The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1928-08-18
The White Terror in China

Ever since last year, marked by
the treachery of the Kuomintang
undreamed of ruthless white terror
has been raging in China, and the
Chinese trade union movement has
been driven underground. The fol-
lowing facts give a slight idea of
the attitude of the Kuomintang to-
wards the working class:
(D Arrests and executions of &C
tive trade unionists and Commu-
nists. (2) Closing down of trade
union premises and the prohibition
of trade union meetings. 80
Wherever the counter-revolutionar-
les do not succeed in breaking up
the labor movement, the revolution
airy unions are corrupted: the old
name of the given organization is
retained, but hirelings are put into
the leading positions las for in.
stance, in Hupeh and Kwangtung)
In other cases the name of the
union Is also changed and the
unions themselves are changed into
heterogeneous organizations, united
by inter-union committees, or into
unions differentiated according to
craft (the united union of Shanghai
the united unions in other pro-
vinces, etc.. Thus is the central
ization of the forces of the work
ing class being destroyed.
Thousands Murdered.
The barbarous repressions have
taken from the ranks of the Chi
nese working class 26,450 persons
shot, guillotined, tortured (eyes
put out, scalded with boiling water
every possible sort of brutality, the
most barbarous tortures were made
use of. But the Chinese working
class has not been broken by this
ruthless terror. On April 23rd
1927, the general strike broke out
in Canton; on June 18th, demon
stration in memory of the Hong
kong strike; June 23rd, a demon
stration concentrating the beat
ing-up in Ahamen; in November
the bloody fight for the premises OF
the Committee of Representatives
of the Workers Unions of Kwang
tung and the obdurate fight for the
re-establishment of the Seamen's
Union, the siege of Wan Ku-wey's
house, and finally, the great upris-
ing in Canton, which shook the
whole East. In Wuhan on August
End, 1927, the general strike; some.
what later, the strike of the work.
ers at the ammunition factory
(Which lasted more than 10 days.
in November, the strike at the cot.
ton mill of Tehen Huna, the work.
ers killed members of the reor.
ganjced bureau (Kuomintangites)
The railwaymep of the Picking.
Hankow and Canton Hankow lines
demanded that back wages be paic
them. In Wuchan and Hankow the
workers broke into the prisons
freed the political prisoners anc
trade union leaders. In Shanghai
the movement against the unitec
front of the Chinese militarists; II
August, in Lao-Chao-Tan, the strike
at 6 cotton mills; in November, il
Yang Shang-pu-the strike at
cotton mills; in December-tht
strike of the tramway employees or
the territory of the international
concession; later series of strikes
in various places, which it is i'm.
possible to give in full here. AL
these actions were made under the
following demands: ~ re-estab
lishment of the revolutionary trade
unions; (2) re-introduction Of the
labor agreements that were ir
force during the period of the Com
munist trade unions; (3) payment
of back wages (there are workers
who have not received their wages
for and even 10 months); al
that wages be paid in undepreciatec
currency (the paper money has lost
all value, it often being impossible
to buy food with it,; against the
arbitrary dismissal Of workers (the