Mao
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84. Kissinger, Henry, Years of Upheaval, Little, Brown, Boston, 1982, pp. 687–8 and 692–3.
85. Mao had noted that the governments-in-exile of the three Baltic States maintained embassies in Washington, as did the Soviet Union of which those countries now formed part. Kissinger, who was seeking a breakthrough on diplomatic relations with China – the Watergate scandal was then at its height and Nixon was desperate for a foreign policy success – took that as a hint that Mao might accept a similar scheme for China. In fact, the reverse was true. Mao had told him that China was ready to wait 100 years if Washington refused to break relations with Taipei, but Kissinger failed to understand that the two statements were complementary.
86. Wang Nianyi, p. 471. Frederick Teiwes and Warren Sun argue that Jiang Qing would not have called for a ‘line struggle’ against Zhou had she not believed that Mao himself was contemplating one. Mao's nephew, Mao Yuanxin, also thought Mao was considering an ‘11th line struggle’ against Zhou. Mao himself, later in December, echoing Jiang's accusations before the Politburo, asked rhetorically: ‘Who is colluding with foreigners [and] wants to be the emperor?’ The difficulty, as always, is to know whether Mao was seriously considering purging Zhou or whether, like his cri de coeur in January 1972, urging Zhou to take over from him, it was a speculative gambit, a trial balloon, which he would never have followed through on. To judge by Mao's actions, he was never serious about Zhou's removal, but his grumbling and, at times, his obvious contempt for the Premier, led those around him to believe that he might be considering it (Teiwes and Sun, End of the Maoist Era, pp. 138–9 & 142).
87. Evans, p. 198.
88. Yan and Gao, pp. 422 and 430–2; Barnouin and Yu, pp. 265-6 and 258.
89. Yan and Gao, pp. 416–20 and 432–42; Barnouin and Yu, pp. 264–5 and 267–8.
90. Hao and Duan, pp. 636–7.
91. Li Zhisui, pp. 578–9.
92. Ibid., 569–70, 573–4 and 576–7.
93. Kissinger, White House Years, p. 1059.
94. Li Zhisui, pp. 580 and 604–5. Mao was operated on for cataracts in August 1975.
95. Ibid.; Pantsov and Levine, pp. 489–90; Zhang Yufeng, interview with the author, June 1997; oral sources.
96. Peng Cheng, pp. 42–3; History of the CCP, Chronology, p. 364.
97. Li Zhisui, pp. 580–6.
98. Teiwes and Sun, pp. 189–217; Yan and Gao, pp. 445–8 and 455–9; Guangming Ribao, Nov. 12 1976; Ye Yonglie, Wang Hongwen xingshuailu, pp. 413–15; Hao and Duan, p. 638.
99. Teiwes and Sun, p. 221.
100. History of the CCP, Chronology, p. 366.
101. There were two exceptions: a Politburo meeting on February 15 1975, called to discuss Mao's health, which Zhou chaired (Li Zhisui, pp. 597–9); and a meeting on May 3 1975, which was the last that Mao himself chaired (Barnouin and Yu, pp. 282–3 and 286). Li Zhisui (p. 600) disputes Mao's presence on the latter occasion, but his information is second hand and appears to be incorrect. Although Wang Hongwen remained formally in charge of the work of the Party Centre until July 2, in practice Deng was the leading figure throughout the first half of the year. Deng chaired the Politburo meetings of May 27 and June 3, and in mid-June Mao told him that from now on he must ‘take control of [all] work’, adding presciently: ‘The tallest tree in the forest will surely face the storm.’
102. Yan and Gao, p. 458.
103. Kissinger, Years of Upheaval, p. 68.
104. Yan and Gao quote Mao as saying of his wife in early 1975: ‘Sooner or later she will break with everyone … After I die, she will create disturbances’ (p. 460).
105. Teiwes and Sun, End of the Maoist Era, p. 231.
106. History of the CCP, Chronology, p. 365.
107. Ibid., p. 366. It is a measure of the extraordinary degree of mistrust that reigned at Mao's court that Zhou, having drafted the preparatory documents for the National People's Congress by hand, then had copies printed and ordered the originals burnt lest the wind turn and papers in his own handwriting be used as evidence against him (Teiwes and Sun, End of the Maoist Era, p. 220).
108. Li Xiannian, Hua and Ji Dengkui were Standing Vice-Premiers, responsible for the day-to-day running of the government. Ji, like Hua, was part of the middle generation of leaders who had come to Mao's attention in the 1950s, had been classed as moderates in the Cultural Revolution, were promoted to the Politburo afterwards and viewed by the Chairman as possible successors after the flight of Lin Biao (ibid., pp. 310–12).
