Up to this point the book has followed the development of the Donggu Revolutionary Base Area on the one hand and Mao’s efforts to build a party-army on the other. In Chapter Four these two strands of the story come together violently. Mao is determined to purge the southwest Jiangxi party organizations of all landlords and rich peasants. Soon an “AB (anti-Bolshevik) Corps” is “discovered,” even though it is nonexistent. Hundreds of people (Communist Party members) are tortured and killed. The culmination of this campaign is the Futian Rebellion.

Chapter Two lays out the history of the Donggu Revolutionary Base Area. It emphasizes some of the unique characteristics of this place – its relative isolation nestled in the mountainous countryside of eastern Ji’an county, the close ties among a number of classmates, and the ties of kinship that made their alliance with local bandits possible. This core leadership group was able to stay together even after their original leader, Lai Jingbang, was killed. Lai was replaced by Li Wenlin, a graduate of Whampoa Military Academy, who led the Donggu Revolutionary Base area to expand to cover some 24 townships in the area.