Date: Mon, 2 Feb 1998 18:31:19 +0100 (MET)
Subject: M-G: UNITE! Info #61en: 4/7 Reply on Cultural Revolution
UNITE! Info #61en: 4/7 Reply on Cultural Revolution
[Posted: 01.02.98; this part goes to restricted (ex-)M-G
mailing list on 02.02.98]
In parts 2 and 3, I've elaborated on some points (in order to
counter just some of the current big lies) concerning how IMO
the Cultural Revolution should be assessed today, on which I
gave my basic answer in part 1. So far I've been replying to
your question 1, Rob. Your second question was, who whould I
have wanted to "win" in what you called the "factional struggle"
in China. My reply on this follows in this part.
And later here I'm also including one portion of my reply to
your third and last question, how about the events on Tiananmen
Square, Beijing, in 1989 (June 4th) and in 1976 (April 5th).
That will be, rather briefly, on those in 1989. On those in
1976, I intend to go into details, as I already said, by bring-
ing some longer passages from earlier postings. What took place
then, in April 1976, was one important expression of the role
that the reactionary 4-gang, whom some are still trying to pedd-
le off as "the real revolutionaries", in reality played in the
overthrow of socialism in China.
This last and detailed reply by me will make up the contents of
parts 5/7 - 7/7 of this Info. These will not go to (ex-)M-G but
only to 'alt.society.revolution' and other newsgroups.
11. THE STRUGGLE IN THE CPC DURING THE CULTURAL
REVOLUTION - A PART OF AND A REFLECTION OF
THE CLASS STRUGGLE AS A WHOLE
You wrote on 26.01, Rob:
>I also want to ask Rolf, what he would have liked to see out of
>the Cultural Revolution. In hind sight, we now know [no - RM]
>that it was a Communist Party of China factional struggle, with
>Mao playing Dengs group off against the Gang of Four, and vice
>versa, but who did Rolf want to "win" this struggle.
It was *not* "a CPC factional struggle", as the bourgeoisie says
and you repeated. It was a struggle between the proletariat and
the bourgeoisie. It was much bigger than "just" an inner-party
struggle.
Of course part of the fight *was* a struggle in the CPC. There
were representatives of the bourgeoisie in that party, both
openly-Rightist such, such as Liu Shaoqi and the likewise tar-
geted Deng Xiaoping who later made self-criticism and served the
proletariat again, relapsing once more in late 1975, and phony-
"Leftist", such as Lin Biao, who from 1969 on was always men-
tioned in the press as Mao Zedong's "closest comrade-in-arms"
until he - *attempted a bourgeois coup* in 1971 and was killed
in a plane crash while trying to escape to the Soviet social-im-
perialists, and the 4-gang, severely criticized by Mao from 1974
on and finally defeated in October 1976 by his successor Hua
Guofeng, who however shortly afterwards himself went against the
proletariat and joined Deng to overthrow socialism in China.
Those struggles in the party of the proletariat - while it still
*was* the party of the proletariat - the CPC, were a *reflection
of the class struggle* in the whole country (and of the interna-
tional one too). Some leaders represented the interests of the
proletariat, those of the overwhelming majority of all people
(not only in China); they followed the correct, Marxist-Leninist
line - to express the same thing in another way - and did so,
in their cases, consistently, all the time: Mao, Zhou Enlai and
Zhu De, to mention the most important. (They all died in 1976.)
Those others I mentioned above had all during various periods
represented the interests of the proletariat too, followed the
correct line in words at least, and in actions to one extent or
other, but eventually came to represent the interests of the
bourgeoisie. Their respective wrong currents of course at one
time or another appealed to various groups among the people,
could "fool some of the people for some time" (to paraphrase
Abraham Lincoln). But while the Cultural Revolution lasted, they
lost out in the end. Then that revolution itself was defeated,
i.e. the proletariat was - temporarily - defeated in China.
How do I know this about who represented whose interests, you
might ask. By checking out the facts, as gathered both from "of-
ficial" Chinese sources and all other sources, on who said and
did what and when, on what the masses did when and where, and
checking how the different things tally or not with Marxism.
Who did I want to "win" this struggle? The proletariat and the
oppressed peoples and nations, of course. I'd have wanted the
line represented by Mao, Zhou and Zhu to win, have wanted Hua
Guofeng, for instance, to have upheld that line after October
1976 too. It's not first of all a matter of (leading) persons,
but one of what line they follow.
