The bonanza was not just in weapons, but also in soldiers. The troops of the Japanese puppet Manchukuo regime, almost 200,000 strong, had surrendered en masse to the Soviet army, and were now made available by the Russians to be “re-enlisted” by the CCP. So were hundreds of thousands of men newly unemployed as a result of Russian depredations and outright destruction. The Soviet occupation forces carted off whole factories and machinery as “war booty,” and even demolished industrial installations. The equipment removed by the Russians was estimated to be worth US$858 million (US$2 billion at current replacement cost). Many local people were deprived of their livelihood. The CCP, which had originally dispatched 60,000 troops into Manchuria, saw its force snowball to well over 300,000.
THIS EMPOWERMENT of the CCP was carried out by the Russians in maximum secrecy, as it was in stark violation of the treaty Moscow had just signed with Chiang. The Generalissimo’s best, combat-hardened troops, who were American-trained and equipped, were stuck in South China and Burma, far away from the areas Russia held. To get them to Manchuria fast, he desperately needed American ships. America wanted him to talk with Mao about peace; so under American pressure, the Generalissimo invited Mao to come to Chongqing for talks. America’s China policy had been defined by the late President Roosevelt (who had died on 12 April 1945 and was succeeded by his vice-president, Harry Truman) as to “knock heads together,” and the US ambassador in China had earlier suggested the idea of bringing the Generalissimo and Mao to the White House together if the two Chinese leaders reached a deal.
Mao did not want to go to Chongqing, and twice turned down Chiang’s invitation, mainly because he did not trust Chiang not to harm him. This would be Mao’s first venture out of his lair since he had started running his own military force in 1927. He told Chiang he was sending Chou En-lai instead. But Chiang insisted the summit must take place with Mao, and in the end Mao had to accept. Stalin had cabled him no fewer than three times to go. While secretly helping Mao to seize territory, Stalin wanted him to play the negotiations game. If Mao refused to show up, he would look as though he were rejecting peace, and America would be more likely to give its full commitment to Chiang.
Mao resented this pressure from Stalin. It was to be his biggest grievance against Stalin, and one he would keep bringing up for the rest of his life.
Stalin told Mao that his safety would be assured by both Russia and the US. The Founder of Chiang’s FBI, Chen Li-fu, told us that the Nationalists had no designs on Mao’s life “because the Americans guaranteed his safety.” Mao knew he would also have secret protection from his strategically placed moles, especially the Chongqing garrison chief, Chang Chen. Even so, he insisted on US ambassador Patrick Hurley coming to Yenan and escorting him to Chongqing as insurance against being bumped off in mid-air.
With all these precautions in place, Mao at last flew off to Chongqing in an American plane on 28 August, leaving Liu Shao-chi in charge in Yenan. When the plane landed, Mao stuck close to Hurley, and got into Hurley’s car, shunning the one Chiang had sent for him.
Mao also took out insurance of the kind he knew best, by ordering an offensive against Nationalist forces while he was in Chongqing, which demonstrated that the Reds would escalate the civil war if anything happened to him. He told his top generals, who were about to be flown (by the Americans) to 8th Route Army HQ: Fight without any restraint. The better you fight, the safer I am. When his troops won the battle at a place called Shangdang, Mao beamed: “Very good! The bigger the battle, the bigger the victory, the more hope I will be able to return.”
Mao flew into one moment of panic in Chongqing, when Hurley left on 22 September, followed by Chiang on the 26th, and he feared he was being set up for a hit. Chou was dispatched to the Soviet embassy to ask if the Russians would let Mao stay there, but Ambassador Apollon Petrov was non-committal, and got no reply when he wired Moscow for instructions. Mao was furious.
