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COMMUNIST CHINA'S DOMESTIC CRISIS: THE'ROAD4
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REFERENCE TITLE: POLO-XIX
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Ser. No. 6
No.
COMMUNIST CHINA'S DOMESTICHE ROAD4
Thisorking paper of theesearch Staff. It analyzes the erratic development of Chinese domestic policy in the putears and tries to shed new light on this question and also on the Sino-Sovietand the matter of disagreements among Chinese leaders
The paper attempts among other things to answer the question of what Mao Tse-tung and hla favorites have learned from the failure of their "leap forward." Itthat they have learned some lessons, but that they have not learned the most importantthe "leap forward" strategy ls itselfthat they are therefore likely to undertake another erhaps
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COMMUNIST CHINA'S DOMESTIC CRISIS: THE ROAD TO
I. BACKGROUND TO THE "LEAP FORWARD"
Tse-tung's
First Five Year
II. THE FIRST "LEAF' AND RETREAT
EPTEMBER
"Upsurge" ln Socialization and
ConstructionJuly
The "Upsurge" in
The "Upsurge" in
De-Stallnizatlon: The Chinese Response.14
Readjustment and Retrenchment
eptember
Retreat at the Eighth Party
The First Soviet
III. THE "GREAT LEAP FORWARD" AND GREAT RETREAT
UGUST
A. The "Great Leap Forward" and the People's
Communeovember
The Third
The Moscow
The "Great Leap Forward" and the
/
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B. The Great Retreat
Soviet and Domestic Pressures.
The Great Retreat
The Peng Te-huai Affair
THE CONTINUOUS "GREAT LEAP FORWARD" ANDULY
A The Continuous and Uninterrupteduly
The Cult of Mao
Revival of the "Great Leap
Revival of the People's
The Chinese
B. The Prolonged and Painful Retreat
uly
Initial Retreat0 -
and
for
and
Retreat
and
Soviet
in Domestic
in Foreign
Crisis of
THE CONTROLLED LEAP: THE "GREATECEMBER
A. The Tenth Plenum of the CCP Central
Committee (July-December
Decision to Launch an Anti-Soviet
Decision to Organize Nation-Wide
"Class
Decision toew "General
Policy" for National
"Great Stride Forward"
(January-June
The Production
Class Struggle: The First
Anti-Soviet Struggle: The First
"Three Great Revolutionary Movements"
ecember
Class Struggle: The
Production Struggle: The*Second
Struggle: The Second
VI. CONCLUS
INTRODUCTION
A crucial quostion in assessing tho future course of domestic policy in Communist China is the extent to which Mao Tse-tung and his lieutenants have learned the lessons of the failure of their "leap forward" approach to economic development. In undertaking to answer this question, this paper will attempt to reconstruct theprocess of education experienced by the Chinesein the economics of Industrializing an overpopu-lated and underdeveloped country.
Central to this process of education hasontinuing debate within the Chinese Communistover economic and militaryebate in which the relevance of Soviet experience and the role of Soviet aid have been questions of great importance. This paper will attempt to shad further light on this
debate
a from an intensive
review of the record.
This paper emphasizes throughout tho views and policies advocated by Mao Tse-tung, who appears to dominate his party and government much more than does Ehrushchev in the Soviet Union. We think that anyof national development policy ln Communist China must center on the personality and conceptions of the man who has assumed the roleatter-day LeninMao Tse-tung.
COMMUNIST CHINA'S DOMESTIC CRISIS; THE ROAD4
ry and Conclusions
have been ambiguous and contradictory elements in Communist China's approach to economic development from the outset. On the one hand, there has been an awareness oi* inexperience in undertaking this new task and of the consequent need to rely on Soviet advice and assistance. On the other band, there has been an intensely national and racial component in Chinese Communism. the claim advanced as early6 that Mao Tse-tung badhinese or Asiatic form of Marxism') which has served to discourage Soviet leaders (even Stalin) fromthe very economic, scientific and technical andassistance essential to China's aodernlzatlon. ^mmmmS
repudiated the Soviet model of economic development and has sought his own solutions to the staggering problems of developing China's backward economy.
Id statements issued in9 andao Tse-tung expressed his strategic contempt for China's population problem andall for "three years of preparation" and "for ten years of construction to build our countryodern socialist state." As an early expression of Mao's revolutionary optimism and propensity to advance unrealistic economic goals, these statementsignificant precursor ofChina's "leap forward" approach to economic
As the resulteries of setbacks andCommunist China's First Five Yearas delayed in preparation and was not released until In contrast with Mao's earlier predictions,
the plan pictured industrialization and socialization of the economy aserculean task requiring along time" (that is, three five-year plans for basic achievement, andoears to attain the statusighly Industrialized greatnd It stressed that "the road already traveled by the Soviet Union is the road we must follow today." atter of weeks, however, Chairman Mao would rise before aof Provincial Party Secretaries on5 to countermand this directive and to point imperiously to another road.
The First "Leap" and Retreat
Dissatisfied with the rate and method of advance provided by the Soviet model, Mao Tse-tung apparently decided at tHis time toew approach to the special problems of China's economic development. As outlinederies of speeches and articles in the latter half5 and inhis new approach was essentially an attempt to apply the "masswhich had proved so successful in the political and military struggles of China(sthe Infinitely more complicated process of socialist construction. Faith in the power of ideology to guide and motivate, in the efficacy of political work, and in the "unlimited croative power" of thewere the mainof the "leap forward" approach to theand construction ofconomy introduced by Mao Tse-tung in tentative and incomplete form at this time.
As is well known, Mao's call inor anin the socializatiqn of China's agriculture resulted in drastically foreshortening the original timetable from three five-yearittle over one year. Mao's rationale for stepping up socialization at this time is of fundamental importance for understanding the subsequent evolution of domestic policy in Communist China. For the first time. China's special conditionsuge population, shortage of cultivated land, recurring
natural calamities and backward methods of farming) were advanced toistinctive Chinese approach to agricultural development. Central to this new approach wcs Mao's view that manpower, properly organized and motivated (in the lower and higher level cooperatives and subsequently in theould be substituted for tractors and other machinery in a'program of rapiddevelopment.
Elated by the successful speed-up ofChairman Mao called in5arallel "upsurge" In economic development. Basing his call on an almost mystical belief in the "unlimited creative power" of tho masses and stressing the principle that "political work is the lifeline of all economiche Chinese leader shortly thereafter launched China's Draft Twelve Year Program for Agriculture (containing theif unrealistic target of doubling food production)ompanion Twelve Year Plan for Science and(containing the equally unrealistic .target ofadvanced world levels in scientifio research. And in order to fulfill Mao's predictionremendous expansion of production following agriculturala massive Investment and construction prograa was carried out in the countryside which would subsequently be described as Communist China's first "leap forward" in oconomic development.
It is instructive to compare this program with that advanced by Mao's future antagonist, Khrushchev, ath CPSU Congress held in Of firstwas the contrast between Mao's emphasis on ideological and political work as the key to economic development and Khrushchev's de-emphasls of theory in favor of "practical work" and "material Incentives." Moreover, since theregime would counterpose the conceptself-reliant and comprehensive industrial system" shortlythere is reason to believe that Mao already opposed the degree of bloc economic integration advocated by Khrushchev at this congress. In retrospect, it appears that major issues in the Sino-Soviet dispute over economic policy and economic relations had already emerged by the spring
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Tbe second half6ime of disillusion and alarm for tbe Peiplng regime, disillusion over the failure (particularly in agriculture) of the first "leap forward" in economic development, and alarm over tbeof de-Stalinization within the Communist bloc. Itime for reappraisal of domesticrocess in which Soviet views on economic development seemed to coincide with thoseoderate grouping of government administrators and economic specialists among the Chinese leadership to whom Mao Tse-tung apparently turned for advice and assistance in restoring order to China's disorganized economy. As the most prominentof this moderate grouping, Premier Chou En-lai setumber of these views in his Eighth Party Congress report on the draft proposals for Communist China's Second Five Year.
Despite this moderate trend In domestic policy, there were already signs in the fall6 of mounting friction in the relations between Communist China and the USSR. First, there were indications that Khrushchev had become incensed by Mao's pretensions to leadership of the underdeveloped areas of the world. Of more immediate concern to Moscow was Communist China's intervention at this time in Eastern Europe, encouraging early Polish and Hungarian demands for greater independence and assigning much of the blame for disturbances there to Russian "great power chauvinism. ' Although the Chinese in the winterelped to contain the troubles In the bloc that thoy bad helped to produce, tbe cumulative effect of Chinese declarations of economic independence,Independence (encouraging others asnd doctrinal independence was apparently too much forto tolerate. For it was at this point that tbe Soviets threatened for the first tine to withdraw their experts and technicians from Communist China.
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And lnhen'"ChTifa's intellectualsamaging "rightist attack" against the CCP, and theof large-scale agricultural collectives established the preceding year began to disintegrate, the period ln which Mao Tse-tung appeared to relyoderateof "administrator-economists" in the Chinesecame to an abrupt halt.
The "Great Leap Forward" and Groat Retreat
Dissatisfied with the results of moderate economic policies and shocked by the outcome of "liberal"policies, Mao Tse-tungeries of radical policy decisions in7 and8 which would culminate in the "great leap forward"erious crisis ln Slno-Soviet relations. Facedapidly growing population, with relative stagnation in food production and dwindling food reserves,isaffectedclass and with mounting dissatisfaction among the peasants and rural cadres, Mao reacted by reviving and expanding the "leap forward", labor-intensive approach to China's economic development which he had advanced in tentative and incomplete form in the winter.
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It is difficult to exaggerate the importance of thisexploit the economic factor of laborln the evolution of the "great leap forward" and commune programs. The underlying premiseimple
tho solution too:ilci o/ economic development (first of all, agricultural development) lay in the massive and intensive application of China's abundant labor supply. This tremendously augmented labor effort would have to bo secured without resort to material incentives! thepolicy had already boon tried and found wanting and in any case was ruled out in order to maximize savings and investment for futuro growth. Given these conditions, lt became imperative toechanism through which the party could effectively mobilize and control the rural labor force and at the same time restrict consumption. This mochanisra would in time appear as the people's.
Following closely after the Chinese Communist cen-
tral committee plenum, the proceedings of the Moscow
conference of Communist parties in7 (and
the negotiations surrounding it) would also exercise strong
Communist China's trilogy of distinctive development"general line of socialisthe "great leapnd theconceived
developed
At the second session of the Eighth Partymeeting in May, Liu Shao-chl formally introduced China's own "general line of socialist construction" and epitomized the "great leap forward" spirit by describing the age as one when "twenty years are concentrateday." It was this session which demonstrated the new dominant roleroup of party-machine leaders who,
together with Mao Tse-tung, would dominate and control the "great leap forward" and commune movements. As the most prominent member of this grouping, Liu Shao-chi provided the rationale for the party's arrogation of authority and control over China's economic development program when he asserted "we can produce more grain, coal and Iron by formulating and carrying outy raising the socialist consciousness of tbe workers and arousing the enthusiasm of the masses,"
With the appearance of the commune in July, Communist China's unorthodox trilogy of domestic developmentwas complete. eturn to tbe "mass line1 approach to socialist construction, they called for total mobilization of all available resources in order to break through the formidable barriers to China's economic and social development, in particular its huge population supportedeak agricultural base. Whore-as Khrushchev inas to stress that the lack of "necessary material conditions" had foredoomed the early Soviet experiment with communes. Chairman Mao8 arrived at just the oppositeunder the conditionsave-not, underdeveloped Oriental economy, the commune Itself would have to bo the instrument to effect rapid economic development.
Because the results are veil known, Peiplng'sefforts in succeeding months togreat leap forward" In all sectors of the economy will be only briefly summarized. The first objective was toleap forward" in agriculture hy Implementing eight basic rules of agricultural production (Mao Tse-tung's "eight pointith special emphasis on deep plowing and close planting as the means forechnological break-through in production. Aswith fanatical determination by party enthusiasts, first agricultural planning, then agricultural statistics, and finally agricultural science were subordinated to political ends in the best__Stalinlst tradition. The end
a5 claim in October that Communist China would double grain production not only8 but also
Following largo-scale agricultural construction and production, the second objective of these programs was to promote a 'leap forward" in industrial development by relying upon labor-intonsive 'native" technology performed by the "greatest labor array In the world." Incited by Mao's call in late August "toreat leap forward in Iron and steel production byigantic peasant labor army ln excess ofillion was organized to construct hundreds of thousands of "backyard" iron and steel installations throughout rural China. The third objective of China's frenetic speed-up of economic activity8 was to accelerate the mechanization andof agriculture. Following short-livedwith locally-produced "baby" tractors, the "native" production of ball bearings, and commune construction of small hydroelectric power stations, tho Chinese Communists claimed in September to have discovered in the towing-cableubstitute for 'those complicated big machines. tractors/ which are hard and expensive to produce" and thushort-cut to agriculturalelectrification under the concreto conditions of our country.
These then were the extravagant economic andpretensions initially advanced for Communist China's commune and "great leap forward" programs in the summer and fall The realization in tbe months thatof the patent falsity of these pretensionsraumatic experience from which the Chineae Communist party has yet to recover. Responding to the pressure of events and to the rising tide of both Soviet and domesticthe Chinese Communistseriod of "great retreat" at the Wuhan central committee plenum in December.
To Yfestern analysts of Chinese Communist politics, the period extending from the fall8 through the summer9 is in many respects the most interesting and revealing since the founding of the Chinese People's Republic. As recent reporting has made Increasingly clear, thiseriod of active Soviet intervention in the policy deliberations of the Chinese Communistranging from Khrushchev's direct representations to Mao Tse-tung, through threats and sanctions, to intrigue
with dissident elements in the Chinese party. It waseriod when domestic opposition to Mao's policiesmajor proportions. The convergence andof these forces in Minister of National Defense Peng Te-huai's attempt to persuade the CCP central committee to reverse course inould not onlyerious challenge to Mao's leadership but also force fundamental decisions about China's relationship with the Soviet Union.
Responding both to Soviet and domestic pressures, the Chinese Communist leadership was compelled toa fundamental and humiliating retreat encompassing both the "great leap forward" and commune programs. Because political considerations were to perpetuateunrealistic "loap forward" goals until wellhe magnitude of Chinese Communist retreat was more readily revealed in the commune program proper
Apparently acting on this assumption, Moscow respondedubstantial increase in both military and economic assistance Another significant feature of this period of general retreat in domestic policy was the return to prominence of moderate elements within the Chineseleadership who presumably favored closer Sino-Soviet economic and military cooperation. Symbolizing this development was the re-emergence of Premier Chou En-lalrincipal spokesman for the Chineae Communist regime, entrusted withonciliatory speech att CPSU Congress in February, with concluding the new Soviet economic aid agreement in Moscow, and withthe "great leap forward" in more modest terms at the April session of China's National People's Congress.
Although there is much still obscure about the reported "violent confrontation" between Minister of National Defense Peng Te-huai and Mao Tse-tung at the Lushan central committee plenum lnhepropositions can be advanced with various degress of confidence:
that Pengemorandum at the first session of the party conference in July attacking the "great leap forward" and communes and urging "an about-face;"
that Peng communicated (probably beforehand) similar viewsetter to the Soviet party;
that these views coincided with those ofwho may very well have encouraged him in this endeavor during his visit to the Soviet Union;
that although Peng centered his fire on domestic issues, the real issue between Peng and Mao was military policy and the advisability of making concessions in order to ensure continued Soviet military, technological and economic assistance;
that the Soviet asking-price for continuedincluded abandonment of the "great leap forward" and communes, in fact if not in name, and acceptance of
a joint defense system in the Far East featuring Soviet control over nuclear weapons and their delivery systems in China;
that Peng won support in varying degreesumber of members of the central committee, including fellow-politburo member Chen Yun and possiblyimited extent even Premier Chou En-lal; and
that Mao Tse-tung then rallied hisounterattacked and won the day at the second Lushanin August, resulting in the punishment of Peng and his more intimate supporters as membersright-opportunist anti-party group."
In retrospect, it appears that this victory by Mao Tse-tung and the "party-machine" or "native radical" grouping at Lushanecisive turning-point in the development of Communist China's domestic and foreign
Lushan to subordinate the military and economic assets of the Soviet alliance to larger political and ideological ends. Another consequence of the Lushan plenum was to seriously weaken the influence of more moderate elements within the CCP. Although there would continue to be significant policy differences among the Chinese Communist leadership, the limits of tolerable dissent would be sharply circumscribed after this decisive party.
The Continuous "Great Leap Forward" and Prolonged Retreat
The latest completed cycle of advance and retreat in Communist China's domestic development program, the roughly three-year period extending from the fall of
topened with the defiant prediction ofcontinuous leap forward throughout the whole decade of the sixties" and closed with the unprecedentedthat the Chinese Communist party's central committee had "lost itsn the charting of economic policy. The decisive turning point was, of course, tho summer of
when the combined effects of successive bad harvests and Soviet withdrawal of technicians caused the "great leap forward" to collapse. Instead of the promised"leap forward", the experience of the Chinese people so far throughouts has been one ofcrisis.
One of the most interesting conclusions emergingeview of this period Is that the Chtnoso Communist leadership, having identified andumber of mistakes in the implementation of its "great leap forward" and commune programs then proceeded almostand systematically to make the same mistakes. The apparent explanation for this remarkable performance is that it was motivated in large part by political considerations, principally the need to uphold the prestige of Chairman Mao and the party leadership against Internal and increasingly vocal external (Soviet) attack.
The immediate ChineBe Communist response to theattack of the Russians and Peng Te-huai at Lushan was to acclaim Mao Tse-tung "the most outstandingrevolutionary, statesman and theoretician of Of particular interest were the nev claims advanced at this time for Mao's creative development of the Marxist-Leninist theory of socialist construction. For the first time, the Chinese leader was credited withumber of principles underlying the "high-speed expansion of socialistspecially his "discovery" that the humanubjectiveoutweighed the material factor in the production process and that political indoctrination was morethan material incentives in increasing production.
The first step ln reviving the "leap forward" approach to economic development in the fall9 was toation-wide "socialist education" campaign designed to "activate the enthusiasm of the broad masses forhe next step was once again the subordination ofto politicalevelopment revealed withcandor by the newly-appolntod Director of the State Statistical Bureau in November when he asserted that statistics "must reflect and eulogize the great victory of the party's general line of socialisthe third step was revival of the "short cut" strategy to agricultural abundance, mechanization andwhich had beenrominent feature of the 'great leap forward"
To prepare for the upsurge in agriculturalChina's peasants were once again mobilizeduge labor army totalingillion to undertake waterconstruction and fertlllzor accumulation in Still another indication of "leapingin agricultural development: at. this timeecret report (approved by the party central committee)ational agricultural science research workwhich hailed the "extraordinary results" achieved in the cross-fertilization of crop species. paddy-rice with corn) and tbe cross-breeding of livestock species. cows with pigs, cows with sheep and sheep withhe new ^short-cut" strategy in the related field of agricultural modernization was exemplified by tho announced
inventionice-transplanting machine which could be manufactured by commune industrial units employing "native" iron and steel and which was to be rushed into operation onercent of China's paddy rice fields Even more bizarre was the "ultra-sonlcs" campaign (adrive to oquip small steel smelters with ultra-sonic whistles) launched in the latter half9 as ameasure to improve the quality of steel production andontinued "leap forward" in tho iron and
steel industry.
Equally striking evidence of the purblindness of the Chinese Communist leadership was the decision toumber of the features and goals of tbe original commune program. Firstation-wide drive to restore the commune mess-halls and thus control the distribution and consumption of foodstuffs in the countryside. Even more objectionable to the peasants was the decision once again to coerce individual commune members Into surrendering their "private plots." Next was the revelation that the regime still adhered to the original time-table calling for all-people. state) ownership over all the means of production and output of the communeseriod of three to six years. The final example was thein0 that the Chinese Communist leadership intendod to revive the urban communes which had proved so impractical and unpopular in the initial period of experimentation in the fall
With the publication of tbe polemical Leninpronouncements inhe Chinese Communists issued an unmistakable challenge to Soviet ideological and political leadership of the international Communist aoverront. As is now well known, the Soviets responded to this challenge at tho Bucharest conference in June byong letter denouncing the Chinese and threatening to reduce aid unless the CCP backed down. When Khrushchev attacked Mao for being as vain andfrom reality as Stalin had been and when tbe Chinese responded in kind, ersonal attack onfor having "betrayed" Marxism-Leninism, the moment of truth had arrived. With the mass exodus of Soviet technicians in August, the Chinese Communists were left
to cope unaided with perennially difficult economicsuddenly grown much larger.
The immediate Chinese response to the Sovietof technicians was one of defiant optimism. eyugust Red Flag article and in other policy statements throughout October and early November,China's leadership asserted an unshaken confidence in its ability to surmount the new economic difficulties.ractical response to the mo'unting food shortage, the regime reduced the already inadequate level of grain rations by aboutercent; halted all non-essential work programs to conserve human energy; and assigned increased priority to agriculture for manpower and Most strikingly, it was decidedigh-level party meeting in October toundamentalin China's rural commune program.
Although official optimism continued for some time, indications of alarm began to appear in cussions in
The basic cause for alarm was the sudden outbreak of large-scale dissidence in several calamity-stricken provinces in October andarticularly ln Honan and Shantung. The popular uprisings in Honan were especially serious, engulfing the entire province and far surpassing the ability of loyal militia units to maintain order. Reflecting tbls, Minister of National Defense Lin Piao warned in January that "we ought to expect more political troubles and incidentsspecially the first half, than in any previous" year" and called for extraordinary measures "to ensure that the armed forces do not get out of hand."
The basic cause of these popular uprisings was, of course, the severe shortage offamine proportions in the disaster areas of East and North China. Confirming Chou En-lai's admission1 that "living conditions^/erecrltlcal
loreover, Mao Tse-tung himself
was to suggest (unwittingly) that the total of these "unnatural deaths" exceededillion.
When finally aware of the magnitude of the political and economic crisis confronting them, Communist China's leadership reacted promptlyeries of urgentmeasures. Of first importance was to ensure the continued loyalty of the People's Liberation Army during this time of national emergency. Next were emergoncy actions to cope with the acute food shortage which would reach its most critical point in the springnternally, these included encouraging the cultivation of quick-growing catch crops on "private plots" wherever possible; exhausting national reserves of grain fordistribution; and mobilizing medical personnel to go to the countryside to treat the most seriouscases. Externally, all food exports were halted, and limited foreign exchange holdings were depleted to rush some two million, tons of food Imports by May and June
Together with the Inauguration of these urgent relief measures, the Peiplng regime was equally concerned withationale for the disastrous results ofChina's "great leap forward" in economic Since party policies were by definition correct, it followed that these policies (in the language of the Ninth Plenum communique ofadabotaged" by "bad elements, that is, landlord and bourgeois elements" among the-party's rural cadres, and that accordingly these "bad elements" would have toation-wide "rectification campaign."
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In less seriously affected areas, cadretook the less reprehensible form of errors and defects in the implementation of "correct" party policies. Perhaps the most serious of these cadre errors was the
'empty boasting style" which was held largely responsible for the failure of the "great leap forward." The standard explanation, both then and later, was as follows: over-zealous local cadres had reported false achievements (especially exaggerated harvest figures) to highercausing them to draw up unrealistic plans and (in the more extreme formulation which would be advanced by Chou En-lai inausing the central committee
lose its way."
esult of this new appreciation of the gravity of their domestic crisis, Communist China's leaders in the period of1 apparently decided toolicy of at least tactical accommodation toward the Soviet Union. During protracted trade and aid negotiationsthrough April, the Pelplng regimeumber of conciliatory gestures, including the almostappearance of Mao Tae-tung and the entirecommittee of the polltburo at the Soviet embassy roception commemorating tho Sino-Sovlet treaty Most striking of all was the new importanceto Soviet aid by Vice Premierarch interview with Hungarian newumon. Whereas theNovember he had publicly denigrated the value of Soviet aid, Chen now conceded that "although each of us does whatever he can, what ls docisive for all of us is naturally the help we receive from the Soviet Union."
As is now well known, the "help" which the Chinese :iad hoped to obtain in these negotiations was not Shortly after the conclusionisappointing trade pact in early April, the Chinese Communists broke their four-month silence byoan0 to Albaniaeward for its support ln the Sino-Soviet
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dispute and by Invoking Mao Tse-tung's authority toKhrushchev's "peaceful coexistence" strategy. As it had begun the preceding August, Communist China's initial period of retreat in domestic policy ended inote of defiance.
In contrast with the triumphant celebration of its thirtiethecade earlier, tbe Chineseparty could find little to celebrate on theof its fortieth anniversary are allusion to current policy, Liu Shao-chi revealed on this occasion that the much-vaunted people's commune (originally conceivedomprehensive economic,military and social unit) had been redefined aa an organization "formed by agricultural cooperatives joining together." Even this more modest formulation would soon bo outdated, for It was just at this time tbat the rural commune almost completely disintegrated. Following the collapse of tbe commune messballs, tbeof supply and marketing, handicraft and credit cooperatives signified that Communist China had reverted to the pre-commune pattern of institutions in the *hat is more, the retreat did not stop with the large-scale collective farm (averagingwhich bad immediately preceded the commune, but extended all the way back to the small-scale collective farmouseholds) which had characterized the early stages of China's cooperative movement.
Together with the enforced retreat in rural policy, the regime began at this time toeries of drastic measures designed tohina's badly crippled industrial sector. These measuros included closing down thousands of small, inefficient plants thrown up hastily during the "great leap forward" and the wholesale transfer of surplus industrial labor back to rural areas, with the planned figure (Including dependents and others engaged in supporting trades)toillion in the spring It was also at this time that the party leadershipew policy of conciliating China's much-maligned Intellectual class, especially scientists and technicians, in an effort to speed'up development of an indigenous Chinese scientific and technological capability.
These further retreats were reflectederies of interviews granted Western visitors by Chineseleaders in the fall Ofengthy interview granted to Viscount Mongomery by Mao Tse-tung in which the Chinese leader admitted that economic decentralization in thead produced waste andue to inexperience and bad organization on the lowernd cited the conclusionovernment survey that, instead of the normal population increase each year of fifteen an annual increase of ten million was "as much as could be safely handled" in Communist China. Although somewhat vague on the specific moans for effecting thisercent reduction in annual population growth, Mao revealed in thisew awareness of the critical nature of China's population problem and at the same time foreshadowed the extensive birth control campaign which would be initiated
It was at Just this time that Khrushchev, perhaps believing that three years of agricultural calamities had sapped Peiping's will to resist, decided toew offensive against the Chinese Communists atd CPSU Congress. Although the campaign was ostensibly directed at tiny Albania, it soon became apparent that the real object was Mao Tse-tung, the only significant challenger to Khrushchev's leadership of theCommunist movement. The Soviet campaign against the Chinese leadership reached peak intensity inhen, ear of sustained economicthe Soviet leadership threatened in quicka "complete organizational break" with the Chinese party and renunciation of the Slno-Soviet military However, instead of carrying out these ultimate threats, the Soviet party then decided to send aletter to the Chinese party on
In an apparently related development, there emerged at this time signs of controversy among the Chineseleadership, and it seems fairly clear that oneof the Soviet inter-party letter dispatched onebruary was to furnishthe eve of both the Chinese National People's Congress and the conclusion
noDIb'SEM
of Sino-Soviet trademoderate elements in the CCP to use to bring about changes in domestic and foreign policy,hange in Chinese policy toward the Soviet Union. It is also fairly certain that the Chinese decision in early March to postpone its congress session for three weeks was for the purpose ,ofigh-level party meeting to consider this Soviet proposal and, of equal importance, to resolve the continuing controversy over domestic policy.
The outcome of this high-level party conclaveignal victory for moderation in domestic policy. For the first time, the Chinese Communist leadership felt constrained to admit that it had committed "errors" "graven its "great leap forward" program. This admission was first made indirectlyuriousarch People's Daily editorial summarizing four years of water conservancy construction on the Crunchi River, an editorial clearly Intended as an allegorical discussion of Communist China's "leap forward" experience inconstruction. The first explicit admission that the Chinese Communist regime had committed "mistakes" in its economic development program appeared shortly thereafter in the communiques issued by the National People's Congress and the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (held concurrently).
