The Cultural Revolution Flashcards
Who is Lin Biao?
Head of army
Who is Chen boda?
Head of propaganda
Who are the Gang of Four?
Cultural revolution group
Wang Hongwen
Zhang Chunquiao
Yao Wenguen
Jiang Qing
When was the cultural revolution ?
1966-1976
Who were the 3 main pragmatists in the cultural revolution ?
Liu Shaoqui
Deng Xiaoping
Zhou Enlai
Who are the group of five?
Peng Zhen Wu Lengxi Zhou Yang Lu Dingyi Lang Sheng
Who is the head of the secret police ?
Kang Sheng
Deng Xiaoping’s famous pragmatic phrase
“Doesn’t matter if the car was white or black as long as it catches the rat”
Where and how did Mao get sideline?
1962
Conference of the 7000 cadres
Mao said that the Great Leap Forward was 90% success and 10% failures
Liu Shaoqui said he spoke to a peasant in his village who said it was 70% man made famine and a 30% natural disasters
Mao had to admit his faults
Zhou Enlai was critical of Mao’s over ambitious targets in the GLF
Mao then resigned from day to day politics
How did the cultural revolution start?
July 1966
Mao swam in the Yangtze River
Propaganda declared he swam 9 miles in 65 minutes which was a new world record.
This was done to show Mao to be fit as ever and a strong leader. He would then return to politics
What were the four main motives of Mao launching the cultural revolution ?
Genuine attempt to destroy China’s heritage and replace it with a new one glorifying the proletariat
Party infiltrated by capitalist roaders
Petty jealously in response to Liu and Deng’s success. Mao wanted to protect his legacy
He wanted the young and the cadres to experience revolution
Why did Mao want permanent revolution?
To get rid of “revisionists” Mao demanded constant class struggle
He fears the party were becoming bureaucratic and a ‘new elite’ we’re developing
What were the early ten points ?
Early ten points drafters by Mao in 1963
He believed the masses should be mobilised to critique corrupt party cadres
The four clean ups -economy, organisation, politics and ideology were aims to cleans non communist ideas
Peasants were told to subject corrupt officials to struggle meetings
However they were still recovering from the famine so the response was lukewarm
What were the later ten points?
Later in 1963, Deng Xiaoping revised the ten points
He wanted the campaign to be organised by work teams of party cadres rather than directly mobilising the masses
They re-wrote Mao’s directives to de-emphasise class struggle
What was Mao’s reaction to the later ten points?
Mao blamed Liu and Deng for unenthusiastic commitment to the plan which caused it to not be a success.
It convinced him that they were against him which prompted the tide of hate that Mao directed against them in the cultural revolution
What 2 things did Mao call opponents?
“Revisionists”
“Capitalist roaders”
Who and how was the first person eliminated in the cultural revolution ?
Why is the way he did it significant ?
A play called “Hai Rui dismissed from office” written by Wu Han (deputy mayor of Beijjng) had comparisons to Mao dismissing Peng Duhai
Mao arranged Yao Wenyuan (member of gang of 4) to write a negative review
The mayor (PENG Zhan) tried to defend Wu Zhan.
He was a close ally of Liu and Deng
The deputy mayor and the mayor (PENG Zhan) were then forced to resign and damned as revisionists
This indirectly eliminated 2 allies of enemies. This shows Mao to be sneaky and indirect with his methods.
This is repeated during the cultural revolution
Who were the cultural revolution group and when did Mao form it ?
March 1966
17 member sub committee
Including Chen boda and gang of 4
What was the little red book ?
Created by Chen boda and Lin Biao
Compiled of Mao’s sayings.
750 million copies were distributed
It became a social necessity to carry by 1966
What was the experience of Song Binbin?
She led red guards to kill her headteacher.
This was the first one killed in the cultural revolution
She was rewarded with the honour of putting an armband round chairman Mao in the first rally in Tiananmen Square
He name meant “gentle” and Mao said she should change it to “be violent”
What was Mao’s call to the students ?
“Bombard the headquarters!”
Why did young people join the red guards ? (4)
Indoctrinated by Mao’s cult of personality
Young were excited by the idea of rebellion in a strongly hierarchical society
1966- children of “black elements” were allowed to join so they did to prove their loyalty to Mao
Pragmatic careerism - unemployment was high and students were given free transport, accommodation and food in order to go to Beijing!
What were the five black elements that the red guards attacked?
Landlords Rich peasants Bad elements Counter revolutionaries Rightists
-basically could be anyone!
What happened with the red guards in Shanghai ?
Nov 1966
Radical red guards set up workers revolutionary general headquarters
Rival group “Scarlett guards” are formed by communist party
100,000 red guards defeated 20,000 Scarlett guards
January storm
1967
Red guards took over the city to set up their own Shanghai commune
February crackdown
Scarlett guards tried to crackdown on radical red guards.
