Author: Red Guard
Originally published on New History Seeking Truth website on
13 March 2019
(Translator’s preface: This is another defence of Mao’s
reputation in relation to the Great Leap Forward. The images are those that
accompanied the original post. They were uncaptioned, and I have not added
explanations, although the second of the Renmin Ribao newspaper front pages
contains the notorious boast of having achieved more than 36,900 jin per mu).
The Great Leap Forward, which took place in China in the
late 1950s, was a major decision of the Party. Many people today believe that
the Great Leap Forward was the product of Mao Zedong's greed for more and
quicker results and his deviation from seeking truth from facts. There is no
shortage of people in the academic world who hold such views. Recently, after
carefully reading the biography of Mao Zedong and the chronicle of Mao Zedong,
which have been edited and published by the Literature Research Office of the
Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, I think that the informative
historical materials show that, on the whole, Mao Zedong consciously adhered to
seeking truth from facts during the Great Leap Forward.
1. The motivation of
the Great Leap Forward
The occurrence of the Great Leap Forward was determined by
the historical conditions at that time. Lenin said: When analyzing any social
problem, the absolute requirement of Marxist theory is to bring the problem
within a certain historical scope.
1. China is too poor, the people are too bitter
Mao Zedong said: The peasants are suffering terribly. There
are many of us, and we are very poor. Seventy percent of us are peasants, and
we do not have enough to eat or wear, and our houses are very simple and
unhygienic. To the ambitious people of the new China, it was only right that
they should be "poor and want to change, to do something, to be
revolutionary". The people wanted to get out of this situation, so they
had to work hard.
2. Foreigners "look down" on us, and we will be
beaten if we fall behind
Countries, like people, have self-respect. If it is
discriminated against, it should rise to the occasion.
Under the leadership of the Party, our people overthrew
imperialism, feudalism and bureaucratic capitalism after a long and arduous
struggle, and established New China, where the working people of China seized
national power for the first time. The people rejoiced, but the imperialists,
led by the United States, refused to recognise us and were eyeing us with
suspicion. Chairman Mao knew very well why, for nearly a hundred years in
China, almost every imperialist country in the world, small, medium and large,
bullied us and invaded our country. The reason for this, "apart from a
corrupt system, is economic and technological backwardness." He repeatedly
pointed out that being backward means being beaten. Therefore, in order to
consolidate and strengthen national defence and ensure the security of the
nascent proletarian regime, it was also urgent to speed up the pace of economic
construction and develop the economy as soon as possible.
At the Diaoyutai Conference in 1960, Mao Zedong said: You
have such a small amount of steel, with an annual output of only 13 million
tons, it is right to look down on you. When we produce 100 million tons of
steel a year, those who look up to us will still look up to us, and those who
look down on us will also have to look up to us. In fact, we have been angry
for more than 100 years, and we have been called the "sick man of East
Asia".
China is in a poor and blank situation, poor in steel and blank
in scientific and cultural backwardness.
3. The revolutionary enthusiasm of the people
On 15 April 1958 Mao Zedong wrote in his article
"Introducing a Cooperative": "It may not take as long as once
thought for our country to catch up with the big capitalist countries in terms
of industrial and agricultural production. Apart from the leadership of the
Party, the population of 600 million is a decisive factor. More people means a
greater ferment of ideas, more enthusiasm and more energy. Never before have we
seen the masses of the people so inspired,
so energetic and so vigorous as they are now." The momentum of the leap
forward leaps off the page.
In the book Hu Qiaomu Remembers Mao Zedong, he writes about
the Great Leap Forward in 1958: "In 1957, several things influenced the
'Great Leap Forward' in 1958. Why was the 'Great Leap Forward' proposed? One
was the victory of the anti-rightist struggle. Chairman Mao felt it was a great
victory. It was an entirely mass struggle that repelled the bourgeois
rightists. In particular, he believed that the Chinese Party could lead
economic construction and that there could be faster development. During the
Rectification, workers put up many big-character posters. Chairman Mao read the
big-character posters in several factories in Shanghai and felt that the masses
had been mobilised and that there was a great deal of enthusiasm hidden in the
masses. All these laid the foundation for the 'Great Leap Forward' to be
proposed." "With these internal and external factors, Chairman Mao
felt that a higher pace of development could be explored. By mobilizing the
masses, production would surely make a great leap forward." Hu Qiaomu is
not giving a comprehensive account of the motivations for the Great Leap
Forward, but what is stated here, especially in relation to international
conditions, is useful for a comprehensive and objective understanding of what
led to the Great Leap Forward in 1958.
