Historical experience is written in blood and iron.

The People's Liberation Army is always a fighting force. Even after countrywide victory, our army will remain a fighting force during the historical period in which classes have not been abolished in our country and the imperialist system still exists in the world. On this point, there should be no misunderstanding or wavering.

All reactionaries are paper tigers.

The most effective method of propaganda directed at the enemy forces is to release captured soldiers and give the wounded medical treatment... Whenever soldiers of enemy forces are captured, we immediately conduct propaganda among them...This immediately knocks the bottom out of the enemy's slander that the Communist bandits kill everyone on sight.

Let the ancient serve the present, let the foreign serve the national; by developing that which has been accomplished one creates something that is new.

The popular masses are like water, and the army is like a fish. How then can it be said that when there is water, a fish will have difficulty in preserving its existence? An army which fails to maintain good discipline gets into opposition with the popular masses, and thus by its own action dries up the water.

There is in guerrilla warfare no such thing as a decisive battle; there is nothing comparable to the fixed, passive defense that characterizes orthodox war.