A crucial conclusion was that China’s geography made it vulnerable in the event of a major war, because the vast majority of the country’s infrastructure was on the east coast, the area most likely to be invaded. Plans were drawn up for the state to ensure sufficient supplies of iron, coal, and chemicals should war break out. There needed to be more production in the interior of China: iron and steel in Hunan, copper and iron in Sichuan, and coal mines in south and southwest China.15 The seeds of the planned economy that would mark Mao’s China were sown by Chiang’s government, stimulated by
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