By now, Chiang had returned to Nanjing and called a meeting of the Military Affairs Commission, the forum in which the decision to go to war would be discussed. To symbolize that the new politics of cooperation against the Japanese was real, three major CCP leaders took the precarious flight to Nanjing to attend the meeting: Zhou Enlai, Red Army marshal Zhu De, and General Ye Jianying.40 Mao instructed them to cooperate, but also to act with caution.