Mao Zedong's statement at the Lushan Conference on 17 August
1959 that "it is inevitable that China will make a great leap
forward" was well-founded and not a subjective assumption.
For such a revolutionary mass movement, the Communists can
only stand firmly on the side of the revolutionary masses and be good at
discovering their socialist activism, protecting and cherishing it. As the
saying goes, "Qi can be drummed up but not let out". It is often said
that Mao Zedong "started" the Great Leap Forward. I think that the
word "started" here can be studied. Such an expression highlights
Mao's personal leadership role, but ignores the socialist activism of the
masses, and may not be historically accurate. To mobilise is not to
"mobilise". The fact is that the slogan "Great Leap
Forward" was raised only after the socialist enthusiasm of the masses had
become quite evident, i.e. after they had already "moved", It was
only then that the slogan "Great Leap Forward" was put forward to
follow the trend and lead the masses "to the socialist front".
2. Mao Zedong's attitude towards the boastfulness and exaggeration
in the Great Leap Forward
First, Chairman Mao repeatedly pointed out the need to be
realistic in accelerating the pace of construction
As early as March 9-26, 1958, when Chairman Mao presided
over the Chengdu Conference and listened to the reports on the development
plans of various provinces and cities, he found and criticized such problems as
"false reports, pompous boasting" and "false high production and
false leap forward", which were out of touch with reality, and stressed
that in order to accelerate economic development, we must start from reality
and seek truth from facts.
In his third speech at the Chengdu Conference on March 20,
he pointedly proposed: "The
speed of construction is a thing that exists objectively. Everything which,
objectively and subjectively, is capable of achievement, we must endeavour to
achieve by going all out, aiming high, and producing greater, faster, better,
and more economical results. But that which cannot be achieved, we should not
try to force ourselves to do" and " We must get rid of the empty reports and foolish boasting,
we must not compete for reputation, but serve reality." (The Chronicles
of Mao Zedong, vol. 3, p. 319)
On April 9, he pointed out when he heard the report from the
provinces and cities that he should oppose "false high production, false
leap forward, and false reports." He said: “farmers can be forgiven for
concealing production,...in the affairs of the world, there must be true, and there
will be false, there will be gains and disadvantages, things you should believe
and things you shouldn’t believe…If you believe in something one hundred
percent, then you will let it happen; if you do not believe in it, you will
lose confidence. We have to check all the work, all kinds of typical cases,
check clearly and check well, for there are some fake doctors, fake professors,
fake heart-to-hearts, fake high yields, fake leap forwards, and fake reports.
(The Chronicle of Mao Zedong, vol. 3, pp. 336_337)
On 27 April, Chairman Mao chaired a meeting of leaders of
the CPC Central Committee and some provincial and municipal heads in Guangzhou
to discuss industrial issues. Mao Zedong said: "Now two ministries are
proposing to catch up with the United States in fifteen years, is it possible?
Is it possible to overtake them? We should not mention the United States for
the time being, we should let the Soviet Union do it, we should only mention
overtaking Britain, the slogan of overtaking Britain remains unchanged, but don’t
raise the issue of surpassing the United States, that is a second stage, it is
an internal matter" (The Chronicle of Mao Zedong, vol. 3, p. 341)
Secondly, Chairman Mao repeatedly stressed the need to
"dampen things down" and criticised "false reporting and exaggeration".
In response to the high targets and boastfulness in the
reports on development planning by the provinces and cities, he repeatedly
proposed to "dampen things down".
