Jinggang Mountains in the context of Suichuan County

The Jiangxi Soviet, sometimes referred to as the Jiangxi-Fujian Soviet, was a soviet area that existed between 1931 and 1934, governed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). It was the largest component of the Chinese Soviet Republic (CSR) and home to its capital, Ruijin. At the time, the CCP was engaged in a rural insurgency against the Kuomintang-controlled Nationalist Government as part of the Chinese Civil War. CCP leaders Mao Zedong and Zhu De chose to create the soviet in the rugged Jinggang Mountains on the border of Jiangxi and Fujian because of its remote location and defensible terrain. The First Red Front Army successfully repulsed a series of encirclement campaigns by the Kuomintang's National Revolutionary Army (NRA) during the first few years of the Soviet's existence, but they were eventually defeated by the NRA's fifth attempt between 1933 and 1934. After the Jiangxi Soviet was defeated militarily, the CCP began the Long March towards a new base area in the northwest.
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Ruijin (Chinese: 瑞金; pinyin: Ruìjīn) is a county-level city of Ganzhou in the mountains bordering Fujian Province in the south-eastern part of Jiangxi Province. Formerly a county, Ruijin became a county-level city on May 18, 1994.

It was an early center of Chinese communist activity and developed a reputation as cradle of the Chinese Communist Revolution. In the late-1920s, the Nationalists forced the Communists out of the Jinggang Mountains, sending them fleeing to Ruijin and the safety of its relative isolation in the rugged mountains along Jiangxi-Fujian border. In 1931, Mao Zedong founded the Chinese Soviet Republic (CSR) with Ruijin as its capital; it was called Ruijing by the CSR. The Communists withdrew in 1934 on the Long March after being surrounded again by the Nationalists.

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) had sphere of influence within the Republic of China from 1927 to 1949 during the Chinese Civil War, collectively called revolutionary base areas. They were also known as the Soviet Zone from 1927 to 1937 during the early stages of the Chinese Civil War, the Anti-Japanese Base Areas during the Second Sino-Japanese War, and the Liberated Zone during the final Stages of the Civil War from 1946 until the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949.

There were six soviet areas from 1927 to 1933: the Jinggang Mountains, the Central Soviet in Eastern Jiangxi on the border of Fujian, the Eyuwan Soviet, Xiangexi (West Hubei and Hunan), and Xianggan (Hunan-Jiangxi). The first soviet was the Hailufeng Soviet created in 1927. The Central Soviet was the main base of the CCP where its leader Mao Zedong issued a directive on 1 September 1931 for the Central Soviet to mass mobilize the region as a base area. As problems occurred over being able to control territories outside the Central Soviet, by 1933 a full transfer of CCP forces to the Central Soviet was achieved. In 1931, the disconnected areas controlled by the CCP were declared the Chinese Soviet Republic (CSR).