Revisiting the China Mission of Mikhail Borodin in 1923–1927: In Light of New Documentation

Abstract

Mikhail Borodin, a Bolshevik Party member, became one of Moscow's most influential foreign operatives in China in the early 1920s. The access to many previously inaccessible Russian and Chinese archival sources after the collapse of the former Soviet Union made it possible for scholars to conduct a new study on Borodin's Mission to China. Perhaps the most extraordinary finding to emerge from the new sources is that it was not the Comintern, but the Soviet Politburo, acting on Stalin's recommendation, sent Borodin to China. His assignments there went far beyond “making revolution.” While in China, he was involved in almost every important aspect of Soviet operations, including secret diplomacy, dealing with all factions: the Nationalists, the Communists, and the various warlords, as well as the warlord-controlled Beijing government. Without a proper understanding of Borodin's Mission to China, it would be next to impossible to comprehend Moscow's policies toward China in the 1920s.

Keywords:

• Soviet policy toward China
• Chinese Eastern Railway
• Sino-Soviet Agreement of 1924
• the March 20th Incident of 1926
• Northern Expedition
• Zhili and Fengtian Cliques

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Zhang, Qiushi. Jiemi dangan zhong de Bao-luo-ting (Bao-luo-ting in Light of the Declassified Archival Materials), pp. 3–24; 402–403.

2 Ding, Yanmo. Bao-luo-ting yu zhongguo dageming (Borodin and China's Great Revolution), pp. 52–53, and the source is from the Russian memoir written by the assistant and Chinese-Russian interpreter of Borodin's office in Canton and Wuhan, Vishniakova-Akimova, V. V. Dva goda v vosstavavshem Kitae 1925–1927 – Vospominaniia, Moskva 1965.

3 Borodin's notes and information, Canton, not before February 16, 1924, in: Ko, Khen’Iui, Titarenko, M. L. et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. I. 1920–1925, p. 410.

4 Jacobs, Dan. Borodin - Stalin's Man in China. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press 1981.

5 Holubnychy, Lydia. Mikhail Borodin and the Chinese Revolution, 1923-1925. New York: Columbia University Press 1979.

6 During the Northern Expedition (1926–1928), Beijing was under the control of the Fengtian Clique of the Chinese warlords headed by Old Marshal Zhang Zuolin. There existed in Beijing an active Kuomintang organization in which the CCP played a leading role. From the viewpoint of the Beijing government their activities were subversive. Some KMT/CCP leaders used part of the Soviet Embassy compound as a sanctuary. On the morning of April 6, 1927, about 300 police, detectives, and soldiers encircled and then entered the Soviet Embassy compound. They arrested a number of CCP members. When the police observed a fire in the nearby offices of the Soviet military attaché, they brought in fire-fighting equipment, put out the fire, and removed several truckloads of documents, many were already partly burned.

Examination of the seized documents began immediately after the raid. The British, American, and French military attachés played a substantial role in the initial work of sorting the documents and organizing their translation. These documents were collected in a volume entitled “Soviet Plot in China,” first published in Chinese in 1928 and then in Western languages. Controversies quickly arose as to whether these documents were authentic, as Moscow firmly claimed that all documents published in the collection were forgeries.

Martin Wilbur had worked on these documents for many years, including checking the originals of the seized documents at Public Record Office in London and National Archives in Washington, DC. In 1956, he published a collection entitled “Documents on Communism, Nationalism, Soviet Advisers in China, 1918–1927: Papers Seized in the 1927 Peking Raid” through Columbia University Press. In 1989, long after his retirement, he published “Missionaries of Revolution: Soviet Advisers and Nationalist China, 1920–1927.” Both volumes were based upon carefully checking and identifying the authenticity of the seized documents in the Embassy raid. However, he also excluded several key documents from the Soviet Plot volume, including a few of the survived part of Borodin's reports to Moscow, as he found that their authenticity could not be confirmed.

One of my biggest moments of sensing the joy of archival discovery was in 1994 when I found that Borodin's reports to Moscow that I unearthed in the Russian Center for the Preservation and Study of Records of Modern History (RDChIDNI, today part of the RGASPI, the Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History) were identical with the survived part of the reports in the collection of “Soviet Plot in China.”

7 Protocol No. 21 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, August 2, 1923, in: Ko, Titarenko et al. eds. VKP (b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. I. 1920–1925, pp. 239–240.

8 Protocol No. 21 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, August 2, 1923, in: Ko, Titarenko et al. eds. VKP (b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. I. 1920–1925, p. 240.

9 Xue, Xiantian et al. eds. Zhongsu guojia guanxishi ziliao huibian 1917–1924 (The Collection of the Documents on the History of Sino-Soviet State Relations, 1917-1924), pp. 217–219; Elleman, Bruce. Diplomacy and Deception: The Secret History of Sino-Soviet Diplomatic Relations, 1917-1927, p. 24.