FORE^CR DlSSEM/CONTROLLED DlSSEM
contrast with this strategic retreat in domestic policy, the Chinese Communist response to the Soviet letter ofebruary was avowedly tactical andln nature. While continuing to berate the Soviet Union and Khrushchev personally in private, the Pelplng regimealt to polemics and evenumber of conciliatory gestures In public toward the Soviet Union in the spring and summer Although several reports suggest that economic considerations prompted the Chinese to soft-pedal the Sino-Sovlet dispute at this time, lt is much more likely that the roal reason was concern for national securityime when hostile powers appeared to threaten Communist China on all sides.
This concern also helps to explain tho onsuing "crisis of nerves" which afflicted tho Chinese Communistin early Added to tho threat of serious popular disturbancesime when the reliability of its armed forces was in doubt, there was (in Pelplng's view) the even graver threat of an American-supported Chinese Nationalist invasionime when it was not possible to count on Soviet military asalutance.
when on topthere occurred in quick
esurgence of Indian military activity along the Tibetanass exodus of tens of thousands of Chinese refugees into both the USSR and Hong Kong, and an outbreak of rioting in several areas (tho best known instance occurring in Cantonune), it appeared that this combination of dangors posed perhaps the most serious foreign and domestic crisis which the Chinese Communist leadership had yet facod.
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It was at this juncture in late June that the United States gave assurances to Peiping through its representative in Warsaw that it would, nothinese Nationalist Invasion of the mainland "at this time." Within China there were evident the first signs of an improvement in economic and social conditions. The mood of Communist China's top leadership appeared suddenly to change. ortnight thoy assembled in high-level conclave toew "hard" line in domestic and foreign policy which has persisted to the present day.
The Controlled Leap: The "Great Stride Forward"
The Tenth Plenum of the CCP Eighth Central Committee convened in Peiping in late2 toeries of decisions which have shaped the course of Chinese Communist policy development ever since.' In retrospect It has become increasingly clear that the three basic policy decisions approved by the Tenthlaunch an offensive against the "modern revisionist" leadership of the Soviet Union; toation-wide "class struggle" campaign; and toew, independent program of economicclosely interrelated and interdependent. Moreover, there is considerable evidence that the common strategy underlying thesewas provided by Mao Tse-tung, who once again emergederiod of relatively little public activity to dominate the proceedings of tho Tenth Plenum and touch more active role in public life.
It is still difficult to find an adequate explanation for Communist China's decision in the fallime of both political isolation and economic weakness, to launch an all-out struggle against the Soviet Union for leadership of tho international Communist movement. Thatecision was taken at this time, however, is
documented inpub-
lic record.
The Peiping regime apparently decided that further retreat and accommodation in the face of Soviet pressures was both unnecessary and, given the nature of Sovietintolerable. Militarily, tho threat of an
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American-supported Chinese Nationalist invasion of thehad passed and with it the need to conciliate Moscow in the hope of having available the Soviet nuclear shield. Economically, Communist China appeared to be emerging from the worst period of crisis andP| besides, Soviet economic assistance during this critical period had been minimal. Tactically, the Chinese leadership may have concluded that it would be better to seize the initiative rather than awaitew Soviet onslaught.
By the fallhree years of privation and ignominious retreat from tho original goals of the "great leap forward" and commune programs had bred wide-spread apathy, disillusionment and dissatisfaction among all classes of Chinese society. Even morearge proportion of the party rank-and-file had begun tothe same symptoms of cynicism toward party programs. Since these developments had gravely damaged the Chinese Communist mystique of being an infallible, force capable of building Chinaowerful nation on the basis of Marxism-Leninism, it was imperativeew rationale bo advanced to explain past failures and silence future criticism. The new rationale, as revealed by Chairman Mao to the Tenth Plenum, was to explain failures and criticism of party policies as largely the handiwork of 'foreign and domestic classgainst whom it was now necessary toation-wide "class struggle" campaign.
Although tho "class struggle" campaign would not be initiated until the following year, there wereumber of indications in the fall2 that it would be protracted and comprehensive, encompassing all classes and groups within Chinese society. As spelled outecember Red Flag article, all elements of the population were served notice that they were liable to attack and punishment, should they persist in any oneumber of "anti-socialist" activities as defined by the regime.
By far the most important of these activities was the "spontaneous tendency tohich hadto an alarming degree in China's countryside during the two-year period preceding the Tenth Plenum.
With national survival at stake, the regime throughout this poriod had been forced to make numerous concessions to the peasantry in the interests of increasingconcessions which had progressively expanded the area of private enterprise (cultivation of "privaterlvato reclamation of wasteland, private householdand private trading on the "freet the expense of the collective economy. In addition to these well-publicized concessions, the .regime had also been forced to permit the withdrawal of large numbers offrom the commune-collective system, the proportion reachingercent in at least the one province of Annwel.ough approximation it may be estimated that at the time of maximum retreat perhaps as much asercent of agricultural production and rural trade was being carried on outside the "socialist" system. Thus, in the words of the communique, the Chinese revolution hadecisive turning-point in the "struggle between tberoad and the capitalist road." As seen by the party leadership, the struggle for control over China's rural economyife-and-death struggle in which victory was essential to preserving the raison d'etre of theCommunist revolution.
The third basic policy decision approved by the Tenth Plenumew "general policy" of developing the national economy "with agriculture tbe foundation and industry the leading factor." It has become increasingly clear that thla new "general policy" was little moreestatement in more positive terms of the economicdjustment" policy which had already been in effectn interim program designed to shore up the badly-lagging agricultural sector preparatoryeneral upsurge in the national economy. Thepolitical nature of this new policy line was revealedumber of Chinese Communist articlesits great significance as the latest example of Mao Tse-tung's "creative development of Marxist-Leninist theory" and as "an important development of the Marxist-Leninist theory of socialist construction." Byan essentially expedient policyew Marxist-Leninist law, the Chinese Communists were apparentlyonce again toense of purpose andln economic policy which would generate confidence and enthusiasmew production upsurge on the part of the Chinese poople.
The first half3 vas to bo an importantperiod for the basic economic policy decisions of the Tenth to re-establish socialist, collective controls over the economy (especially the ruraloew upsurge in production (especially agricultural production); andohird Five Year Plan which would be both dynamic (demonstratingChina's ability to achiovo substantial progress on its own) and feasible (avoiding the excesses andof the "great leap forward"he compulsion toapid, if somewhat more realistic, rate ofwould be well exemplified by the important East China regional party leader Ko Chlng-sbih in3 when he would exhort the Chinese people togreat stride forward" in socialist production and Byowever, it would become clear that this undertaking to force the pace had encountered serious obstacles both in the short runisappointing summer harvest) and in the long run (the -failure of the State Planning Commission to come upiable Third Five Year Plan).
The crisis of confidence experienced by Communist China's leaders in the spring2 had expanded by the end of the year to encompass most of the Chinese Confronted with wide-sproad public and party apathy, the Peiping regimeong-term, intensiveeducation' campaign at the Tenth Plenum designed to restore popular confidence in party leadership and faith in the efficacy of party programs. This was all the more essential since Communist China's hopes for rapid economic development3 rested primarily on its ability once again to substitute political andincentives for material reward as the major stimulus in production.
The first step in the lengthy re-education process was to reassert the "greatness" and "correctness" of the Chinese Communist leadership, especially as personified by the "great contemporary Marxist-Leninist" Mao Tse-tung, who once again was depictedemi-divine being whose attributes Included infallibility and scientific The next step in reviving popular confidence was
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a concerted effort Initiated at the Tenth Plenum tothat the party's economic policies had alreadya "new situation of victory" and, "after effortseriod ofould usher inew period of great upsurge In socialist construction." It is ofinterest to note tbat as this campaign gained momentum in the wintert began to display, at least in agriculture, some of the characteristicsodified "leap forward" campaign.
The mood of buoyant optimism and the image of rapid progress which Peiplng wished to convey both domestically and abroad in3 reached their peak on Hay Day, By the end of the month, however, references to an imminent upsurge in the national economy had dropped out of sight and by3 the lineerted to the less extreme optimism of the Tenth Plenum -thatertain period of time" was required before Communist China wouldnew period of great upsurge" in economic development.
The Tenth Plenum decision to re-establish socialist, collective controls over tho rural economy was apparently based on the assumption that agricultural production had recovered to the point where it was possible once again to squeeze out tbe resources needed for economic growth. Since it was clear that China's peasants would resist this effort to deprive them of hard-won gains, it was necessary to generate new idoological and politicalto overcome this resistance. This motivation,more than any other, explains the genesis of the nation-wide "class struggle" campaign (and the allied "socialist education" and "five antl's" campaigns) initiated in tbe fall2 and developed with increasingup to the present time.
It remains to note briefly tbe role of Lei Feng, "the extraordinary ordinaryn Communist China'seducation" campaign in the spring ajor objective of this campaign to study and emulate the "revolutionary spirit" and "horoic self-sacrifice" of Lei Feng was to provide an ideological and moral substitute for material incentives in stimulating production. It is in this sense that tbe Lei Feng campaign, indeed tho
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entire "socialist education" campaign under way since the Tenth Plenum, should be viewedeaffirmation and re-exprossionasic and long-held tenet of Maothat political indoctrination, rather than material is the key to rapid development of Communist China's backward economy.
Although the decision at tho Tenth Plenum to precipitate opon political warfare with the Soviet Union undoubtedly appealed to many Chinese (on nationalistic if not racialhere wore indications in the spring3 that many others were uneasy about the break with Moscow and its long-term offect on Communist China's aspirations toreat world power. It is now known thathoping perhaps to capitalize on theso feelings of doubt and apprehension,idruce byseveral conciliatory letters to the CCP in the fall and winter, including renewed offers of oconomic and technological assistance ln exchangeessation of Cblnose polemical attacks.' As is also well known, the Chinese Communist response was to advance Itsune "Proposalseneral Line for theCommunist Movement" which in effect called upon Communists everywhere to switch their allegiance from Moscow to Peiping. It was ironic that Communist China should proclaim Its right to lead the internationalmovement at just the point in time when failure to come upiable Third Year Plan had demonstrated its Inability to chart an independent course of economic development.
A new phase in Chinese Communist domestic policy was initiated in latehen Mao issued the dictum: "Class struggle, production strugglo, and scientific experiment are threo great revolutionaryin buildingowerful socialist country." Of these 'three great revolutionaryhe most Important was "class struggle" conceived as theforce "to drive the struggle for production andexperiment forward." With this reassertion of the primacy of political and ideological work (the concept of "politics takeshe Chinese Communistrevealed an important truth about this allegedly
new program for China's socialistthis program roserabled ln important respects the originalline for socialist construction" which Liu Shao-chi had announced in8 on the eve of the "great leap forward."
It was no longer possibleowever, tothe image of leaping progress which Liu had expressed6 in the slogan: "hard workewp-pinesshousand."
The Pelplng regime apparently decided byhat stronger measures were required to secure compliance with its policies. One of these was intensification of "class struggle" against "class enemies" who wereto usurp leadership" over basic level organizations in the countryside. In view of the harsh guidelines for intensifying the "class struggle" and of refugee reports indicating greater resort to violence in the countryside, this new campaign directed at China's more productive peasants may very well have adverse effects on Communist China's agricultural production.
The best evidence that "class struggle" hadew stage of severity was the appearance of the "five antl's" campaign in whereas "socialistrelied primarily on indoctrination, the appearanceew "antl's" campaignhift fromto political struggle, from persuasion to coercion. Indicating the long-term nature of thiseries of clandestine reports in3 depicted it as developing at three levels (central, provincial and county) in successive stages extending toccording to these reports, the primary goal of thiscampaign is to stamp out tendencies toward "modernwhich have cropped up within the CCP, with "modern revisionism" defined to include both "pro-Soviet" and "capitalist" Inclinations.
In contrast with this Increasingly assertive political line, however, there were signs of confusion andln Pelplng's economic policy in the latter half In contrast with the self-assured and optimistic
tone of pronouncements earlier in the year, the tone of policy statements at the National Day colebrationsctober and the National People's Congress session in Late November was sober (if not somber) and clearlyin justifying China's policy; of "national self-reliance. ' As further evidence of uncertainty, an article in the4 People'a Daily contained the explicit admission that Communasfor new solutions to 'several new problems without ready-made answers which have arisen in our socialist construction.F*
A crucial question in assessing the future course of domestic policy in Communist China is the extent to which Mao Tse-tung and his lieutenants have learned the lessons of failure of their 'leap forward" approach to economic development. Cased on the findings of this paper, the answer to this question must be an equivocal *bovh yes and no.*' On the one hand, there is anbody of evidence that Mao Tse-tung wnd the dominant leaders of the CCP still cling to tbe basic theoriesthe "leaptrategy of economic On the other hand, there is abundant evidence that the Chinese Communist leadership, well aware of serious errors in past efforts to translate these theories into practice, is attempting to apply them now with more realism and practicality. esult of the conflict between these persistent theories of "leap forward"and these memories of recent failure, there has been anuality about recent Chinese Communist pronouncements in the field of economic policy.
Recent indications that the Peiping regime is engagedairly protracted gearing-up process, preparatory toew "leap forward*-like advanceelp to explain this ambivalence in current Chinese Communist policy discussion. while intensifying political activity and strengthening its political control the Peiping regime, mindful of its "great leapfailures, at the same time is advocating caution and restraint and appears reluctant to make any radical changes in its present ad hoc pattern of economic and
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social controls until solutions are found to "the many new problems" which have arisen in China's socialist construction.
Whatever these solutions may turn out to be, there is good reason to believe that they will be shapedby political and ideological factors rather than by considerations of economic rationality. Thus Judgment is based in part on the fact that during the course of the pastonths the Pelplng regime has not only not adopted the policies which appear best suited forChina's economic development but has appearedto oppose them.
As this paper has attempted to demonstrate, the character, conceptions and patterns of thought of Mao Tse-tung also support this view concerning Communist China's future development policy. Although the record shows that Mao can be flexible when danger threatens, It shows even moreroclivity for simplifiedand organizational solutions (the most recent being the establishment in all departments of the national economyolitical commissar system modeled after the People's Liberation Army) to complex problems of economic development.
Another basic sourco of the persistent strain masssthinese Communist development policy is the fundamental contradiction botween Peiping'a grandiose ambition to rapidlyreat world power and the paucity of means at its disposal. It is this fundamental incompatibility between ends and means which seems to compel the Chinese Communist leadership to experiment with radical innovationsontinuing search for ato industrialization and great power status. Although Mao Tse-tung and the dominant- leaders of the Chineseparty have undoubtedly learned some lessons from the excesses and more flagrant mistakes committed during the "great leap forward" ora, they do not appear to have learned the most important lesson ofthe "leap
forward" strategy Itself is Incapable of solvingChina's staggering problems of economic
For all of thesecourse in the pastonths, Mao's abiding characteristics, and the basic Incompatibility of ends andthink, that lt can be predicted with some assurance, at least while Mao continues as China's leader, that there will be yet another attempt to incite an "all-out advance" ln economic development in the future, possibly as soon
I. BACKGROUND TO THE "LEAP FORWARD"
Oa every kind ofnation, the peasants, strategy, the construction of the party, literature and culture, military affairs, financeand economy, methods of work,Tse-tung has not only applied marxism to new conditions but has givenew He hashinese or Asiatic form of Marxism.
Shao-chi to Anna Louise6
A serious task of economic construction awaits us. We shall soon lay aside some of the things that we know well and shall be compelled to take up things that we do not. This means difficulties. The imperialists count upon our inability to tackle economic problems. They stand by watching for our fiasco.
'Tse-tung, "On the9
Thanks toeadership of the Chinese Communist Party and the help of tbein other countries, primarily the help of the Soviet Union, economic construction in China will bo carried on not slowly, but probably atspeed. We can already count the days when China will attain prosperity.-
Central Committee9
As the above quotations suggest, there have been ambiguous and contradictory elements in Communist China's approach to economic development from the very outset. On the one hand, there has been an awareness ofand lack of expertise ln undertaking this ne* task and of the consequent need to rely on Soviet advice and) assistance. On the other hand, the intensely national and racial component of Chineso Communism, strikingly revealed ln the characterization of Mao Tse-tung as the creator of an "Asiatic form ofas servedwith an awareness of China's power potential) to dissuade Soviet leaders beginning with Stalin fromthe very economic, scientific and technical and military assistance essential to China's modernization. Given this explosive blend of Chinese chauvinism and Marxism-Leninism and its by-product of Sovietand niggardly support, it was perhaps inevitable that Mao in time would repudiate the Soviet model of economic development and seek his own solutions to the staggering problems of developing China's backward economy.
A. Stalin's Obstructionism
It ls one of the ironies of history that theCommunists, who have suffered grievously at the hands of Stalin, are now the staunchest defenders of Stalin's good name within the international Communist movement. The first and best known Instance of Stalin's pernicious influence was his China policy7 which, in directing the merger and subordination of the CCP to the Kuomintang, resulted ln nearly strangling the Chinese Communist movement in Its Infancy. Also well documented was Stalin's decision after World War II not to support the Chinese Communists, advocating onceerger' with the Chinese Nationalists from whom he proceeded to wrest territorial and commercial concessions. orollary to this decision, Stalin then ordered the stripping of China's industrial base ln Manchuria of some two billion dollars of Industrial plant andeither destroyed on the spot or carried off in the form of war booty. The legacy of Chinese Communist
bitterness occasioned by Stalin's despoiling* of Manchuria has appeared in recent statements of high-ranking Chinese leaders who, at least retroactively, regard these actions as partong-standing Soviet effort to prevent China fromreat power.
The conflict of Chinese and Russian national and revolutionary interestsew stage when theCommunists assumed power9ood of supreme self-confidence and assertiveness. Almost immediately after the establishment of the Chinese People's Republic, Liu Shao-chilaim to leadership over the national liberation movement in Asia by proclaiming (before aof Asian and Australian Trade Unions in Peiping) the "road of Mao Tse-tung" as the revolutionary model for other Asian Communists to follow. It is now known from the bitter exchanges of the inter-party letters0 that this effort to establish "the theory of Mao Tse-tung" (already enshrined in the CCP Constitution5 aswith Marxism-Leninism) as the fountainhead of Asian revolutionary doctrine was undertaken without any advance notification or consultation with Moscow. Chairman Mao was to reap the harvest of this early example ofin the international Communist movement when he traveled to Moscow the following month for his first face to face meeting with Stalin.
Despite surface manifestations of harmony andthe undoubted economic and military benefitsto the Chinese from the agreements signed inhere is evidence today that Peiping resented the niggardly character of Soviet assistance tendered during this and subsequent negotiations in the period0 Keeping in mind that the total amount of Soviet economic credits to China (extendedas0 million and that Moscow would demand nearly three times this amount in repayment for military assistance during the Korean War, there is considerablein the Chinese Communist charge (assiduously promoted in recent years in anti-Soviet propaganda campaignsChina) that the Soviets exploited Chinese weakness during the early years of the Chinese People's Republic. According to recent reports, the Chinese Communists consider
that Stalin himself wasprime offender, charged in these reports with offering only token aid out ofof the national ambitions of China's leaders.
B. Mao Tse-tung's Optimism
Mao Tse-tung's call9 for an upsurge in the national liberation struggle externally was paralleled by an equally optimistic (and unrealistic) assessment of Communist China's potential for rapid economic and social development internally. tatement reminiscent of his earlier "paper tiger" image of American atomicMao expressed his strategic contempt for China's population problem ln9 as follows:
Itery good thing that Chinaig population. Even if China's population multiplies many times -she is fully capable ofolution; the solution lsnder the leadership of the Communist party.every kind of miracle can be performed. We believe that revolution can changeand that before long there willew Chinaig populationreat wealth of products.
And in0 lnentral committee plenum, Maoall for "three years of preparation" and "for ten years of construction to build our countryodern socialist state."* As an early expression of Mao's revolutionary optimism and propensity to advanceeconomic goals, the above statementsignificant precursor of the "leap forward."
*This Oold prediction implying the completion ofconstruction in China2 would not be revealed publicly until8 in an article by Tan Chen-lln.
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During the "three years of preparation", Peiplng registered notable successes inits administrative controls and restoringand industrial output to pre-war levels. The quick galas achieved during this period of economic however, were followederies of setbacks and disappointments. First was an abortive attempt in3 to organize agricultural cooperativesarge scale, setting off an Intense and extended intra-party debate on tho proper tempo of collectivization. Next protracted negotiations with Moscow revealed thatSoviet assistance to China's Industrialization program would be limited and costly and that returns from many key-point projects would not be realized untilonsiderable lapse of time. This was followed shortly by the alarming results of3 census which showed China's population to beillion in excess of earlier estimates, as well as an unexpectedly high annual growth rate of two percent. In4 the Chinese Communist leadership was confronted with the first serious challenge to party unity at the top when Kao Kang and Jac Shu-shih (both politburo members) allegedly sought support within the armyid to achieveof power subordinate only to Mao.* Finally and perhaps most distressing of all was the absolute decline in grain production3oincidingrowing awareness of the magnitude of China'sproblem.
C. The First Five Year Plan
Reflecting these somber developments. Communist China's Tirst Five Yearas delayed in preparation and not released till In contrast
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with Mao's earlier prediction, industrialization and socialization of the economy were now pictured aserculean taskomparatively longthat is, three five year plans for basic achievement ando SO years to attain the statusighlygreat power. Dedicated to the priority development of heavy industry, the plan stressed that China's industrialization program was "modeled on Soviet experience" and impossible to achieve without "theof the Soviet Union" and "the help of Soviet experts." Indeed, in view of Peiping's admission of "lack of experience in drawing up long termt is likely that Soviet experts were largelyfor drafting this first blueprint for Communist China's economic development.
Adhering to the principles of "gradualism" andhe plan set forth the modest goal of one-third of China's peasants to be organized in lower-level, semi-socialist cooperatives This policy of gradual socialization was designed, as previousspokesmen had intimated, to avoid the turmoil and disruption resulting from Stalin's suddenof Soviet agriculture ins. Moreover, tbe plan Indicated that full-scale collectivization would have to wait upon the attainment of7 specified as the year for"ln thecollectivized and mechanizedagriculture."
In short. Communist China appeared ready toa program of economic and social development based largely on Soviet experience. As thestipulated, "The road already traveled by the Soviet Union is the road we must follow today." atter of weeks, however. Chairman Mao would riseonference of provincial party secretaries on5 tothis directive and point imperiously to another road. And though there was uncertainty, both then and later, as to the ultimate destination of this road, it was clear from the outset that it wouldistinctively Chinese road along which Mao and his principal lieutenants Intended to travel at "leap forward" speed.
II. THE FIRST "LEAP" AND RETREAT
What we should not do is to'allow somecomrades to cover up theirby quoting the experience of
Tse-tung, "The Question5
Inao Tse-tung emergederiod of relatively little public activity toleap forward" in the socialization and construction of China's economy.* Earlier predictions that Communist China would develop its economy "at considerable speed" with the help of the Soviet Union had not been borne out. Sovietsmall to begin with, were nearly exhausted. More alarming, grain production for three years running had not kept pace with the rate of population growth. with the old methods (the Soviethe Chinese Communist leadership apparently decided at this time toew approach to the special problems of China's economic development.
"It should be noted that this first attempt-to force the pace of economic development was not characterizedleap forward" at the time. Iniu Shao-chi would refer retroactively to "the leap forward"
As outlined by Chairman Maoeries of speeches
and articles throughout the latter halfS andhis new approach was essentially an attempt to apply the "masshich had proved so successful in the political and military struggles of the revolution, to the infinitely more complicated process of socialist construction. Faith in the power of. ideas {Marxism-Leninism and Mao'3 ideology) to guide and motivate, in the efficacy of political work (tbe party as organizer andnd in the "unlimited creative power" of the masses (principally their laborwere tbe main ingredients of tbe "leap forward" approach to economic construction introduced by Chairman Mao inand incomplete form at this time.
With these general observations, it is time to
examine Peiping's first attempt to force the pace of economic development, the firsteries of cyclical advances and retreats which have characterized Communist China's domestic policy from that time'to the present day.
A. Then Socialization and Construction"
The masses of the people possesscreative power. They cann the length and breadth of the productionwork is the lifeline of all economic work.
Tse-tung, "Preface and Notes on the Socialist Upsurge in5
It is necessary to put into effect consistently the principle of personal material incentives for workers,that application ofost important requirement
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for steady growth in production.
"Report to the Twentieth Party6
1. Tho "Upsurge" in Socialization
As is well known, Mao Tse-tung'S call inor an "upsurge" in the socialization of China'sresulted In drastically foreshortening thetimetable from three five yearittle over one year. Less well known, however, are the circumstances surrounding this momentousand the rationale advanced to Justify it.
Itevealing commentary on Mao's personality and work style that he apparently decided at this time on his own authority to settle the "great debate" on cooperativization which had raged within the CCP for several years. By-passing the central committee and its Rural Work Department (headednown advocate of "gradualism" loe issued his hurry-up call1 July speech entitled "The Question ofCooperation" deliveredeeting ofparty secretaries.* Further suggesting theof high-level opposition within the party, Maoolemical attack against "rightists" and "right, opportunists" who sought "to cover up their dilatoriness by quoting the experience of the Soviethe firsteries of such charges against moderate elements within the Chinese party which would recur with increasing intensity in the years to come.
"As Soviet propagandists have recently stressed in their indictment of Mao's "personalityha Chinese leader would also by-pass the central committee whenthe "great leap forward" and commune programs in the spring
Mao's rationale for stepping up socialization at this time is of fundamental importance forthe subsequent evolution of domestic policy inChina. For the first time, China'suge population, shortage of cultivated land, recurring natural calamities, and backward methods of farming) were advanced todistinctive Chinese approach to agricultural development. As Mao saw it, two important conclusions flowed from this enumeration of adverse conditions in China's rural areas. The first was his assertion that the very poverty of China'smade them "eager to take the socialist road." This idealized conception of China's peasants as endowed with special revolutionary qualitiesighlyoes far to explain the radical nature of subsequent Chinese rural development programs culminating in the people's commune.
The second conclusion was that "under theprevailing in our country, agricultural coopera-tivlzatlon must precede the use of big machinery," On this point, Mao's plan of agricultural organization deviated sharply from the Soviet model which holds that collectivization and mechanization of agriculture must proceed hand in hand. Central to this new approach was Mao's view that manpower properly organized and motivated (in the lower and higher level cooperatives andin the communes) could be substituted for tractors and other machineryrogram of rapid agricultural development.
There was evidence, moreover,onscious intent toew model of agricultural development for the underdeveloped countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America. Mao's cryptic statement that his program hadery great world significance" was spelled out ln ensuingcomment that "billions of peasants all over the world" would follow this 'most brilliant example forthe road to socialism."
2. The "Upsurge" in Construction
Elated by the successful speed-up ofChairman Mao called in5arallel "upsurge" in economic development. Basing his call on an almost mystical belief in tbe "unlimited creative power" of the masses, the Chinese leadereries of speeches and articles in the winteret forth some of the main features of China's "general line forconstruction" (which would not appear until, including the principle that "political work is theof all economic work" and the slogan "buildingby achieving greater, faster, better and more economic results." It was at this time that MaoChina's Draft Twelve Year Program for Agriculture, containing the amibitious and inspiring targets offood production, eliminating illiteracy, mechanizing agriculture and generally transforming backward economic and cultural conditions in the countryside. ompanion Twelve Year Plan for Science and Technology called for achieving advanced world levels in scientific research And in order to fulfill Mao's predictionremendous expansion of production following agriculturalassive investment and construction program was carried out in the countryside which would subsequently be described as Communist China's first "leap forward" in economic development.
The first step in this first "leap forward" effortrogram of irrigation and water conservancycarried out on an unprecedented scale in the winter. This was followedassin the countryside in the first half6 which in many respects was the prototype of tbe freneticwhich would characterize the "leap forward" in agriculture in the spring Itovement based on propagandizing the Draft Twelve Year Program which swept the great majority of peasants into advanced agricultural cooperatives ranging in size fromoimes larger than the lower stage, semlsocialistof the preceding year. To accomplish thistransformation of rural society, the cadres held
forth to the peasants the glowing prospect qiof the Twelve Year Program far ahead ofthe rapid mechanization and electrification olof substantial Increases in agriculturalandignificant increase in theconsumption of the new collective farm members. nearly two million modern'.farm plowsand rushed to rural areas- in the firstthe yearajor start toward the goal of
Following the appearance of these inspiring slogans and ambitious targets, Chairman Maoecret report to the politburo in6 entitled "Ton Basic Relationships." Believed to contain some of the basic principles underlying China's new approach to socialist construction, this report is also an important source for understanding Mao's economic thought. As such, anwill be made to reconstruct its contents on the basis of ensuing discussion in Chinese'Communist.
