Ten rumors in War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression： the Eighth Route Army planted opium on a large scale.

[On August 15th, 1945, Japan announced its unconditional surrender. After eight years of hard fighting, China finally won. However, the people and events in this period of time are gradually out of shape in the reports of future generations. On the occasion of the 69th anniversary of Japan’s surrender, Observer.com specially launched a series of "Ten Rumors of the Anti-Japanese War" to set the record straight. Previously published "Zhang Lingfu, the Top Ten Rumors in War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression》、《Sun Liren, the top ten rumors in War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, buried the Japanese army alive.》、《Ten rumors of the Anti-Japanese War: "Fishing posts"""and"The chairman’s guard of the top ten rumors of the anti-Japanese war》。 】

In the modern history of China, opium is a scar that can’t be bypassed anyway. It has harmed hundreds of millions of Chinese, and the resulting war has also changed the direction of China’s traditional society. Therefore, today, the vast majority of Chinese, who are sane and law-abiding, will inevitably show an expression of disgust when referring to drugs represented by opium, and then condemn them with a hundred thousand points.

However, with the help of the increasingly developed network platform, the saying that the CPC and the Eighth Route Army were built and built into large-scale planting, selling and encouraging opium consumption, which was originally circulated in academic circles, quickly spread among the people. After reading similar rumors, some readers who are not very rich in historical knowledge can naturally understand the anger in their hearts, but history is really like this?

The origin of rumors

The story that communist party and the Eighth Route Army planted and sold opium first appeared during the Anti-Japanese War. At that time, in order to package its "anti-drug achievements", the Japanese puppet government often organized people to stage a farce of "communist drug trafficking", and then published the news that "opium X was seized and communist X was captured alive" in a certain place in its imperial traitor media. However, during most of the Anti-Japanese War, these reports did not attract much attention from public opinion at that time and later academic circles.

In addition, in recent years, many so-called "old cadres", "old Red Army", "my grandfather", "my great grandfather" and "my second uncle" have appeared on the Chinese Internet, and "witnessed" the communist party Eighth Route Army’s large-scale opium cultivation and trafficking in various places. However, these "testimonies" almost have no exact information about time, place, people, etc., and there are almost no other objective evidences that can be corroborated. Therefore, such "testimonies" are unacceptable to those who are interested in textual research on historical issues. The following "versions" really make the saying that "the Eighth Route Army sells opium on a large scale" a topic worthy of discussion:

First of all, the Diary of Yan ‘an, the masterpiece of the Comintern’s liaison in the CPC Central Committee and the agent of the Soviet Intelligence Department, Peter Buffilovich Vladimirov. In this book, Vladimir said that he not only witnessed the 359th Brigade of the Eighth Route Army harvesting opium in Nanniwan in the 1930s, but also was personally admitted by senior leaders of the Chinese Communist Party such as Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai and Deng Xiaoping. Because of Vrakimilov’s special status, the publication of Yan ‘an Diary immediately caused a sensation in overseas academic circles.

The second statement comes from Xie Juezai Diary. In his diary in 1944, a few days wrote:

"That is, the legal tender for special goods accounts for government revenue … … Do your best. … … I don’t know that his responsibility is to sell black and white to make up for the financial deficit. " (January 18, 1944)

"Interesting words heard at the symposium: … … ‘ There are few multilateral currencies for special goods, and the future will be terrible ’ " (12 March 1944)

"Leading organs to launch a thing, must be very considerate, often a small step error, can make a big fuss among the masses. ‘ Domestic sales of special goods ’ That is an example. " （1944.3.14）

Attentive readers have noticed that a word called "special goods" is mentioned in these diaries. It is said that this "special goods" is opium.

The third statement comes from the document "Interim Measures for the Collection and Management of Tobacco Tax in Huaitaixi County" which is said to have been promulgated and implemented by the Eighth Route Army in July 1945. This document can be seen everywhere on the Internet now, so it is omitted here.

The fourth argument comes from the textual research of a "famous scholar" in mainland China: Zhang Side, an Eighth Route Army soldier who praised "dying more than Mount Tai" in Mao Zedong’s famous article "Serving the People", actually died in the process of burning opium. This statement is also widely circulated on the Internet.

Zhang Side

Opium is not just drugs.

