In 1945, the smoke cleared as Japan surrendered. However, peace did not arrive in mainland China, as it was engulfed in the turmoil of the Chinese Civil War between the Nationalist government and the Communist forces. The Nationalist troops were strong, well-equipped, and far superior to the Communist army. Yet, just four years later, in 1949, Chiang Kai-shek sadly retreated to Taiwan, while Mao Zedong ascended to the Tiananmen Gate Tower. Why?
It was because there were multiple Communist spies hidden around Chiang Kai-shek, some even in high positions.
Guo Rugui was one of Chiang Kai-shek’s favorite proteges, one of the top staff officers in the Nationalist Army. He secretly sent top-secret military information to Yan’an, undermining Chiang Kai-shek’s desire to hold out in the southwest and ruining his own life.
A saying in the Taiwanese newspapers described him as “a spy turning the tide, the victor of the two armies has already been decided.”
Today, let’s talk about the story of this “greatest spy” that made Chiang Kai-shek regret deeply: why did he choose this path? How did he survive the miserable decades under the Communist rule?
In 1907, Guo Rugui was born into a scholarly family in Sichuan, surrounded by an air of books, yet he had a rebellious streak. In 1919, during the May Fourth Movement sweeping the country, the young Guo Rugui studied at the United High School in Chengdu and was influenced by the progressive teacher, Hu Zilin. He was attracted to socialism and thought that participating in movements to save the country was quite refreshing.
However, this enthusiasm soon led to a setback. The school principal, who was more traditional, enforced strict educational methods, which the students did not appreciate. Guo Rugui stood up, instigating a student protest that eventually led to the dismissal of the principal.
Although the majority welcomed the new principal with open arms, the outcome was disappointing. The new principal turned out to be corrupt, leading to chaos in education. The students directed their discontent towards heroes like Guo Rugui who caused disturbances. He left the school feeling embarrassed and uneasy, as later reflected in his memoirs.
The lesson learned was profound, but Guo Rugui did not take it to heart. Instead, he ventured further onto the path of anti-tradition.
In 1925, Guo Rugui enrolled in the fifth phase of the Huangpu Military Academy, marking the beginning of his military career.
During the first cooperation between the Nationalists and the Communists, some Communist party members served as instructors at the Huangpu Military Academy. Guo Rugui became acquainted with some Communists and was deeply influenced by their ideas. Deceived by the principles advocated by communism, he believed he had found the true salvation for the country.
Later, through the introduction of his classmate and good friend at the Huangpu Military Academy, Yuan Jingming, he secretly joined the Communist Party.
After the Nationalists and Communists split in 1927, Guo Rugui attempted several mutinies that failed and almost exposed him. In 1930, to protect him, his cousin Guo Rudong hastily sent him to study in Japan, where he attended a military school to receive systematic military training. During this time, he lost contact with the Communist Party.
In 1931, the “September 18 Incident” erupted, the Japanese army invaded the northeast, and Guo Rugui, indignant, dropped out and returned to China. Upon his cousin’s arrangement, he entered the Army Military University to become a student of Chiang Kai-shek.
The triple experience of Huangpu, Japanese military school, and the Army Military University enabled him to become a “military genius” in the Nationalist Army: proficient in Japanese and German, an expert in military theory, having been on the battlefield, served as an instructor, he was a versatile player.
In 1937, the War of Resistance against Japan began, and Guo Rugui was transferred to the 14th Division of the 18th Army under Chen Cheng to participate in the Battle of Songhu. On the battlefield, Japanese airplanes bombed the Nationalist positions relentlessly, causing them to waver. Guo Rugui stepped forward, taking the initiative to defend the positions with his troops.
Before heading to the battlefield, he wrote a farewell letter to Chen Cheng, full of heroism: “If the position remains, I will return to pay my respects in front of you; if the position falls, I will dye the battlefield with blood. When the victory of the War of Resistance comes one day, General, if you pass through Wusong Estuary and see the waves like mountains, that would be my soul returning to you!”