As later revealed by Liu Shao-chi, "the general idea of this report was to mobilize all positive factors and available forces for building Chinaodern, prosperous and mighty socialist state in the shortest possible time." The method employed was to identify ten basic "contradictions" (relationships) in the economic and political life of the country and advance certain general guidelines for resolving these contradictions. Just as Mao (in an article attributed to the politburo appearing that same month) had attempted to explain away
*It was soon discovered that these plows were unsuited to the terrain and methods of cultivation in many areas, with the result that nearly half of them could not be used. As will be noted in succeeding chapters, this would be merely the firsteries of ill-fated experiments in searchshort-cut" to agricultural mechanization.
Stalin's errors as merely another exampleocialist society, so he was now attempting; to apply the "science" of Marxist-Leninist dialectics to problems of economic development within his own country. This faith (or professed faith) in the existence andof the "dialectical law of the development of things" (if only properly interpreted) is an important aspect of all of Mao's doctrinal writings, including his pronouncements on political economy.
*Mao was to initiate his0 flowers"immediately following this report.
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The trick of course was to understand the inner workings of this law and apply it in accordance with China's special conditions. This Mao sought to do in bis April report by settingumber of vague and somewhat contradictory proposals designed to buildin China with "greater, faster, better and more economical results" (inialectical or self-contradictory formulation)'. These proposals apparently included the following: o assign greater emphasis to agriculture and light industry which in turn would promote the development of heavy industry; omore small and medium industrial enterprises and exploit more fully existing industry;o allocate more funds to economic construction by reducingexpenditure; o work out an appropriateratio which wouldlight increase in worker-peasant incomeuch largerin investment (Mao apparently believed that the production "upsurge"6 would be sufficient foro decentralize authority over economic planning and construction and thus "unleash creative energies" at the local level;o enlist the cooperation andof all classes and groups within the country to engage in an accelerated construction program byrelations between the party and the people,the work style of party and government cadres, andore "liberal" policy towardsinally, although the evidence is less
certain here, to press ahead with the constructionargely self-sufficient national economy.
3. De-Stalinization: The Chinese Response
It is instructive at this point to compare this program with that advanced by Mao's future antagonist Khrushchev ath Congress of the Communist party of the Soviet Union held two months earlier. Of first importance was tho contrast between Mao's emphasis on ideological and political work as tho key to economicolitical work is the lifeline ofnd Khrushchev's de-emphasis of theory in favor of "practicalappliednd "material incentives." Like Stalin before him, Mao was about toorced-draft program ofa backward agrarian economy in which personal incentives and material well-being were considered to be of relatively little consequence. In the6 and subsequent defenses of Stalin, Peiping has always paid high tribute to his correct policies "on theof the Soviet state and the collectivization of agriculture." As exponents of Stalin's methods of forced economic development, it appeared that the dominantleaders were skeptical of Khrushchev's "economism" from the beginning.
More speculatively, there is reason to believe that Mao also opposed the degree of bloc economic integration advocated by Khrushchev ath Party Congress. Since the Peiping regime would counterpose the conceptself-reliant and comprehensive industrial system" for China shortly thereafter (at their Eighth Party Congress in September), itair inference that Mao advanced this principle as an aspect of the tenth contradiction, "internationaln his April report. In it appears that major issues in the Sino-Soviet dispute over economic policy and economic relations had already emerged by the spring
One final observation on the initial Sino-Soviet dialogue on de-Stalinization deserves mention at thishighly defensive and detailed rationaleby the Chinese Communists to prove that Stalin's errors connected with the "cult of personality" could not possibly develop within the Chinese party. As afor Stalin's crude and terroristic methods, Mao's formulahought reform" or more popularlyas proWerred to other bloc parties in the spring6 as the correct method for dealing with erring comrades. This in turn wouldremium onacade of unity when heated disputes over domestic policy and the Sino-Sovietwould rend the Chinese Communist leadership in subsequent years. Constrained by the need to uphold this pose of leniency (and perhaps by inclination asao has eliminated his opponents6ind of "silent" purge in which the offenders eithercompletely or, stripped of real power, are permitted rare public appearances on ceremonial occasions.
With the major themes of the Sino-Soviet dispute over economic policy identified and an important ground rule for handling intra-party disputes established, it is time to examine the accomplishments and aftermath of Communist China's first "leap foward" in economic.
B. Reappraisal, Readjustment and Retrenchment
In the beginning ofthe tendency to do everything at once and do lt everywhere, taking noof actual conditions, and recklessly running ahead.
En-lai,6
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However, some comrades at the time magnified these defects andthe great achievements attained and hence regarded the leap forward6reckless advance'.
Shao-chi,8
The events of tho year extending from the fall
6 to the fall7 constitute an important, if somewhat obscure, chapter in the history of Chinesedomestic policy. Iteriod of extensive retreat on the economic front in which Chinese policy pronouncements appeared to reflect Soviet views on economic development. It waseriod when, as suggested by the above quotations, clear differences over domestic development policy emerged among theCommunist leadership. inal introductory it should be notedumber,of the pragmatic measures introduced in theo cope with tbe collapse of the "great leap forward" would be based on precedents in this earlier period when moderate policies prevailed.
The second half6ime of disillusion
and alarm for the Peiping regime, disillusion over the failure (particularly in"agriculture)of the first "leap forward" in economic development and alarm over theof de-Stalinization within the Communist bloc. Reacting to the domestic setback, Mao sanctioned (perhaps reluctantly) retreat and retrenchment in economic policy within China. Reacting to the disarray within the bloc, Mao advanced his novel doctrine ofcontradictions" within and between socialist-countries to explain (and, incidentally, aggravate) the disruptive effects of de-Stallnizatlon in Eastern Europe. Emerging as the temporary champion of "liberalization" in intra-bloc relations, the Peiping regime challenged Moscow's leadership over other blocbold move which apparently would cause the Soviets by the end of the year to threaten withdrawal of their economic and technical experts from China.
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1. Retreat at the Eighth Party Congress
The signal to pause and regroup forces on the economic construction front was sounded at the Eighth Party Congress in In contrast with the ebullience and confidence which had characterized Mao's speeches earlier in the year, the tone of the reports at this congress was one of caution and indecision. For the first time, "leftist" adventurism (coupled with "rightistas identifiedeviation to avoid in socialist construction. As the result of failure to take into account objective conditions, the limitations of resources and the need to maintain adequate reserves, there hadendency to "set tooace." This tendency was formally recognizedovember plenum of the central committee-olicy of "suitable retrenchment" was adopted.
The basic cause of economic retrenchment in6 was the poor showing in agriculture. DespiteMao's confident assertion that agriculturalwould result in an "immense nation-wide expansion oflaimed output of food crops roseercent over the previous year and state grainactually fell below the level Although the "leap forward" had registered impressive gains in both, industrial production and capital construction, the implications of this shortfall for the futureof what was an essentially agrarian economy were grave. Itime for reappraisal of fundamental policies,rocess in which Soviet views on economic development seemed to coincide with thoseoderate grouping of government administrators and economicamong the Chinese leadership to whom Mao Tse-tung appeared to turn for advice in restoring order and balance to China's disorganized economy. As the most pominent member of this moderate grouping. Premier Chou En-lai setumber of these views in his September congress
report on the draft proposals for Communist China's Second Pive Year Plan
First, after criticizing "tho tendency to doat once and do it everywhere and, taking no account of actual conditions, recklessly runninghepremier stressed the need for "realisticbalancednd "overall arrangements" In planning work. Since there is evidence that Moscow bad pressed for reduction of the industrial goals originally proposed for the Second Five Year Plan, Chou's remarks also reflected Soviet concern for greater realism In China's economic planning.
Next, Chou appeared to endorse Khrushchev'sprescription for stimulating economicon material incentives to elicit higher levels of labor productivity and output. This was evident in his advocacyroportional increase in light Industry investment to provide more consumer goods during the plant was also evident in his admonition against setting "tooate of investment, therebylegitimate popular demands for Improvement in the standard of living. It was particularly evidenteries of measures advanced by Chou (and subsequently elaborated by Chen Yun) toadly needed stimulusgricultural production. Resembling in some respects
*In' addition to Chou (third ranking member of thethe principal members of this group appeared to be Chen Yun (fifth ranking member of the politburo, senior economic specialist and senior vice-premier) and three lesser politburoFu-chun (Chairman of the* State Planningi Hsian-nien (Minister of Finance) ando (Chairman of the Economic Planning Commission).
a revealing shift in emphasis, Liu Shao-chi In his congress speech not only did not callroportional Increase in light industry investment but warned that lowering the rate of development of heavy Industry would be "wrong."
3 agricultural development program, these measures were designed to provide China's peasants with greater material incentives, including enlargement of their "privatencreases in state procurement prices for agricultural products, the retsxn of hogs to private care, and the inaugurationo-called "free market" in which the peasant could sell secondary farm produce.
Less clear was the view expressed by Chou in this report on the relative advantage of constructing large, modern industrial enterprises as opposed to small and medium sized plants. The Chinese premiereutral position in this controversy (both within the CCP and between the Chinese and their Soviet advisers) which, when ultimately resolved in favor of the small plant program, would lead to the excesses of the "native" iron and steel production campaign in the "great leap forward"
One point in Chou's report which presumably did not meet with Soviet approval was the announcement for the first time that Communist China intended toself-reliant and comprehensive industrialoming so soon after Khrushchev's advocacy of the concept of bloc economic integration ath Soviet Congress, this formulationeclaration of economic independence with far-reaching implications for the future course of Sino-Soviet relations.
2. The First Soviet Threat
Indeed, there were already signs in the fall of "
f mounting friction in the relations between Com-aunlst China aod the USSR. First. TjTfSJSjMSwassjfBMmwassMBSfl
there were
indications that Khrushchev had become incensed by Mao's pretensions to leadership of the underdeveloped areas of the world. Chinese Communist claims that theirprograms of socializing agriculture and capitalist industry and commerce constituted "models" for thecountries were countered publicly in two
ways. First, Soviet delegate Mikoyan emphasized In his speech to the CCP's Eighth Party Congress that Lenin had conceived of both of these programs, thus undercutting the Chinese claim to originality. The second method was to make unmistakably sarcastic (at least, in retrospect) references to the "humility of Communist China's For example,3 November Pravda editorial cited "the wisdom of the leadership of the CCP" forsaying that they do not pretend to the universal recognition of their methods" and Khrushchev9 November speech lauded his "Chinese comrades" for "not becoming conceited" about their accomplishments but rather "displaying exceptional modesty."
Of more immediate concern to Moscow was Communist China's Intervention at this time in Eastern Europe, encouraging early Polish and Hungarian demands for greater independence and assigning much of the blame forthere to Russian "great power chauvinism." Even after changing course to support Soviet military'in Hungary, the statement of the Chinese positionong politburo article ofecember) was doubly in purporting to provide thetheoretical explanation for Soviet bungling in East Europe, n warning "other bloc countries against mechanical copying of Soviet experience (the more so in view of the many "mistakes and failures" in that experi-
ence) .
The cumulative effect of Chinese declarations of economic independence, political independenceothers asnd doctrinal independence wastoo much for Khrushchev to tolerate. For it was at this point in time that the Soviets threatened for the first time to withdraw their experts and technicians from Communist China.
The circumstances surrounding this first crisis in Sino-Soviet relations are somewhat obscure. One account indicates that the CPSUeneral request-forof technicians from all socialist countries (on the pretext that local technicians were trained) which was not agreeable to Peiping, On the other hand, the
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Chinese version describes this incident as adispute (apparently involving the status and authority of Soviet experts in China) which was resolved by changing the tern "advisers" to "technicaln either case, the threat of Soviet withdrawal appeared toobering, if temporary, effect on Mao Tse-tung during the first half
intellectuals to his call for criticism of the Chinese Communist party and government. Although the content of this damaging "rightist attack" falls outvide the scope of this paper, it should be noted that it included Mao Tse-tung himself who was accused (quite accurately) of "being impetuous in making decisions withoutareful study of the facts." Ititting climax to Mao's disastrous experiment with "liberalization."
Secondly, despite Chairman Mao's directive tothe importance of agriculture, the rural economy continued to deteriorate. asic difficulty was that peasant consumption and living standards had not risen as promised following collectivization. There were other reasons *why, as conceded in the published version of Mao's speech in June, "some people have whippediniature typhoon around what they call the cooperatives having no superior qualities." The larger scale ofand the increased demands for accurate accounting and bookkeeping exceeded the abilities of rural cadres, which in turn bred suspicion and jealousies betweenin the enlarged cooperatives. The upshot wasdissolution of the large agricultural collectives
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expressed in dramaticeptember central committee directive to reduce by two-thirds the size of collective farmsuggested optimum of one hundred households.*
The headlong retreat on tbe agricultural front inot only called into question the viability of Peiping's Twelve Year Agricultural Program but also cast serious doubt on Communist China's prospects for The period in which Mao Tse-tung appeared to rely on the adviceoderate grouping ofin the Chinese.Communist leadership was almost at an end. Inhe central committee of the CCP would meet in plenary session tobard" revolutionary line in both domestic and foreign policy. It is to an appraisal of this sharp turn to the left in economic policy culminating in the "great leap forward" that we must now turn.
"This directive, believed to represent the moderate views of the head of the party's Rural Work Department Tcng Tzu-hui, Is of more than passing interest today. Many of the reforms and concessions introduced In the commune system1 would be based on this directive. Furthermore, the party pledge in0 not to tamper with tbe revamped communeseriod of at least five years should be viewed in the lightimilar pledge inhina's rural cooperatives would be kept small in0 households)eriod of ten years.
Iir. THE "GREAT LEAP FORWARD" AND GREnT RETREAT
Our cause is the revolutionary cause and what we most need isoptimism which in strategyall 'powerful1 foes andall 'serious* difficulties andin tactics we must attach importance to them and overcome them one by one.
Daily8
Liberation of the productive-force of the laboring people will have the same effect as smashing the atom.
Tse-tung,8
Dissatisfied with the results of moderate economic policies and shocked by the outcome of "liberal"policies, Mao Tse-tungeries of radical policy decisions in the winter and springhich wouxd culminate In the "great leap forward"erious crisis in Sino-Soviet relations. Moreover, the radical perspectives and programs which began to emerge at this timeasic and long-held tenet of Mao Tse-tung'sconviction that human effort galvanized by ideals and mobilizedassive scale can triumph over material limitations and transform the objective world. Crudely put, this faith in the power of mind over mattereeply-ingrained streak of idealism in Mao's world-view which goes fax to explain the momentous decisions in domestic and foreign policy taken in the winter and spring.
Ia domestic policy, the three programs which would dominate the Chinese scone8 to"general line of socialisthe "great leapnd thedesigned to accomplish thefeat of rapid modernization and industrializationackward Asian economy. In foreign policy, Mao would express the same contempt for the objective limitations of the real world at the7 Communist summit meeting in Moscow where he would Introduce his "paper tiger" image of America's military power and call for the adoptionew forward strategy in the international Communist movement.
It is time to examine more closely the origins and consequences of this complex of radical policy decisions which, in their denial of Soviet economic, political, strategic and military doctrines, wouldundamental challenge to Moscow's leadership of the bloc. Central to this examination willeview of significantshaping Sino-Soviet relations throughout this period, the developments viewed asattern of Soviet inducements and threats designed to bring Peiping into line and culminatingoncerted effort tothe Chinese Communist leadership in
A. The "Great Leap Forward" and the People's Commune
It is man that counts; theinitiative of the massesighty drivingome people say that ideological and political work can produce neither grain, nor coal norne may ask: have we not produced more grain, coal and iron by formulating and carrying out correct politicaly correctly handling contradictions among the people, and by raising the socialist consciousness of the workers, aad are we not going to produce more aad more by so doing?
Shao-chi, 8
Now we must not think that Communism will only be realized very slowly. So long as we work properly, the time will be very soon when we realize Communism.
Shao-chi,8 1. The Third Plenum
The situation which confronted the Chineseleadership as it met in the Third Plenum of the Eighth Central Committee in7 was far from promising. Two major domestic policies espoused by Chairman Mao during the precedingonths were in disrepute. The proposed answer to China's agriculturalDraft Twelve Year Agricultural Program and the rapid creation of large-scale collective farms as the means for implementing thisfailed to provide either the promised increments in productiontable organizational form in the countryside. Mao's original conception of the liberal "hundred flowers" campaigneans of improving relations between the CCP and the Chinese people (especially the intellectuals) had been undermined by the "rightist" attack on the party and government. Moreover, the stop-gap program adopted in6 of providing greater material incentives to the peasants was not proving any more effective in raising either agricultural output or peasant consumption. Facedapidly growing population, with relative stagnation in food production and dwindling food reserves,isaffected intellectual class and with mounting dissatisfaction among the peasants and rural cadres, Mao Tse-tung reacted by strongly affirming theof his original policies and byeries of radical measures designed to implement these policiesuch faster pace.
The first measure was to redefine and extend the "rectification" campaign, now merged witho encompass all the people. The cadres and peasantsrimary target of this expanded
d :
campaign, which would serve both to silence criticism and suppress doubts and at the -same timereat new effort of construction and production in the countryside. Another major target was China's intellectual class, many of whom were sent to rural areas for "labor reform"eward for heeding Mao's earlier call to criticize the party. Even the favored urban working class was included in the expanded "rectification" movement. The objective here was toew "rational -low-wage policy"to narrow the sizable gap between urban and rural living standards and strengthen the worker-peasant evealing explanation'of thiseople's Daily editorial ofovember stated: "In our wage policy in thee have over-emphasized the importance of material incentives, while inadvisablyour political and ideological work among theand employees."
The second measure was to revive, revise andthe "leapabor-intensive approach to China's economic development first advanced ln tentative and incomplete form by Chairman Mao in the winter. It is known that Mao at this party plenum revived his earlier slogan calling for "greater, faster, better and more economical results" in China's socialist It is known that Mao at this plenum stressed his earlier conclusion that China's special conditionsarge territory, large population, small amount of arable landredominantly agrarian economy)an approach to economic development quitefrom that in the Soviet Union. It is also known that the Draft Twelve Year Program for Agriculture (first introduced by Mao inajor topic of discussion at the7 plenum and that thewas taken at this time toeasant labor armyillion strong toiganticof agricultural construction whichwarfefforts in the countryside.
It is difficult to exaggerate the importance of this decision to exploit the economic factor of labor power in the evolution of the "great leap forward" and commune programs. The underlying premiseimple
the solution to tho problem of economic(first of all, agricultural development) lay in the massive and intensive application of China's abundant labor supply; or, to employ the Jargon of the Chineseleadership, in the application of the "masshich had proved so successful in the revolutionaryfor power, to the much more complicated process of socialist construction. Moreover, this tremendously augmented labor effort would have to be secured without resort to material incentives,olicy which had already been tried and found wanting and which, in any case, was ruled out in order to maximize savings and investment for future growth. Given these conditions, it becametoechanism through which the party could most effectively mobilize and control the rural labor force and at the same time restrict consumption. This mechanism would in time appear as the people's commune.
The immediate problem in the final monthsowever, was toew set of-psychological and moral incentives to incite labor enthusiasm among the people. An early example of this new type ofincentive appearing in November was the slogan: "Catch up with and outstrip Great Britain innother example was the concept of the "leap forward" At this stage there were widespread doubts, bred by the experience of the precedingonths andinto the higher echelons of tbe leadership, whether China could sustain morelow, painful rate of growth in economic development. Mao's confidentat the party plenum that China couldapid tempo must haveonic to the flagging spirits of the party and populace.
The third and final incentive was tbe visionommunist society which the leadership was to holdthe Chinese people as the ultimate and not fargoal of their bitter struggle. Although this theme was not widely publicized until the summer months of the following year, it would appear in muted form as early as8 in an important New Year's Day partyandampaign launched Immediately thereafter
to indoctrinate tbe broad masses in the Communist spirit andew Communist attitude towards labor,mW
2. The Moscow Conference
Following closely after the Chinese Communistcommittee plenum of September-October, theof the Moscow Conference of Communist and Workers Parties in7 would also exercize strongover the evolution of China's domestic and foreign policies As recent reporting has made clear, this conference (and the negotiations surrounding it) was the occasion for important developments in Sino-Soviet political and military relations.
Of first importance was the Soviet agreement of7 to assist China in the development of anweapons program,owerful inducement for the Chinese Communist leadership to subordinate theirambitions in the interests ofodern
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,*. At the
sane time, it is likely that the agreement alsoprovisions (either explicit or implied) for Joint controls and other safeguards which wereto Mao Tse-tung on political grounds. That the Chinese leader was dissatisfied with this advanced weapons agreement (either that it was inadequate oron China's sovereignty orhreat to party control over the military) Isy Mao's performance at the Moscow conference;y his strong stand the following spring opposing Russian"to bring China under Soviet militaryy his speech to the Military Affairs Committee the following summer in which he disparaged theof nuclear weapons and the value of Sovietassistance.
At first glance, it appeared that this Soviet demarche in the fall7 had been successful when Chairman Maoublic declaration'in MoscowSoviet "leadership" of the bloc. But this public concession was largely negated by attacks on Khrushchev's "peaceful coexistence" strategy in private negotiations characterized by "heated exchanges" (Mao's own term) between the Chinese and Soviet party delega-tions. As is now well known, Mao'sto the conference sought to demonstrate that there hadecisive change in the East-West balance of forces and that this change dictated ew forward strategy for the international Communist movement. In presenting this
*That this agreement included Soviet assistance in the development of nuclear weapons is suggested
by statements of Soviethat they were assisting the Chinese inegard; and fjj| oy tne ck1coso disclosures in3 which clearly placed this agreementuclear context and which in the original Chinese text clearly implied that7 agreement called forChinaample of an atomic bomb and technical data concerning its manufacture."
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strategic assessment, Mao denigrated tbe military and economic power of the Westpapernd minimized the consequencesuclear war should one resultew bloc ofespite his public declaration, Mao also implied f| mmmammwrnammwamwaamal that what he really envisagedorm of collective leadership for theeffect, co-leadership by the Soviet Union and Communist China.
If the7 agreement did not explicitly provide for joint controls, the Chinese Communists have recently disclosed that specific proposals towards this end were made shortly thereafter when8 theof the CPSU put forward unreasonable demandsto bring China under Soviet militaryhere is good reason to believe, moreover, that at least the first of these "unreasonable demands" (variously reported as proposals for establishing Soviet or joint Sino-Soviet submarine, radar, air and missile bases in China, and, of specialroposed Soviet plan to deploy and control nuclear warheads in China) was advanced in the spring For it was in Hay orresumably after one or more of "these unjust demands were rightly and firmlyhat Chairman Mao made an important speech to the Military Affairsof the CCP in which he disparaged the importance of nuclear weapons and the value of Soviet military sistance
3. The "Great Leap Forward" and the People's "Commune
As noted above, the trilogy of China's distinctive domestic development"general linehe "great leap forward" and the communes-
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were linked from the outset. The New Year's Day editorial of People's Daily, which ushered8reat flourish, revealed in itsull Steamn important element of the 'generalnnounced the regime's determination to "leap forward" in all branches of the economy; and for the first time called on thepeople to struggle for the realization of socialism and Communismingle "great ideal."
The first steps toward the realization of this
March at
mgtu, Mao proposed two important measures for imple.-menting these ambitious goals. First he advocated the formation of greatly expanded "largen some cases representing an expansion ofoimes the original size.* Mao's second proposal, thatmass-line" for industrial development designed tothe underemployed labor force of China's peasants, was equally significant and deserves furtherat this point.
It will be recalled that Chairman Mao had proposed as early as6 the construction, of more medium and small size industrial enterpriseseans ofChina's industrialization and, to promote this objective, the decentralization of planning and financial authority to local governments. As finally worked out
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by tbe planners and technicians in tbe winter, tho new program centered on the construction of modern plants and provided safeguards for centralized control. Inpatient for faster progress, however, Mao apparently decided at Chengtu to transform this programass campaign which would penetrate beyond local levels of government to the agricultural cooperatives, there to rely on labor-intensive "native" technology toleap forward" in industrial development.tbe decision at the7 centralplenum tough peasant labor army to engage in agricultural production and construction, this decision at Chengtu toass movement in rural industrial construction appears to be the secondfactor leading to the establishment of communes in China. As the Chinese Communists would arguethe commune organizationogical corollary of the rural industrialization program.
The third major party conference was the second session of the Eighth Party Congress which' met in Peiplngoay. It was here that Liu Shao-chiintroduced China's own "general line of socialist construction" and epitomized the "great leap forward" spirit by describing the age as one when "twenty years are concentrateday."* It was this session which demonstrated the new dominant role of the party androup of "party-machine" leaders (whose power derived mainly from their key positions in the party apparatus) to whom Mao Tse-tung had turned for advice andin implementing the radical domestic (and foreign) policies adopted at this time. In place of the senior "administrator-economists" (Chou En-lai, Chen Tun, Li Fu-chun and Liew cast of characters.
% *ea?ral }iae- reflecting Mao's faith in tbe power of "subjective" factors to transform the oblec-tive world, called and still calls for "going allout aiming high and achieving greater, fastir beSer and more economical results in building socialism."
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leaders and, in the context of events as thencluded, in order ofLiu Shao-chi (second only.to Mao ln the party leadership and Mao's heireng Hsiao-ping (chief of the partyeng Chen (polltburo memberanking member of thend Tan Chen-lin (the secretariat's new spokesman on rural policy and agriculture).
The rationale for the party's arrogation of authority and control over China's economic development program was provided by Liu Shao-chi in the following passage fromis congress speech.
Ideological and political work is always the soul and guide of every kind ofwhat7 some peoplee can produce more grain, coal and iron by formulating and carrying out correct political linesby raising the socialist consciousness of the workers and arousing the enthusiasm of the masses...
Thus "economic work"ighly complex activity Involving the planned allocation of resources, cost accounting and incentives keyed to production) was displaced byand political work" (an undertaking to arouse the "enthusiasm of the masses" for production). And China's "economic and technicalho were attacked by Mao and Liu8 for "rightistere rep-laced by party enthusiastsgreat leap forward" in all branches of the economy.*
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the existenceeasonably well-defined grouping within the party who opposed the "great leap forward"ritics of this program were variously attacked as membersgloomyclique" and an "account-settling clique."
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As the head of delegation to this bloc economic
It ls interesting to note that two of the high-level members of the "administrator-economist"Chen Yun (the senior economic specialist) and Li Fu-chun (Chairman of the StateEMA meeting in Moscow during the stages of the Chinese party congress, the highest-ranking Chinese Communist participate ln the deliberations of
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the countries closely the China and trade agree-long- term economic that one of the
organization, Chen Yun was present on-voting server) when the conference decided "to strengthen economic cooperationso as to bring aboutand coordination in production" of all in the socialist camp. Since this followedonth earlier that Communist the USSR intended to negotiateong-term meet" in order "to coordinate bettert ls reasonable to conclude
topics discussed by Chen Yun with Khrushchev ln their talks ofay was Soviet assistance under such aeconomic development program. And, tosubsequent developments, it iseasonable inference that Chen Tun may have advocatsd on bisloser Sino-Soviet economic relationship than Mao and the "party-machine" were willing to accept.*
The drive to establish aa independent,domestic development program was symbolizedrevival in May and Juneoncept which hadin Chinese Communist publications sinceconceot of "the
*Asknown, this second Soviet effort toa network of long-term military and economicagreements binding Communist China to theat the outset.
| The accompanying claim that his works were Marxist-Leninistone other than universal truths oflearly implied that the Chinese Communists regarded Mao as the ranking Marxist-Leninist theoretician of the day and, as such, eminently qualified to provide theoretical guidance in their audacious commune experiment.'.
The people's communewas the last of the trilogy of China's distinctive development programs to appear.BmmBBBBBBBBBBmmsammmmmarB there ence that Mao had conceived the commune at least as early as April and may well have introduced and developed the
concept pBBBBmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmal xu the spring Whatever its point of origin, the people's commune was unveiled in July, in two Red Flag articles by Chen Po-tapokesman forthe chosen instrument for China's "great leap forward" in economic development.