Mao called this an “adverse current• and told the CCP to stop attack red guards
September
Mao got worried and had the Shanghai commune replaced by the revolutionary committee where the party was mainly in charge
What was the Wuhan incident ?
1967
PLA kill 1000 red guards
They also kidnap officials sent from Mao who were there to stop the mass killings of red guards
Mao then gets suspicious of Lin Biao
What were the four olds that the red guards attacked?
Old ideas
Old culture
Old customs
Old habits
Examples of what red guards destroyed ?
Confucius temple in Shandong
2700 books, 6618 artefacts , 2000 graves destroyed
Qing era archway
Hai Rui’s burial site
Tibet
- long hair was cut
When did the PLA restore order
1968
What orders did Mao give to the PLA in 1968 and why?
Ordered PLA to systematically crush the red guards
Because
He was worried foreign nations would take advantage of the chaos and he wanted to get the economy going again
How many people did the PLA accuse of being spies bad elements or counter revolutionaries ?
1.84 million
What happened in Yunan and Guangxi?
Guangxi
Villagers were shot and their flesh and livers were eaten
Yunan
Brains and testicles were eaten
6979 people did by what was described on official reports as “death by enforced suicide”
What were the tactics of the PLA when restoring order ?
Surveillance
Mass rallies
Struggle meetings
What did the red guards thing was going on when the PLA were “restoring order” and what was actually going on?
Red guards thought a “black hand” was against them
Mao admitted to being the “black hand”
How did the red guards stray from Mao’s intentions?
They wanted to overthrow the party rather than just Mao’s enemies
How was Jiang Qing responsible for the red terror?
Jiang Qing targeted anyone who could reveal her past as a Shanghai actress with a dubious repute
She also launched the “cleansing the class ranks” campaign to remove any remaining shreds of capitalism
What happened to Liu Shaoqui ?
Initially allowed to be kept as a “living target” -Jiang Qing in a house being subjected to constant struggle meetings
He was then exiled to an unheard building where his hair grew to over a foot. He developed pneumonia and Mao denied him aid
Jiang+Kang interrogated and tortured 28,000 people and collected confessions that he gave information to the CIA 1968
He
Died 1969
What happened to Liu Shaoqui’s wife?
Forced to wear a fashionable dress in front of 300,000 red guards. She was humiliated.
Sentenced to years of solitary confinement in prison
What happened to Zhou Enlai?
And his funeral?
Got cancer
Denied vital treatment
Died 1976
Funeral turned into a protest of the Gang of Four
1 million people
What was Lin Biao afraid of?
Water
What happened to Lin Biao ?
1969 named mao’s successor at 9th party congress
1971 worried he might be purged so got on a plane to escape which ended up crashing because of lack of fuel
What was the reaction of the death of Lin Biao ?
People began to question the regime. They lost faith in it
Lin was portrayed as Mao’s closest ally then we was denounced after his attempt to flee as working for the Soviet Union
“Let the people learn from the PLA”>
“Let the PLA learn from the people”
What happened to Deng Xiaoping? (The many many times sent away then came back)
Damned as “number 2 person taking the capitalist road”
Sent to a tractor farm in rural Jiangxi
-son tried to escape torture and died
DENG COMES BACK 1975- appointed PLA chief of staff
DENG SENT AWAY 1976 - blamed by the Gang of Four for the protest at Zhou’s funeral
Sent to a pig farm
DENG COMES BACK AGAIN. 1978 (in charge)
“To be rich is to be glorious”
When did Mao die?
1976
September
Who was mao’s successor and what did they do?
Hua Guofeng
“Two whatevers policy”
- uphold whatever decisions Mao made
- follow instructions map gave
Had Mao embalmed in tianamen square
Put Gang of Four on trial ! October 1976
What happened to the Gang of Four?
Put on trial
October 1976
Jiang Qing “I was his dog, i bit when he asked me to bite” - life in prison then killed herself
Yao Wengyuan - 20 years
Wang Hongwen and Zhang Chunquio - life in prison
What Happened to the red guards ?
18 million red guards exiled to the countryside
“Up the mountains down to the villages”
Sent to learn from the peasants
The previously loyal guards turned against Mao
Evidence of Mao having lots of power
What pragmatic polices did Deng implement after Mao’s death ?
The four modernisations
1978 implemented
Industry, defence, science, tech
Opened up trade. Transform china to a free market economy
What happened in 1972 with foreign relations?
Nixon visited
Mao starts to favour pragmatists
However anti American propaganda continues
Shanghai Communqué set up - official government message showing new relationship with USSR