In his third speech at the Chengdu meeting on March 20, he
pointed out sharply that if anything can be done according to subjective and
objective conditions, it should be done more quickly and with less effort. But
if you can't do it, don't force it. "Right now there is a gust of wind, amounting to a force 10 typhoon. We
must not impede this publicly, but within our own ranks we must speak clearly,
and dampen down the atmosphere a little. Dampening things down is not
throwing cold water, but to make things more solid. To get rid of false claims
and boastfulness, not to compete for fame, but to be pragmatic and to have
concrete measures." (The Chronicles of Mao Zedong, vol. 3, p. 319)
Here, Chairman Mao likened the wind of "boastfulness
and exaggeration" that emerged at the time to a "ten-stage
typhoon" and pointedly pointed out that "things must be dampened down".
After only four days, he sensed the seriousness of the
problem of "boastfulness and exaggeration" and again stressed the
need to "dampen things down" and not to be "overwhelmed" by
the mass fervour when he spoke for the fifth time at the Chengdu meeting on 25
March.
Another 10 days later, Mao Zedong spoke at the Wuchang
meeting on April 5, and again stressed the need to "cool things down"
in response to Hunan's needing to achieve a few "transformations" in
a year. He said: "There is still so much boasting, not much less, but it
has to be suppressed. Anti-adventurism has cut the over-enthusiasm in half,
let's not cut it all, but just compress it a little." (The Chronicle of
Mao Zedong, vol. 3, p. 334)
In this way, during the launching stage of the Great Leap
Forward, Chairman Mao saw the existence of high targets and a boastful wind in
development plans everywhere and called it a "stage-ten typhoon". In
just 15 days, he proposed and stressed three times that we should "calm
things down", asking everyone to "compress your inflated brains and
calm down"; "remove false reports and exaggerations"; and
"don't get dizzy with success." It should be acknowledged that this
was timely, important and deafening.
I wonder how those clowns felt in the face of such iron-clad
evidence when some later tried to distort history and smear Chairman Mao!
Thirdly, Chairman Mao also made it clear that the targets
should not be too high and that "there should be room for manoeuvre"
On 25 March, in his fifth speech at the Chengdu Conference,
in order to be realistic and "calm things down" in construction, he
proposed another principle, that planning and setting targets should
"leave room for manoeuvre" and "work out what can be done and
what will work".
He said, “I hope that some of the excessive targets are not
so high, that they are doable and workable, and that at least some of the
things don't make the papers. Doing is one thing, telling is another. Even if
you can do it, you have to be more careful about what you say, leaving some
room for the people, some room for your subordinates, and some room for
yourself. There is a principle in writing a play that you have to leave room
for the audience, that is, to give people something to think about, if all the
action and all the language is done and spoken, it is not necessarily good. In
short, if you write too many cheques, it is difficult to cash them later”. (The
Chronicles of Mao Zedong, vol. 3, p. 325)
On 2 April, at the Wuchang meeting, Chairman Mao once again
pointed out that "there must be room for manoeuvre". He said,
"Don't announce water conservation too soon, but leave room for it. It is
dangerous to announce the completion of water conservation, greening and the
'four noughts'. Only announce basic completion. Three years of bitter struggle
to basically change the face of the country does not mean absence of struggle
afterwards. In my speech on the correct handling of contradictions among the
people, I suggested that there will be hope not after three years, but after decades
of hard struggle." (The Chronicle of Mao Zedong, vol. 3, p. 331)
Finally, Chairman Mao also advocated that "we should
look at the opposite side"
On 20 March, in his third speech at the Chengdu Conference,
Chairman Mao asked whether it would be good for all counties to run industries,
or whether it would be "a great chaos in the world". He said, “There remains a question in my mind about
producing, in the course of the second five-year plan, 20 million tons of
steel. Is this a good thing, or will it throw everything into confusion? I’m
not sure at present, so I want to hold meetings. We’ll meet four times a year,
and if there are problems, we will make adjustments.” (The
Chronicles of Mao Zedong, vol. 3, pp. 319-320)
On 25 March, in another speech at the Chengdu Conference,
Chairman Mao advocated that to consider issues from the opposite side, one must
"listen to the views of the opposing side". He said: "Those who
respect materialism and dialectics advocate arguments and listen to the views
of the opposing side, which is the struggle of opposites" (The Chronicles
of Mao Zedong, vol. 3, p. 324).
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