After asserting that the "general.line" hadassured bumper crops in agriculture, Chen stressed in his first article the key role of China's peasants in the mass movement under way to promote rapidof the economy. Then, as the organizational form for mobilizing the peasants to undertake this role, Chen cited an advanced agricultural cooperative as an example of spontaneous formationpeople's commune' combining industry and agriculture.
Chen's second articleonsiderably more detailed discussion of the commune concept. Arguing that Lenin had entrusted to "the Communists of Eastern countries" the urgent task of developing Marxist theory "in tho light of special conditions unknown to the Europeanhen advanced the people's commune as Mao Tse-tung's
*The Chinese Communists have deliberatedly obfuscated the origins of the commune by pretending that itpontaneous creation of the masses.
latest "creative development" of Marxist-Leninist theory in fulfillment of this task. Just as China'sproducers cooperative had been cited earlierbrilliant example" for "billions of peasants all over the world too now the people's commune was advanced as the best organizational form for solving the special problems of economic development in Asia and, by extension, all the underdeveloped areas of tho world.
Chen then put Mao on record as having saidinhat "our direction must be gradually and systematically to organize 'industry, agriculture, commerce, education and the militia' ig commune, thereby to form basic units of our society." Chenthat this concept of the commune was "adrawn by Comrade Mao Tse-tung from actual life" and that under Mao's banner China would in tbe "not distant future"ommunist society.
Chen's articles were revealing in-several respects. They firmly identified Mao as the architect of the commune program, asserted that Mao's concept was derived from practical experience in China, and implied somewhich were to strain severely the Sino-Soviet that Peiping hadistinctive road to Communism; that this roadhort-cut which would bring China to Communismelatively early date; and that this road was applicable to other underdeveloped countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America.
With the appearance of the commune in July (aparty resolution directing the establishment ofcommunes throughout the country followed inommunist China's unorthodox trilogy of domesticprograms was complete. eturn to tho
'Subsequent discussion in Chinese publications would indicate that this occasion could have been no later than the fifth plenum of the central committee held the last week in May.
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"mass line" approach to socialist construction which Mao had introduced in tentative and incomplete form more than two years earlier, they called for total mobilization of all available resources in order to break through the formidable barriers to China's economic and social in particular its huge population supportedeak agricultural base. Whereas Khrushchev inas to stress that the lack of "necessary materialhad foredoomed the early Soviet experiment with communes, Chairman Mao8 arrived at just theunder the conditionsnderdeveloped Oriental economy, the communewould have to be the Instrument to effect rapid economic development.
As originally envisaged, the commune was to effect total mobilization of China's limited resources in three ways. First, by taking over the "private plots'* of land, small livestock and larger production tools belonging to individual peasants, the commune gained control over the total labor power of the peasant and reduced himtatus of total dependency on the commune for his The second step was the extension of more rigid and effective controls over peasant consumption to be implemented by means of the famous "free supply" system through the commune mess-hall. It was here that thewas expected to perform one of its most important functionsechanism forizablesurplus into investment for industry. to the original plan, these greatly augmentedfunds were to be used for three separate but relatedfinance the purchase of agricultural producer goods from existing industrial plants; to help finance the construction of modern industry through increased tax payments and "contributions" to the state; and to pay for the construction of "native" industry on the commune level In the Chinese view, the commune would make lt possible to telescope the painful process of "primitiveexperienced by any agrarian society bent on
The third and by far the most important resource in the commune mobilization program was human labor power.
As Liu Sbao-chi had stressed in his May congress report, "It is man thatman conceivedroducer, not consumer, and man organized into labor armies for shock campaigns in nearly every field of economic activity. Citing the Communist Man ifestoentury earlier had called for the "establishment of industrial armies, especially fornd China's owntradition of armed struggle,eptember Red Flag editorial on the formation of people's communes stressed their utility in organizing the peasants "along military lines" in order to "storm the fortress of nature and march to the happy future of industrialization,and Communism in the countryside."
Because of limitations of space (and becauseare welleiping's frenzied effortsmonths togreat leap forward"sectors of the economy will only be brieflyfirst objective was toleap forward"byevolutionary.approach approach io which theutilization of China's most abundant resource,expected to compensate for the critical scarcityother factors of production as arable land,machinery and chemical fertilizer. Centralapproach was the adoptionet of "gardenconsisting of eight basic rules of(Mao's "eight pointithon deep plowing and close planting asechnological break-through Inin turn would permit realization of Mao'sof land cultivation which was aimed at theof sown acreage "in the next several years" toof the existing level. As implemented withby party enthusiasts, first agriculturalthen agricultural statistics and finallyscience were subordinated to political endsbest Stalinist tradition. The end result of thisI io October
that Communist China would double grain production not only8 but also
Following large-scale agricultural construction and production, the second objective of these programs was toleap forward" in industrial development.ontinuing mystery to Western analysts,China's "mass line" of industrial development8 was apparently based on the belief that techniques which had proven relatively successful in agriculture could be applied to the Infinitely more complex process of industrialization, especially the reliance upon labor-intensive "native" technology performed by the "greatest labor army in thencited by Mao's call ln late August "toreat leap forward in iron and steel production byigantic peasant labor army in excess ofillion was organized to construct hundreds of thousands of "backyard" iron and steolthroughout rural China. The disastrousof this shock construction and productionattacked from the outset by China's industrial planners and technicians asof rural style" and "analogous to the practice of guerrillatorisis of major proportions in China's 'great leap forward" just prior to the8 plenum of the central committee.
The third objective of China's frenetic speed-up of economic activity8 was to accelerate theand electrification of agriculture. If the commune wasechanism to substitutemanpower for machinery in solving China'sproblem, lt is also true that the Chineseconsidered thisirst step in aprogram leading to industrialization andmechanization. As was the case with the "mass line" of Industrial development, however, the program ofrevolution in agriculture proclaimed by Pelplng;8 was characterized by shifting content and destined for ignominious failure. Following short-livedwith locally produced "baby" tractors, the "native" production of ball bearings, and commune construction of small hydroelectric power stations, theclaimed in September to have discovered ln the towlng-cableubstitute for "those complicated big machines. tractors7 which are hard and expensive
I
to produce" and thushort-cut to agriculturaland electrification "under the concrete conditions of our country." (Underlining supplied)
Following the appearance of the commune anddiscoveryeries of short-cuts toabundance, industrialization and theagriculture, Chinese Communist estimates offuture rates of growth jumped sharply. At thethe "short-cut" strategy clearly implied aof the standards for measuring the achievement of industrialized economy in China. As athese developments, it appeared that Communistnow intended to complete the transitioneriod of five2 to markof one stage and at the same timeew highertransition to
These then were the extravagant economic andpretensions initially advanced for Communist China's commune and "great leap forward" programs in the summer and fall The realization in the months thatof the patent falsity of these pretensionsraumatic experience from which the Chinese Communist party has yet to recover. The glaring discrepancy between promise and performance called into question not only the validity of the party's programs but even the competence of its leadership. Responding to the pressure of events and to the rising tide of both Soviet and domesticthe Chinese Communists sharply reversed course in November anderiod of "great retreat" on all fronts. It is to an examination of the developments in this period, culminating in the most serious challenge to Mao Tse-tung'e leadership of the CCPhat we must now turn.
B. The Great Retreat
When the leaders of the Chinese People'snnounced the 'great leap' and began setting up people'sour party saw that 'thisoad of dangerous. S. Khrushchev personally told Mao Tse-tung in the summerhatorm of production organization of peasants as the commune did not Justify itself for many reasons.
Government3
In the summerrevisionists inside the country rose in response to international revisionism and launched their frenzied attack against theof the party.
Chi-fang, "Preface to Stories of Not Fearinged1
Peng Te-huai was sentonastery because heetter to the CPSU expressing dissatisfaction with the Although they admit they had to change their original ideas somewhat, the Chinese still use the termn reality, they are brigades rather than communes..
by Khrushchev at the Bucharest Conference, 0
To Western analysts of Chinese Communist politics, the period extending from the fall8 through the
-
summer9 is in many respects the most interesting and revealing since tbe founding of the Chinese People's Republic. As recent reporting has made progressively clear, thiseriod of active Soviet intervention in the policy deliberations of the Chinese Communistranging from Khrushchev's direct representations to Mao Tse-tung through threats and sanctions to intrigue with dissident elements in the Chinese party. It waseriod when domestic opposition to Mao's policies assumed major proportions. As the following discussion will attempt to demonstrate, the convergence andof these forces in Peng Te-huai's attempt to persuade the central committee to reverse course inot onlyerious challenge to Mao'sbut alsoundamental decision on China's relationship with the Soviet Union. In retrospect, it appears that the Eighth Plenum of the Eighth CCP Central Committee at Lushan in9ecisive turning point in both domestic and foreignatershed in the history of Communist China'spolicy internally and of Sino-Soviet relations.
1. Soviet and Domestic Pressures
It was fitting that the first act in this power struggle shouldirect confrontation betweenand Mao in Peiping in late July and early Although the subject of speculation at the time, it isatter of record that Khrushchev on this occasion warned the Chinese leader of the dangersin the commune and 'great leap forward" programs, citing "many reasons" drawn from Soviet experience why they were impractical and doomed to failure. Demonstrat-
once
assertIveness, Mao's response tothis^^omradely" atlvice was to assume personal leadership of the mass campaign to organize communes throughout China on the very next day after Khrushchev's departure.
A topic of more immediate urgency, however, was Communist China's imminent offensive against the Chinese Nationalists in the Taiwan Straits. Although ourabout the exchanges on this issue is less precise, there is reason to believe that this wasoccasion when8 the CPSU leadership put forward unreasonable demands designed to bring China under Soviet militaryith Khrushchevthe establishmentoint Sino-Soviet navalin the Far East. Needless to say, this proposal was also "firmly rejected" by the Chinese Communist
Following these fruitless representations,turned increasingly to threats and sanctions in order to secure compliance from his Chinese ally. In August, the Soviets threatened once again to withdraw their technicians from China but were dissuaded from taking this drastic step. Next, Khrushchev withheldin the Taiwan Straits crisis until Peiping hadhumiliating losses and been forced to retreat. As the Chinese have subsequently charged (with someit was only when there was "no need for the Soviet Union to supporthat the Soviet leaders expressed their support for China."
Finally, Soviet spokesmeneries of in-creasingly outspokenmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmamsl
at Communist China's commune and "great leap forward" Elaborating Khrushchev's earlier admonitions to Mao, these criticisms were clearly Intended to refute Communist China's claim of advanced status on the road to Communism, discount its economic pretensions, andforcefully Soviet primacy incommon road" for all bloc countries to reach socialism and It is likely, moreover, that more palpable forms of pressure were applied to persuade the Chinese to change course at the Wuhan central committee plenum in December, including blunt interparty communications and revived threats concerning the Soviet aid prof^_
the import of
Khrushchev's public warning in October that 'it isfor one socialist state to construct socialism and Communism on its own" must have been clear to the Chinese leadership.
A factor of equal If not greater Importancethe Chinese Communist 'regime to change course at Wuhan was the rising tide of domestic opposition to the 'great leapnd commune programs, First was the disclosureumber of "leadingn China's iron and steel industry opposed continuing the mass iron and steel campaign and, shortly thereafter,ational conference of party industrial secretaries had decided to suspend this ill-fated experiment with "native" production of iron and steel. all for "unified planning" and for "treating the whole countryhesshis conference signaled the approaching end of the extreme decentralization of controls which hadthe "great leap forward" prograa of industrial development up to that,
Next,eries of emergency directives testified to the mounting crisis in agriculture and tbe decision in Novmber to "let the peasantsndicated the need to slacken the pace and regroup forces in the By December it wasconcede lies and falsification" in the reporting of agricultural production. And, following the admissionovember People's Daily editorial that "the tool reformas almost comehe claim to have discovered a short-cut" to agriculturalwas abruptly withdrawn.
It was in the commune program proper, however, that the extent of domestic opposition was most clearly road groundswell of popular this opposition appeared in the form ofvocal criticism from within the government, the partv and the military. Cadre disaffection in the was revealed in manythe reluctance of basic-level government workers to Join the communes; by cadre unwillingness to eat in the general commune mess-halls; and by cadre charges appearing in the press that tbe entire commune programrash advance" and was "theoretically wrong." ovember Red Flag conceded that cadre insubordination had reached serious proportions when it called for "shifting our main efforts to dealing with bourgeois tendencies among our party cadres
in the villages because such tendencies have seriously hampered the establishment and development of ourcommunes. ' (Underlining supplied)
The evidence of opposition to the communes within the ranks of the military is of special interest in the light of subsequent developments. Ittriking paradox that the attempt to reintroduce the supply system (the Chinese Communists frequently cited the supplyof 'military Communism" in force during theirwar periodrecedent for "free supply" under the commune distribution system) into the armed forces in the fall8 apparently aroused considerable In October, the Liberation Army Daily revealed that this proposal had touched of f1 among military cadres andtrong attack against "those comrades who do not welcome the supply system." In early November the General Political Department of the People's Liberation Armyass socialist-Communistcampaign among the armed forces in defense of the commune program, concludingtern injunction to all military components to support it. One objective of the campaign deserves specialofall commanding personnel in the army progressiveents in the commune movement and the march tohus, there were already indications that opposition to the communes extended into the military command.
2. The Great Retreat
Responding to the pressure of events and to the rising tide of both Soviet and domestic criticism, the Chinese Communist leadership, eries of urgentextending through November and early December, was compelled toundamental and humiliating retreat encompassing both the commune and "great leap forward" programs. The manner, character, and magnitude of this "great retreat" deserves extended discussion.
There is abundant evidence that the Peiping regime decided at the Wuhan central committee plenum in December
toajor overhaul of Its "great leap forward" program. The cumulative effects of failure in the mass iron and steel campaign, of grave imbalance in the national economy, of serious trouble in agriculture, and of the near collapse of the tool reform and farm mechanization programsorced retreat on the economic front. Although political considerations were to perpetuate hopelessly unrealistic "leap forward" goals until wellhe December commune resolution revealed that the era of extreme economic pretensions was at an end. In place of former claims to bave discovered ato agricultural abundance. Industrialization, and agricultural mechanization, the Wuhan plenum resolution contained the following relatively sober appraisal of China's future development: "The building of acountryighly developed modern industry,science andillr more years to complete, counting from now."
The magnitude of Chinese Communist retreat was more clearly revealed in the commune programetreat all the more humiliating because it appeared to result largely from Soviet pressure. Soviet pressure appeared to be largely responsible, for example, for the decision at Wuhan to abandon the extreme ideologicaloriginally advanced for the commune,the claim that this radical social organizationhort-cut to the ultimate Communist society.*
This retreat was accomplished first of all bythat 'the stages of socialism and Communism,
of Soviet pressure at this time wereovember speech by Ambassador Yudln (who had Justfrom Moscow to Peiping) and theovemberof the Draft Theses of Khrushchev's impending report to the Twenty-First Party Congressharply criticized basic elements of the commune systemefuted point by point the Chinese claim to be leading the bloc in an accelerated march to Communism.
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different in quality, should not beecondly, by acknowledging the Soviet position that highly developed productive forces (material abundance in industry and agriculture) were indispensable for the advance toand finally, by redefining the commune system of distribution (originally hailedanifestation of "the economic system ofsorm of socialist distribution." When,further. the December resolution of the tfuhan plenum depictedistinctively Chinese institution andrestricted its application to China in discussing the future transition to Communism, the major economic and doctrinal pretensions originally advanced for the com-aune nroffram
The central committee decided at Wuhan not only toeneral retreat in domestic policy but also to approve Mao Tse-tung's resignation as.Chairman of the People's Republic of China, Although there wereother contributing factors, it is hardlythat this decision to resign was unrelated to the sorry performance ot the commune and "great leapprograms. Facedrisis in both domestic and foreign policy. Mao apparently decided that it was necessary to devote maximum tine and energy toa situation which had got badly out of hand.
The first steponcerted effort to dissociate the party'sChairmanthe -ore radical and unsuccessful features of the "greap leap forward" and commune programst One tactic employed in the December resolution was to ascribe the defects of the commune experiment to low-level cadres who were "dizzy with success" and, more ominously, to "alien class elements who have smuggled themselves into the leadership of the communes," The occupational hazard of the cadrecapegoat for mistakes of the party's leadership was once more clearly revealed.
Another device was tho attempt to demonstrateall along had charted the correct course despiteof "rightist conservatives" on the one"leftist" adventurists on the other.* In orderthis position, lt was necessary to resortfalsification of the record. Despite thishowever, (and bearing out the, chargeat Wuhan that "the commune movementconcepts and the commandsewrecisely Chairman Mao and the group of hisTeng Hsiao-ping, Tan
who had assuxnedpersonal lead-
ership of the commune movement8 in apurporting to lead to an early Communist society in China.
spring, servative" strain defects in the
Mao himself played an active role in this trans-effort at f
party
that self
Mao again alludedossible "con-in his thinking in enumerating various .immune and "exeat leap forward" oro
it is likely
Mao felt constrained at this time to associate hlm-with those elements within the party and government {administrators, economic specialists and military figures) who had appeared to question the feasibility of thesefrom the outset,
*Both ot these tactics would be revived and elaborated at the Ninth Plenum of the Central Committee in1 when the party leadership would be forced once again togreat retreat.
XROLLED DwSEM
Apparently acting on the assumption that Peiping had "ceded" on the communes, Moscow responded with aincrease in both military and economicfollowing the Wuhan conference. Thereharp jump in both the quality and quantity of military goods shipped to China, including^or the_first timend.
equally impressive, with the publication in9ew Soviet agreement to providedditionalplants to Communist China and the subsequentof anercent jump in the delivery of "complete sets of equipment"9 under the Soviet aid program.
A significant feature of this period of general retreat in domestic policy accompanied by increased Soviet economic and military assistance was the return to prominence of moderate elements within the Chinese Communist leadership who presumably favored closer Sino-Soviet economic and military cooperation. Of firstwas the re-emergence of Premier Chou En-lairincipal spokesman for the Chinese Communist regime, entrusted withonciliatory speech at the Soviet party congress in February (where he said that the Soviet example of "building socialism and Communism" hadCommunists everywhere "who see in the Soviet Union's today theirith concluding the new Soviet economic aid agreement in Moscow; and with redefining the "great leap forward" in more modest terms at the April session of China's National People's Congres^(where he made the distinctly un-"leap forward" like statement that
there night be decreases in productioniven year, especially in agriculture). Next was the return to relative prominence of Chen Yun (the party's senior economic specialist) to assumo an important role inthe "great leap forward" fiasco in the iron and steel and construction industries and to publish ato the Soviet program for building Communism. Next was the reappearance of the self-confessed "conservative" Teng Tzu-hul as the party's spokesman on rural policy, citing numerous failures in the extremist agricultural programs8 and deriding the 'foolish ideas" of those who had wanted to move rapidly from socialism to Communism Finally, there is evidence that Minister of National Defense Peng Te-huai and his adherents within the People's Liberation Army were advocating greater moderation in domestic policy and conciliation at this time.
Of particular interest during this period of general retreat was the fact that Chairman Mao appeared to shift ground to place himself at the head of this more conservative consensus within the party. Presidingeries of high-level party meetings extending from February through April, Mao is known to haveumber of specific measures designed to remedy theof the commune and "great leap forward" programs and to have advocated more practical and "realistic" work methods in implementing these
sanctionedundamental retreat in tne commune(Including decentralization of controls to thebrigade; return of "private plots" and production tools to the peasants; scrapping of commune Industry; recognition of material incentives; and voluntaryin the commune messhalls) tbat by mid-summer Communist China's vaunted people's commune appeared to exist in name only. Additional evidence of Chairmanisenchantment was his admission in May that "theway out for agriculture lies in mechanization"
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and not, by implication, in the "militarized production" system of the original commune.
Most striking of allircular letter sent by Mao in9 to party committees at all levelsdown to the village. Although marked bythis letter conceded that production targets under the "great leap forward" had been highly admitted that there had been "excesses" in theof the commune program, and in effectto basic-level rural cadres for having beenby their superiors to "the curses and complaints" of the peasants JB With this background in mind, ensuing developments in the summer culminating in the Peng Te-huai affair become somewhat more intelligible.
3. The Peng Te-huai Affair
The first of these developments*was the Soviet decision to turn from the carrot to the stick in its continuing efforts to influence Chinese Communist policy deliberations. Perhaps alerted by Peng Te-huai (who traveled to the Soviet Union in late April) to the existence of policy differences within tbe Chinesethe Sovietseries of broadcasts to China from mid-May to mid-June underlining the vital nature of Soviet aid to,Communist China's economic development. Following this implicit threat, Peng Te-huai returned to Peiping onuneix weeks tour of the USSR and Eastern Europe, possiblyarning of Soviet sanctions if the Chinese did not make further, more explicit retreats in their "great leap
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forward" and commune programs. This was followed in short order by the sudden Soviet cancellation onune of its7 agreement to assist the Chinesein the development of advanced weapons.* As the final instance of renewed Soviet pressures, Khrushchevhinly-veiled public attack in July on China's communes, including the charge that its sponsorsoor understanding of what Communism is and how it Is to be built."
Coincident with these pressures, there were clear signs of uncertainty within the Chinese Communiston how to cope with China's mounting economic crisis: whether to persist with the "great leap forward" and commune programs or retreat even further to more orthodox policies in the hope of greater (or at least undiminished) Soviet assistanc
jommunist request for large-*cale economic aid in June, perhaps seeking clarification of Khrushchev's Twenty-First Party Congress pledge in February to help thebloc countries catch up with the advancedmore or less simultaneous transition to
Another sign of policy vacillation was thein early June by the influential provincial party
*nnat appears to have precipitated Soviet cancellation of this agreementhinese demand that Moscow stop procrastinating and hand over, in accordance with theof this agreement, ample of an atomic bomb and technical data concerning its manufacture."
likelihood ofequest is strengthenedthe fact that it would have followed closely onoffer in May of substantial support forFive
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fore ig.
, .ed dissem
g/sis^^Itrollh
secretary Tao Chu that the-test of "greatness" in(which in the context could only refer to Mao) was the ability "to change original policy and discard the original formula" once the objective situation had changed. Still anotherpeech in which the Director of the State statistical Bureau Hsueh Mu-chiao (soon to be purged) consistently used the expression "agricultural producer cooperatives or people'spparently reflecting Soviet efforts to downgrade the status of the commune organization to that of itsfarm. The final Indication of flux and of an on-going Sino-Soviet dialogue was Chou En-lai's assertion onune of the need to learn not only "from the Soviet Union"tock formulation) but also 'from Soviet (almost unprecedented).
It was at this Juncture of events that the central committee convened at Lushan for the most dramatic and momentous meeting of the Chinese Communist leadership since the founding of the CPR. At Lushan, Soviet and domestic opposition to Mao's leadership and policiesin the person of China's Minister of National Defense Peng Te-huai. In retrospect, it appears that this plenumecisive turning point,atershed in the history of Communist China's domestic policy and of Sino-Soviet relations.
_Aljjiough__there is much we still do not know about
theeng
and Mao Tse-tung atn propositions
can be advanced with some (although varying degrees of)
confidence:
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hat Pengemorandum at the first session of the party conference in July attacking the "greai. leap forward" and communes and urging "an about face;"
Peng had communicated (probablysimilar viewsetter to tbe Communist Party
of the Soviet Union;
that these views coincided with those ofwho may very well have encouraged him in this endeavor during his visit to the Soviet Union;
that although Peng centered his fire onissues, the real issue between Peng and Mao was moreispute over military policy and the advisability of making concessions in order to ensure continued Soviet military, technological and economic assistance;
that the Soviet asking price for continued assistance probably included abandonment of the "great leap forward" and communes in fact, if not in name, and acceptanceoint defense system in the Far East featuring Soviet control over nuclear weapons and their delivery systems in China;
that Peng won support in varying degreesumber of members of the central committee, including
fellow-politburo member 'lien Yun and possiblyimited extent even Premier Chou En-lal; and
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Mao then rallied his supporters,and won the day at tbe second Lushan sessionresulting in the punishment of Peng and hissupporters as membersrighti-party group."
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Chinese charges extending-from the fall0 to the fall1 accusing Khrushchev of "expressingsupport for anti-party elements within thehe assertion published in the Chinese Communist party organ Red Flag in1 that 'inrevisionists inside the country rose in response to international revisionism and launched their frenzied attack against the leadership of the party."
ollowlng so soon after Soviet cancellation of the advanced weapons aid agreement, it is plausible to assume that Peng recruited support on the basisledge to reinstate this agreement once Soviet conditions were met. This hypothesis is supported, moreover,recent report that Peng
The evidence for assessing the amount of support Peng was able to muster at Lushan deserves more extended discussion. First, Peng appears to have receivedsupport from other senior military figures of the regime, including Chief of Staff Huang Ko-cheng irector of the General Logistics Department Hung Hsueh-chih (alsoirector of the General Train:
olitical Department Tan Cheng
alf dozen lesser military leaders who have been out of the news Next, there appears to_be little questionlM^BHHHHmmmmT that porters also including Chang Wen-tien (alternatemember susbsequently dismissed as Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs) and Chou Hsiao-chou who would lose his post as first secretary of the Hunan provincial party committee.
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no rOREietf disJemJoItrolled
Among the top level party leaders whose positions at Lushan are less certain, the case of Chen Yun (vice-chairman of the polltburo and senior economic is of special interest. Although allowed to retain his oarty and
_ JClusion
that Chen has been "silently" purged is the fact that since that time he has neither made speeches nor written articles, has appeared publicly only rarely on ceremonial occasions, and has not been seen at all for the past two years.
retrospect, it appears that this victory of the "party-machine" or "native radical" group at Lushanecisive turning point ln the development ofChina's domestic and foreign policy, especially in the development of Sino-Soviet relations. Reacting to Soviet sanctions (in the sudden cancellation of the advanced weapons aid agreement) and to Soviet subversion (in Khrushchev's intrigue with Peng Te-hual), the dominant leaders apparently decided at Lushan tothe military and economic assets of the Soviet alliance to larger political and ideological ends. This was indicated first of all by the assertioo (both then and later) that "right opportunism" (Peng Te-hunl's heresy) was the same as "modern revisionism" (Khrushchev's
T A
ontroll
-
dissf/b,
heresy) and, conversely, that the "ideology of Mao Tse-tuDg" was the "true" Marxism-Leninism of the contemporary era. This was also indicated by Teng Hsiao-ping who,pecial article written for Pravdaectured the Soviets on the evils of "great nationand implied that China would "go it alone" Ifsjj
Another consequence of the Lushan plenum was to seriously weaken the influence of-more moderate elements within the CCP. Whereas these elements in the spring had publicly criticized, even ridiculed, the excesses of the "great leap forward" and commune programs, they were now served notice that criticism of party policies would no longer be tolerated, indeed, Premier Chou En-lai appeared to be addressing these moderates (in hisugust "Report on9 Economichen he warned: "Aren't you afraid of being thrown across the border line /To Join7 the bourgeois rightists?" Although there would continue to be significant policy differences among the Chinese Communist leadership, the limits of tolerable dissent would be sharply circumscribed after the Lushan plenum.
An immediate result of the victory of the "party machine" group at Lushan was revival of the "great leap forward" and commune programs of economic and social development, accompanied by revival and intensificationcult of personality" for Mao Tse-tung rivaling that under Stalin. It is to an examination of this period of "continuous great leap forward" that we now turn.
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IV. THE CONTINUOUS "GREAT LEAP FORWARD" AND PROLONGED RETREAT
Our leap forwardew thingin our country that fits inwith socialist economict can be stated positively that our economy will continue to grow year by year and that we can maintain the speed of the leap forward in its development.
Shao-chi, "The Victory of Marxism-Leninism ined9
The Chinese Communist authdrities admitted that the leap forward hadretty ghastlyoth Chou En-lal and Chen Yi said that those who earlier believedthat China couldodern industrialn fromoears had been proved completely wrong,
of Malcom MacDonald (Following trip to Communist China in
As the latest cycle of advance and retreat inChina's domestic development program, the roughly three-year period extending from the fall9 topened with the defiant predictioncontinuous leap forward throughout the whole decade of the sixties" and closed with the unprecedented admission that theCommunist party's central committee had "lost its way" in the charting of economic policy. The decisive turning-point was, of course, the summer0 when the combined effects of successive bad harvests and Soviet
withdrawal of technicians caused the "great leap forward'1 to collapse. Instead of the promised continuous "leaphe experience of the Chinese people so far throughouts has been one of continuous crisis.