109. The following account is drawn from ibid., pp. 253–263 & 283–304.
110. Barnouin and Yu, p. 281. In this connection it is noteworthy that in mid-1976, Mao asked to re-read the texts of the criticisms of Zhou for empiricism which he had made at Yan'an. By then Zhou had died, so at that stage his concern must have been with the policy (empiricism), and how it might affect his legacy, rather than with the person (the Premier) who had promoted it.
111. MacFarquhar, Politics of China, p. 291.
112. Ibid., p. 282; Gardner, p. 106.
113. Barnouin and Yu, pp. 282–3; Peng Cheng, pp. 50–1 and 56.
114. So did Zhou Enlai. On June 16 he sent Mao a report of humiliating self-abasement entitled, ‘My mistakes and crimes in the 40 years from the Zunyi conference until today’, accompanied by a pathetic note to Mao's secretary, Zhang Yufeng, urging her to show it to the Chairman ‘when he is feeling good and relaxed, has a full stomach and has had a good sleep. Be sure not to show it to him when he is tired. Please, please.’ At the May 3 Politburo meeting Mao had conspicuously ignored Zhou. Others present that day found him more than usually enigmatic and intimidating. (Teiwes and Sun, End of the Maoist Era, pp. 3 & 295–6).
115. Yan and Gao, p. 471. See also the wall poster illustrated in Witke, Comrade Chiang Ch'ing (opposite p. 335).
116. Teiwes and Sun, pp. 73–4, 232–4 & 306. Already in 1973, Kang had told both Deng Xiaoping and Zhou Enlai of his suspicions of the two radicals’ treason. At a meeting with Mao in Changsha, in December 1974, Zhou raised Kang's concerns about Zhang Chunqiao, though not about Jiang Qing. Mao apparently dismissed the allegations, saying that in the absence of proof the matter should be shelved. The issue continued to obsess Kang, and in May 1975, after he learned of Mao's reaction, he insisted on being taken on a stretcher to see Zhou Enlai, who was also then in hospital, to urge him yet again to convey the accusations against Jiang Qing to Mao. Zhou refused, prompting Kang's letter in August. Kang was evidently aware that the message had not got through, for in October 1975, only weeks before his death, when his illness allowed him a brief remission, he had a final meeting with Mao during which he did not mention the allegations, evidently recognising that, by then, Jiang's political situation had improved. In April 1976, Foreign Minister Qiao Guanhua reportedly told Mao that Kang had ‘slandered’ Jiang Qing and Zhang Chunqiao, but without giving details. The most plausible among the various charges Kang levelled against Jiang was that she had betrayed the Party while imprisoned in Shanghai in 1934. According to a senior Chinese Party historian, Zhang Chunqiao's wife was indeed a traitor and Zhang had covered up for her. See also Byron and Pack, Claws of the Dragon, pp. 405–7.
117. Barnouin and Yu, pp. 283–5.
118. Peng Cheng, p. 57.
119. Ibid.
120. The following account is drawn principally from Teiwes and Sun, pp. 363–415 and MacFarquhar and Schoenhals, pp. 402–12.
121. Barnouin and Yu, pp. 279–80; Evans, pp. 206–7.
122. An additional factor may have been that the same month, October 1975, Deng had approved a document on the reform of science and technology which turned out to include an adulterated version of one of Mao's quotations. The Chairman had been quoted as saying: ‘Science and technology is a force of production’. Mao had actually said: ‘Without doing science and technology, the forces of production cannot be improved’. The article was later denounced as one of ‘three poisonous weeds’ which Deng had allegedly promoted (Teiwes and Sun, End
of the Maoist Era, pp. 321–39).
123. Jia Sinan, pp. 376–8; Hao and Duan, pp. 648–9; MacFarquhar, p. 296.
124. Barnouin and Yu, p. 280.
125. Li Zhisui, p. 605.
126. Yan and Gao, p. 480.
127. Ibid., p. 479. See also Wang Nianyi, p. 560.
128. Hao and Duan, p. 560.
129. Evans, p. 210.
130. It was launched in the Foreign Ministry and at the ‘Two Schools’ (Qinghua and Beijing Universities) in the second half of November.
131. Barnouin and Yu, p. 286.
132. Yan and Gao, pp. 482–5; Li Zhisui, pp. 609–10.
133. Teiwes and Sun, End of the Maoist Era, p. 439.
134. Yan and Gao, pp. 485–6.
135. On March 2, Jiang Qing denounced Deng by name at a meeting of provincial and military region leaders, describing him as a ‘counter-revolutionary commander’ and ‘Han traitor’, terms which Mao criticised as excessive. From the beginning of that month, Deng was named in Party documents circulated to county and regimental level. In the public media, the emphasis switched from attacking the ‘rightist wind’ to the ‘unrepentant capitalist roader’, but outside the Party, he was still not identified. As during the movement to criticise Lin Biao and Confucius in 1974, factional fighting broke out in a number of provinces – most notably Henan, Sichuan, Yunnan and Zhejiang. By the spring of 1976 this had caused serious economic disruption.