I don’t want to analyze the above statements, because it is very necessary to understand the role of opium in the social and economic operation of China before the Anti-Japanese War.

As we all know, the terminal price of opium is quite high, its volume is not big, and its weight is very light. In old China, where the financial system was chaotic, opium, together with gold, silver and pounds and dollars, became the main hard currency in circulation in China at that time, and was called "yellow, white, black and green". Considering the problems of quantity, scale and difficulty in inspection, opium thus overpowered the most valuable gold, silver and foreign currency, and became the currency with the highest cost performance and liquidity in China before the Anti-Japanese War.

In addition, in old China, which has not yet been industrialized, medicine was originally a scarce material. Sometimes military doctors need surgery, but they often find that there is no narcotic except smoky soil. At this time, opium, which has certain anesthetic and antidiarrheal effects, can indeed play the role of medicine at some time.

Although opium was introduced into China from abroad, after the mid-19th century, in order to alleviate the outflow of silver, the Qing government and local governments began to encourage poppy cultivation. Before the Anti-Japanese War, China had become the first drug producer in the world. Most people born after the founding of New China know what opium is like in books, but today, people over 80 years old are almost impressed by the special smell produced when cooking opium. According to the American representative’s speech at the 18th meeting of the Committee on Smoking Prohibition of the League of Nations in 1934, the annual output of opium in the world except China was 1,770 tons. However, according to the estimation of Dr. Lien Teh Wu, director of the National Port Quarantine Administration of China at that time, the opium output of China in 1930 was an astonishing 12,000 tons, equivalent to seven times the world output value. Even so, scholars all over the world generally believed that this data greatly underestimated the opium production capacity of China at that time.

Before the Anti-Japanese War, the grass-roots society in China did not have much prejudice against opium, and opium was also a necessity for wealthy families. There is no doubt that China was once the first drug consumer in the world. According to statistics, the population of China was 474 million in 1932, but the number of drug addicts nationwide reached 80 million, accounting for 16.8% of the total population. Considering the weak grassroots control and statistical ability of the Kuomintang government at that time, the real drug addicts will only be more.

Before the Communist Party of China (CPC) took control of northern Shaanxi, Shanxi and other places, Shanxi-Shaanxi area was one of the most serious areas in China. In the 1920s, Shaanxi had reached the point where there were no smoking houses, and all men, women and children smoked. Smokers accounted for more than 50% of Shaanxi’s total population, and poppy cultivation and opium manufacturing became the only prosperous industries in Shaanxi.

The influence of opium on the old China society completely exceeded the imagination of ordinary people for ordinary drugs. If we use today’s knowledge of drugs to mechanically copy the opium problem during the Anti-Japanese War, it will naturally be difficult to understand the essence of the opium problem.

Bowing to reality: recognizing opium’s status as a hard currency

What is clear and certain is that the Communist Party of China (CPC) is the only political force in the modern history of China that really tried its best to fight drugs in the controlled area. As early as the Agrarian Revolutionary War, the Chinese Communist Party took drug control as one of its priorities. After the end of the Long March and the Red Army stationed in Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia, the hardest hit area with a history of opium cultivation and trafficking for hundreds of years, communist party immediately launched a massive anti-drug campaign in the border area, which basically eliminated drug abuse in the control area in a very short time. At present, it has basically reached a consensus in academic circles.

Some people will ask: "Since you can ban smoking in communist party, why not ban opium as well?" Communist party did try to ban opium cultivation in its jurisdiction and made considerable efforts (this was in sharp contrast to the various warlords who planted and sold cigarettes at that time), but history proved that this idea was still a pattern at that time. It takes many years to restore the land after poppy eradication before it can be used to produce food again, so banning smoking often brings a new problem: how to solve the rations of tobacco farmers and opium processing workers?

From the national economic point of view, even in a state of war, unless there is a natural barrier like the Taiwan Province Strait, the domestic material circulation can be restricted and blocked, but it is difficult to be cut off. After the anti-drug campaign was launched in the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia border region, the situation of smuggling opium into the border region increased rapidly. Because a place bans opium production and restricts opium consumption, it will often lead to an increase in opium prices, which will only stimulate opium cultivation in other provinces and even lead to the outflow of local gold and silver. From this point of view, a truly unified state power is the prerequisite for the complete prohibition of opium, which was not available in China during the Anti-Japanese War.

