China on the Eve of Communist Takeover
A. Doak Barnett
Frederick A. Praeger
<p>This book attempts to illuminate some of the trends and conditions
in China just prior to, and at the time of, Communist
takeover. It is not, and does not purport to be, either a history
or an exhaustive analysis of those years. It is composed, in fact, of
reports I wrote in China during that period, and, like all current
reporting in times of rapid change, these reports have certain unavoidable
limitations; they inevitably tend to be fragmentary and
lack the kind of perspective only time can provide. Nevertheless,
I believe that they do contain information unavailable elsewhere,
and that they may convey a "feel" for many of the complex problems
involved in the revolutionary upheaval in China which
could not be obtained except from on-the-spot observation and
study.</p>