10 Jacobs. Borodin - Stalin's Man in China, pp. 114–115.

11 Karakhan's letter to Borodin, Beijing, July 12, 1924, in: Ko, Titarenko et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. I. 1920-1925, pp. 455–457.

12 Jacobs. Borodin - Stalin's Man in China, p.137.

13 Holubnychy. Mikhail Borodin and the Chinese Revolution, 1923-1925, p. 381.

14 Xue, Xiantian. Minguo shiqi de zhongsu guanxi shi 1917–1949 (The History of Sino-Soviet Relations during the Republic Period 1917-1949), pp. 71–77; Lin, Jun. Zhongsu waijiao guanxi 1917–1927 (The Sino-Soviet Diplomatic Relations, 1917-1927), pp. 87–89; 21. Leong, Sow-Theng. Sino-Soviet Diplomatic Relations, 1917-1926, pp. 266–267.

15 Elleman. Diplomacy and Deception. The Secret History of Sino-Soviet Diplomatic Relations, 1917-1927, pp. 121–122; 205–206; Chen, Zhihong. Die China-Mission Michail Borodins bis zum Tod Sun Yatsens – Ein Beitrag zur sowjetischen Chinapolitik in den Jahren 1923-25, pp. 75–76, 177.

16 Koo, V. K. Wellington. Gu Weijun huiyilu (Reminiscences of Vi Kyuin Koo), vol. 1, p. 340.

17 “Benbao zhuandian” (Special report), in: Guangzhou minguo ribao (Canton Republican Daily), Canton, April 25, 1924.

18 “Bao-luo-ting dao feng jieqia guanyu san sheng gean” (Borodin is traveling to Mukden to consult various cases regarding the three Northeastern Provinces), in: Minguo ribao (Republican Daily), Shanghai, May 21, 1924. Also see Karakhan's letter to Borodin, Beijing, July 12, 1924, in: Ko, Titarenko et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. I. 1920-1925, p. 456.

19 Xue. Minguo shiqi de zhongsu guanxi shi 1917–1949 (The History of Sino-Soviet Relations during the Republic Period 1917-1949), pp. 86–87; Chen. Die China-Mission Michail Borodins bis zum Tod Sun Yatsens – Ein Beitrag zur sowjetischen Chinapolitik in den Jahren 1923-25, pp. 188–189; Elleman. Diplomacy and Deception. The Secret History of Sino-Soviet Diplomatic Relations, 1917-1927, pp. 180–181; Elleman. The Soviet Union's Secret Diplomacy Concerning the Chinese Eastern Railway, 1924-1925, pp. 470–476; Elleman. Secret Sino-Soviet Negotiations on Outer Mongolia, 1918-1925, pp. 539–563.

20 Chen. Die China-Mission Michail Borodins bis zum Tod Sun Yatsens – Ein Beitrag zur sowjetischen Chinapolitik in den Jahren 1923-25, pp. 77, 182–188.

21 Borodin's report about the discussion of KMT's Second Central Plenary on the relationship with the CCP members, Canton, August 15–30, 1924, in: Ko, Titarenko et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. I. 1920-1925, pp. 467–476. Also see Minutes of a meeting of Xie Chi and Zhang Ji with Borodin, June 25, 1924, in: Bao-luo-ting zai zhongguo de youguan ziliao (The Materials about Borodin in China), pp. 11–15; 19. Ko, Shih-ming. Zaoqi guogong guanxi xin lun – cong elian liangong dao sanda zhengce de bianzheng. (A New Study on the Early History of the Relationship between KMT and CCP), pp. 379–384.

22 Protocol No. 22 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, September 11, 1924, in: Ko, Titarenko et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. I. 1920-1925, pp. 479–480.

23 Usov. Sovetskaia raevedka v Kitae, 20-egody XX veka, trans. into Chinese by Lai et al., p. 181; Heinzig, Dieter. Sowjetische Militärberater bei der Kuomintang 1923-1927, pp. 142, 174.

24 Resolution of CCP's Central Plenary on Comrade Qu Qiubai's report on the policy line taken in Province Guangdong, Shanghai, October 8, 1924, in: Ko, Titarenko et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. I. 1920-1925, pp. 480–483. Also see Huang, Xiurong. Liangong (bu), gongchanguoji yu zhongguo guoming geming yundong 1920–1925 (The CPSU[B], the Comintern and the Chinese National-revolutionary Movement, 1920-1925), vol. 1, pp. 532–534.

25 Borodin's confidential report to a delegation of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Beijing, February 15th and 17th, 1926, in: Titarenko, M. L., Leutner, M. et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 86, 101. Also see Huang, Xiurong et al. eds. Gongchanguoji, liangong (bu) midang yu zhongguo geming shi xinlun (A New Study of the History of Chinese Revolution in Light of the Declassified Secret Archival Materials on the Comintern and the CPSU[B]), p. 343.

26 Borodin's letter to Karakhan, Canton, May 30, 1926, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 231–240.

27 Karakhan's report at a meeting with a delegation of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Beijing, February 2, 1926; Protocol No. 27 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, May 20, 1926, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 65–79; 227–228.

