IN EARLY October, a No Cold War Britain campaign delegation undertook a study tour in China focused on understanding modern China via its creation and development.

The starting point was Shanghai, where, in July 1921, representatives of about 50 members formed the Communist Party of China (CPC). Only 28 years later, that party took power, creating the People’s Republic of China (PRC), in the world’s most populous country with 540 million people — but which was then almost the world’s poorest. 

Today, after lifting 850 million people from poverty, and with the fastest increase in living standards of any major country, Shanghai’s over 20 million inhabitants have a skyline dominated by apartments and offices more modern than any Western city. One delegation member, seeing it, remarked: “Shanghai makes New York look like London.”

This development, in the span of a single lifetime since 1949, shows the extraordinary effect of a socialist revolution in transforming people’s lives for the better. It is by far the fastest single improvement of by far the largest number of people in human history.

The idea was to follow this process in the order in which it took place. So, we started in Shanghai by visiting the site of the first national congress of the CPC, which led this process. 

The original, very modest, venue is preserved with a table laid with cups for the 13 delegates. Threatened by arrest, the founders were forced to flee to complete the congress on a boat. Few epochal events had a more modest opening.

The site museum demonstrated the background — the Chinese people’s struggle for over 100 years against the horrors flowing from the 1840s opium wars and treaties imposed by Western imperialism. Over 50 million people died in the struggles for China’s national liberation. 

Successive uprisings culminated in the overthrow of the emperor system in 1911, and then the 1919 May 4th Movement against the Versailles peace conference’s decision to transfer Germany’s territorial concessions in China to Japan rather than returning them to China. 

These events, coupled with the impact of the 1917 Russian Revolution, led to the establishment of the first communist group in 1920. The museum’s beautifully laid-out material ends with a plaque: “Never forget why you started, and your mission can be accomplished.”

Also in Shanghai, we visited Soong Ch’ing-ling’s former residence. She played a crucial role in securing the support of non-communist patriots to the revolution, and to oppose the pro-imperialist forces in China’s governing Kuomintang (KMT) of the inter-war period — who preferred to be foreign clients rather than establish a genuinely independent China. She became the PRC’s honorary president.

Next stop was Yudu in Jiangxi province, the departure site of the famous Long March of 1934-35. In the march’s museum, the staggering scale of its achievement and the human sacrifice necessary to create it are clear. 

After over a year of incredible hardship, the Red Army arrived in Yan’an, in China’s north-central province of Shaanxi, after a march of 9,000km (5,590 miles) — longer than the distance from London to Beijing. A military battle occurred on average every 72 hours. Standard equipment on the march was straw shoes tied with string. The original force of 86,000 was reduced to 9,000 by the time of its final arrival.

This was one of the most incredible feats of endurance, not just in the Chinese revolution but in history. It laid the basis for the CPC’s role in the war of resistance against Japan’s invasion of China, which began in 1931 and lasted until 1945. The CPC emerged from this struggle with a mass army that was victorious in the 1946-9 civil war against the KMT — a triumph that transformed Asia and opened the way for today’s multipolar world.

We also visited the site of the central executive committee of the earlier Chinese Soviet Republic — the fall of this Jiangxi Soviet precipitated the Long March. But despite its failure, much was learnt. Leading a popular government in liberated areas between 1929 and 1934 created a CPC cadre capable of organising tens of millions of peasants and workers. 

The experience of this struggle, and the early battles of the Long March, confirmed Mao Zedong’s analysis, compared with the representatives sent by the Comintern, leading to the continuous establishment of Mao’s leadership of the CPC from January 1935.

Jiangxi showed the extraordinarily modest conditions of this struggle — Mao and CPC cadres personally dug the Red Well site for the local peasantry, and a supreme court sat in a tiny room, where four judges presided over two adjacent desks and 10 village benches.

More formidable is the Soviet Memorial Park in Ruijin city. Here, notably, are the archaic weapons (even swords and spears) that the Red Army had to use in the 1930s in the fight against the Western-backed KMT.

Then we visited modern China’s rural revitalisation. In Rongjiang, a young woman is building a thriving industry based on traditional ethnic minority dyed fabrics, but using the state-installed internet to create national demand. 

In a nearby village, we were shown round a local flower nursery by the village party secretary, a young woman from the Miao ethnic minority, with village growth focused on creating excellent social facilities for adults and children amidst great natural beauty. 

In Huawu village, we saw a shrine to 17 volunteers who joined the Long March, never to return. Trees marked by a commemorative stone were planted for each. We met the grandson of one of the 17, who explained the village’s transformation, clearly visible in older, abandoned houses within sight of modern apartment replacements.

On to Yan’an, a place pivotal to China’s liberation. From here, the CPC directed its war of resistance against Japan and began the final civil war, leading to the PRC’s creation. CPC’s leaders’ living quarters were mountain caves, with an entrance, lattice-work to provide natural light. 

Rudimentary lifestyle does not prevent world-shaking creativity; it was here, living in a cave, that Mao wrote his fundamental theoretical works such as On Guerilla Warfare, On Contradiction, and On Protracted War.

Then we moved on to Beijing, to join tourists sharing the splendours of the Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square, and the Great Wall.

Our last day’s visit was to the CPC’s museum, linking the heroic period of founding the PRC to the apparently more prosaic work of governing an enormous, complex country. It was for this “prosaic work” that so many had given their lives and sacrificed so much to create conditions for the peaceful improvement of the lives of hundreds of millions of people.

Also fascinating was how China placed its own struggle in an international context. An exhibition reviewed the CPC’s contingent in the International Brigades of the Spanish civil war. Also prominently displayed were photos of North Americans and Europeans who served in China’s Red Army. No better ending to the tour than this reminder of internationalism’s enduring significance.

After the visit, the delegation had a discussion meeting with the International Department of the CPC, represented by Vice Minister Ma Hui. Ma provided an overview of the CPC, which included four themes.

First, the achievements meant that the “regeneration of the Chinese nation is unstoppable.” In 1949, annual per capita GDP was $30; in 2024, it was $12,000. The International Labour Organisation shows China has achieved the fastest increase in real wages of any major country in the world. Now, China is leading the world in solar, wind, and hydropower.

Second, China combined Marxism with Chinese reality to find its own socialist way forward.

Third, China has joined hands with the world’s progressive forces, as well as upholding the UN-based international order against recent unilateral attempts to overturn it. China’s Global Development Initiative and One Belt One Road contribute to international commerce and security.

Finally, the core of everything — from the early days of the CPC, through the bitter struggle for power, to the building of contemporary China’s society — depends on the support of China’s people.

A fruitful discussion then ensued on how to combat lies against China.

How to summarise? To see a development from 9,000 kilometres of marching on straw sandals to China’s ultra-modern cities, and, most of all, to see what that means in terms of improving the lives of hundreds of millions of people, is an impact no indirect report or statistic can convey.

No wonder Western media has to lie so much about China. If the people of the world, above all those of the global South, passing through the same struggle for development China has, could see contemporary China, capitalism would not survive.