Mao did *not* "play off" Deng's group against the 4-gang and/or
vice versa. At least, that was not the *main* thing in that
"three-cornered struggle". Mao and the other genuine revolutio-
naries *combated both* of these groups and the respective bour-
geois currents they represented, which in their turn each com-
bated both the proletariat, as represented by Mao etc, and also
the other bourgeois group and current.
In China, the proletariat, and the people as a whole, eventually
got caught between two fires. The 4-gang's crimes served as pre-
texts for Deng and Hua in their later attacks on Mao's line. It
was a similar - though not quite the same - thing in the Soviet
Union in the 1920s and 1930s: There was Trotsky's very bad,
bourgeois current and group, which was defeated, but the wrong-
doings of this hated group served as pretexts for certain se-
rious bourgeois deviations in the (still socialist, though) rule
under Stalin, i.a. a regime under which all criticism, also cor-
rect such, tended to become branded as "Trotskyism".
What Zhou Enlai said on this general question in his report to
the CPC's 10th Congress in 1973 I've often quoted:
"It is imperative to see that one [wrong] tendency
covers another".
Eventually, the two bad tendencies in China represented by Deng
Xiaoping respectively by the 4-gang, fighting each other and
above all fighting the proletariat, combined to overthrow so-
cialism in that country, tearing apart, so to speak, those for-
ces that tried to uphold Mao's proletarian revolutionary line.
Of course they were both massively supported from abroad by the
imperialists in the world.
This struggle continues today, one could say, in the history-
writing on that period in China, with the imperialists (them-
selves, openly) lying in favour of the Deng Xiaoping group while
their (main) phony"Marxist" ventriloquist dummies, the RIMitz
and MIMitz - and tomorrow they'll create some OIMitzes, PIMitzes
etc too - today all are lying in favour of the 4-gang. What's
necessary for the revolution is the line of Marx, Lenin and Mao
Zedong - including what was further developed by the (then)
KPD/ML(NEUE EINHEIT) in Germany also for a long period after Mao
Zedong's death. That line needs to win. Armed with it, the pro-
letariat and the oppressed peoples can overthrow imperialism.
12. ON THE MASSACRE AT TIANANMEN SQUARE
(AND ABOVE ALL IN THE STREETS NEARBY)
ON (03.06 AND) 04.06.1989
I wrote on this on 04.06.1996, and repeated one year later in my
Info #36en, "Remember Tiananmen '89 and '76", i.a.:
A HEINOUS CRIME
The peoples of the world should remember the events at Tiananmen
Square, Beijing, China, on 4 June 1989 and also those on 5 April
1976. Both those days are symbols of the resistance of the
Chinese people against revisionist, phoney"Marxist" and in
reality fascist forces and arch enemies of socialism.
On 4 June 1989, military forces of the Deng Xiaoping clique
massacred people who were protesting against its revisionist
oppression and demanding democratic rights and an end to the
enormous price rises after the re-establishment of capitalism in
China. This was a historical crime which very clearly exposed
the fascist character of that regime to the whole world.
.........
WHAT DID DENG SAY IN 1974?
As for the revisionist traitor and present dictator Deng Xiao-
ping {this was written in 1996 - RM}, the peoples of the world
should remember something which he himself said 22 years ago,
when on 10 April 1974 he, as representative of the then still
socialist China, held a speech before the U.N. General Assembly.
This happened to be an important speech. In it, Chairman Mao's
correct analysis of the world as then divided into three parts,
or three worlds, was presented publicly for the first time.
In this speech, the later traitor Deng Xiaoping among other
things also said...
"If capitalism is restored in a big socialist country, it will
inevitably become a superpower. The Great Proletarian Cultural
Revolution..." {the rest of this quote was in part 1 here - RM}
"If one day China should change her colour and turn into a su-
perpower, if she too should play the tyrant in the world, and
everywhere subject others to her bullying, aggression and ex-
ploitation, the people of the world should identify her as so-
cial-imperialism, expose it, oppose it and work together with
the Chinese people to overthrow it."
Well spoken, Mr. present dictator Deng! I hope that you're
reading these lines, or that some secretary of yours is. Here I
offer you some salt:
:::::::::::::::::::
and some pepper:
;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
and invite you to eat up that statement of yours 22 years ago.
It really was very good - whoever suggested that it be included
in that speech of yours. My own guess is that it was Chairman
Mao.
[Continued in part 5/7]
[For (ex-)M-G: This posting measured by me at 9.6 kB]
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