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07/19/2007
China and Mao, Part II
This coming fall, the Communist Party of China holds its 17th
national congress. Last week I covered a key recent speech
given by President Hu Jintao, who stressed China’s
“unprecedented opportunities and challenges” in meeting “the
new expectations” of the people. Hu also stressed that “To
develop socialist democracy is our long-term goal,” while talking
of a “democratic decision-making process.”
Then President Hu talked of implementing “Marxism-Leninism,
Mao Zedong Thought and Deng Xiaoping Theory.” So I just
thought we’d take a look at a few of Mao’s theories through
various quotations.
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March 1927 Mao (1893-1976) draws the heretical conclusion
that the Chinese peasantry had high revolutionary potential and
that the Communist Party’s efforts should focus on the
countryside rather than the cities.
“In a very short time several hundred million peasants will rise
like a mighty storm, like a hurricane, a force so swift and violent
that no power, however great, will be able to hold it back. They
will smash all the trammels that bind them and rush forward
along the road to liberation. They will sweep all the imperialists,
warlords, corrupt officials, local tyrants and evil gentry into their
graves.”
October 1935 during the Long March (1934-35)
“The Red Army is not afraid of hardship on the march, the long
march.
Ten thousand waters and a thousand mountains are nothing
The far snows of Minshan only make us happy
And when the army pushes through, we all laugh.”
August 1946 during a time of renewed civil war.
“The atom bomb is a paper tiger which the U.S. reactionaries use
to scare people. It looks terrible, but in fact it is not. The
outcome of a war is decided by the people, not by one or two
new weapons.”
July 1949 Mao takes over.
“Not only in China but also in the world without exception, one
either leans to the side of imperialism or to the side of socialism.
Neutrality is mere camouflage and a third road does not exist.”
November 1957 post launch of Sputnik, which appeared to
give the Soviet Union an advantage.
“The east wind is prevailing over the west wind Let us
imagine, how many people will die if war should break out? Out
of the world’s population of 2,700 million, one-third – or, if
more, half – may be lost I debated this question with a foreign
statesman [Nehru]. He believed that if an atomic war was
fought, the whole of mankind would be annihilated. I said that if
the worst came to the worst and half of mankind died, the other
half would remain while imperialism would be razed to the
ground, and the whole world would become socialist.”
August 1958 Mao battles Chiang Kai-shek over the offshore
islands of Quemoy and Matsu, while differing with Nikita
Khrushchev at the same time over Marxism-Leninism.
“He [Khrushchev] wants to improve relations with the United
States? Good, we’ll congratulate him with our guns Let’s get
the United States involved, too. Maybe we can get the United
States to drop an atom bomb on Fujian Let’s see what
Khrushchev says then.”
July 23, 1959 a public admission that the Great Leap Forward
(1958-63) had fallen well short of the expectations built up
around it.
“The chaos caused was on a grand scale and I take responsibility.
Comrades, you must all analyze your own responsibility. If you
have to s---, s---! If have to fart, fart! You will feel much better
for it.”
January 1964
“Khrushchev has said that we have one pair of trousers for every
five people in China, and sit around eating out of the same bowl
of watery cabbage soup.”
July 10, 1964
“Two large powers – i.e., the United States and the Soviet Union
– are trying to become friends and take over control of the whole
world. How can we approve of such a development?”
March 1966 Cultural Revolution (1966-76) launched to purge
Communist Party of his opponents and to instill correct
revolutionary attitudes. By 1968, China was nearing civil war.
“The propaganda department of the Central Committee is the
palace of the King of Hell. We must overthrow the palace of the
King of Hell and set the little devils free. I have always
advocated that whenever the central organs do bad things, it is
necessary to call upon the localities to rebel, and to attack the
center.”
August 1966 [Decision of the Central Committee of the
Chinese Communist Party]
“The great proletarian Cultural Revolution now unfolding is a
great revolution that touches people to their very souls Our
objective is to struggle against and crush those persons in
authority who are taking the capitalist road, to criticize and
repudiate the reactionary bourgeois academic ‘authorities’ and
the ideology of the bourgeoisie and all other exploiting classes
and to transform education, literature and art and all other parts
of the superstructure that do not correspond to the socialist
economic base, so as to facilitate the consolidation and
development of the socialist system.”
April 6, 1967 Mao addresses the Red Guards
“Have no fear of chaos. The more chaos you dish up and the
longer it goes on, the better. Disorder and chaos are always a
good thing. They clarify things But never use weapons.”
August 1968
“A proletarian party must get rid of the state and take in the
fresh air, for only thus can it be full of vitality. Without
eliminating waste matter and absorbing fresh blood, the party has
no vigor.”
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After Mao died, you had De-Maoization, 1976-89, as Deng
Xiaoping eventually emerged to lead a reform effort.
Deng, 1978
“We are now carrying out the modernizations of industry,
agriculture, national defense, and science and technology.
However, the adjective ‘socialist’ should be prefixed to these
four modernizations. We call them the ‘socialist four
modernizations.”’
Deng, September 1986
“The main task of socialism is to develop the productive forces,
steadily improve the life of the people, and keep increasing the
material wealth of the society. Therefore, there can be no
communism with pauperism, or socialism with pauperism. So to
get rich is no sin.”
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The purpose of this little exercise was to point out that while
today, President Hu Jintao talks of Maoist Theory, Mao’s
principles are all built around the little people, the peasantry.
These are the very ones beginning to slowly rise up today in a
classic battle over rising expectations. This is exactly what Hu
and China’s current leadership fear most. So do the people fall
back on Mao, amidst the corruption and degradation of their
land? You can’t just conclude, ‘Oh, they’d never do that. Mao
has long since been discredited.’
And Mao’s thinking on nuclear weapons is more than a bit
disconcerting. It’s something I’ve mused about from time to
time. Does there come a moment when China risks nuclear war
because it believes it would be limited and the West would cave?
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Source: “History in Quotations,” M.J. Cohen and John Major
Hot Spots* will return July 26.
Brian Trumbore
*After 8 years I changed the title of the link from “Hott
Spotts.”
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