune; this is also the crucial hinge of long war and long unity.

Zedong firmly believes that long-term unity between the two parties will certainly sustain a long war. However ferocious and stubborn the enemy may be, it will ultimately fail. The Chinese nation of 450 million people will surely, through prolonged and arduous struggle, overcome difficulties, build strength, launch counteroffensives, expel the stubborn invaders, and stand proudly in East Asia.

With this heart and this will, I know you must feel the same.
I write this especially to convey my thoughts. Wishing you health! And with

revolutionary salutations to the nation
Mao Zedong, respectfully
September 29, 27th Year of the Republic