The Eyuwan Soviet was a short-lived soviet government established in March 1930 by the Chinese Communist Party in the Dabie Mountains border region between Hubei, Henan, and Anhui provinces. At its height in 1931 and early 1932, the Eyuwan Soviet was the second-largest Chinese Soviet after the Central Soviet in Jiangxi. It improved the rights of women and redistributed land to poor and landless peasants. It was famously led by Zhang Guotao, a rival of Mao Zedong, who attempted to consolidate his control over Eyuwan with a series of purges. The Fourth Nationalist Encirclement Campaign defeated Eyuwan's Fourth Red Army in late 1932 and forced it to retreat westwards towards Sichuan and Shaanxi. The Soviet government ceased to function and the Communists retreated into the mountains. Despite several extermination campaigns intended to flush them out, the region remained a hotbed of Communist guerrilla activity until a truce was established in the Chinese Civil War.
Xu Haidong, the founder of the first Communist army unit in the Eyuwan region
Although he was only its leader for a year and a half, the Eyuwan Soviet has since been strongly associated with Zhang Guotao.
Zhang Guotao, or Chang Kuo-tao, was a founding member of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and rival to Mao Zedong. During the 1920s he studied in the Soviet Union and became a key contact with the Comintern, organizing the CCP labor movement in the United Front with the Kuomintang. From 1931 to 1932, after the Party had been driven from the cities, Zhang was placed in charge of the Eyuwan Soviet. When his armies were driven from the region, he joined the Long March but lost a contentious struggle for party leadership to Mao Zedong. Zhang's armies then took a different route from Mao's and were badly beaten by local Muslim Ma clique forces in Gansu. When his depleted forces finally arrived to join Mao in Yan'an, Zhang continued his losing challenge to Mao, and left the party in 1938. Zhang eventually retired to Canada, in 1968. He became a Christian shortly before his death in Scarborough, Ontario, in 1979. His memoirs provide valuable and vivid information on his life and party history.
Zhang in 1927
Zhang with Mao Zedong in Yan'an, 1938