28 Protocol No. 86 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, October 29, 1925, in: Ko, Titarenko et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. I. 1920-1925, p. 656.

29 V. I. Solov’ev's letter to Karakhan, Canton, March 24, 1926, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 153–154.

30 Protocol No. 22 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, April 29, 1926, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 201–202.

31 Protocol No. 20 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, April 15, 1926; Borodin's speech at a meeting with the Far East Bureau of Comintern Executive Committee, Canton, August 9, 1926; Protocol of Borodin's meeting with the Far East Bureau of Comintern Executive Committee, Canton, August 16, 1926, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 174; 308–311; 324–332.

32 Protocol No. 18 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, April 1, 1926; Protocol No. 20 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, April 15, 1926; Protocol No. 18 of the 14th meeting with the Soviet delegation of Far East Bureau of Comintern Executive Committee, Shanghai, September 11, 1926, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 163–172; 174; 357.

33 Protocol No. 64 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, October 21, 1926, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, p. 483.

34 Protocol No. 18 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, April 1, 1926, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, p. 164.

35 Protocol No. 61 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, October 14, 1926, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 472–473.

36 Protocol No. 67 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, November 11, 1926, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, p. 512.

37 Protocol No. 75 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, December 30, 1926, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, p. 572.

38 A secret report entitled “The Current Political-economic Situation in China,” delivered by Borodin at a general assembly of members of Veteran Bolsheviks Society, Moscow, October 23, 1927, and also see Protocol No. 78 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, January 13, 1927, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 920–921; 579–580.

39 Minutes of a conversation between Voitinsky and Chiang Kai-shek, Jiujiang, Feburary 26, 1927, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 630–631. Also see Wu Yuzhang's Memoir on Borodin, in: Bao-luo-ting zai zhongguo de youguan ziliao (The Materials about Borodin in China), pp. 248–249.

40 Li Yuzhen. Kuomindang yu gongchanguoji 1919–1927 (Kuomintang and the Comintern, 1919-1927), pp. 550–551; Also see Wilbur, C. Martin. “The Nationalist Revolution from Canton to Nanking, 1923-1928” in: Fairbank, J. K., ed. The Cambridge History of China, Vol. 12, Republican China 1912-1949, pp. 634–636.

41 Protocol of a joint meeting of Politburo of the Central Committee of CCP and Executive Committee of the Comintern, May 12–13, 1927, Hankou; Stalin's letter to Molotov and Bukharin, Sochi, July 9, 1927, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 723–724; 849–850.

42 Protocol No. 103 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), May 19, 1927, Moscow, and also see Stalin's letter to Molotove, Sochi, July 11, 1927, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 727–728; 852.

43 Protocol No. 116 of an emergency meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, July 8, 1927, in: Titarenko, Leutner et. al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 843.

44 Protocol No. 102 of a closed-door discussion session of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, May 13, 1927; Protocol No. 113 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, June 27, 1927, in: Titarenko, Leutner et al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 725; 817.

45 Protocol No. 107 of an emergency meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, June 2, 1927; M. N. Roy's telegram to Stalin and Bukharin, Hankou, June 17, 1927; Protocol No. 112 of a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of RCP(B), Moscow, June 23, 1927, in: Titarenko, Leutner et. al. eds. VKP(b), Komintern i natsional’no-revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Kitae. Dokumenty. T. II. 1926-1927, pp. 763–764; 780–783; 803. Also see Zhang, Qiushi. Jiemi dangan zhong de Bao-luo-ting (Bao-luo-ting in Light of the Declassified Archival Materials), pp. 476–481; Cai, Dengjin. Wang Jingwei pingzhuan (A Biography of Wang Jingwei), pp. 128–132.

46 Li. Kuomindang yu gongchanguoji 1919–1927 (Kuomintang and the Comintern, 1919-1927), pp. 587–588; Cai. Wang Jingwei pingzhuan (A Biography of Wang Jingwei), pp. 134–136; Liu Jizheng et al. Wuhan guomin zhengfu shi (The History of the Wuhan Nationalist Government), pp. 512–514.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Zhihong Chen

Zhihong Chen holds professorships at Cornell University and NYU Shanghai. She was trained in three countries, China, Germany and the US, and received her Dr. Phil. degree in International History from Cologne University in Germany in 1997. In 2000, she published the book entitled Die China-Mission Michail Borodins bis zum Tod Sun Yatsens - Ein Beitrag zur sowjetischen Chinapolitik in den Jahren 1923–1925 (Mikhail Borodin's China Mission up to the Death of Sun Yat-sen: A Study of Soviet Policy toward China, 1923–1925) in Germany. With the support of multi-archival and multi-sourced research, she has been working on a comprehensive study on Borodin's mission in China 1923–1927 in both English and Chinese languages. This paper is a product of her research. She has maintained an active research, writing, and translation agenda. For more information please visit her Cornell website at http://history.cornell.edu/zhihong-chen.