One of the most interestingeview of this period is t'hat the Chineseleadership^ having identified and admitted aof mistakes in the implementation of their "great leap forward" and commune programs then proceeded almost willfully and systematically to repeat the same mistakes. The best explanation for thisperformance is that apparently it was rootiviated in large part by political considerations, principally the need to uphold the prestige of Chairman Mao and the party leadership against internal and increasingly vocal external (Soviet) attack.
Three geoeral observations concerning the ensuing two year period of enforced retreat deserve mention at this point: hat the initial effect of Sovietand threatened economic collapse <vas to unify the top Chinese Communist leadership in the formulation and implementation of urgent corrective measures; hat this unity and determination to undertake necessaryapparently broke lownispute over policyin the springhat at no time was any fault ascribed to the guiding principles ofhe "great leap forward" and the people'sor to the leadership of the party center orMao, but rather to the mistakes of interpretation and execution of these programs committed by lower level party officials and cadres.
The Continuous and Uninterrupted "Great Leap "Forward"UJ
fs long as we diligently study Marx-ism-Leninism and the teachings of Mao Tse-tung, we will be able tonuous and uninterrupted great leap
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forward in our national economy.
Fu-chun, "On the Great Leap Forward in Socialisted0
Comrade Maoas developed the basic principles governing the high speed development of socialist construction.
Hsing, "Study Comrade Mao Tse-tung's Thoughts Concerning the High Speedofelplng People's Daily,0
1. The Cult of Mao Tse-tung
j
v.'hen Mao Tse-tung appeared in public for the first time following the combined Soviet-Peng Te-huai challenge at Lushan, theeptember issue of People's Dailyln an unusual formulation that he received "aovation of five minutes" from the delegates assembledilitary sports festival. Shortly thereafter, the new Minister of National Defense Lin Plao issued andeclaration of allegiance when he pledged "the unconditional loyalty he People's Liberation Army to the party and Comrade Mao." At the same time,igh-level party spokesman acclaimed Chairman Mao, again in unprecedented terms, as "the most outstanding contemporary revolutionary, statesman and theoretician of Marxism-Lenin-ism." The stage was set for tbe revival and elevation to new heights of the "cult of Mao Tse-tung."
The importance of this recurring phenomenon in Chinese Communist political life (it has appeared again recently) warrants further discussion. The purposes of the nation-wide campaign ln glorification of Mao Tse-tung
ere apparently three-fold: o repair_
Mao's self-esteem which must have been badly scarred
at Lushan; o generate
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popular support of the regime through the charisma of itserhaps most important, to substitute "the ideology of Mao Tse-tung" for the falseof Khrushchev as the true expression of contemporary Marxism-Leninism.
Following four public (if indirect) attacks by Khrushchev on China's foreign and domestic policies in the fall9 (including charges ofnd mistakes inhe claims for Mao's ideological pre-eminence in the international Communist movementprogressively shriller and more explicit. Toew, the following tributes appearederies of articles by provincial first secretaries in the spring The ideology of Mao Tse-tung is Marxism-Leninism of the new historical stage, the stage of socialist revolution and socialistThe only correct way to study Marxism is to use Mao Tse-tung's ideology as guidance andung's works as thehe yardstick to judge whetherenuine Marxist is his comprehension of Mao Tse-tung'sThe general line ofconstruction, the great leap forward and the people's communes are great products of the ideology of Chairman Maore important contributions to Marxism-Leninism."
Of particular interest were the new claims advanced at this time5 February People's Daily article)
graphic illustration of this is to be found ln the following messageational workers conference to Chairman Mao in r and respectedMao: You are toright sun. You give us zealright future. Youuide to victory. With you we can go ahead at fullhenever we think of you, our confidence rises and we are full of vigor,it possible for us to overcome all difficulties and achieve anything. Row happy and proud we are to live ln this great Mao Tse-tung era."
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for Mao's creative development of the Marxist-Leninist theory of socialist construction. For the first time, the Chinese leader was credited with discovering aof principles underlying the "high-speed expansion of socialistspecially his "discovery" that the humanubjective initiative")the material factor in the production process and that political indoctrination was more important than material incentives in increasing production. he placing of 'politics in command' is first, while material incentives can onlyecondary position.") As is now well known, this domestic campaign depicting Mao Tse-tung as the rightful successor to Marx and Lenin was transformedirect challenge to Soviet ideological and political leadership of the international Communist movement with the publication of the Lenin Anniversary pronouncements on the building of Communism and world Communist strategy in
Almost lost in this adulation of Mao's genius was the fact that he had called for what appeared toignificant shift in Communist China's economicpolicy at the Lushan party plenum in August t was at this time, according to subsequent reports, that "Comrade Mao Tse-tung fully summed up the entireof our economic work99 and put forward the more specific policy of developing the national economy on the foundation of agriculture." It was also at this time that Mao proposed the establishmentinistry of Agricultural Machineryirst step inhis pronouncements (the previous May) that "the fundamental way out for agriculture lies lnand that "countinge shouldmall-scale solution in fouredium scale solution in seven years,arge-scale solution in. ten years." Since these are major elements in Communist China's current economic development program (the time-span for achieving mechanization has been extended fromears tooears), it is of some importance to discuss the origins and implications of this apparent policy change in the fall
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Of firsthis new policy appeared tolear admission that the labor-intensive "militarized production" approach of the people's commune had failed to solve Communist China's agricultural problem. it was necessary to suppress this admission in the first months following Lushan when thewas engagedurious defense of the commune It was not till late October that Chu Tehear earlier had signaled the initial retreat in China's commune and "great leap forward" programs) revealedational workers conference thatountry like China whichuge populationast land area, agriculture is the basis for developing the national economy" and Li Fu-chun (the regime's top economiccalled for arranging0 national economic plan "in the order of agriculture, light industry and heavy industry." It was also Li Fu-chun who (in the springnnounced the authoritative version of the new policy guideline which persists to the presentis the foundation and industry thefactor of the national economy."*
The Immediate effect of Mao Tse-tung's new policy directive was to arouse confusion in the minds of party officials entrusted with explaining its significance to the rank and file. If it appeared to have any it was,umber of provincial newspapersin the springhat now "agriculture should be put in the position of first importance" in China's development policy. On the other hand, as all the authoritative expositions were quick to point out.
*lt is interesting to note that the Chinese Communists derived this formulation from an obscure passageork by Stalin writtenS and then proceeded,to hail itnew theory" of Mao Tse-tung "conspicuous by its absence in the For this amusing exercise in sophistry, see the article by Teng To entitledIs the Foundation for the Development of China's National Economy" in New
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The basic cause of confusion, of course, was that this new policy orientation was more apparent than real. Instead ofajor shift in resourcetoward agricultural development, it was more aof aspiration reflecting Mao's conclusion (originally revealed innd revived in the springhat the long-term solution to China's agriculturallay in mechanization. The short-term solution, as9 People's Daily eaitorial emphasized, was to revive "all methods of leadership proven effective in the course of8 great leapethods designed to "activate the enthusiasm of the broad masses for labor."
2. Revival of the "Great Leap Forward"
The first step in reviving the "leap forward"to economic development in the fall9 was toation-wide rectification campaign to purge the party of 'right opportunist" . conservative) thoughts, identified in the Lushan plenum communique as "the principal danger now facing the achievement of aleap forward this year." Once more the criterion of political loyalty and personal survival within the party was unquestioning acceptance of the new "leapgoals advanced for China's9 economic plan, especially the targets calling0 percentin steel andercent increases in grain and cotton production. Once dissident elements within the
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party had beenierce "socialist education" campaign was then unleashed to goad the masses to greater production efforts in order to fulfill these ambitious goals.
The next step was once again the subordination of statistics to politicalevelopment revealed with surprising candor by the newly-appointed Director of the State Statistical Bureau In November when he asserted that statistics must reflect and eulogize the great victory of the party's general line of socialist construction." In keeping with this apparentlypolicy of statistical falsification, the Chinese Communists shortly thereafter announced that, despite the worst natural calamities in several decades, grain produc tion9 hadillion tons, exactlythe "leap forward" goal0 percent increase predicted at Lushan.*
The third step was revival of the "short-cut" strategy to agricultural abundance, mechanization and industrialization whivi had beenrominentof the "great leap forward" Facedontinued critical scarcity of arable land, machinery and chemical fertilizer, it was necessary to revive Mao's "eight point charter" of intonsive land cultivation in order to sustain the "leap forward" in agricultural For example,0 cotton production plan was to be realized by converting someercent of total cotton acreage into "high yield" tractsore than average cotton fields, the higher yields to be achieved through such technical innovations as deep plowing and through the application of more water and fertilizer. To prepare for this upsurge in agricultural
*-Ac"t'ual grain production that year, as Chinese Communist
spokesmen have subsequently admitted, was on the orderillion tons orercent less than the amount claimed.
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production, the peasants were once again mobilizedassive scale to undertake water conservancy construction and fertilizer accumulation in the winter By December, this huge labor army totaledillion, with party cadres directed to pay "primary attention toand ideological work" in stimulating peasant work enthusiasm. Still another indication of "leaping progress" in agricultural development at this timeecret report (approved by the party central committee)ational agricultural science research work conference which hailed the "extraordinary results" achieved in the cross-fertilization of crop species. paddy rice with corn) and the cross-breeding of livestock species. cows with pigs, cows with sheep and sheep with pigs)!
The new "short-cut" strategy in the related field of agricultural modernization was exemplified in two ways. First was the launchingassive hog-raising campaign under the.personal direction of Chairman Mao, with the rural communes directed to5 percent Increase in the single year Although numerous benefits were expected to accrue from this new mass campaign, the principal objective was to compensate for the meager supply of chemical fertilizer. As Li Fu-chun put it inach hog was to be regarded asmall organic fertilizer factory."
Next was the unfoldingass technicaland technical revolution movement designed to speed up the mechanization of agriculture. In keeping with the slogan "walking on two legs" (paying equal attention to modern and "native" methods in design andbe crowning achievement of this campaign wasice-transplanting machine which could beby commune industrial units employing "native" iron and steel. Although the0 People's Dally editorial announcedillion of these would be produced and put into operation onercent of China's paddy rice fieldshis wondrous invention was merely the latesteries of ill-fated experiments (the most, notable being the towing-cable machine which had appeared in searchshort-cut" tomechanization.
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As in agricultural production and modernization, it was necessary to revive the slogan of "walking on two legs" in order to sustain the continued "leapln industry. After the disastrous "backyard" Iron and steel production campaign the Chinese Communists claimed to have transformed thousands of these primitive native installations into "small modernaccounting for one-half and one-third of the respective national totals of pig iron and9 and for even larger proportions ln0 plan. However, an Indian iron and steel technicalvisiting China ln9 concluded that theof these newly-modernized blast furnaces and steel converts was only slightly better than that of their "native" predecessors. This conclusion is reinforced by the strange tale of the "Ultra-Sonics Campaign" ssmwssml
was
aunched in the latter half9esperation measure to improve the quality of steel produced in these smelters.* It is also reinforced by the admissionhinese Communist official in2 that nearly one-third of theillion tons of steel production claimed0 was of "inferior". unusable) quality.
3. Revival of the People's Commune
Equally striking evidence of the purblindness of the Chineae Communist leadership was the decision toa number of the features and goals of the original commune program. Having conceded in the Lushan plenum resolution that the communes had suffered from "over-centralization, equalitarianism andhe
*This nation-wide drive to equip small steelwith ultra-sonic whistles would be singled out by Chou En-lal in2 as oneumber of blunders committed during the "great leap forward" period.
Peiping regime then proceeded to promote these samein the winter and spring. It isto note, moreover, that certain of the methods employed to reactivate the communes at this time havereappeared in Communist China's rural development program.
The most important method was the launching of successive, violent political-ideological campaignsto restore commune collective controls in thewhich had been seriously eroded in the first half These campaigns (rectification, ew "three anti's" drive against corruption, waste and bureaucratism) were merged by central committee directive in the spring0oncerted drive to purge the party's basic level organizations of "bad elements" guilty of "serious errors" in implement ins the commune program.
Once these "rightist
opportunists" and other bad elements had been removed from the party's rural leadership, the way was clear toumber of the original features of the commune system.
Firstation-wide drive to restore thomesshalls and thus control the distribution andof foodstuffs in the countryside.* Even more objectionable to the peasants was the related decision once again to coerce individual commune members intotheir "privatehis time turning them over to the messhalls for the cultivation of vegetables and other supplementary foodstuffs. In still another
EM
*In some provinces, as many asercent of these had collapsed in the spring
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measure to ensure adequate food for the messhalls,production brigades were directed in the spring0 to assume centralized control over the stockpiling and distribution of grain supplies which the lower-level production teams in many cases had been "concealing for secret distribution" to their members.
The movement toward greater centralization extended into the upper levels of the commune structure as well. It was Li Ching-chuan (polltburo member and presently first secretary of the Southwest China regional party bureau) who revealed69 Red Flagthat the regime still adhered to thecalling for all-people. state) ownership over all the. means of production and output of the communeseriod of three to six years. The first step in this process was to assist the poorer production brigades "to catch up" within individual communes by, among other things, allocating to them funds andcontributed by the better-off production brigades. It was at this point that the phenomenon of "equalitar-ianism" or "leveling" once more became wide-spread,the complaints (reportedumber of provincial papers in the springhat the "advanced areisadvantage" and that many production brigadeswere "deliberately understating output."
The final example of Chinese Communist resolve to revive the original commune program was Li Fu-chun'sin0 that "now all the cities are setting up people's communesig way." It is still almost incomprehensible that the Chinese Communistshould have attempted to restore the urban commune which had proved so impractical and unpopular in the initial period of experimentation in the falls with the original decision, it appears that ideological and political considerations once again were primein this short-lived effort to revive Communist China's urban commune program in the spring
4. The Chinese Challenge
With the publication of the polemical Leninpronouncements inhe ChineseIssued an unmistakable challenge to Sovietand political leadership of the international Communist movement. Since this was- to lead directly to the withdrawal of Soviet technicians, with disastrous consequences for Communist China's domestic development program, it is important to discuss briefly thesurrounding this momentous decision.
As an initial observation, it appears thatChinese explanations of the origins of the Lenin Anniversary articles are substantially-correct. to these explanations (appearing for example in3 Chinese party statement entitled "The Origin and Development of the Differences Between the Leadership of the CPSU and Ourselves"), it was Khrushchev's initiationeries of "virulent attacks on theand foreign policies of the CCP" in the fallhus "bringing tbe differences between China and the Soviet Union into the open before the wholehich prompted the Chinese to speak out "in defense of Marx ism-Len inism."
The immediate cause appears to have beenerformancearsaw Pact conference in0 when the Soviet leader charged Peiping with "adventurism" in both foreign and domestic policy and,upremereferred (indirectly but unmistakably) to Mao Tse-tung as "an old and insensitive man who,air of worn slippers, should be thrownorner."
;he Lenin Anniversary articles discussed at some length the motives (hostile) and consequences (minor) of the "anti-Chinese campaigns" incited by the imperialists, reactionaries, and, by implication, modern revisionists.
More speculatively", there is reason to believe that the moderate grouping within the Chinese Communistcontinued at this time to advocate restraint In the face of these "anti-Chinese" campaigns. It isthat this was one of the "scores ofs3 Chinese statement subsequently admitted,
when "confrontederrors of the CPSU leadership..
our partyconsidered: What should we do?" Although nothing Is known of the secret party deliberations at this juncture, Premier Chou En-lal (as the principal figure in this moderate grouping) had continued in publicthroughout preceding months to place greater emphasis than his colleagues on the value of Soviet experience and aid. Andpeech just weeks before tbe Lenindeclaration, the influential South China regional party leader Tao Chu had called both for "strengthening mutual assistance and cooperation" with the Soviet Unionrerequisite for accelerating China's economicand for "making our utterances and actionsto International solidarity."
Finally, there is reason to believe that tbeleaders of the CCP did not in fact foresee the full consequences of their challenge to tbe Soviet leadership. By characterizing their April declaration ofprinciples asolicy of both unity andhey appeared to believe that thoy could retain theof "unity" with, and at the same time carry out "struggle" against, the Soviet Union. It was thisview (no doubt another expression of Chairman Mao's dialectical approach to major policy problems) which Edgar Snow, reporting on his conversations with topleaders in the fallould describe asa degree of naivete" in Communist China's conduct of relations with the Soviet Union. More to the point. Snow also reported that the Chinese Communists were "hurt and surprised" by the Soviet withdrawal of technicians in the summer And, as additional evidence, the CCP letter0 (replying to the CPSU notice of withdrawal) expressed "astonishment" over the Soviet decision, protested that it would "create difficulties and harm socialistnd requested
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As is now well known, the last act in the series of events leading up to Soviet withdrawal was played out at the Bucharest Conference ln June. It was here that the Sovietsong letter denouncing theand threatening to reduce aid unless the CCP backed down. It was also here that Khrushchev attacked Mao for being as vain and isolated fron reality as Stalin bad been. When the Chinese responded in kind, ersonal attack on Khrushchev as having "betrayed"the moment of truth had arrived, with the mass exodus of Soviot technicians in August, the Chinese Communists were left to cope unaided withdifficult economic problems suddenly grown much larger.
B. The Prolonged and Painful Retreat0
It should not be held that we have completely understood the objective laws governing the cause of building socialism in ourhere are still many objective laws governing work in many fields that are not understood or not fully understood by some of our comrades.
"'March Forward Under the Great Banner of the Generaled1
Chou En-lai blamed the plight of China's economy on cadrearticularly the false reporting of achievements to higher authorities.esult the central committee had 'lost itsnd made grave errors-in regard to agriculture and light industry.
reportpeech by Premier
Chou En-lai in May or2
The combined effect of successive bad harvests and the Soviet decision to withdraw technicians in the summer0 dealt Communist China's "great leap forward"of economichattering blow. Confronted with the threat of economic and political collapse, the Peiplng regime respondederies of urgentmoasures in the winternd then,and painfully, with even more drastic remedieseriod of further retreat extending fromo The record of this two year period ofand painful retreat is of fundamental importance ln assessing the extent to which Mao Tse-tung and his lieutenants have learned the lessons of failure of their "leappproach to economic development.
As might be expected, there appeared to becontroversy throughout this period over the proper response to Soviet economic pressures. Alternatingdefiance and at least tactical accommodation, the varying character of this response appeared to reflect fluctuating assessments of the gravity of China'scrisis. Moreover, the initial leadership unityby the threat to national survival throughout this period appeared to break downispute over policy issues in the winterthus tending to confirm the recent Soviet allegation that "someCommunist leaders" had "desperately resisted" the prolonged retreat in Communist China's domestict is to an examination of this highly significant period, the backdrop to current domestic development programs, that we now turn.
1. The Initial Retreat
We ought to expect more political troubles and incidentsspecially the first half, than In any previousWe must7 ensure that the armed forces do not get out of hand.
of National Defense Lin Plao,1
Although each of us does whatever he can, what is decisive for all of us is naturally the help we receive from the Soviet Union.
by Vice Premiero Hungarian newsmen,1
a. Defiant Optimism
As noted above, the immediate Chinese Communist response to the Soviet notice of withdrawal ofwas to request "reconsideration." Apparentlya negative reply, this was followed by thein theugust issue of People's Daily of an editorial breathing defiance against those who "call us fools who do not know our limitations" and deriding those who would "have us merely stretch out our hands forhis note of righteous indignation and intransigence would dominate policy discussion throughout the falluring which time the Chinese would engage inpolemics with the Soviet leadership in Moscow and take the first steps in coping with the economic crisis at home.
"Keeping in mind the caveat that he may well havehis remarks to be transmitted to United States it is still noteworthy tbat Chou En-lai isreported to have told Edgar Snow as late as0 that the Chinese Communists foresaw no changesin their military alliance with the Soviets and that far from allowing it to decrease, the Chineseintended to strengthen- it wherever possible. Then, tatement which contrasts sharply with that of the editorial noted above, Chou added: "This is one area in which we are fully prepared to make anythat are asked of us and where we would be fully prepared to beg for assistance If that were to be required of us."
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The first authoritative statement of party policy reflecting these new developments was an article by Li Fu-chun in theugust issue of Red Flag. Afterattacking the "modern revisionists". thefor "attempting to isolate us and undermine our great cause of socialisti revealed Pei-ping's decision to "rely primarily on our own efforts" and only "secondarily seek the greatest possible help from abroad."* Li alsoumber of specific measures for implementing this newly proclaimed policyself-reliance, including the reallocation of manpower to concentrate on agricultural production, the cutting back of investment, the strengthening of centralizedover the economy,ew rectification campaign designed to impress on all party cadres the absolute necessity of "seeking truth in facts." After admitting that "we haveertain extent acted blindly in our practicali concluded this major policy statement with the defiant assertion that "we will and can bringontinuous leap forward in our national economy."
it
Bearing out the /iew that the Chinese Communists were concerned but not overly apprehensive about their economic prospects in the fall0 was the lengthy interview granted to Edgar Snow by Mao Tse-tung in October. Even allowingigh propaganda content in this off-the-record interview, lt is clear that Mao at this stage was still firmly convinced of the correctness of his economic policies. Although admitting the existenceood shortage (but not starvation) and deploring the consequences of "unbalanced effort or hasty decisions"ountryillion people, Mao reaffirmed his conviction that "the Chinese people were China's great-est resource since they were available for transforming the country without capital outlay." (Underlining Tl keeping with this simplistic view (which might
*Thisan oddly defensive ring, as if anticipating charges that the dominant leaders of the CCP had underestimated the value of Soviet assistance.
be characterized as the central tenet of Communist China' "leap forward" approach to economicnow noted with amusement that the Chinese leader then"to discuss China's internal economic, industrial and agricultural problems very much in the same way he once expounded his concepts of guerrilla warfare."
In other developments throughout October and early November, Communist China's leadership displayed growing concern but unshaken confidence in their ability totheir new economic difficulties. In celebrating National Dayctober, tbe regimecontinued leap forward" in industrygreat victory innaturalwhich were however the "most serious since the founding ofl Addressingto the mounting food shortage, the regime reduced the already inadequate level of grain rations by aboutercent; halted all non-essential work programs to conserve human energies; and assigned increased priority to agriculture for manpower and materials. Mostof all was the decisionigh-level partyin October toundamental retreat in China's rural commune pro*
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No bint of this policy retreat was revealed, of course, ln the polemical exchanges between the Chinese and Soviet party delegations to the October preparatory meeting and November international Communist conference in Moscow. osition of intransigence in these exchanges <which have been fully reportedhe Chinese Communist representatives not only defended their commune and "great leap forward" programs' but also charged (in talks with other partyhat Sovietto provide adequate economic assistance had compelled China to adopt certain features of these programs. the experiment with small-scale iron and steel.
Defiance was also the keynoteurprisingly candid Interview given to Japanese newsmen by Vice Premiernovember in Peiping. Noting that be spoke on behalf of the party central committee, Chen stressed that the Chinese brand of Communism was equally as valid as Soviet communism; denigrated the value of Soviet aid
to China's industrialization; depicted China's policy of self-reliance in economic development as essential for political independence; and portrayed China's distinctive commune and industrialization programs (with someas generally applicable to other underdeveloped countries. Of particular interest was Chen's prediction that,ear of readjustment to cope with natural calamities and other difficulties, Communist China would resume its "leap forward" in economic development
b. Dissidence and Disorder
Following this optimistic assessment, Peiping's view of its domestic problems suddenly changed to one of alarm. Although indications of this alarm began toin published discussions at this time (particularly the communique issued after the Ninth Plenum of thecommittee in mid-Jam
The basic cause for alarm was the sudden outbreak of large-scale dissidence in several calamity-stricken provinces In October andarticularly in Honan and Shantung. The popular uprisings in Honan were especially serious, engulfing the entire province and far surpassing the ability of loyal militia units to maintain order. Indeed, many of the militia units Joined in the revolt, paralyzing local administration andout "counter-revolutionary" revenge by killing party officials.
raced with the possibility of additional, even more dangerous disturbances elsewhere, the Chinesehad ample cause for alarm over internal security
ia the countryhole! and particularly in tho armed forces which would have to suppress these dissidents. Reflecting this sense of alarm, Minister of National Defense Lin Piao warned in January that "we ought to expect more political troubles and incidentsspecially the first half, than in any previous year" and called for extraordinary measures "to ensure that the armed forces do not get out of hand."
tep further, the basic.cause of these popular uprisings was, of course, the severe shortage of food reaching famine proportions in the disaster areas of East and North China. Although Communist China's leaders indignantly denied tbe existence of famine, there is abundant evidence from diverse sources of widespread outbreaks of malnutrition diseases (particularly edema and hepatitis) andesulting sharp Jump in the mortality rate at this time. Confirming Chou En-lai's admission in February that "livingwere critlcal/VB
i^tore-
over, Mao Tse-tung himself would suggest (unwittingly.iscussion of Communist China's population problem with Field Marshal Montgomery the following October) that the total of these "unnatural deaths" exceeded five million.
When finally aware of the magnitude of tbeand economic crisis confronting them. Communist China leadership reacted promptlyeries of urgentmeasures. irst importance was to ensure the continued loyalty of the People's Liberation Army during this time of national emergency. This was accomplished
by immediately increasing array rations, giving preferential treatment to the families of servicemen, and instituting-an army-wide investigation of the causes and scope of discontent combined with an Intensive indoctrinationdesigned to assuage this discontent.
Next were emergency actions to cope with the acute food shortage which would reach its most critical point in the spring Internally, these includedall non-essential work programs; raising stateprices of grain byopercent; encouraging the cultivation of quick-growing catch crops on "private plots" wherever possible; exhausting national reserves of grain for emergency distribution; and mobilizing trained and student medical personnel to go to the countryside to treat the most serious malnutrition diseases. Externally, all food exports were halted and limited foreignholdings were depleted to rush some two million tons of food imports by May and June
c. Rationale for Failure
Together with the inauguration of these urgent relief measures, the Peiping regime was equally concerned withationale for the disastrous results of Communist China's "great leap forward" in economic According to time-honored practice, it was necessary to identify and to sacrifice upon the altar of Chairman Mao'sumber of the partywhose only crime was, perhaps, an excess of zeal in implementing policies emanating from Peiping. Sinceconfidence in party leadershiprime requisite for Communist China's current domestic development it is of some importance to understand Peiping's concerted effort in the wintero extricate Mao Tse-tung and the central committee from majorfor the "great leap forward" debacle.
Althoughajor share of responsibility to natural calamities (now described as the worstundredatural phenomena alone could not explain
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the collapse of both political and economic controls in the disaster areas of North and East China. Since party policies were by definition correct, it followed that these policies (in the language of the Ninth Plenumofad been "sabotaged" by "bad elements, that Is, landlord and bourgeois elements" among the party's rural cadres and that accordingly these "bad elements" would have to be
n-ct if ication campaign ammmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
this announcement signaled tbe startierce campaign of blood-letting in which many party cadres in disaster-stricken "rotten areas" weresacrificed as scapegoats, with the masses exhorted to direct their sense of vengeance against these "class enemies."
In less seriously affected areas, cadretook the less reprehensible form of errors and defects in the implementation of "correct" party Comprising tbe heart of Communist China'sfor mistakes in the "great leap forward" and commune programs, this general indictment of rural cadre work style in the rectification campaign ofurther discussion.
The first of these cadre errors, classified in typical Chinese fashion as the "five styles" or "fiveas that of exhibiting the "Communist style" of Thiseneral epithet applicable to
masses were directed his rectification campaign to distinguish between "bad persons doing bad things". class enemies) and "good persons doing mistaken things". the average rural cadre).
same "five styles" would be featured in ansecret speech by Chou En-lal inlaming the plight of China's economy on cadre shortcomings.
employed here, the term 'Communist style" was of course an Ironical expression.
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cadres at all levels who had sought to carry out the party's decision in the fall9 toumber of the features and goals of the original commune As noted in the preceding section of this paper, this attempted revival had produced the very same-phenomena of "over-centralization, equalitarianism and waste" which had characterized China's initialwith communes Clearly the responsibility for repeating these errors could not be ascribed to Mao and the party center.
In order to refute the wide-spread (and well-founded) belief that the "Communist style" had originated in the central committee, the Chinese Communistsew phase of the'rural rectification campaign inn study of the "Draft Sixty Regulations for Work in Rural People's Communes" (essentially anof the twelve-point directive of. Simply put, the strategy was to rewrite the history of the commune movement, suppressing party directivesperiods of rapid advance and stressing those issued luring the period of retreat ln the spring fH
the objective was to make rural cadres understand "that Comrade Mao Tse-tung early in the spring9 had already brought forth the basic spirit of the 'Draft Sixtyhat "the party central committee and Comrade Mao Tse-tung had all along made clear and correctnd that "the party central committee is not wrong, but rather the thinking of rural cadres is confused."