136. On January 21 1976, the day Mao named Hua as Zhou Enlai's successor, he commented that Deng might still have ‘useful work to perform’.
137. Nixon, Richard, In the Arena: A Memoir of Victory, Defeat and Renewal, Simon & Schuster, New York, 1990, p. 362.
138. Zhang Yufeng, ‘Mao Zedong yu Zhou Enlaide yixie wannian qushi’, in Guangming Ribao.
139. Zhang Yufeng, ‘Mao Zedong Zhou Enlai wannian ersanshi’, Yanhuang zisun, No 1, 1989.
140. Evans, pp. 207–8.
141. The following is drawn from Garside, Roger, Coming Alive: China after Mao, New York, 1981, pp. 115–36; Yan and Gao, pp. 489–503; MacFarquhar, Politics of China, pp. 301–5; and oral sources.
142. At the time, it was assumed that the Wenhui bao article, which attacked that ‘capitalist roader within the Party [who] wanted to help the unrepentant capitalist roader regain power’ had been ordered by Zhang Chunqiao. Thirty years later, in 2005, a former editor of the paper claimed that, rather than being politically inspired, the problem was of clumsy drafting: the ‘capitalist roader within the Party’, he maintained, was Deng, not Zhou, and the ‘unrepentant’ capitalist roader, or roaders, referred to Deng's supporters. Teiwes and Sun argue that this is plausible since by this time attacks on Zhou could serve no useful purpose (End of the Maoist Era, pp. 468–71). However, that sits ill with Mao's comment that mourning for Zhou was a cover for ‘restoration’ – ie. for negating the Cultural Revolution – and for his re-reading, in the last three months of his life, when he was so ill that he could not attend to any other business, the texts of his criticisms of Zhou at Yan'an. Zhou, even dead, was no small matter for Mao. In any case, whether a blunder in drafting or a deliberate attack, the article was a crucial trigger for the unrest that followed.
143. At the time it was widely believed that a number of protesters were killed. In fact, it appears that there were no deaths. 38 arrests were made that night. Over the whole period of the protests, 388 people were detained, most of whom were released soon after Mao's death.
144. Yan and Gao, p. 502.
145. MacFarquhar and Schoenhals, p. 430. It was widely, but incorrectly, reported – including by me in the first edition of this book – that Deng was sheltered by Xu Shiyou in Guangdong. That was the generally accepted version in Beijing when I arrived there a year later. In fact Xu would not have had the power to protect Deng: only Mao could do that.
146. MacFarquhar, Politics in China, p. 305. Mao had used the same phrase about both Deng and Zhou Enlai. There has been much speculation since that it was spurious or exaggerated (see, for instance, MacFarquhar and Schoenhals, pp. 434 & 603 n. 14). However, none of Hua's senior colleagues disputed it, and it is logical that Mao should have wished to make clear, once and for all, that Hua was his anointed successor, as indeed was the case.
147. Li Zhisui, pp. 614–23: Yan and Gao, pp. 510–15.
148. Wang Nianyi, p. 601.
149. Yan and Gao, pp. 487 and 516.
150. MacFarquhar, Politics in China, p. 300.
151. Ibid., pp. 306–7; Li Zhisui, p. 621; Evans, pp. 214–15; Wang Nianyi, p. 591.
152. Li Zhisui, pp. 624–5; Yan and Gao, pp. 516–19.
153. Xiu Ru, 1976 nian dashi neimu, Beijing, 1989, pp. 403–4.
EPILOGUE
1. Liu Wusheng (ed.), Zhonggong dangshi fengyunlu, Renmin chubanshe, Beijing, pp. 439–40.
2. MacFarquhar and Schoenhals, pp. 443–9.
3. Schram, Unrehearsed, p. 190.
4. Kuo, Classified Chinese Documents, p. 57.
5. Oral sources; Chen made his comment at a CC work conference in November 1978. See also Ming bao, Hong Kong, Jan. 15 1979.
6. Barmé, Geremie R., Shades of Mao, M. E. Sharpe, Armonk, 1996, p. 34.
7. Chavannes, Edouard, Les Mémoires Historiques de Se-ma Ts'ien, Adrien-Maisonneuve, Paris, 1967, vol. 2, pp. 144–5.
8. Miscellany of Mao Tse-tung Thought, 1, p. 98.
9. If the death-toll from the Great Leap Forward is taken as 38 million (the figure given privately by Yang Jisheng), and it is estimated that a further three million died in the land reform and the political movements of the early 1950s, and between 2.5 and three million in the Cultural Revolution – all of which are minimum figures – the number of people who died in China as a direct result of Mao's policies was of the order of 46 million. By comparison, the total death-toll in the Second World War is estimated at 55 million; in the Taiping Rebellion, 20 million; and in the First World War, eight million. None of those events, however, can be ascribed to the will of a single man.