In history, especially when the base area of the border region was in trouble in 1941, some people and even some units in the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia border region did smuggle opium, and the government of the border region severely cracked down on these behaviors within its capacity. As for the large-scale cultivation of opium within the jurisdiction, it is hard for me to imagine that opium poppy will be cultivated on a large scale in the base area in the early 1940s when the whole country was suffering from famine. After all, opium soil can’t be used as food, and the food bought from enemy-occupied areas through black market and other channels is only a drop in the bucket compared with the population in the border area.

Due to the lack of other enough hard currency, the Eighth Route Army did have a considerable amount of opium opium, which was used to balance the import and export deficit in the border region. Even in the history of the Party and the memoirs of leaders, there are not many taboos about this, because this is the special national conditions of China in those days caused by history. Since it is impossible to seize the national political power for the time being, what communist party can do is to bow to reality — — Recognize opium’s status as a national hard currency.

Eight roads grow opium on a large scale? Selective slander

After understanding these background knowledge, we began to systematically analyze the reliability of several origins of the statement "the Eighth Route Army planted and sold opium on a large scale".

First of all, talk about Yan ‘an Diary. Although this book was born in the background of the break-up between China and the Soviet Union, Yuri Vlasov, the actual editor of the book, later admitted that this "Yan ‘an Diary" was compiled for the anti-China needs of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, but the author dare not completely deny that the historical materials mentioned in "Yan ‘an Diary" must be false, that is, completely unreliable.

Yuri Vlasov, the actual editor of Yan ‘an Diary. He later admitted that the diary of Yan ‘an was a work compiled for the anti-China needs of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.

In the environment of Yan ‘an at that time, it was difficult for Vladimir to write a "diary" that strongly criticized the leaders of the Communist Party of China, but the biggest Bug of this "diary" was that there were too many contradictions between the contents of the diary and historical facts. For example, Vladimir Mirov directly questioned Mao Zedong about opium in northern Shaanxi, and Deng Xiaoping made an answer. The date of the diary is August 2, 1942, but at this time Deng Xiaoping has been appointed as the secretary of the Taihang Branch of the Communist Party of China. He should be on the Taihang Mountain, not in northern Shaanxi. In addition, the 359th Brigade harvested opium in Nanniwan in the 1930s before the Great Production Movement, and the opium processing factory was located in Chaling &hellip, Hunan Province, which was closely controlled by the Kuomintang. … Mistakes like that, then more.

In a word, there are too many serious contradictions between the contents of Yan ‘an Diary and historical facts. Combined with the historical background of the publication of this work, the original historical status of this work is very questionable.

Secondly, the statement about special goods in Xie Juezai Diary. As it happens, the author has a set of Diary of Xie Juezai edited and published by People’s Publishing House in 1982, and the records of "special goods" in online diaries are indeed true, so the author makes a contextual analysis of these diaries.

"That is, the legal tender for special goods accounts for government revenue … … Do your best. … … I don’t know that his responsibility is to sell black and white to make up for the financial deficit. " (January 18, 1944) and "Anecdotes heard at the forum: … … ‘ There are few multilateral currencies for special goods, and the future will be terrible ’ (When the border currency is recovered, the price of special goods falls, and it is extremely difficult to buy special goods) "(March 12, 1944).

These two days’ diaries all describe Xie Juezai’s own views on the economic problems in the border region, and these are the only paragraphs in the two days’ diaries that mention "special goods" and "black and white goods". Although there is no unanimous conclusion on what kind of products "special goods" are (it is said that "special goods" refer to local specialty salt), even if we assume that "black goods" in "special goods" and "black and white goods" refer to opium, it can only prove that opium is used as hard currency to balance the fiscal deficit in the border region as I said above, and it cannot prove that the Eighth Route Army in communist party has large-scale opium cultivation; The diary on March 12 can be understood as a kind of anxiety of the participants in the forum about the relationship between hard currency and currency.