Next in the catalogue of serious cadre errors was the "empty boasting style." Whereas the "Communist style" was blamed for the excesses of the commune program, the "empty boasting style" was held largely responsible for the failure of the "great leap forward." The standard explanation, both then and later, was as follows: over-zealous local cadres had reported false achievements (especially exaggerated harvest figures) to highercausing them to draw up unrealistic plans and (in the more extreme formulation which would be advanced by Chou En-lai inausing the central committee "to lose Its way." To answer the charge that "the empty
boasting style was forced out fromural cadres were ordered to read Chairman Mao's circular party letter in9 in which the Chinese leader had conceded "exaggeration" in "great leap forward" productionalluded to "excesses" in the commune program, and in effect apologized to basic-level rural cadres for. having been subjected by their superiors to "the curses
and COmplaintS" Of the peaSantS.
f^Hmwamwsmwmsssicadre reaction (no doubt the intended one) to this letter was to shift the blame for failure in China's domestic development programs to middle-level. provincial level) officials who had distorted the correct policies of Mao and the party center.
The third of the "five styles" was "'blindof production" at the commune level. It was this defect which had undermined Chairman Mao's "eight point charter" featuring deep-plowing and close-planting as the means forechnological breakthrough in agricultural production.* The remedy of course was not abolition of the "eight point charter" butew spirit ofeeking truth fromew method oflexibly according to local conditions"). And with the enumeration of the 'special class style" (claiming favored status andand the "command style" (coercing thebe regime's bill of particulars charging basic level cadres with major responsibility for policy failures was complete.
The dimensions of Communist China's crisis in the winterere so great, however, that scapegoats in the upper echelon of the party were also required.
it was necessary
"It will be recalled that Mao, on the assumption thatreakthrough had actually been achieved, predicted8 that Communist China would double grain production not only8 but also
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to demonstrate that Chairman tee, once apprised ox the gr taken many timelv measures
Hao and the central commit-avitv of the situation, had
notable casualtieswangsi, and Tsingh In contrast with th tionaries in the co prisonment for the these have since re in the party's regi
most
were party iirst secretaries in the rovinces of Shantung, Honan, Kansu, ai, all of whom vere replacedunishment meted out to erring func-untryside (including execution or im-'badowever, most of appeared in good standing as officials onal bureaus.
One final category of scapegoats deserves ment ion, Pres umabl
y tnat tnese were the same "some comrades" criticized in1 People's Daily for "not..the objective laws governing the cause ofsocialism under the conditions of our country." the very vagueness of these references and the fact that no high-level officials meeting this description are known to have been purged suggest that these scapegoats were more fictitious than real, and may in fact have been inventedurther means of diverting responsibility for policy failures from the true culprits, Chairman Mao and the central committee.
According to the propaganda strategy outlined above, Communist China's domestic crisis in the winterad been caused both by deliberate "sabotage" and by unwitting distortion of "correct" party policies enunciated by Mao Tse-tuntr and the central committee in the spring
though the various explanations advanced. and defective understanding at lower levels; the vast size and diversity of China's land and population) were hardly convincing, they do suggest the motivationthe Chinese Communist leadership to reestablish regional bureaus of the central committee at this tioc.ml
Paradoxically, it appears that this decision to decentralize the party's apparatus was for the purpose of strengthening centralized party controls over theand economic life of the country. Clearly,was radically wrongolitical system which had failed to communicate advance warning of the national emergency which suddenly confronted the regime in tbe winter. Serving bothechanism formore accurate information from the provinces to the party center and for supervising the execution of party programs within the provinces, the regional bureaus are believed to play an especially important role in the implementation of economic policy. As Chairman Mao would subsequently admit to Field Marshal Montgomery,of economic authority had resulted in waste and inefficiency and lt had been necessary to reinstltute centralized controls over China's economy.
Tbe decision to establish regional bureaus would have important long-range consequences for the structure of power within the CCP. Of more immediate interest were
the indications in the fall0hift in the relative position of party leaders. First was theafter long absence of Chen Yun, the party's leading economic expert. As was the case in the winter, Chen's return to relative prominence served both toetreat in domestic policy andisplay of unity among the top leadership
f sii reason for these tributes (pos-
ing
they suggest that Communis? V ^
^ srss.-
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JNTROIfLED DlSSEM
In contrast with the glib explanation for past policy failures, the Chinese Communist leadership bad no ready solutions for the staggering economic problemsthe regime when the Ninth Plenum of the Eighth Central Committee convened in Rather than enunciating new policies, Chairman Mao at this plenum directed the entire party to carry on "vigorousand research work" throughout 'the ensuing year. Pending the "clarification of circumstances" and theof reliable data, It was possible only to reiterate continued emphasis on agricultural development (especially grain production) and take the first hesitant steps in "readjusting" the industrial sector of the economy badly crippled by the sudden withdrawal of Soviet assistance.
Indeed, enough data were already at hand tothat the road to economic recovery wouldong and painful one. are policy discussion during this period,o revealedebruary Red Flag article that, instead of the one-year period of readjustmentby Vice-Premierbe preceding November, the regime now estimated tbat "two to three years" of readjustment and consolidation were required before China's industry could "leap forward" once again. Other Red Flag articles at this time criticized the small-plant indus-trialization program (whichad defended two months earlier on both economic and political grounds) andthat over ten million urban workers and their dependents would be returned to rural areas to strengthen the agricultural front. In the course of privategranted at this time, Chou Eo-lai andariously admitted that "living conditions had becomehat no solution to China's food shortage was possiblehat heavy industry had been "largelynd that (in glaring contrast with thehat China wouldtrong industrial power in ten years) it would take thirty to fifty years for China to achieve industrialization.
esult of this new appreciation of the gravity of their domestic crisis, tlie Chinese Communist leadership apparently decided toolicy of at least tactical accommodation toward the Soviet Union following the Moscow conference of Communist parties in Indeed, in signing the Moscow declarationecember,edelegation subscribedumber of Soviet positions on the building of socialism and Communism, including the Soviet call for better coordination of bloc economies. As an inducement for theset is known that the Soviets offered at this tine toewand technical assistance agreement with Communist China.
During the ensuing trade and aid negotiationsthrough the Peiping regimeumber of additional conciliatory gestures. First was the acknowledgment in the Ninth Plenum resolution that the "great Communist Party of the Soviet Union"vanguard" position in the international Communist(this formulation had appeared in tbe Moscowan admission of superiority not repeated since. Next was the almost unprecedented appearance of Mao Tse-tung and the entire standing committee of the politburo at the Soviet embassy reception commemorating the Sino-Soviet treaty anniversary. Most striking of all was the new importance attached to .Soviet aid by Vice Premierarch interview with Hungarian newsmen. the preceding November he had publicly denigrated the value of Sovietake exception to the view that but for Soviet aid China's industrial construction would not have developed to the presenthen nowthat "although each of us does whatever he can, what is decisive for ail of us is naturally the help we receive irom the Soviet Cnxon." (Underlining supplied)
concession was Liu reference in Moscow to China's experiment for ourselves "
communes
3 deprecatory asind of
:Ct?ET
NO FORtJGif DlfsEM^CCN'TROLLED DlSSEM
As is now well known, the "help" which the Chinese had hoped to obtain in these negotiations was not 'sideinimal sugar loan of forty million dollars, Moscow provided neither grain to help Communist China overcome its critical food shortage nor credits to permit continued deliveries for China's industrialprogram. Shortly after the conclusion of this disappointing trade pact in oarly April, the Chinesebroke their four-month long silence with twowell calculated to arouse Soviet ire. First was the granting0 loan to Albaniaeward for its support in the Sino-Soviet dispute. The second was Mao Tse-tung's gleeful denunciation,the Bay of Pigs misadventure, of the "Kennedyas "worse, not better, than the Eisenhower administration." By invoking Mao's authority to attack Khrushchev's "peaceful coexistence" strategy, Peiping served notice once again that it would not submit to Soviet economic pressures. As it had begun the preceding August, Communist China's initial period of retreat in domestic policy ended inow of defiance.
2. Further Retreat
China's national existence will be threatened unless domestic conflicts are ironed out.
Tse-tung,attributed to Maohinese Communist defector)
The people in China might respond favorably to attack from hostile forces/In that eventuality7 the Chinesewould betho most critical problem imaginable.
NO FOREIGNoWrOLL'ED DlSSEM
Communist Embassy Briefing,
a. Redefinition and Reappraisal
In contrast with the triumphant celebration of its thirtiethecade earlier, the Chineseparty could find little to celebrat* on theof its fortieth anniversary While continuing to assert the "correctness" of pasttrictly derived from objectiveartycentering on Liu Shao-chi's key-note address had almost nothing to say about the future. Rather thannew domestic policy guidelines, Liuall for all party cadres to participateew campaign of study "to understand and grasp the objective laws of China's socialist construction." In tbe same way that responsibility for past errors had been pinned on tbe cadres, so were they now assigned responsibility forfrom objective reality inherent laws, not imaginary laws,uide to action."
are allusion to current policy, the Chinese chief of state revealed chat the much-vaunted people's commune (originally conceivedomprehensive economic, political, military and social unit) had been redefined as an organization "formed by agricultural cooperatives joining together." Even this more modest formulation, taken from the "Draft Sixty Regulations for Work in Rural People's Communes" approved by the central committee in March, would soon be outdated. For it was just at this time (July and August) that the rural commune almostdisintegrated, far exceeding the line of retreat envisaged in the spring. Following the collapse of the commune messhalls, the reappearance of supply andhandicraft and credit cooperatives signified tbat Communist China had reverted to the pre-commune pattern of institutions in the countryside. What is more, the retreat did not stop with the large-scale collective farm (averagingouseholds) which had immediatelythe commune, but extended all the way back to the small-scale collective farmouseholds) which had characterized the early stages of China'scooperative movement.
Together with the enforced retreat in rural policy, the regime began at this time toeries of drastic measures designed tohina's badly crippled industrial sector.*
It was also at this time that theew policy of conciliating China's much-maligned intellectual class, especially scientists and technicians
number of
measures increasing'the authority of managers andwere introduced into the modern industrial sector to improve production planning and operations. urther deterioration in Sino-Soviet relations, this new policy would culminate in2eries of speeches delivered by top-level party spokesmenChou En-lai and Chen I) to national conferences of scientists andin which the party
"Tnese measures were" codifiedSeventy Point
Directive for Industry" corresponding with the earlier
"Draft Sixty Regulations for Work in Rural People's."
/
would apologize for past treatment, pledge greaterbenefits and more intellectual freedom in the future, and issue patriotic appeals for the rapid development of an Indigenous Chinese scientific and technological
Although largely carried on behind tbe scenes, these further retreats were reflectederies ofgranted Western visitors by Chinese Communist leaders In the fall In October,dmitted to Sir Harold Caccia that grave errors had been committed in the economic field because China's planners andhad been ignored, errors which were now being Of much greater importanceengthygranted to Marshal Montgomery at this time by Mao Tse-tung. As the most recent account of Chairman Mao's views on China's domestic policy problems available to the West, this Interview deserves extended discussion.
First, with respect to Communist China'sproblem, Mao statedthat he would be succeeded by Liu Shao-chi. adding (in what appears toighly significant allusion to incipient factionalism within the Chinese Communist leadership) that "after Liu, 'they' could fight over the leadership." Next Maothat economic decentralization in thead produced waste andue toand bad organization on the lowernd that the government had reverted to centralized controls.
Finally, the Chinese leader indicated that the Peiping regime wasasic reappraisal of its perennial food/population problem. Mao cited the conclusionovernment survey that, instead of the
SEM
conversation with another British visitor, Walton Cole, however, the Chinese Vice-Premier was optimistic about future economic development, predicting (on the assumption of good harvests and good progress in economichat China would resume its "leap forward"
" NTR0LLED DISStM^
normal population increase each year of fifteen Billion, an annual increase of ten million was" as much as could be safely handled'* in Communist China.* Althoughvague cn che specific means for effecting this fifty percent reduction in annual population growth (aof indoctrination and such administrative measures as enforcing later marriages), Mao Tse-tung revealed in thisew awareness of the critical nature of China's population problem and at the same timethe extensive birth control campaign which would be initiated
b. The Soviet Offensive
It was at just this time that Khrushchev decided toew offensive against the Chinese Communists, perhaps believing that three years of agriculturalhad sapped Peiping's will tos thisintensified in the winter, the initial Chinese response of defiance would change to vacillation and then tactical accommodation. Moreover, signs ofamong tho Chinese Communist leadership would appearritical point in this new stage of the Sino-Soviet dispute.
As is well known, Khrushchev utilized the Twenty-Second Soviet Party Congress in1ehicle for attacking domestic and bloc opponents, especially Communist China. In essence, the Soviet leader's strategyo present the new Draft CPSU Party Programhis basic domestic and foreign policies) for
"As noted earlier, Mao's claim that this reduction had already been achieved inood year was probably true, but not because of "sensible methods of birth control" as Mao alleged. Tho real reasonharp Jump in the mortality rate.
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adoption by the congress;o assert the validity of this program for all bloc countries; o attack all those (the domestic "anti-partyhe Albanian leadership and, by implication, the Chinese Communist leadership) opposing this prograa as Stalinists;o call upon all Communist parties to rid themselves of this Stalinist incubus. It was this attempt to extend "de-Stalinlzation" to encompass the entire bloc,by Intensified diplomatic, political, economic and military pressures, whichew crisis in Sino-Soviet relations in the fall and winter.
Although ostensibly directed at tiny Albania, it soon became apparent that tbe real object of thiswas Mao Tse-tung, the ooly significant challenger to Khrushchev's leadership of the international Communist movement. As the Chinese have recently revealed,"expressed undisguised support for anti-partyin tho Chinese Communist party" to Premier Chou En-lai at the time of the Twenty-Second Soviet Party Congress. In November Czech Premier Sirolty publicly attacked the Chinese party for "further aggravating the personality cult" . promoting Stalinist methods and forms of in recent years. On the occasion ofh birthday in December, Pravda reprinted an article by Hungarian party first secretary Kadar which clearly implied that the Chinese leader was sufferingsenile disorder and observed that "thisnwithanarmful and revolting charactor."
Mandarin broadcasts to China in2 depicted the "cult of personality" as a 'disgraceful method of leadership" and as "inflicting great losses on thesserted that "the time for materializing the promises made to the Chinese people by the CCPtressed the "international obligation for all Communists to overcome the personality cult and itsnd, more directly, called for the "removal" of loaders everywhere who were disarmament
FORJiIGK
DISSEM
B more- recent Chinese polemics have accused the Soviet leadership "on the pretext ofthe personality cult' of crudely interfering in the internal affairs of fraternal parties and countries and subverting their
The Soviet campaign against the Chinese leadership reached peak intensity in ear of sustained economic pressure (Sino-Soviet trade1 had droppedercent below the level, the Soviet leadership now appeared ready to use virtually all its remaining leverage by threatening in quickcomplete organizational break" with the Chinese party and renunciation of the Sino-Soviet military alliance. However, instead of carrying out these ultimate threats, the Soviet party then decided toonciliatory letter (discussed below) to the Chinese party
Although apparently taken by surprise by Khrushchev's offensive at the Twenty-Second Party Congress, tbe Chinese Communist delegation reacted promptly and vigorously. As head of the Chinese delegation, Premier Chou En-lai responded to each of the main lines of Khrushchev'smost notably by paying homage to Stalinreath praising the late Soviet dictatorgreat Marxist-Leninist" and by publicly condemning Khrushchev's censure of Albania's leaders as being contrary to a
Although the Chinese Communists were not quite
ready to engage in open polemics following the Soviet party congress, they didation-wide campaign criticizing Khrushchev and the Soviet Union in private discussion groups organized by party cadres and extending down to the primary schoolhe timing andof this campaign suggest that it was designed to prepare the Chinese party and people for the possibility of an open break in Sino-Soviet relations and, of equal importance, to provide another scapegoat for China's economic failures. In detailing the case againstthe campaign charged the Soviet leader withChina's industrial slowdown (by withdrawing Sovietith aggravating China's food shortage (by insisting on debtithto subvert and subdue the CPR (by applying economicith seeking personal comfort and luxury and encouraging class differences within tbe Soviet union; withdreadful failure" in his "virgin lands" experiment; and withcult of per-sonality'of his own. To top it off, the Chineseheaped personal abuse upon the Soviet leader (employing such epithets ascoward" andnd predicted that eventually he would be disowned and overthrown by the Soviet people.
is irony in the fact that Premier Chouthe symbol of moderate forces within the CCP who onoccasions had appeared to favor Sino-Soviet economic and militaryforced to play the role of antagonist to Khrushchev at this conference. Sinceasking price for normalization of Sino-Soviet relations at this time appeared to be replacement of Mao Tse-tung as leader of the CCP or at least repudiation of Mao's policies, Chou could hardly have responded.
SECRET ,
NO FCREIGX DIS5EM/CONTROLLED DISsEM
c. Retreat in Domestic Policy
A development of equal, if not greater importance, was the appearance at this time of signs of controversy among the Chinese Communist leadership overevelopment reflected in sharp fluctuations in domestic and foreign policy throughout the winter and spring. Firsthort-lived but unmistakable revivalumber of ingredients inleap forward" approach to domestic development which coincided with thecampaign attacking Khrushchev as the villainfor China's economic failures. Next was an interval extending through February and early March in whichby the regime indicated vacillation andover policy issues, including (presumably) theebruary Soviet party letter with its implicit, conditional offer to resume economic and military assistance. The resolution of this policy debate would appear in late March and April ia the formramatic victory for moderation in domestic policy (featuring the most explicit repudiation of the "great leap forward" yet made) and in the adoption of an avowedly tactical policy oftoward the Soviet Union.
Added to these stresses and strains, the threathinese Nationalist invasion, the resurgence of Indian military activity along the Tibetan frontier, the large-scale exodus of Chinese refugees from both Kwangtung and Sinkiang, and the outbreak of riots in several areas then produced in May and June the most serious combined foreign and domestic crisis which the Chinese Communist regime had yet faced. Although there is much we still do not know about these developments, it is of fundamental importance to review briefly the record of events and to assess the forces and considerations governing Chinese Communist policy decisions throughout this critical.
The view from Peiping of Communist China'sand foreign policy problems in1 was far from reassuring. As reportedhinese Communist defector, Chairman Mao had said (apparently at about this
tROLLED DISSEM
time) that "China's national, existence will beunless domestic conflicts are ironed out." This iane tone of apprehension was sounded in2 People's Daily editorial which alludedtest of serious difficulties" internally and to "fierce and frightening storms" raging outside the country. Although confronted by these twin dangers, the decision of the regime at this time tohard" linea number of ingredients of the "leap forward" approach to domestic development is all the more striking.
The reappearance of this line dates from early December when three People's Dally editorials suddenly revived long-dormant concopts of thehe "revolutionary enthusiasm" and the "subjective initiative and creativity" of the masses, and called upon party cadres to "fully mobilize" thisfor production by carrying out continuous, "ideological and political work." Resurrecting the themes of "bitterf "revolutionary optimism" and of "summoning up full vigor and aiming'he regime appeared once again to be resortingolicy of exhortation in which political and psychological stimuli were being substituted for material incentives as the key to developing production. The concurrent anti-Soviet campaign was clearly intended to serve as one of these stimuli, as revealed02 People's Dally article breathing defiance against those countries carrying outlockade of scientific and technicalgainst China and asserting tbat these "will only make us firstand then 'activated' and will only raise ourwill and make us press forward with courage." As the final ingredient of this new "hard" line, partythroughout December and January reiterated the need for strengthening "centralized and unifiedover the economy and society of Communist China, and thus prepare the waynew leap forward" in China's socialist construction in the future.
With this injunction to strengthen "centralized and unifiedhe motivation of the Chinese Communist leadership inhard" lineime
of considerable weakness becomes more intelligible. After nearly two years of continued retreat andin thehe regime apparently decidedrocess of organizational and ideologicalup was essential to its continued control over the resources and population of China. Apparently convinced that they hadajor crossroads in domestic policy (the Red Flag New Year's Day editorial declared thatour socialist construction is nowecisive juncture"), the dominant party leaderseries of ideological, organizational and administrative measures in December and January designed to reimpose control over the countryside (especially grain supply)rerequisite to generating new momentum in the economy.
According to an editorial appearing in2 issue of the Canton South China Daily, theof peasant refusal to deliver or sell grain to the state had assumed alarming proportions. In acandid discussion, this party editorial revealed that many peasants still retained the "mentality and habits of small individual producers" and thus wereto sell farm products to the state." Moreover, rural party cadres hadith the peasants byconcern for the interasts of the peasants but not the interests of the state" and by "stressing economic work but neglecting ideological education." In lieu of
*The most recent concession was the revelation2 People's Dally editorial that the small-scale productionoamilies) now exercized basic ownership within the people's communes, controlling both production and distribution. With this furtherof controls, the pattern of ruralnow resembled that which had existed as early as
material incentives in the form of industrial consumerhe editorial called for "an intensive socialist ideologicalo heighten the political conscious ness and patriotic fervor" of tho peasants and persuade then to sell to the state rather than on the "free market. Accompanying this Ideological campaign, the Peiplng regime issued regulations inmposing fixed price ranges on commodities sold on these "free markets." Also suggesting an intent to pursue more vigorous economic -oli:: there were credible reports that the CCP planned toarge-scale increase-production, practice-economy campaign after the Chineso New Year and secure agricultural investment funds by assessing individualteam members in the rural communes.
There is less evidence for making confidentabout the apparent policy dispute within the Chinese Communist leadership throughout February and early March. Thatispute existed is strongly suggested by the appearanceighly equivocal Red Flag editorialn editorial which first'argued the case for persistinghard" line (to combat popular apathy, 'ideological paralysis" and the "great danger" posed by declining party morale and discipline) and then argued the case for shiftingsoft" line (to avoid theof "subjectivism" androm reality and the people.) It was also suggested by the almost complete absence of party editorialsthis period,ign of policy flux and Finally, as perhaps the best Indication ofwithin the leadership, it was just at this time that Chen Tun (tbe conservative vice-chairman of thedisappeared and has not been seen since.
NO FOPj/lGN DISSEM/CONTROLLED DISSEM
Apparently sensing these policy differences within the Chinese Communist leadership, the Soviets dispatched an inter-party letter onebruary which they havecharacterized as 'aimed at improving relations
with the CCP and CPR along all Although the
contents of this letter have not been revealed, it may be fairly deduced from later Soviet and Chinese commentary that it contained an implicit offer to resume some measure of military and economic assistance subject to certain preconditions. Moreover, it seems clear that the purpose of this letter was to furnishtho eve of both the Chinese National People's Congress and the conclusion of Sino-Soviet trademoderate elements in the CCP to use to bring about changes in domestic and foreign policy,hange in Chinese policy toward the Soviet Union. It is also fairly certain that the Chinese decision in early March to postpone its congress session for three weeks was for the purpose ofigh-level party meeting to consider this Soviet proposal and, of equal importance, to resolve the continuing controversy over domestic policy.
The outcome of this high-level party conclave, as revealed to the National People's Congress when it finally convened onarch,ignal victory for moderation in domestic policy. For the first time, the Chineseleadership felt constrained to admit that it had committed "errors" (indeed, "grave errors") ln its "great leap forward" program. This admission was firstur ousarch People's Daily editorial summarizing four .ears of water conservancy construction on the Urumchi River, an editorial clearly intended as an allegorical discussion of Communist China's "leapexperience in socialist construction. Afterthat the "most basic experience". lesson) derived from this work was the need "to proceed steadily and gradually on firmhe editorial castigated the "leap forward" (Indirectly, of course) as "attempting to do something beyond our capability" and asheory of quick victory which resultsesire to get things cheaply and by empty And then, itifulto find doctrinal justification for thisadmission, the editorial concluded by enjoining the
NO
whole nation "to keep firmly inhe fundamental principle of Marxism that everything depends on time, place and circumstance."
The first explicit admission that the Chineseregime had committed "mistakes" in its economic development program appeared in the communiques issued by the National People's Congress and tho Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (heldlthough containing little detail on the nature andof thesehe communiques andpril People's Daily editorial did suggest the motivation for this unprecedented admisslon--that the Chinese Communist leadership had decided ln effect to apologize to the long-auffering Chinese people for past errors in order to solicit their understanding and supportime of national crisis. Regime concern over abreakdown of political and social controls wasin urgent appeals for "strengthening the great unity of the people" and especially in the revealing that "the nost important guarantee for completion of our currents the great unity of various nationalities ln our country."
Followinghe second major political objective of these congresses was to promote aspirit" of discussion in which regime spokesmen and delegates alike engaged in "criticism andand in which the delegates were encouraged to"numerous suggestions andn the spirit of being their own Indeed, theretriking parallel between this show of "democracy" in the spring2 and the ill-fated experiment with "liberalization" 0 flowers" campaign) five years previously when Mao Tse-tung had called upon the Chinese-people to criticize the party and help "rectify errors" committed by the party rank and file. Carrying thetep further, just as the Polish and Hungarian uprisings in the fall6 had prompted this earlier experiment, so was concern over possible uprisings In China nowimilar period of relaxation and conciliation in Peiping's domestic policy.
wpftoi
d. Retreat In Foreign Policy
Ia contrast with this strategic retreat in domestic policy, the Chinese Communist response to the Sovietolebruary was avowedly tactical and temporizing in nature.
tplng regimealt to polemics and evenumber of conciliatory gestures in public toward the Soviet Union in the spring and summer several reports suggest that economicprompted the Chinese to soft-pedal the Sino-Soviet dispute at this time, it is much more likely that the real reason was concern for national securityime when hostile powers appeared to threaten Communist China on all sides.
The performance of Chinese Communist delegate Mao Tun at the World Peace Congress meeting in Moscow in early July strongly supports this conclusion. Speakingime of peak Chinese Communist concern over the possibilitynited States supported Chinese Nationalist invasion, Mao Tun deliberately nisconstrued an ambiguous statement by Khrushchev to mean that "the Soviet Union is ready, if necessary, to come to the assistance of the Chinese people." Obviously acting under instructions, thedelegate took great pains inuly press interview
to "prove" that there were no Sino-Soviet differences over the Taiwan Strait or, for that natter, over any other Issues. Most striking of all, Mao went on to make the most laudatory reference to Khrushchev that anyCommunist official has made io recent years,to the speech of "Nlkita Sergeyevich Khrushchev" to the florid Peace Congress as "remarkable and profound."
It remains toreliminary andtentative assessment of the forces andgoverning the Chinese Communist decision in the spring2 to undertake the retreats in domestic and foreign_ policy outlined above.
thereumber of developments throughout theand fall2 suggesting that tbe Chinesewas indeed concerned about the loyaltyof its military forces. Most dramaticwere indications from diverse sources that theregime had once more had to contendeng Te-huai-ism" in the People's Liberationperhaps insistence on both greaterdomestic policy and some measure of accommodationthe Soviet Union. The evidence for thisis briefly
he
convocationarty congress of the Air Force vith unusualew days later;he unprecedented emphasis on military affairs at the Tenth Plenum of the CCP central committee held later that month, including expulsion of two military leaders from the secretariat of the central committee;ho pointed reference in the central committee communique to the "greatsignificance" of the Lushan plenum of9 in "victoriously smashing the attacks by. Peng Te-huai and his supporters) immediatelyryptic allusion to "subversion" carried out by foreign and domestic enemies against "our state and party."
e. The Crisis of Nerves
Because of limitations of space, it is possible only to describe briefly the ensuing "crisis of nerves" which afflicted the Chinese Communist leadership in early Added to the threat of seriouslaie when the reliability of its armed forces was in doubt, there was tin Peiping's view) the even graver threat of an American-supported Chineseinvasionime when it was not possible to count on Soviet military assistance. As noted above, thisof dangers posed perhaps the most serious foreign and domestic crisis which the Chinese Communisthad yet faced.
