Interview: Popular support leads China to victory in war against Japan: Brazilian expert

At a time when it had not yet risen to power, the Communist Party of China (CPC) was playing a vital role in the Chinese People's War of Resistance Against Japan and in helping end World War II, a Brazilian scholar told Xinhua in an recent interview.

"Latin America might have been very far away from the main battlefields of WWII, but Brazil was a participant. This is what led me to study China's role in the war, which surprised me greatly. The Chinese people resisted impressively and won the war thanks to the power of the people," said Severino Cabral, director of the Brazilian Institute for China and Asia-Pacific Studies (IBECAP).

Before the Lugou Bridge (also known as Marco Polo Bridge) Incident in 1937, the professor recalled, Japan had already occupied China's three northeastern provinces of Heilongjiang, Jilin and Liaoning, turning the country into a semi-colonized state.

When Japan launched full-scale aggression against China in 1937, the semi-colonized country could not fight back with advanced weaponry. Within such a context, the CPC stepped forward and established a common front against Japanese aggression with the Nationalist Party, also called the Kuomintang (KMT).

"Only with these united forces did China become able to win," Cabral said.

During the war, the army led by the CPC won key battles such as the Pingxingguan Battle and the Hundred Regiments Offensive, which raised the spirit of the Chinese people, he said.

The Pingxingguan Battle is a historic engagement fought between the CPC-led 8th Route Army and the Imperial Japanese Army on Sept. 25, 1937 leading to heavy casualties and losses on the Japanese side, while Hundred Regiments Offensive is a major campaign of CPC-led National Revolutionary Army divisions against the Imperial Japanese Army in Central China from August 20 to December 5, 1940.

Furthermore, CPC leader Mao Zedong created a series of important military theories, such as "Protracted Warfare," "A United Government," and guerrilla tactics, which were proved to be decisive and opened a new path to fight against the Japanese aggressor troops, the professor said.

The essence of his tactics is to always have the support of the people, he explained. The role of the general public was critical throughout the War of Resistance, and formed the basis for the CPC's final victory in the civil war against the KMT led by Chiang Kai-shek, he said.

"Until today, the CPC has never forgotten the people and China has become a great power in the world," Cabral said.

This is also how China played an important role in WWII in general, he said, explaining that the War of Resistance in China effectively contained the Japanese forces' attacks, giving more time for the U.S.-led forces to progress on the Pacific front and end the war. Endi