10. Oral sources. I have been unable to track down the reference, but Mao expressed the same thought less colourfully at a CC meeting on Dec. 20 1964 (Miscellany, 2, p. 426).
AFTERWORD
1. Washington Post, Dec. 12 2014.
2. New York Times, Oct. 2 2015.
3. ChinaFile, May 4 2016.
4. Martin Bernal of Cornell University frankly acknowledged in the New York Review of Books (February 25 1971): ‘When writing on China in the 1940s we are really thinking about Vietnam today. I further admit that … it affects my judgment of events there – and my interpretation of Chinese history.’
5. Lest it be thought that this characterization is unjust, given Halliday's subsequent stance, it may be helpful to recall his articles for the New Left Review, founded in 1960 as a vehicle for the Marxist Left in Britain. In 1974, he began an account of Hong Kong like this: ‘There are 300,000 hard drug addicts; 80,000 triad gang members; several hundred thousand squatters; sickness and squalour all round.’ The colony, he continued, was a ‘fantastic concentration of wretchedness and cunning’, administered by ‘Whitehall scum’ with a police force that was ‘a criminal octopus… working on behalf of the ruling class’. The British government, he said, should ‘terminate its aggression against China’. ‘Revolutionaries in Britain’, despite their ‘lamentable record’ in matters pertaining to the colony, had a special responsibility to fight against ‘the continuing and horrendous exploitation of four million Chinese’ (‘Hong Kong: Britain's Chinese Colony’ in New Left Review, Sept–Dec 1974, pp. 91–112). Stripped of inflammatory language, some of Halliday's criticisms might have been true, but overall it was extraordinarily warped, the same criticism that would afterwards be made of Mao: The Unknown Story, albeit in that case from an opposite standpoint. Seven years later, writing about the Korean War, Halliday again advanced a far Left thesis: ‘The starting point has to be this,’ he wrote, ‘South Korea was not invaded by North Korea on June 25 1950; it was inva
ded by US imperialism in September 1945 [italicised in the original].’ The United States, with Soviet acquiescence, he went on, ‘forcibly overthrew a demonstrably popular national organization… The DPRK [North Korea] has a strong case to rule the [whole] country.’ (‘The North Korean Enigma’, ibid., May–June 1981, pp. 18–52).
6. Perry, Anyuan, p. 3.
7. Chang and Halliday, pp. 504 & 533.
8. Benton, New Fourth Army, pp. 645–6, 683–4 & 696, referring to the Chinese Party's scapegoating of Xiang Ying after the New Fourth Army Incident in 1941, which he described as ‘historical character assassination … a case study in distortion’. The same words might be applied to Jung Chang's treatment of Mao.
9. Private communication from Professor Timothy Cheek, University of British Columbia.
10. The Chinese phrase which Schram translated as ‘the irresistible sexual desire for one's lover’ reads 如好色者之性欲发动而寻其情人 (ru haosezhe zhi xingyu fadong er xun qi qingren). The key terms are haosezhe, which means literally ‘a man who loves women’, a sensualist or, in a pejorative sense, a lustful person; xingyu, ‘sexual desire’; and fadong er xun, ‘to be aroused and to seek out’. The closest one could get to Jung Chang’s translation while remaining faithful to the original would be: ‘as the sexual desire of a lustful person is aroused and seeks out a lover’. The Chinese for sex maniac, xingkuang, literally ‘sex mad’, is not there. Nor can fadong er xun be read as meaning ‘prowl’.
11. Chang and Halliday, p. 395, where the source is given as ‘a family member’. On the previous page, she writes that when Mao learned that Anying wished to marry Songlin, he ‘flew into a ferocious rage and bellowed at him so terrifyingly that Anying fainted’, information which she attributes to ‘a member of the household’. From this she deduced Mao's ‘sexual jealousy (the beautiful and elegant Si-qi had been around Mao for much of her teens)’. In fact, Songlin had been adopted into Mao's household at Yan'an when she was six years old. Her father had been executed by the nationalists and her mother was an underground Party worker in Shanghai: as a child, Songlin was terrified that she would never see her again. Mao was moved by her plight, she said, after seeing a play in Yan'an where she acted the part of a foundling, which reminded him of the time when Anying and his brother, Anqing, lived as street children in Shanghai after the execution of Yang Kaihui. Both Mao and her mother welcomed the match, she said: ‘Chairman Mao was very happy. He and my mother talked it over for hours … My mother thought that if I married Anying he would be a trustworthy husband. Chairman Mao thought we were in love and that I would not turn out to be a bad person’ (Liu Songlin, interview with the author, January 2005). As for sexual jealousy, whatever the teenage Songlin's qualities, she was not, as photographs of the time make clear, ‘beautiful and elegant’.