S^dRET /
DlSSEM/CONTROLLED DlSSEM
>reover, there were clear signs inreports at this time. Chen I'sayin which the Chinese vice-premier dwelton the "twonternal and external,government and felt compelled to deny thatsoon collapse or splithat theCommunist leadership was worried, evenwhen, on top of this, there occurred in quicka resurgence of Indian military activityTibetanass exodus of tens ofChinese refugees into both the USSR and Hongan outbreak of rioting in several areas (theinstance occurring in Cantonune), ltthese fears were justified.
SECRET /
NO FOREIGN DlSSEM?CONTROLLED DlSSEM
It was at this juncture in late June that the United States gave assurances to Peiping through its representative in Warsaw that it would nothinese Nationalist invasion of the mainland "at this time." Within China there were evident the first signs of an improvement in economic and social conditions. The mood of Communist China's top leadership appeared suddenly to change. ortnight they assembled in high-level conclave toew "hard" line in domestic and foreign policy which has persisted to the present day.
V. THE CONTROLLED LEAP: THE "GREAT STRIDE FORWARD"
The 'great leap forward| approach /To economic development? has. beenin favorore gradual, step-by-step solution.
En-lai to Japanese Delegation,2
Our country will certainly make rapid progress provided we work hard.Shao-chi to National Conference of Scientists,3
We can certainlyreater all-round bumper harvest this year and soon turn our countryocialist power with modern agriculture, modern industry, modern national defense and modern science andhe great stride forward of the Chinese people cannot be resisted by anybody. (Underlining supplied)
Ching-shih to East Chinaof Advanced Agricultural3
The Tenth Plenum of the Chinese Communist party
eighth central committee convened in Peiping in late2 toeries of decisions which have shaped the course of Chinese Communist policyto the present day. Bearing out Peiping's characterization of this plenary session as of "great historic significance" the decisions adopted at this meeting constitute another fundamental turning point
in Chinese Communist policy formation. After two years of retreat and accommodation in the face of foreign and domestic pressures, the Peiping regime apparently decided that further retreat was both intolerable and unnecessary and that, conversely, the time had come to take armsea of troubles.
In foreign policy, this precept was appliedin the decision toajor military attack on India- in October. Of much greater long-term significance, however, was the decision to initiate an all-outagainst Moscow in which the stakes were none other than leadership of the international Communist movement. This objective the Chinese Communists have pursuedand with some success during the course of the past IB,months.
By contrast, the record of Chinese Communistpolicy since the Tenth Plenumicture of uncertainty and confusion which poses formidable problems of interpretation. Compounding the difficulties usually encountered, the following factors make analysis ofdevelopment in Communist China especiallyn abnormally high propaganda content ln policy the ambiguous, shifting nature of policy guidelines; ontinued disagreement within theover policy issues; isclosures about the scope, duration and character of the'tlass struggle"adopted at the Tenth Plenum which have only recently come to light;he marked shift in regime outlook from optimism in the first portion of this period toin the latter portion in the face of "new problems in socialist construction without ready-made answers."
In keeping with these general observations, this chapter will discuss the most recent phase of Communist China's domestic crisis under three headings: he period surrounding the Tenth Plenum (in which theof this highly important conclave are conceivedlueprint for domestic and foreign policy development up to the present); he period of the "great stride forward" ln the first half3 (In which an abortive attempt is made to translate this blueprintiable
oconoaic developmenthe period of the "three great revolutionary movements" In the last half3 (in which political pressures are intensified as the regime gropes for new solutions to its perennial economic problems.)
A. The Tenth Plenum of the CCP Central Committee (July-December
In retrospect, it has become increasingly clear that tbe three basic policy decisions approved by the Tenth Plenum of the CCP central committee ino launch an offensive against the "modernleadership of the Soviet Union; toation-wide "class struggle" campaign; and toew, independent program of economicclosely interrelated and interdependent. Moreover, thero is considerable evidence that the common strategythese decisions was provided by Mad Tse-tung who once again emergederiod of relatively little public activity to dominate the proceedings of the Tenth Plenum and touch more active role in public life.
To illustrate briefly the interdependent nature of these policies, it is obvious that the decision to wage an all-out struggle against Khrushchev would preclude further Soviet assistance and necessitateolicy of "self-reliance" in China's economic The close link between the anti-Soviet and "class struggle" campaign was emphasized in the Tenth Plenum communique whichlear warning thatdomestic criticism of party policies would be construed as Soviet-inspired "subversion." The integral relationship between the second and third policies (between the political indoctrination "class struggle" campaign and the new economic development program),was not at first apparent and is still only dimly perceived by some Western observers.
But to fail to see this interrelationship is to fall to realize that Communist China's "new" approach to
NO FvrtE
TTR^L
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socialist coostruction adopted at the Tenth Plenum wasodified version of the old "leap forward"is, iteaffirmation andof the deeply-held conviction by Mao Tse-tung and his principal lieutenants that "politics must take com-mand"over the economy and that political indoctrination, rataer than material incentive, is the key to rapidof Communist China's backward economy. At the same time, this new" approach did seek to avoid the excesses and more flagrant mistakes committedthe "great leap forward" era. As will be discussed at greater length below, whether it ls possible tothe conflicting requirements of doctrine and party controls, on the ooe hand, with the requirements of production and economic motivation, on thewhether in fact lt is possible tocontrolled leap" in economicperhaps the central problem in any estimate of China's economic prospects.
reliminary to this new "forward march" in socialist construction, however, the Chinese Communist leadership apparently decided to publicize more widely in the latter half2 the "mistakes" of the "great leap forward" which Premier Chou En-lai had first revealed secretly to the National People's Congress in the spring.emarkably frank published discussion in early July, Tao Chu (first secretary of the Central-South Chinaparty bureau) referred to "difficulties, mistakes, and policy failures" which China had experienced in (Underlining supplied) In August the republication of Liu Shao-chi's How Tooodwas designed in part to explain how cadre errors had transformed "good" central committee policies Into "bad" ones by disregarding objective possibilities.mmml
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From September through November, Chou En-lai,nd other leaders appeared tcpecial point offoreign diplomats and visitors that "China had made manyhat China "hadot" and "is still learning from itshat "the great leap forward hadretty ghastlynd that the "'Chinesenadmit their failures."* But it was at the Tenth Plenum in late September and the celebration of China's National Day in early October that the regime presented the most comprehensive explanation of the nature and
It appears more tnan coincidental that theseof error were made by more moderate leaders within the CCP who had apparently questioned the feasibility of the "great leap forward" from the outset. By contrast, none of the more radical "party-machine" leaders. Liu Shao-chi, Teng Hsiao-ping, and Tan Chen-lin) has ever been known to criticize the "great leapndcommunes, perhaps because they are still convinced of the validity of these programs.
The first basic mistake of the "great leap forward" era had been to emphasize industrial development at the expense of agriculture, an overemphasis expressed in excessive investment and allocation of manpower to Overemphasis and excessive speed had beentrue of development of the iron and steelwith the result that more than one-third of theillion tons of steel produced0 had been of "poor". unusable) quality. When combined with three consecutive years of agricultural calamities, it followed that Communist China would now have toew policy of agriculturalgriculture the foundation, industry the leading factor") in order to redress or "readjust" the grave imbalance which had developed in the national economy.
Another mistake had been the "unreasonableof the commune program which,ad been set up "too quickly and on toocale."* Because of cadre errors in theof this program,imilar "readjustment" policy had been carried out for the communes in theeaturing decentralization of authority to theteams and the return of "private plots" to the peasants. (One report at this time stated that "private plots" would remain forears.)
Of particular interest was the disclosure at the Tenth Plenum that large numbers of peasants had withdrawn from the communes during this "readjustment" period, reaching the alarming proportion ofercent In Anhwei Province. It was clear that strong measures were required to arrest this process of disintegration, measures which would be progressively revealed in the unfolding of the "socialistclass struggle" and "five anti's" campaigns As usual, the rural cadres would bear the brunt of these campaigns, this time accused of the new "error" of "revisionism."
*Three years earlier during the celebration of Communist China's tenth anniversary, the dominant Chinesead attacked those making the very same criticisms of the "great leap forward" and people's communes noted above as "right opportunists." In order to concealegree shift in party line, the Peiping regime in the fall2 (accordingeliable report) ordered the suppression of all major leadershipissued on this earlier occasion.
Turning to the causes of the "mistakes" which had sabotaged the "great leap forward" and commune programs, the new familiar rationale (originating in thecampaign1 and repeated at the NationalCongress session in the springas once again"leading cadres" (principallyparty first secretaries) and subordinate cadres
alike had both misunderstood and misapplied the correct policies of Chairman Mao and the central committee.
A second cause of China's "mistakes" was theSoviet withdrawal of technicians and termination of assistance to Communist China's industrialization-program ln Although Premier Chou "En-lai had stressed thisontributing factor in his secret speech to the National People's Congress in the spring, Khrushchev was now held to be 'primarily responsible" for China's economic difficulties. Thus the groundwork was laid for asserting more and more openly as the anti-Soviet struggle unfolded that the greatest "mistake" of all in Communist China's economic development program had been to rely on the good faith and pledgeserfidious Soviet ally.
1. The Decision to Launch antruggle
It is still difficult to find an adequatefor Communist China's decision in the fallime of both political isolation and economicto launch an all-out struggle against the Soviet Union for leadership of the international Communist Thatecision was taken at this time,ver, is well documented
Onugust, Foreign Ministereveled the firsteries of bitter (if indirect) attacks against the Soviet Union for engaging invilification" and "invasion" of China.
Is an obviously coordln-
ated move, the Albanian party organopullit on
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ctober for the first time calledplit in the international movement, an open break "however painful it mayith Khrushchev and all who followed him. One month later, on IS November, the Chinese Communist party organ People's Daily surfaced the decision of the Tenth Plenumefinitive editorial drafted,to one report, on the personal instructions of Mao Tse-tung. anifesto of Peiping's claim to supreme doctrinal authority within the international Communist movement, this editorial,concludedlarion call for 'all Marx1st-Leninists to resolutely carry on the struggle against modern revisionism to the end."
As for Chinese Communist motivation, the Peiping regime apparently decided that further retreat andin the face of Soviet pressures was both unnecessary and, given the nature of Soviet provocation, intolerable. Militarily, the threat of an American-supported Chinese Nationalist invasion of the mainland had passed and with it the need to conciliate Moscow in the hope of having available the Soviet nuclear shield. Economically, Communist China appeared to be emerging from the worst period of crisis and, besides, Soviet economic assistance during this critical period had been minimal. Tactically, the Chinese leadership may have concluded that it would be better to seize therather than awaitew Soviet onslaught.
As for tbe numerous Soviet provocations which may have prompted this decision,3 Chinese statement lists ten examples of "sabotage" of Sino-Soviet relations perpetrated in the roughly one-year periodthe Tenth Plenum. The most intriguing of these was the charge that "the leaders of the CPSU1'- had attempted "to subvert its.eadership by every possible-means." As discussed at some length in the preceding chapter of this paper, this charge apparently referredevival of "Peng Te-huai-ism" among elements in the People's Liberation Army, especially inithe Air Force, who may have responded to fresh Soviet overtures byaccommodation to the USSR. Other Soviet actions which must have appeared particularly outrageous as violations
of Chinese national interests were the following more or less simultaneous developments in the months justthe Tenth he projected sale of MIGplanes to India, symbolizing as it did the entire course of Soviet policy toward the Sino-Indianoviet notification on2 of its intent to enter into an agreement with the "United States tofurther proliferation of nuclear weapons;lleged Soviet "large-scale subversive activities" which were held responsible for the exodus of tens of thousands of minority peoples from Sinkiang into Soviet Central Asia. eaction to these menacing activitiesup byn the phrase "vilification, sabotage, subversion and invasion"), the Chinese Communist decision at the Tenth Plenum to launch an all-out attack against the "revisionist" leadership of the CPSU at least becomes more intelligible.
2. Tnc Decision to Organize Nation-Wide 'Class Struggle"
By the fall three years of privation and ignominious retreat from the original goals of the "great leap forward" and commune programs had bred wide-spread apathy, disillusionment and dissatisfaction among all classes of Chinese society. Even morearge proportion of the party rank-and-file had begun tothe same symptoms of cynicism toward party programs. Since these developments had gravely damaged the Chinese Communist mystique of being an infallible force capable of building Chinaowerful nation on the basis of Marxism-Leninism, it was imperativeew rationale be advanced to explain past failures and silence future, criticism. The new rationale, as revealed by Chairman Mao to the Tenth Plenum, was to explain failures and criticism of party policies as largely tbe handiwork of "foreign and domestic class enemies" against whom it was now necessary toation-wide "class struggle" campaign.
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Accordiogubsequent Chinese CommunistChairman Mao at the Tenth Plenum "searchlngly analyzed the international and internal situations and once more explainedenetrating way the existence of classes, class contradictions and class struggle throughout the entire historical period of transition from capitalism tohereby7 brilliantly enriching and developing the Marxist-Leninist theory about classes and class struggle and providing ourand the revolutionary people all over the worldew weapon." This quotation is significant for the following diverse reasons: it demonstrates the dominant role played by Chairman Mao at this partyhairman Mao's finding on "classes and class struggle" are presented as having validity not only for China but for all socialist countries, thus refuting Khrushchev's claim to havetate and party "of the whole people" (inlasslesshairman Mao's "brilliant development of the Marxist-Leninist theory about classes and class struggle" at the Tenth Plenum represents an almost complete reversal
wildly divergent appraisals illustrate not only the notorious fallibility ofudgment but also the extent to which subsequent developments bave belied his optimistic view7 of the cohesiveness and loyalty of Chinese society on the point of undertaking large-scale socialist construction.
Two observations about tbe "class struggle"in tbe fall2 deserve special emphasis: hat emphasis at this stage was placed on preparations for actual launching of the campaign ln the spring and summerhat there wereumber of indications that the campaign would be protracted and
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comprehensive, encompassing-ail classes and groups within Chinese society. In the way of preparatory measures, three of the formal decisions announced in the Tenth Plenum communique (the planned interchange of leading cadres, the strengthening of the party control and the changes in the central committeeforeshadowed disciplinary action againstelements within the party.
The multiplicity of uses to.which the Chineseregime intended to put the 'class struggle"was revealed in published discussions of thisconcept following the plenary session. As noted above, one such use was to convey the grim warning that further opposition to party policies would be construed as the work of "class enemies" engaged in Soviet-inspired subversion. That "class enemies" of this type hadbeen discoveredairly high level within the CCP was suggestedecember Red Flagenin on Class Struggle in the Transitionhichto the "growthight-opportunist cliquethe party" as "almostnd warned of the "splitting, subversive activities" oflique.*
A second use was to warn of the danger of continued controversy within the party,esser offense since not directly attributed to machinations of the "enemy." The major point of interest in the discussion of this phenomenon (appearing again in the December Red Flag article) was the admission (indirectly through TEe medium of Leninist quotations) that such "disagreements" continued to exist within the CCP and were subject to exploitation by hostile forces.
*Since no time period was specified, this may very well have been an allusion to the activities carried out by Peng Te-huai's "anti-party group"
A third intended use of the "class struggle"was tolanket warning to "new bourgeois
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elements" whirl: bad emerged not only within the party but also within the government, economic organizations, mass organizations and indeed within all classes and groups of Chinese society. As spelled out In the same Red Flag article, all elements of the population were served notice that they were liable to attack andshould they persist in any oneumber of "anti-socialist" activities as defined by the regime.
By far the most important of these activities was the "spontaneous tendency to capitalism" which hadto an alarming degree in China's countryside during the two-year period preceding the Tenth Plenum. With national survival at stake, the regime throughout this period had been forced to make numerous concessions to the peasantry in the interests of increasingconcessions which had progressively expanded the area of private enterprise (cultivation of "privaterivate reclamation of wasteland, private householdand private trading on the "freet the expense of the collective economy. As noted above, in addition to these well-publicized concessions, tbe regime had also been forced to permit the withdrawal of large numbers of peasants from the commune-collective system, the proportion reachingercent in at least the one province of Anhwei. ough approximation, it may be estimated that at the time of maximum retreat perhaps as much asercent of agricultural production and rural trade were being carried on outside the "socialist"
Viewed in this light, the Chinese Communistat the Tenth Plenum toation-wide 'class struggle" campaign becomes more comprehensible. In the words of the communique, the Chinese revolution hadecisive turning-point in the "strugglethe socialist road and the capitalist road." As seen by the party leadership, the struggle for control over China's rural economyife-and-death struggle in which victory was essential to preserving the ralson d'etre of the Chinese Communist revolution. Asby the Tenth Plenum decision "to furtherthe collective economy of the people'she first stage of the "class struggle" campaign in the
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spring3 would focus on peasant "individualism" in production and trade, with the worst offenders singled out for punishment as "mortal enemies of socialism."
3. The Decision toew "General
Policy" for National Economic Uevelopment
By the fallommunist China's "three red banners" (the trilogy of policies advanced by Mao Tse-tung8 as the answer to Communist China's special problems of economic development) existed in name only. In place of the "great leaphe Peiping regime had enunciated the policy ofr step-by-step development, at the National People's Congress in April. In place of the much-vaunted people's communes, the regime was struggling to uphold the small-scalefarm against the inroads of peasant And, in place of the "general linehe Tenth Plenum of the CCP central committeeew "general policy" of developing the national economy "with agriculture the foundation and industry the leading factor."* Clearly, it is of some importance to discuss tbe content and significance of this new policy of agriculturalolicy which has proved to be not only confusing (to Chinese and Westerners alike) but (in the sense that ittoew "solution" to China's economic development problems) short-lived as well.
The first observation that should be made is that, although apparently so conceived, this wasong-range development policy at all. In retrospect, it has
noted in the preceding chapter, this policy was actually not new at all, having originated three years earlier during the period of "continuous great leap forward."
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become increasingly clear that this new "generalas little moreestatement in more positive terms of the economic "readjustment" policy which had already been in effectn interim program designed to shore up the badly-lagging agriculturalpreparatoryeneral upsurge in the national economy. As demonstrated by the abortive attempt (in the months following the Tenth Plenum) to draft the Third Five Year Plan on the basis of this new "general policy,"
lt fell far short of the requirementsomprehensive, long-term development program.
The essentially political nature of this new policy line was revealedumber of Chinese Communist(published in the fallelebrating its great significance as the latest example of Mao Tse-tung's "creative development of Marxist-Leninist theory" and as "an important development of the Marxist-Leninist theory of socialist construction." Just as the Chinese Communists hadnew law of undulatory development" when the "great leap forward" collapsed, so were they now reacting to failure on the agricultural front bythe principle of priority development of agriculture as an "objective law" of socialist economic development.**
"Aithougn "general policy" was the usual term, Chinese Communist publications in the fall2 also referred to this agricultural orientation policyew "general line" for national economic development.
"It is interesting to note that this "objective law" islagrant example of Chinese Communist "modernlat repudiation of the basic economic law of socialism which calls for priorityof the means of production. the capital goods produced by heavy industry). Chinese Communist propagandists who sought to rationalize this deviation were driven by the demands of doctrine to the patently false conclusion that agricultural products are actually "capital goods."
WW
By presenting an essentially expedient policyew Marxist-Lenin1st law, it appears tbat the Chinesewere attempting once again toense of purpose and direction in economic policy which would generate confidence and enthusiasmew production upsurgo on the part of the Chinese people.
Even the decision toajor effort to modernize agriculture (publicized with great fanfare following the Tenth Plenum) appeared to be based more on political considerations than on any coherent Described as "the central task and main program of the wholehis undertaking to achieve the mechanization, irrigation, fertilization andof agriculture was little moreestatement of the grandiose objectives originally announced by Chairman Mao5 and repeated periodically The new emphasis on the protracted nature of this modernization processoears), theexploratory character of published discussion, and the admission that relatively little state investment would be available suggested that agriculturalin the near term would continue along traditional lines. Again the intent appeared to be primarily one of projecting an image of certainty and clear direction in agricultural development policy where in fact none existed.
Of more immediate relevance to the development of China's rural economy was the fourth formal decision adopted at the Tenth Plenum, the decision "on theof commercial work." In accordance with this(which Chairman Mao had "personally"ew importance was assigned to the role of trade, finance and pricing policy in bringing rural production andunder state control. The primary objective was to increase the state's take from agriculture through appropriate changes in procurement and farm pricing policies and through the controlled distribution ofconsumer goods* thereby progressivelytbe "free market." As discussed by the Minister of Commerceovember Red Flag article, this new policy combined "economic measures, correct administrative
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and politicalith chief emphasis placed on "economic measures." As demonstrated bydevelopmentsowever, this was apolicy which could and would be shifted togreater reliance on political and administrative controls.
It remains to discuss one of the most significant developments in the fall ofreappearance of signs, of disunity among the Chinese Communist leadership over domestic policy, especially economic policy. this policy debate appeared to involve roughly the same groupings ofndeaders identified inchapters of this paper as an abiding feature of the Chinese Communist leadership. As it had in the past, the disagreement appeared to center on questions of method and "speed of construction" (or optimum rate offor China's economy. And once again, as suggested by the lead-in quotations to this chapter, .the principal figures in these two groupings appeared to holddifferent views in the fall and winter, with Liu Shao-chi holding forth the prospect of "rapid progress" and Chou En-lai stressing the need for "gradual, step-by-step solutions."* Additional evidence suggesting policy differences, moreover, is provided by the curious circumstances surrounding the decision at
nTlustrating tne "rapid progress" which Liu Shao-chi apparently had in mind, an Important3 Red Flag editorial would repeat the estimate advanced during the "great leap forward" era that it would take Communist China onlyecade or two to catch up with the most advanced levels in the world in science and technology and build our countryowerful socialist state with modern Industry, modern agriculture, modern nationaland modern science and technology." Just nine months earlier, Chou En-lai had informed Malcolm MacDonald that this estimate (and those who accepted this estimate) "had been proved completely wrong."
this time to proceed post haste with the draftinghird Five Year Plan to commence
The first curious circumstance is that thewas made at all.
ovember,
Premier Chou En-laiapanese delegation that it would be two years) before China's trade and production had roturned to normal. ovember, bow-ever, Peiping suddenly announced the appointment of seven high-ranking officials as deputy directors of the State Planning Commission, strongly suggesting the creationigh-level task force to formulate Communist China's Third Five Yearrash basis.
The second curious circumstance concerns tbeof these new appointees, who were not only senior officials (five were either members of the politburo or vice-premiers) but also appeared to have been selected in almost equal numbers from the "party-machine" and "administrator-economist" groups. This apparentlyeffort to achieve balanced representation was particularly marked in the case of the agricultural specialists, with the radical Vice-Premier Tan Chen-lin exactly counterbalanced by the moderate Vice-Premier Teng Tzu-hui. Still another instance was the pairing of Chen Po-taeading party propagandist andspokesman for Chairman Mao) with the morefinancial and economic specialists Li Hsien-nien ando.
Thus on the basis of admittedly incomplete it may be speculated that some such process as the following characterized tbe decision to go ahead with Communist China's Third Five Year Plan in the fall ofthereolicy debate over the desirability
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and feasibility of attempting toong-rangeplan at that time; that Chairman Mao then called for the preparation oflanrash basis, arranging at the same time for adequateof both groups in the drafting process; and that this wasolitical decision,Chairman Mao's view that it was imperative toCommunist China's ability not only to survive-Soviet economic sanctions but also to chart an independent course of economic development which would be valid for other underdeveloped countries as well.* With thein Decemberew session of the NationalCongress would be convened ln the second quarter it appeared that this would be the target date for completion and publicationeasonably ambitious Third Five Year Plan which would provide both guidance and inspirationew upsurge in Communist China's production and construction.
B. The "Great Stride Forward"
As noted above, the first half3 would be an important testing period for the basic economic policy decisions at the Tentho re-establishcollective controls over the economy (especially the rural economy);oew upsurge in(especially agriculturalohird Five Year Plan which would be both dynamic (demonstrating Communist China's ability to achieveprogress of its own) and feasible (avoiding the excesses and mistakes of the "great leap forward" era).
"This latter point was made explicitlyhinese Communist official in3 who asserted that "China had to show the world that only her socialist system was able to solve the many problems of the underdevelopedof the world."'
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Before turning to an examination of developments within this period, it is important to note briefly theincompatible nature of these objectives.
The first contradiction was that posed between the requirement for strengthening socialist controls over China's rural economy. increasing the state's take from the agricultural sector) and the requirement for increasing agricultural production. That Communist China's leaders (at least some of them) were aware of thiswas suggested by the relative restraint of the "class struggle" campaign in the first halfith greater emphasis placed onocialisthan on coercion.
The second contradiction was inherent in thedirective to draft economic development plans which would be both dynamic and feasible. This political and ideological compulsion toapid, if somewhat more realistic, rate of progress would be well exemplified by politburo member and East China regional party leader Ko Ching-shih in February when he wouldthe Chinese people togreat stridein socialist production and construction. Byhowever, it would become clear that thisto force the pace had encountered serious obstacles both in tbe short runisappointing summer harvest) and in the long run (the failure of the State Planning Commission to come upiable Third Five Teary another irony of history, it would be just at this point of demonstrated incapacity in charting its own course of domestic development that Communist China would proclaim the universal validity of its policies bya new "general line for the internationalmovement."-
1. The Production Upsurge
The crisis of confidence experienced by Communist China's leaders In the spring2 had expanded by tbe end of the year to encompass most of the Chinese people.
Confronted with widespread public and party apathy, the Peiping regimeong-term, intensiveeducation" campaign at the Tenth Plenum designed to restore popular confidence in party leadership and faith in the efficacy of party programs. This was all the more essential since Communist China's hopes for rapid economic development3 rested primarily on its ability once again to substitute political andincentives for material reward as the major stimulus in production.
The first step in this lengthy re-educationwas to reassert the "greatness" and "correctness" of Chinese Communist leadership, especially asby the "great contemporaryao Tse-tung. eries of major articles and editorials extending from the Tenth Plenum well into the springarty propagandists expounded the theme that, and the "anti-China chorus" to the contrary, Communist China had scored continuous victories inrevolution and socialist construction in the past and would continue to do so ln the future because of "the brilliant and correct leadership of the CCPcommittee and Comrade Mao Tse-tung."
Central to this campaign was the revival andto new heights of the "cult of Mao Tse-tung" in which the Chinese leader once again was depictedeml-dlvlne being whose attributes included infallibility and scientific foresight. 2 China Youth article asserted that "the past ten years of pracfice'in socialistave proved the unqualifiedof Comrade Mao Tse-tung." Even more striking was an article appearing in3 issue of China Youth Dally which eulogized Chairman Mao'st all times standing higher and seeing farther than anyonen the following passage: "The way Chairman Mao Tse-tung looks at problems must be like standing on topkyscraper looking down on tha streets and roads below. Each path, turn and curve comes in his view. How can it be possible for him to loseUnderlining supplied) The final and mosf extreme illu-stratlon of this new undertaking to exploit tho charisma
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of Mao Tse-tung was the emergence in3 of the campaign to "learn from Leiropaganda hero whose miraculous accomplishments were attributed "to earnest and repeated study of Chairman Mao Tse-tung's works" and (in Lei Feng's own words) "to the blood given by the party and Chairman Mao Tse-tung which has penetrated into every single cell of my body."
The next step in reviving popular confidenceoncerted effort initiated at the Tenth Plenum tothat the party's economic policies had alreadya "new situation of victory" and wouldfter effortseriod ofsher inew period of great upsurge in socialist construction." It is ofinterest to note that as this campaign gained momentum in the wintert began to assume the character, at least in agriculture,odified "leap forward" campaign. Because of limitations of space, it is possible to present only the following brief summary of this significant development.
First, an important People's Daily New Year's Day editorial asserted that "tremendous achievements" gained during the preceding five year period had "shown even more clearly that it is possible toreat leap forward in China's socialistlaimedsuccesses" in "readjustment of the national economy and rapid restoration of agricultural production" during the preceding two year period; and, on the basis of these successes, called upon the Chinese people to "advance with powerful strides" and "to striveumperandew upsurge in the national economy" Then in late January, Liu Shao-chi issued the dictum noted above that "our country will certainly make rapid progress provided we work hard."
It was not until the East China regionalconference in early February, however, that this campaign began in dead earnest. It was here that Ko Ching-shlh, describing the conference as "ideological preparationew upsurge of agriculturalalled for initiation ofhundering and large-scale
increase production campaignracticalsserted that China's "agricultural production and rural economy can be developed at highnd, symbolically, proclaimed that China wouldgreat stridein economic development. Amplification of these guidelines appeared in follow-up provincial agricultural conferencesssued the ambitious targets0 toercent increase in grain and cotton production3sserted that "there is presenta picture of rapid growthew high tide of national economic construction is in the offing" alled upon the rural cadres to "whiproduction upsurgea new upsurge in agricultural production of immense proportions" (Kwangtung).
