This passage on Red Army's crossing the Dadu-he River at Luding Iron Chain Bridge is to diffuse some ongoing "brawling over the facts".
While having no grudge against Chang & Halliday's depicting Mao as a monster, this webmaster agrees with Thomas Bernstein of Columbia University and Steve Tsang of Oxford University that the book "Mao: The Unknown Story" spelled a disaster for the serious history research due to the commodity nature of the said book.
Clearly bucks and pounds mean more than straightening out historical truth for the said authors.
It also makes the webmaster's task of rectifying China's modern history more important than ever.
Good reviews of the said book would be:
A swan's little book of ire
Jade and Plastic: A Review of Mao: The Unknown Story by Jung Chang and Jon Halliday (Andrew Nathan - The London Review of Books)
linked at
http://www.howardwfrench.com/archives/2005/11/13/jade_and_plastic_a_review_of_
mao_the_unknown_story_
by_jung_chang_and_jon_halliday/
http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/a-swans-
little-book-of-ire/2005/10/07/1128563003642.html?oneclick=true
Thomas Bernstein of Columbia University in New York, having examined the book, stated that "the book is a major disaster for the contemporary China field".
Oxford University's Steve Tsang made the following comment:
"Mao was a monster, ...[But] their distortion of history to make their case will in the end make it more difficult to reveal how horrible Mao and the Chinese Communist Party system were, and how much damage they really did to the Chinese people."
Historical facts and events:
The third important Communist meeting on the Long March after Liping Meeting & Zunyi Meeting was the Huili Meeting that was held outside of the citywall because Red Army failed to sack the city from Sichuan Provincial Army during the seven day and seven night siege. This exhibited the fact that provincial troops did resist the Red Army without a deliberate let-go in the early stage of the conflicts. Related to Huili Meeting would be Lin Biao's criticism letter against Mao Tse-tung regarding 'banditry flightism' and Peng Dehuai's implication [during the 1959 Lushan Meeting] for Lin Biao's suggestion at 1935 Huili Meeting that Peng replace Mao as the leader of Red Army.
Li Lishan said he was fetched to Russian Altai from Moscow for talking to Red Army over radio as a result of Moscow losing touch with the Red Army. Otto Braun memoirs confirmed this loss of contact from his angle but had no implication that a relay station in Shanghai was sabotaged by government agents at the exact timig of the long march. [After he sabotae of the relay radio station, CCP interim central in Shanghai rebuilt the telegraph service and continued to call on the Red Army but failed to get the signal received by the Red Army Central.] Whereas, Comintern telegraph set was always safe in Rewi Alley's house, operated by a British communist who worked in Shanghai municipal electricty company as well as two German communist women (possibly sisters by the name of Wei-te Ma-ya and Fei-te Ma-ya]. Alternative CCP records stated that it was Red Army themselves who destroyed the heavy radio equipment prior to the breakout and brought along lighter telegraph sets. Communist records repeatedly claimed that they were able to decipher government troops' wires en route. Chen Yi related books did state that the Red Army Central Front deliberately did not reply to remnants in Jiangxi Soviet till early 1935 or in another sense turned off communication with some parties during the Long March. I used the word 'turning off" because i) CCP's Central Army Front always maintained telegraph communications with Zhang Guotao's Red Army Fourth Front for the planned reunion in northwestern Sichuan Province; ii) Mao, after Jan 1935 Zunyi Meeting, sent out the first reply to remnant Red Army guerrillas in Jiangxi Soviet base after Moscow-returnee-controlled CCP Central ignored Xiang Ying & Chen Yi's repeated telegrams for almost three month. Red Army Central Front, other than wireless contacts with the Fourth Front, appeared to have limited liaison with other groups of Chinese Communists in the nation. However, Mao, after toppling Moscow-returnees at Jan 1935 Zunyi Meeting, painstakingly dispatch several batches of foot messengers to Moscow for solidifying his positions in lieu of reestablishing wireless communications with Moscow.
Otto Braun claimed that Red Army still had maintained 30,000 strength after the debacle in Xiangjiang River crossing. Beling blindfolded from military meetings, Braun's number was doubtful. After the Huili Siege, the total number of Red Army Central Front would not be too far from the number of 5000-10,000. The pretext that "there were not enough boats to cross the Dadu River" was a myth since Mao Tse-tung's Red Army had probably dwindled to 5000-10000 by the time of Huili Meeting and then further separated into two contingents, with one such contingent penetrating the deep mountains of Yi-zu minority people for Anshunchang Crossing. The number could be vindicated by the fact that after re-union with Red Army Fourth Front in northwestern Sichuan Prov, Mao's Central Front Army was replenished by 3000-5000 soldiers from 4th Front, but attrition and loss, including those buried alive by Provincial General Lu Dachang after the Battle of Lazikou Pass, still halved the newly-built Central Front by the time Mao arrived at northern Shenxi Province. The numbers could be rounded up if we gave the replenishment back to Zhang Guotao's Fourth Front, which ultimately died in the hands of Ma Family Cavalry during the Western Route Expedition. (Here also comes Yi-zu minority chieftans' naive expectation [in 1950] that People's Liberation Army would treat them good because their ancestor, 15 years ago, had an oath with Liu Bocheng for lending the Red Army a path to the Dadu River.)
Chang & Halliday did pick up some internet chatters about government troops letting go the communist Red Army somewhere.
The fact is that at "let-go" stake was not Mao's Central Red Army nor Chiang's Central Government Army, but Heh Long & Ren Bishi's Communist Second Flank Army and Sichuan Provincial Army. Sichuan provincial army, controlled by Qin Zhongwen, i.e., an ex-communist, had let go Red Army Second Flank when they reached Sichuan Province.
Southwestern provincial armies ignorantly mistook the Russian-instigated rebellion of communist Red Army as just another civil strife.
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US Interest Rate Down = 
China Exchange Rate Up !
![At the time [when China fell under the alien rule],](http://imperialchina.org/0442201b51e71777df540167-resized.jpg)
![Though, Anna Wang [Anneliese Martens], in her memoirs, expressed jealousy over Gong Peng by stating that the Anglo-American reporters had flattered the Chinese communists and the communist movement as a result of being entranced with the goldfish-eye'ed personal assistant of Zhou Enlai](GongPeng.jpg)
