Page:China in Revolt (1926).pdf/5



EFORE I enter into the question, I consider it necessary to say that I have not had at my disposal exhaustive material on the Chinese question such as would be necessary to unfold a complete picture of the Chinese revolution. I am, therefore, compelled to confine myself to a few general remarks of a fundamental nature which are directly connected with the question as to the main trend of the Chinese revolution. The theses of Comrade Petrov, the theses of Comrade Mif, two reports of Comrade Tang-Ping-Shan and the remarks of Comrades Rafes on the Chinese question are in my possession. In spite of their excellence, all these documents have in my opinion, the great defect that they evade a number of the fundamental questions of the revolution in China. I think that our attention should be above all directed to these defects, and for this reason my remarks will at the same time be of a polemical character.

Lenin said that the Chinese would soon have their 1905. Some comrades took this as meaning that exactly what took place with us in Russia in 1905 would necessarily repeat itself in China. This is wrong. Lenin certainly did not say that the Chinese revolution would be a copy of the Russian revolution of 1905; he merely said that the Chinese would have their 1905. This means that, apart from the features which the Chinese