A forum themed The Communist Party of China (CCP) and “One Country, Two Systems” was held in Hong Kong by the Liaison Office of the Central People’s Government on June 12. Matthew Cheung Kin-chung, the Chief Secretary for Administration, said on his weblog that he had deep feelings about the forum and was inspired by it so much, pointing out that the country had achieved a lot outstandingly under the leadership of the CCP, and that “the Chinese people have risen up, been well-off and mightier”. He also indicated that the CCP had brought 1.4 billion people “sense of security, attainment and blissfulness, having cleared the country of the destitution and lone-term weaknesses, and the decadency and mortification caused by the invasion of Western powers a hundred years ago, so there would have been no modern China if there had not been the CCP”. Cheung stressed that that is inarguable historical fact, saying that the CCP vowed to work for the well-being of the people and the Chinese nation, and seek peace and progression for mankind.

The 100th anniversary of the founding of the CCP and the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation have become a propaganda campaign for Xi Jinping’s perennial administration, but those knowledgeable about the history of the CCP would know it is not a political party advocating nationalism at all. The Party was born at the right time in the 1920s out of foreign forces! After the Russian October Revolution in 1917, the Party was not yet consolidated, and not until 1920 had it gained the control over the country’s domain in the Far East. The Soviet Communist Party exported the revolutionary notion in the name of the Communist International (Comintern) to countries adjacent to the Soviet Union (SU)’s territory. Since there was a boundary between China and the SU stretching out endlessly at the convenience of facilitating incoming and outgoing of ammunition and specialists, Maring (Henk Sneevliet) was dispatched by the Comintern to do the preparatory work for convening the 1st National Congress of the CCP in Shanghai.

As regards what the CCP has been propagandizing as the great nation beating back an invasion and engaging in the war of resistance against Japan led by the Party, it was nothing more than a mandate given by the Comintern, as a united front against Japan was a tactic adopted by the SU and originating from the global anti-fascist strategy in need of leveraging the Kuomintang (KMT). Meanwhile, the SU and Japan were scrambling for the territories in Northeast Asia. That had nothing to do with a great cause of saving the country with nationalism, but simply a mandate given by the big brother – the SU. The CCP being able to topple the KMT government and seize the power can be ascribed to the SU army handing over to the CCP the weapons of the Kwantung Army of Japan, and dispatching military advisors to be in command, hence Northeast Asia being put under CCP’s control. The SU and CCP were not on an equal footing to each other, but in a relationship that the former was in a leadership position over the latter, or the former the superior to the latter.

Why was the CCP at the command of the SU and Comintern? It was because Marxism-Leninism was about world revolution – unification of the proletariat to overturn capitalism. Believing in internationalism – workers have no fatherland, communists objected to parochial nationalism, and would shed their blood and lay down their lives for the proletariat in other countries. In 1947, the denunciation of Josip Tito for upholding “nationalism” in Yugoslavia by the SU was levelled at his being disobedient to the big brother. The Comintern proclaimed itself an international political party which was cross-country and cross-nation, and the SU was the one in command behind the scenes. Mao Zedong’s nationalism, however, had never been a parochial notion centering a race, but “the people” of different classes.

Today, such a partisan education has eventually come upon Hong Kong.

(Lau Sai-leung, political commentator)

This article is translated from Chinese by Apple Daily.

Click here for Chinese version

We invite you to join the conversation by submitting columns to our opinion section: [email protected]

Apple Daily reserves the right to refuse, abridge, alter or edit guest opinion columns for accuracy, length, clarity, and style, and the right to withdraw and withhold columns based on the discretion of our editorial page editors.

The opinions of the writers do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editorial board.

---------------------------------

Apple Daily’s all-new English Edition is now available on the mobile app: bit.ly/2yMMfQE

To download the latest version,

iOS: bit.ly/AD_iOS

Android: bit.ly/AD_android

Or search Appledaily in App Store or Google Play