In 1927 the Communists began a debate in Moscow as to whether they had used the Nationalists enough or not. One group said they might as well liquidate the Nationalists, Sunyatsenism, Chiang Kai-shek and all; the other said they should use the Nationalists a little longer, to carry on the struggle against American, Japanese, and British "imperialism." Chiang Kai-shek displayed a keen interest in these formal theoretical discussions which, thanks to his Moscow training, he understood perfectly. While the Communists were still debating when and how to hijack him, he hijacked them. In the fall of 1927, he turned against them, using the weapons of terror and propaganda, and then shifting to the more solid ground of economic development. They have not forgiven him. Nationalist China to this day possesses a working duplicate of the Moscow propaganda facilities which the Communists, unconscious of the humor of it, call "fascist." (What is anti-Communist for whatever cause _is_ Fascist, they say.) The Russian revolution of 1917-1922 and the Chinese revolution of 1922-1927 represent the situations created by Communist psychological warfare. Since that time, except for Spain, Communist psychological warfare has failed in every single attempt to come to power outside Russia. Following World War II, Communist psychological warfare proved itself capable of holding countries only _after_ the military force had occupied or won them. The magic has gone out of Communist propaganda; it can keep control only with heavy military pressure behind it. But in the far past, it has been capable of winning--as in Russia and China--without outside military aid. With a renovation of techniques, doctrines, and personnel, it may do so again. CHAPTER 6 Psychological Warfare in World War II Bolshevik accomplishments in psychological warfare were often regarded as part of the peculiar mischief of Marxism, not as techniques which could be learned and used by other people. Similarly, the history-making sweep of the Chinese Nationalist armies northward in 1922-1927 was considered to be specially and incomprehensibly Chinese; possible lessons which might have been learned from Chinese Communist psychological warfare were left unheeded by officials and students in the West. Meanwhile Germany, the greatest power of Europe, had been fighting bitter internal psychological warfare battles[24] which looked like heated internal politics. Not until Adolf Hitler assumed the Reich's Chancellorship and began using his Brown-shirt methods for foreign affairs did other people wake up to the existence and application of the new weapon.