Turning Point: The Cultural Revolution

Preface

Mao's apprehension of the USSR's new leadership and policies and other factors led to high tension between China and the USSR. By the early 1960s, the tension was so high that Mao devised a plan that would:

• Phase out any government officials that didn't share Mao's beliefs about how China's government.
• Influence the youth to make them more revolutionary
• Make healthcare, education, etc. less "elitist"

His plan for doing all of this focused primarily on the nation's children through a program called the "Red Guards."

The Red Guards

Beginning

Mao initiated the Cultural Revolution in May 1966 by removing many significant leaders of the politburo (government of a communist party), such as President Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping. By January of 1967, they had begun trying to formulate new political groups to replace the previous ones removed. Still, the process was very disorganized, prompting some higher-ups to attempt to get Mao to end the cultural revolution, with no success.

During this time, Mao also closed down the schools and influenced the Chinese people (mostly the children) through media to rebel against their leadership with the slogan "Bombard the Headquarters." Under the belief that "political power grows out of the barrel of a gun," an expression constructed and pushed by Mao, many elders and educated people/scholars/intellectuals were physically and mentally abused or killed. Along with this, many people considered "anti-revolutionary" were publicly humiliated, tortured, and killed. In that first August of 1966, often called Red August, around 1,772 people were killed in the capital, Beijing. Many of those 1,772 people were teachers, some of whom were killed by their students. The devastation and hysteria among the general population harmed the economy and caused industrial production to go down 12% from 1966 to 1968.

Issues within the Red Guard

The summer of 1967 saw the Red Guard divide into multiple factions with opposing views on which one was the "true" group with the most "Maoist" views. The fighting between the differing factions got so bad that Mao attempted to unify the Red Guard with the army's support under defense minister Lin Biao. However, the attempts didn't work, instead causing more issues and separation throughout China.

Issues Within the Government

In 1969 at the 9th Party Congress, Lin Biao was determined to be Mao's successor upon his death. Accordingly, Lin rapidly began taking advantage of his heightened abilities, which worried Mao. Lin declared martial law, allowing him to eliminate possible rivals to his position. Mao was concerned as he didn't want a successor who was so eager to take power, and so he did what he could to oppose his administration, along with Premier Zhou Enlai and Mao's wife, Jiang Qing (possibly). Eventually, their issues peaked in September of 1971 when, while fleeing to the Soviet Union, Lin was killed in a plane crash after a botched assassination attempt against Mao. Following Lin's death, a large portion of the Chinese military higher-ups was killed or purged. Lin's death was a blow to many of the millions of Mao supporters who had attacked, tortured, and killed millions of people to elevate Lin to his power level.

The Ending of the Cultural Revolution

Zhou Enlai was one of the primary leaders starting from the early 1970s, and he tried to stabilize China's overall infrastructure and economy. He undid some of the things done earlier in the Revolution, like restoring China's education system and communications with the outside world.

Mao's health was obviously declining by this time, and in 1972 he had a significant stroke and was also suffering from a fatal tumor. Due to this, questions about Mao's successor came back into focus. As a result, Zhou and Mao decided that power would return to Deng Xiaoping. However, Jiang Qing and her supporters disagreed with this choice and pushed to follow/form a more radical path.

The Chinese political landscape often changed until Mao died in 1976, going between Jiang's political group and her supporters and the Zhou-Deng political group. At first, the radicals with Jiang were rising in influence and power. Still eventually, due to more economic instability and disruption, Mao diverted his focus back to the Zhou-Deng group. Zhou died in January of 1976, and then Deng was officially removed in April 1976. Eventually, though, Mao's death in September and the following purging of the Gang of Four led by Jiang Qing led Deng to return to power in 1977.