As for the diary of March 14th, 1944, it said: "When a leading organ starts a thing, it must be very considerate, and often a small step makes a mistake, which can cause great trouble among the masses. ‘ Domestic sales of special goods ’ That is an example. " This diary mainly talks about the way of leadership. In 1943, some people in the border area proposed whether to implement "domestic sales of special goods", but this issue quickly caused controversy and was finally rejected. The "domestic sales of special goods" mentioned in the diary should be the discussion of "domestic sales of special goods" in 1943. Combined with the main content of this diary, the diary of March 14th can’t be used as evidence that the Eighth Route Army in communist party planted and sold opium on a large scale.

In addition, Xie Juezai Diary explicitly mentioned drug control for many times and days, but these records were selectively ignored by some scholars. The author now extracts a paragraph:

June 6, 1943

It is proposed to give instructions to the county (city) governments in each district to ban smoking: all commissions and county governments:

Eating opium, a scar left by the old society, has been cured a lot, but there are still a few addicts who have not given up. We must work harder to avoid a resurgence. Unless otherwise prohibited by the prohibition of planting, instructions on the prohibition of eating are given:

……

When summing up the work this year, quitting smoking is one of the assessment results of governments at all levels.

Next, let’s talk about the document "Interim Measures for the Collection and Management of Tobacco Tax in Huaitaixi County". Huaitai West County refers to Huaiyang, Taikang and Xihua counties. Although there is no definite evidence to prove that this "method" does exist, Huaitai and Xixi counties are surrounded by Japanese-occupied areas. It is hard to imagine that the Japanese army, which is rich in opium, will sit idly by and watch the existence of such a commercial and military competitor. Moreover, there is no mention of cultivation in public institutions in this "method", so it is naturally impossible to prove that opium cultivation is the main economic policy of communist party.

Crucially, Huai, Tai and Xi counties used to be the defense zones of the Kuomintang army in Tang Enbo. At the end of 1944, the Kuomintang army was greatly defeated in the battle of Henan, Hunan and Guangxi, and the armed forces behind the enemy lines of the Chinese Communist Party were able to establish this base area. Considering the lag of eradicating opium cultivation, if the proclamation does exist, then this "Measures" is not so much evidence of the Eighth Route Army’s drug manufacturing and trafficking, but rather a profile portrayal of the Kuomintang reactionaries’ opium cultivation and trafficking.

As for the statement that "Zhang Side died in the process of burning opium when his cave collapsed", let’s leave aside the possibility that the Eighth Route Army would be embarrassed and still use the Central Guard Corps to refine opium in 1944, but the biggest loophole of this statement lies in the fact that burning opium is different from burning charcoal. Burning charcoal doesn’t have to be looked after all the time, but refining opium must be looked after all the time. With the ventilation of the cave, the person who looks after the opium will be poisoned, and there is no need to wait until the cave collapses.

After Li Mi led his troops to flee Myanmar, one of his "main businesses" was poppy cultivation. After years of development, the Golden Triangle has gradually become "famous"

The Last Opium of the Republic of China

Having said that, I finally want to talk about how drug control was carried out in New China after the War of Liberation.

In some traditional opium producing areas, party and government workers will level the opium fields, then collect and destroy drugs, and at the same time give some rations to farmers, and then switch to grain after a period of time. Those who take or inject drugs should register and quit within a time limit according to the size and age of their addiction; Secondly, the staff also linked drug rehabilitation with production education, and involved those "addicts" who were not involved in production and behavior degeneration into the tide of industrial and agricultural production, so that they knew that they were members of society and stimulated their determination to give up drugs. In this way, although there are records of serious drug addicts dying from drug addiction attacks all over the country, the vast majority of drug addicts have been thoroughly remoulded after receiving withdrawal treatment and productive labor, and become new people who are useful to society.

One of the earliest sources of the Golden Triangle, a world-famous drug producing area, was the Kuomintang Li Mi and other departments that were beaten out of Yunnan. After living in Myanmar and Thailand, poppy cultivation became one of Li Mi’s "main businesses". After years of development, the Golden Triangle gradually became "famous". And this site rich in drug lords has become the last hiding place of opium in the Republic of China.

After communist party came to power, he made China a glorious "drug-free country"; Although the Kuomintang regime was nominally unified throughout the country, during its reign, China became the world’s first drug producer and consumer, and after its defeat, it also created the world’s largest drug producer. From this point of view, it is never clear who is more worthy of praise and who should be reviled.