For seven days and nights, Guo Rugui led two regiments to fight fiercely against the Japanese. Out of the eight thousand brothers, only two thousand remained by the end, but they managed to hold the position! This battle made Guo Rugui renowned in the Nationalist Army, cherished by Chen Cheng and caught the eye of Chiang Kai-shek. From then on, he advanced rapidly and became a star general in the Nationalist Army.
Prior to the Wuhan campaign, he proposed a bold idea: “To defend Wuhan without fighting in Wuhan.” This meant exchanging space for time to consume the Japanese military strength. Chen Cheng heeded his advice, and it worked. Although Wuhan was lost, the main force of the Nationalist Army was preserved, wearing out the Japanese forces and transitioning the war into a stalemate. Guo Rugui’s military talent was unmatched.
In 1945, as Japan surrendered, Guo Rugui participated in the surrender ceremony, full of pride. However, no one knew that this prominent figure beside Chiang Kai-shek was deeply dissatisfied with the corrupt practices of some Nationalist military leaders and still longed for the world the Communists spoke of. He had been seeking opportunities to contact the Communist Party.
When the Communist Party learned that such a high-ranking Nationalist military officer wanted to defect, they could not miss this opportunity and sent someone to contact him.
In 1945 and 1946, Guo Rugui secretly met with Dong Biwu from the Southern Bureau of the Communist Party twice, during which Dong Biwu advised him not to go to Yan’an but to remain in the Nationalist Army as an “inside man” to provide intelligence to the Communist Party.
From then on, Guo Rugui led a double life. By day, he was the head of the fifth department of the Ministry of National Defense, overseeing military organization and training, regarded as a prominent figure by Chiang Kai-shek; by night, he transcribed top-secret documents and secretly sent them to Yan’an. He kept eight diaries, documenting the “two to thre
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Hundreds of clandestine meetings with Communist contacts and every strategic deployment of the Nationalist Army.
The intelligence he provided was astonishing: the attack plan in Shandong, the troop distribution in Xuzhou, troop redeployment in the Dabie Mountains, the breakout plan in Yan’an, the breakout plan in Changchun, the layout of the Yangtze River defense line, the sequence of the Southwest forces… This intelligence was like a series of knives aimed directly at the lifeblood of the Nationalist Army.
In 1947, before the Battle of Menglianggu, Guo Rugui copied a Nationalist battle plan and provided it to the Communist Party, even warning them about the firepower of American equipment. With this information, the Communist forces set up ambushes and even resorted to a desperate tactic – using landlords, wealthy farmers, and Kuomintang family members as “human shields” to deplete the Nationalist army’s ammunition and undermine morale. As a result, the elite 74th Division of the Nationalist Army was completely wiped out, and anti-Japanese hero Zhang Lingfu died heroically for his country.
Before the Huaihai campaign in 1948, when He Yingqin proposed the plan of “defending the Yangtze River, must defend the Huai River,” the Nationalist forces had not made any moves, but Mao Zedong had already obtained the plan. Guo Rugui even persuaded Chiang Kai-shek to have a decisive battle near Xuzhou, which led the Nationalist Army into a desperate situation. The famous anti-Japanese general Qiu Qingquan was so angry that he shouted during the meeting, “Your deployment is no different from sending us to die like Xiang Yu at Gaixia!” As expected, Qiu Qingquan died in battle, and the Nationalist Army suffered a major defeat.
Guo Rugui not only leaked intelligence but also sowed discord within the Nationalist Army, promoted faulty deployments, and spread false information. Nationalist leaders like Du Yuming had long been suspicious of him and reported to Chiang Kai-shek: “When I went to Guo Rugui’s house, as a department head, the sofas in the living room were all patched up! Such integrity, he must be a Communist spy!”
