Editing Deng Xiaoping (section)

=== Military campaign in Guangxi ===
From 1929 to 1931, Deng served as the chief representative of the Central Committee in Guangxi, where he helped lead the [[Baise Uprising|Baise]] and [[Longzhou Uprising]]s. Both at the time and later, Deng Xiaoping's leadership during the rebellion has come under serious criticism. He followed the "Li Lisan Line" that called for aggressive attacks on cities. In practice, this meant that the rural soviet in Guangxi was abandoned and that the Seventh Red Army under Deng's political leadership fought and lost several bloody battles.{{sfn|Franz|1988|pp=83-84}}{{sfn|Yang|1997|pp=66-67}} Eventually, Deng and the other Communist leaders in Guangxi decided to retreat to Jiangxi to join Mao Zedong. However, after a costly march across rough terrain, Deng left the army leaderless without prior authorization to do so.{{sfn|Franz|1988|pp=86-87}} A Central Committee post-mortem in 1931 singled out Deng's behavior as an example of "rightist opportunism and a rich peasant line".{{sfn|Yang|1997|pp=66-67}} In 1945, several former commanders of the Seventh Red Army spoke out against Deng for his actions during the uprising, although Mao Zedong protected Deng from any serious repercussions.{{sfn|Goodman|1994|p=34}} During the [[Cultural Revolution]], [[Red Guards]] learned about the events of the Baise Uprising and accused Deng of desertion.{{sfn|Franz|1988|p=87}} Deng admitted that leaving the army was one of the "worst mistakes of [his] life" and that "although this action was allowed by the party, it was politically horribly wrong."{{sfn|Deng|1968}} Modern historians and biographers tend to agree. Uli Franz calls leaving the army a "serious error".{{sfn|Franz|1988|p=87}} Benjamin Yang calls it a "tragic failure and dark period in [Deng's] political life."{{sfn|Yang|1997|p=70}} On the other hand, Diana Lary places blame for the disaster more broadly on the "ineptitude" of both the local leaders and the CCP Central Committee.{{sfn|Lary|1974|pp=107}}