When Chiang Kai-shek heard this, he was furious: “Why can’t revolutionary soldiers be honest?” To be cautious, he sent Jiang Jingguo for a secret investigation. One evening, Jiang Jingguo unexpectedly visited Guo’s home and saw only a few dishes on the table. Guo Rugui was nibbling on a radish while studying military tactics, which deeply moved Jiang. Upon returning, Jiang Jingguo told Chiang Kai-shek, “Guo Rugui is incorruptible and could serve as a model!” From then on, Chiang Kai-shek placed even greater trust in Guo Rugui and promoted him to a major general in 1948.
In 1949, as the Nationalist Army experienced consecutive defeats in three major battles, Chiang Kai-shek planned to retreat to the southwest. Guo Rugui saw an opportunity, took the initiative to lead his troops to Sichuan. Without hesitation, Chiang Kai-shek appointed him as the commander of the 72nd Army, provided a slew of weapons, ammunition, and seasoned veterans.
Guo Rugui stationed his forces in Neijiang and Yibin, blocking the vital Yangtze River passage, with a strategic and ideal position. He placed trusted allies in key positions, ensuring tight control over the army.
In December 1949, in Yibin, he led his troops to defect to the Communist Party, shattering Chiang Kai-shek’s dream of holding the southwest.
It was only then, upon retreating to Taiwan in defeat, that Chiang Kai-shek finally realized: the person he trusted the most, Guo Rugui, had been a hidden Communist agent for many years!
Despite Guo Rugui’s significant contributions to the Communist Party, after the establishment of the new government, he did not receive recognition and was not even trusted. The Communist Party only gave him a minor position as the Director of the Transport Department of the South Sichuan Provincial Government, as if he had been sidelined. When he sought to restore his party membership, the Communist Party asked him to provide testimony from the person who introduced him, who had long passed away. In 1951, he was transferred to the Nanjing Liberation Army Military Academy as an instructor.
In the following years, through various Communist movements, he was not spared and became a “veteran activist.” During the 1957 rectification movement, he commented, “Only with democracy and the rule of law can there be long-term stability,” and was branded a rightist, banished to a farm for reeducation. During the Cultural Revolution, he faced raids on his home, public humiliation, and unbearable suffering. Many of the subordinates who rebelled with him, from superiors to squad leaders, were falsely accused of being “spies,” persecuted, scrutinized, and executed, presenting a heart-wrenching scene.
In 1979, at the age of 71, Guo Rugui was finally allowed to “rejoin the party.” In his later years, he devoted himself to writing, publishing “The History of Chinese Military” and “Records of Direct Combat in the China Anti-Japanese War,” revealing the obscured truths: during the War of Resistance, the Nationalist Army fought in over 22 major battles, more than 1,100 significant engagements, nearly 30,000 minor battles, with over 3.2 million casualties in the army and over 4,000 casualties in the air force, along with nearly 2,500 destroyed aircraft. These words seemed to be his way of repenting and atoning to history.
In 1997, while accompanying his daughter to the airport, Guo Rugui passed away in a car accident.
After Guo Rugui’s passing, his son received several letters from old classmates of Guo from his time at the military academy, which contained only blank sheets of paper. It turned out that upon graduation from the academy, they had exchanged messages: “Everything is best left unsaid.”
Within those blank pages lay a mix of complex emotions – they resented Guo Rugui for causing two million Nationalist soldiers to flee to Taiwan, but their camaraderie also made it difficult for them to let go.
Guo Rugui’s story is a tragedy torn apart by ideals and reality. He thought that by betraying the Kuomintang, he could secure a brighter future. He detested the corruption of the Kuomintang, yet after the Communist Party took power, the corruption was even worse. He risked his life for the Communist Party only to be persecuted mercilessly during political movements.
When he witnessed the dictatorship of Mao Zedong, did he ever recall Chiang Kai-shek’s trust in him? When he saw the plight of those purged, did he remember his own experiences at the Chengdu United High School? Did he finally realize that the communism he once believed in was a beautiful lie?
Guo Rugui is not a rare case. Countless spies and agents like him believed in the empty promises of communism, betrayed their oaths, and were eventually crushed by history.
－The Production Team of “The Truth of a Century”