Perhaps the best indication of an intent tocertain "leap forward" techniques in agriculture was provided by Tao Chu (the Central-South China regional party leader) in an article appearing in the3 Canton South China Daily. Praising two modelfor exhibiting "revolutionary zeal"-and the spirit of "moving mountains" in their triumphs over nature, Tao reaffirmed one of the basic ingredients (theof mass movements) in the "leap forward" approach to economic development as follows:
The socialist causeommon cause of millions of people. To build socialism and change the outlook of 'poverty andou mustmillions of people to work togetheream. Only the masses of people are creators ofowever the masses need leadership; they needto giveush.
*This injunction to conduct the campaignractical manner" received even greater emphasis in another speech (of whichrief summary is available) to thisby Chou En-lai.
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That the regime was still mindful of earlier excesses in this social mobilization technique was suggested, however, by Tao's occasional reminders of the need to combine "zeal and confidenceealistic work style."
Paralleling this campaign of exhortation and of "whippingroduction upsurge" in the countryside, thereumber of indications that this approach was considered inappropriate for Industrial andand technical development. In late January, Chou En-lai and Ko Ching-shih appearedhanghaiof scientists and technicians to stress "realism and practicality" and to warn against "violating the law governing the development of science andhe law of advancing step by step." Several articles by provincial first secretaries in the springhe need for gradualism in modernizing China's agriculture, pointing out that overambitious targets, haste and "reckless reform" had characterized previous efforts to achieve the technical transformation of
Alsoragmatic strain in Chinesedomestic policy was the decision in February to reinstltute (after an interval of six years) an ambitious program of birthrogram sponsored by tho
principal figure in the moderate grouping within the
CCP. Premier Chou En-lai. Cnou delivered an important speechedical conference in Peiping at this time in which he stressed that the party and government had decided toong-term "family planning" campaign and called upon the conference to devise measures for implementing this policy. Underlining the urgency of birth control, the Chinese premierhat China's population problem was equal in importance to its agricultural and national defense problems; hat China's currentwas in excessillion and was increasing at an annual rate. percent (aboutillion);hat continuation of this trend would defeat China's plans for economic development;hat, consequently, it was Imperative to reduce this rate progressivelyercent in fiveercent in ten years
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percentifteen year period. Although slow to develop, this campaign has accelerated in recent months to include mass indoctrination on the desirability (if not necessity) of late marriage; popularization of birth control methods, abortion and sterilization; andof maternity and other benefits after the third child.
The immediate effort in the spring3 toroduction upsurge, moreover, was almost at an end. The mood of buoyant optimism and the image of rapid progress which Peiping had wished to convey both domestically and abroad reached their peak on May Day. On that occasion, regime spokesmen claimed substantial increases in agricultural and industrial productionthe preceding year and "an across-the-board turn for the better in the national economy." By the end of the month, however, references to an imminent upsurge in the national economy had dropped out of sight and by August the line had reverted to that ofertain period of time" was required before Communist China would new period of great upsurge" in economic development.
Symptomatic of this change in party line was the announcementune that the National People'ssession originally scheduled for early summer had been postponed until late in the year. As recenthave made increasingly clear, this decision appeared to reflect diminished confidence in China's economic prospects resultingisappointinghe inability of China's economic planners to translate Chairman Mao's policy guidelinesiable Third Five Year Plan.
2. Class Struggle: The First Stage
As noted above, the Tenth Plenum decided not only toew upsurge in production but also tosocialist, collective controls over the rural economy. This decision was apparently based on the
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agricultural produce" to the-state in order to support industrialization and economic growth. The additional explicit statement in thistheof industry must precede the modernization ofthe essentially fraudulent nature of the agricultural orientation policy which had been proclaimed with great fanfare at the Tenth Plenum.
Since it was both impolitic and embarrassing to admit that China's peasants en masse were opposed to socialism, the Peiping regime revived the pre-"great leap forward" concent of rural "class analysis" to assert that "upper middle" peasants were largely responsible for the resurgence of capitalism in the countryside. To the extent thatlass could be said to exist in the spring it was composed of the more energetic and productive peasants who had made good use of thefreedoms" . to farm "private plots" and to sell produce on the rural "freeermitted during the preceding three year period. As pointed out in theebruary issue of Chinaheir /the "upper middle" peasants/ speculative activities and other activities unfavorable"to socialism constitute the most important part of the activities of capitalist forces in town and country under present social conditions."
Refugee reporting indicates that, with important exceptions, the struggle waged against thesepractices in the spring3 was relatively Rather than abolishing "private plots" (as it had done twicehe regime apparently issued regulations limiting their size and the time peasants could spend working on them. imilar process of whittling away at the rural "free market" was alsofeaturing the imposition of price ceilings and state procurement at low prices of part of theof "private plots."
There were, however, important exceptions to this general rule of leniency, exceptions which figuredin reportsew "five anti's" campaign (probably still in the experimental stage) just getting underway in China. Although varying from province to province,
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the main targets of this campaign in the spring3 were speculation and "individual farming." As noted earlier, the phenomenon of large numbers of peasants withdrawing from the commune-collective system to engage in "individual farming" had reached alarming proportions.ercent in Anhwei Province.) Now that the worst period of agricultural crisis was over,lagrantractice could no longer be It is not surprising, then, tbat rural cadres who had countenanced "individual farming" were singled out (accordingumber of refugee reports) for public trial and punishment (including beatings) as the first of many "class enemies" to be attacked in
It remains to note briefly the role of Lei Feng, "the extraordinary ordinaryn Communist China's "socialist education" campaign in the springajor objective of this campaign to study and emulate the "revolutionary spirit" and "heroic self-sacrifice" of Lei Feng was to provide an ideological'and moralfor material incentives in stimulating production. It is interesting to noteanuary Red Flagattacking "modern revisionists" for betraying the noble ideals of Communism in favor of "materialndividualnd personal welfare" anticipated the emergence of Lei Feng by asserting that "in socialist society, numerous new people with Communist ideological consciousness and morality will inevitably bes the campaign developed, it was predicted that Comrade Lei Feng (personifying the very antithesis ofwould Inspire tens of thousands of Chinese youth to emulate his "Communist spirit and virtue." This would produce, by chain reaction, "an increase of the people's Communist spirit and virtueigantic force beyond measurement,piritual atomic bomb ofpower, with which we will overcome any obstacle, avert any crisis, and smash any enemy in our great cause of socialist revolution, and construction." It is in this sense that the Lei Feng campaign, Indeed the entireeducation" campaign under way since the Tenth Plenum, should be viewedeaffirmation and re-expressionasic and long-held tenet of Maopolitical
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indoctrination, rather than material incentives, is the key to rapid development of Communist China's backward economy.
3. Anti-Soviet Struggle: The First Stage
Although the decision at the Tenth Plenum toopen political warfare with the Soviet Onionappealed to many Chinese (on nationalistic if not racialhere were indications in the spring3 that many others were uneasy about the break with Moscow and its long-term effect on Communist China'storeat world power. As discussed at some length above, there is good evidence that at some time2 the party high command had been forced to deal with dissident elements within the People'sArmy, especially within the Air Force, who hadolicy of accommodation in order to secure additional Soviet military and economic support. IC is all the more remarkable, then, that certain Chinese Communist officials apparently continued to question the wisdom of waging an anti-Soviet struggle even after the grim warning in the Tenth Plenum communique that suchwould be construed as Soviet-inspired subversion.
military officer to the effect that Premier Chou En-lai still favored re-establishing good relations with the USSR.*
It was also at this time that the editorhinese Communist newspaper in Hongriefing in Canton to report that the Sino-Soviet dispute had resulted in "considerable loss of spirit and enthusiasm among people on the mainland who now feared that the lofty goals of industrialization, agricultural mechanization and great power status might never be realized.
if oblique, references to the demoralizing effects of the anti-Soviet struggle at theexample,S July China Youth article that "some of our youth are liable to becomend feel anxious
"It is interesting to note that Chou En-lai on several occasions in recent years has predicted quick victory for China in the Sino-Soviet conflict, most notably in his secret speech to the National People's Congress in2 when he contended that Khrushchev "would be obliged within two years" to reassess his China policy and, by implication, resume military and economic assistance. Although hardly qualifying as evidence of "pro-Soviet" inclinations, this position does suggest considerable defensiveness in the face of domestic criticism as well as an effort to allay anxiety on the part of his audience.
nodiSoEm
concrete incidents appearing on the stage
of international class struggle."
Hoping perhaps to capitalize on just such attitudes and tendencies, it is now known that Khrushchevidruce by dispatching several conciliatoryto the CCP in the fall and winter, renewed offers of economic and technical assistance in exchangeessation of Chinese polemical attacks. As is also well known, the Chinese Communist response was to advance itsune "Proposaleneral Line for the International Communist Movement" which in effect called upon Communists everywhere to switch theirfrom Moscow to Peiping. As noted earlier, it was ironic that Communist China should proclaim its right to lead the International Communist movement at just the point In time when failure to come upiable Third Five Year Plan had demonstrated its inability to chart ancourse of economic development.
Indeed, the new "general line" advanced by Communist China at this time was singularly devoid of theoretical or practical guidance in the organization and planning of socialist economic construction. Of theointsthis new program, only one dealt directly with this important subject and this was the negativethat "each socialist country must rely mainly onfor its construction". steer clear of such Soviet schemes to "integrate" bloc economies as CEMA.)
The remaining points bearing on the nature ofsociety all stressed the need to strengthenand military controlsf (the dictatorship of thein order to guard against the machinations of class enemies and the ever present danger of "theof capitalism." In keeping with these guidelines, Communist China's domestic policy in the latter half3 would be characterized by an intensification ofpressures as tho regime groped for new solutions to its perennial economic problems.
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C. The "Three Groat Revolutionary- December
A new phase in Chinese Communist domestic policy was initiated in late3 wljen Mao Tse-tungthe dictum: "Class struggle, production struggle and scientific experiment are three great revolutionary movements in buildingowerful socialistlthough purporting to provide new general guidelines for China's socialist construction, this prescription, as elaborated in party publications in the summer and fall,umber of the theoretical propositions which Chairman Mao had advanced periodically5 as the answer to China's economic problems. Reflecting this development, the Peiping regime revived the "general line for socialist construction" (introduced In8 on the eve of the "great leapn the falllevating itosition of major Importance lnof Communist China's future development.
To the discomfiture of the dominant leaders, this renewed effort to substitute ideological for material incentives in Communist China's economicencountered resistance which was apparently Internally, the regime was forced to admit the existence of opposition extending from rural cadres generally up to and including "some comrades in leading positions." Externally, the Soviets pilloried theleadership not only for economic follies in the past but also for an apparent intent to repeat these follies in the future.
In the highly revealing September statement of Anna Louise Strong (Mao's American spokesman resident inCommunist China's "chief problemhow to keep the revolutionary spiritow to fight the tendencies of all men and revolutions toonfrontedolitically indifferent population and deprived of Soviet advice and assistance, there were clear signs in the closing months3 that the Peiping regime was floundering in the face of "new problems in socialist construction without ready-made answers."
1. Class Struggle: The Second Stage
Of the "three great revolutionary movements"by Chairman Mao in the most important was "class struggle" conceived as the motivating force "to drive the struggle for production'and scientific experiment forward.*1 With this reassertion of the primacy of political and ideological work (the concept oftakeshe Chinese Communist leadership revealed an important truth about this allegedly newfor China's socialistthis program resembled in many respects the original "general line for socialist construction" which Liu Shao-chi badto the second session of the Eighth Party Congress in8 on the eve of the "great leap forward." The resemblance between these two programs, separated by five years in time and by the harrowing experience of economic disaster, is so striking that it deserves furtheron.
First, and foremost, it became increasingly clear in the fall3 that the "socialist education" and "five anti's" movements (which together comprise the "class struggle" campaign) were modeled closely after theand "anti-rightist" movements. Just as "rectification" had sought toroduction upsurge "by raising the socialist consciousness of the workers and arousing the enthusiasm of thehe objectives of "socialist education"3 were "tothe labor enthusiasm of the masses and encourage their zeal for production" and to mobilize all tbe forces that can be mobilized and organize all the people who can be organized into the struggle for production." As was true in the earlier period, it was again held that the key to success in this mobilization effort lay indefects in cadre "workrimarily correcting the defect of "bureaucratism" of China's rural cadres by having them "participate in collective, productive labor."
As expoundedeyuly Red Flag editorial, rural cadre participation in collective, productive labor was of "fundamental importance" to the success of Communist
China's socialist revolution and socialist construction. Among the manifold advantages accruing from this practice perhaps the most important was the "power of example" which cadre participation in physical labor was supposed to generate among China's peasants. As depicted here, China's millions of rural cadres would thereby serve as miniature Lei Feng's, becoming "bosom friends" of the toiling peasants, fostering industry and thrift, and "stimulating the labor enthusiasm of the masses." Of particular interest was the claim that this method of overcoming "bureaucracy" (in both rural and urban areas) would enable Communist China "to greatly increase the amount and greatly accelerate the tempo of socialist capitalequirement all the more urgent (as the editorial pointed out) now that Peiping could no longer look to "foreign countries for loans." As Liu Shao-chi8 had called for the mobilization of China' peasants "to create limitless wealth and thus accumulate large amounts of funds for national industrialso did Red Flag inxhort."all Of our cadres to be fully aware of this way to'increaseof socialist capital by overcoming bureaucracy."
Finally, cadre participation in collective,labor was essential for carrying out the last of the "three great revolutionaryorevolutionary movement of scientific experiments lanned way throughout the country." In rural areas, this meant (according to an important September Red Flag article) "cultivating experimental plots" together-with-veteran peasants and scientific and technical personnel and thus "finding out the objective laws governing the struggle for agricultural production." Again therelear precedent for this in Liu8 report which had directed that "all party cadres must putto work on 'experimental plots'" in order to secure "necessary knowledge in science and technology to guide the workother words, to become both "Red" and "expert."
One difference (an important one) was that it was no longer possible3 to sustain the image of leaping progress which Liu had expressed8 in the slogan:
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"hard workew years, happinessrue, theuly Red Flag editorial did revert to the estimate advanced during the "great leap forward" era that it would take onlyecade or two to catch up with the most advanced levels in the world in science and technology and build ourowerful socialist state with modernodernmodern national defense and modern science andestimate which Chou En-lai just nine months earlier had termed "completely wrong." But this was not repeated,uch more representative view of future developments was that given by Chou Yang in his important policy speech given onere, instead of predictions of rapid material progress and future prosperity for the Chinese people, thespectacle" which Chou Yang conjured up before his audience was one of heroic struggleears" culminating in "complete victory" for the world revolution.
Another difference was that the Chinese Communist leadership exercized greater restraint in promoting this new mobilization campaign Indeed, the regime apparently felt compelled to extend the original tins-table for this campaign once aware of the widespread opposition it had aroused. Announcedune, this undertaking to promote cadre participation in physical laboranacea for China's economic ills bad by July reached the statusation-wide propaganda campaign. In editorial after editorial, the People's Dailythe manifold benefits of this remedy and warned of the dangers which failure to implement promptly might entail. By early August, however, lt was admitted that basic-level rural cadres, displayingad raised numerous objections, especially that it affected the performance of their
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administrative duties. Then, taking cognizance of this ground-swell of protest,eople's Daily editorial ofugust sounded the signal for tactical retreat by asserting: "We must refrain from hastily promoting cadre participation in physicalhould allow ourselves at least several years before this great'can be broughtuccessful conclusion."
Even more intriguing were the indications at this time that opposition to this new mobilization effort extended into the leadership as well. Appearing In theuly Red Flag editorial noted above andollow-upuly People's Dally editorial, the charges leveled against those leaders (identified only as "some comrades in leadingere that they failed to realize that "correctnly comes from the threeof class struggle, production struggle andexperiment" and, more ominously, that "their worlds still bourgeois or still has the remnants of bourgeois ideology."* In this lattertheretrong suggestion tbat the dominant Chinese leaders were once again contendingody of opinion among the leadership counseling more moderate and pragmatic domestic
easonable inference that these were the same "some comrades" who would be criticizedeptember Red Flag article for fearing that "class struggle would affect production.'
ii
the identity of the "some comrades" mentioned here is admittedly vague, it is legitimate to question whether this opposition may not have arisen at theor even county levels of leadership rather than at the party center. Although not conclusive, previous studies haveairly consistent pattern in Chinese Communist usage of the term "some comrades" in discussing opposition to party policies,attern indicating not only that these "some comrades" actually opposed policy measures but also that these "some comrades" in mostwere situatedairly high level within the
Confronted with this demonstration of widespread resistance, the Peiping regime apparently decided in the fall3 that stronger measures were required to secure compliance with its policies. The first of these was intensification of the "class struggle" campaign in rural areas. The second was the launchingong-term "five anti's" campaign throughout the party, with the smashing of "modern revisionism" as its primary goal. Each of these significant developments deserves brief mention.
According to the new "hard" line ln rural areas (as spelled out in theeptember issue of Red Flag and even more candidly in theecember issue of the Canton South Chinat was urgently necessary to step-up the struggle against "class enemies" who were "trying to usurp leadership" over basic levelin the countryside. Although the traditionalof "landlords, rich peasants, and bad elements" were the nominal objects of this attack, it was clear that the real objectshe more productive and enterprising peasants who had prospered during the preceding three-year period of "limitedand were resisting regime efforts to diminish these freedoms;ural cadres who had sided with these peasants in the Interests of maximizing production. As stated candidly in theecember South China Daily, "ourot to develop any kind ofut agricultural production based on socialist collective economy." That these were the real objects was alsoby the means selected to enforce this new controlformation of poor and lower-middle peasant organizations under party control to "carry outtowards class enemies. In view of the harshfor intensifying the "classoxpose the subversivend smash the attacks of classnd of recent, refugee reportsgreater resort to violence in the countryside, this new campaign directed at China's more productive peasants may very well have adverse effects on Communist-China's agricultural production.
Tha best evidence that "class struggle" badew stage of severity, however, was the appearance of the "five anti's" campaign in Whereaseducation" relied primarily on indoctrinationto the "rectification" movementhe appearanceew "anti's" campaignhift from ideological to political struggle, fromto coercion.
as aand preventive measure, this campaign has beenby an authoritative party spokesman as "necessary to prevent leading party members from acceptingdoctrines."
In contrast with this increasingly assertiveline, however, there were clear signs of confusion and uncertainty in Pelping's economic policy in thehalf It isrief examination of this significant development that we now turn.
2. Production ;truggle: The Second Stage
There is little question but that the failure of Communist China's Third Five Year Plan to materialize3ajor disappointment to the Peiping regime. Slated for disclosureational People's Congress session originally scheduled for early summer, theof this session appeared largely motivated by
a desire to gain time in order to come upiable plan. As late asegime spokesmanisiting Japanese delegation that the Third Five Year Plan would soon be made public and that it wouldlan for "realizing socialism through China's own efforts" featuring "substantial construction.? In October,Premier Chou En-lai revealed publicly that China was still "operating on the basis of annual plans'* and Vice Premierdmittedurther period of "readjustment" was necessary beforeong-term plan which might be "five, seven or ten years" in duration.
Among the factors prompting this embarrassingetter appreciation of China's technological deficienciesore accurate diagnosis of China's economic ailments were undoubtedly important. Probably of more immediate importance, however, was thethat the "bumper harvest" on which tbe regime had pinned its hopes for an economic upsurge3 was not forthcoming. Whereas in earlyhineseleaderizable increase in grainof someercent, subsequent estimates dropped sharplyigure just barely exceeding the annual rate of population increase.
Fortunately for Peiplng's propagandists, the inten-
sification of Sino-Soviet polemics inimely rationale for this embarrassing retreat. Onuly the Chinese Communists for the first time publicly charged that the "sudden" Soviet withdrawal of "all" of its experts and scrapping of aid agreements0 had "inflicted incalculable difficulties and losses on China's economy, national defense and scientific* Soviet "perfidy"ominant theme in the communique of the National People's Congress session (finally held fromovemberecember) and especially inecember People's Daily editorial which asserted that this perfidy has "caused heavy losses for China's work of construction" and "dislocated the original economic plan, greatly aggravating our difficulties." It remained for Vice Premiero in early4 to assignresponsibility for China's economic difficulties to
km
"the sudden blow struck by Comrade Khrushchev" With this public accusation (appearing In an interview with Anna Louisehe strategy of Communist China's leadership in designating Khrushchev the chief scapegoat for Its own economic policy errors was revealed for all to see.
At the same time, thereumber ofthat the Peiping regime was deeply concerned about the unsatisfactory performance of- Communist China's economy3 and its prospectso-it-alone policy of economic development. In contrast with the self-assured and optimistic tone of pronouncements earlier in the year, the tone of policy statements at the Nationalctober and the National People's Congress session in late November was sober (if not somber) and clearly defensive in Justifying China's policy of "national
Two developments in domestic policy in the fall3 reflected this growing concern over tbe food/ population problem. First was the revelation in late October (by Vice Premierapanese visitor) that Communist China had "recently" shifted the focus of its agricultural development program away fromto place greater emphasis on the production andof chemical fertilizer. adical departure from the policy line established by Chairman Mao as early3 and reiterated periodically through the fallismissed mechanization as "not too practical
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for many pares of China" where there was already anof labor power. By contrast, this new approach to agricultural development appeared much more sensible ln terms of China's needs and, if persisted in, shouldbeneficial long-term results.
The second development was the intensification and expansion of Communist China's birth control programthe public sponsorship of Premier Chou Of particular interest in the fallwas the candid admission that birth control was essential to solveChina's food and clothing problems. According to statements of refugees and other reports coming out of China, tho regime was now telling the Chineae people that without birth control "the average per capita consumption of food cannot be increased" and "tbe standard of living of the Chinese people cannot be raised." Reports also indicate that sanctions of increasing severity against early marriage and excessive births. familiesbirthourth child to be deprived thereafter of state assistance of any kind) were being Invoked in the fall
Probably tbe moot significant development ln the latter halfowever, was the appearance of an unmistakable note of confusion and uncertainty ln Chinese Communist discussions of domestic policy. This note was first sounded3 July People's Dally editorial which implied that the inability of "leading cadres to achieve uniform knowledge through consultation and dlacusslon" had bean one of the factors preventing solution of China's
view of his continuing, close association with this doctrinally-suspect program, itair inference that Chou En-lai ls the leading proponent of birth control among the Chinese leadership. In this connection, the Chinese leader la reported to have stated on his recent African trip that Communist China's population problem la "the main problem for any responsible Chinese leader."supplied"?
Still another sign of confusion was the curious treatment of the "three red banners" (which symbolized Mao Tse-tung's distinctive approach to China's economic development) in Chinese Communist policy discussion in the fall First, oneptember Chou En-lai alluded to this concept in almost ironic terms when he declared: "Tfe have at last found the key to socialist the three red banners of theline for socialist construction, the^great leap forward and the" (Underlining Beginning tbe very next day with the celebration of National Day, however, there was no further reference to these "three red banners" in high-level policythroughout the remainder of the year. Tending to confirm the signiflcance of this propaganda indicator,
It remains only to note briefly more recentof vacillation and confusion in Chinese Communist domestic policy. Even Chou Yang's public declaration of the right of Peiping and Chairman Mao to lead theCommunist movement (published onecember) reflected this uncertainty while proclaiming "the groat international significance" of China's experience in revolution.and construction. After recounting at some length the early and intermediate periods of this
experience (the road tohou could only refer to "new problems arising from present socialist revolution and socialist construction" in the contemporary period. Then, clearly implying that Communist China was still groping for solutions, Chou urged his audience to take the "basic generalizations" of these, problems byMao Tse-tung and the central committee" and "further expound and develop /them/ into theory."
Finally, an article in theeople's Daily entitled "Leadership andthe explicit admission that Communistsearching for new solutions to its staggeringof economic development. Perhaps designed todemands of high-level party and governmentmore clear-cut policy directives, this articleat some length on the epistemologicalhuman error; oted conditions undersserted that "whenundertaken by us fails due to an. erroneousweonscientiously summarize thepast experience." The article then concludedthe urgency of learning from pastthe present time 'when several new problemsanswers have arisen in our socialist (Underlining supplied)
3. Anti-Soviet Struggle: The Second Stage
It is perhaps fitting to conclude this lengthy survey of Chinese Communist domestic policyrief comment about the most recent phase of the Sino-Soviet struggle. For whatever the nature^ of Sovietnd provocation throughout preceding years, Peiping's continued defiance of Moscow in the latter half3 could not but appear irrational when judged strictly by the standard of economic development needs. Suggesting that Communist China's leadership was aware of-this fact, the National People's Congress communiqueecember was clearly defensive in discussing China's newlypolicy of "national self-reliance." Moreover,
there were indications that some of these leaders once again in the fall3 were advocating more moderate tactics in the Sino-Soviet dispute.
First, thereoticeable slackening of Pei-ping's anti-Soviet attacks throughout October and early November, coinciding with the new awareness of Communist China's bleak prospects for economic development noted in the preceding section of this paper. As might be expected, the principal spokesman during this hiatus in the Sino-Soviet polemic was Premier Chou En-lai who on two occasions discounted the likelihoodino-Soviet break, asserted that the dispute was not irreconcilable, and even implied (onctober) that China "would accept, friendly help" if tendered by the Soviet Union. Equally striking was Vice Premier Chen I's statement in another October Interview that: "We will not imprudently throw away the friendship toward China of the CPSU, the Soviet people and the Red Army."*
Next was Khrushchev'sctober'call for theof open polemics,onth laterPSU letter containing concrete proposals for "strengthening the economic, scientific-technological and culturalbetween the USSR and the CPR" and including another offerontingent basis) to return Soviet experts to China. Although this Soviet initiative was primarily tactical in nature (an effort to make Communist China appear responsible for continuing open polemics),may also have hoped by this conciliatory gesture to strengthen the hand of more moderate elements within the Chinese Communist leadership and thus effect some measure of reconciliation in Sino-Soviet relations.
"Thisoi course, an ambiguous formulation which conspicuously omits Khrushchev from the listing ofin Soviet society whose "friendship" the Chinese valued. When contrasted with the vitriolic attacks of Communist China's "party-machine" leaders, however, this wastriking statement.
If so, the Soviet leader's hopesossible rapprochement were doomed from the outset. Forduring the latter half3 were makingclear that the hard-line, ideologically-motivated leaders Liu Shao-chi and Teng Hsiao-ping were exercizing major responsibility for Sino-Soviet relations and, in what appeared toelated development, had gained greater prominence and stature among the Chinese Communist leadership. Since changes in the relative prominence of top leaders in the past have usually reflected policy changes. the shift to more moderate policies in the fall0 aod the corresponding rise in influence of Chou En-lai), this apparent shift in the relativeof Communist China's top leaders in favor of tho more radical "party-machine" grouping deserves further discussion.
Liu Sbao-chi's Increased stature was revealed dramatically in the second major polemical attack against the Sovietbe Question of Stalin" datedeptember) In which bis role in the Chinese revolution was suddenly elevatedosition almost co-equal with that of Mao Tse-tung. It was also suggested by Liu's increasingly prominent role in the anti-Soviet struggle in3. his "Important" secret speech In late October laying down doctrinal guidelines for this inal Indication that Liu has beenhis position as Mao Tse-tung's successor, he was credited4 Red Flag article with"an outstanding contributionarxist-Leninist n accolade previously reserved for Mao
The increased importance of Teng Hsiao-ping (who as Secretary General is generally regarded as the number three man in the CCP) was symbolized by his appointment as acting premier in December during Chou En-lal's extended
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tour of Africa. Having headed the Chinese delegation to Moscow in July and having received unusual prominence at National People's Congress session in November, theof the doctrinaire and militant Tengeading government role (especially in conjunction with Liu Shao-chi's sudden rise in stature)orresponding decline in influence of the very forces of moderation to which Khrushchev had presumably directed his appeal.
The increasingly impassioned and vitriolic nature of Peiping's anti-Soviet attack in the fall3 also tended to support this conclusion. Although the content of these polemics lies outside the scope of this paper, it should be noted that Soviet counter-attacks at this time began to focus on the "utter failure" of Communist China's domestic development policy.* Of particular interest in this Soviet indictment was the charge that Communist China's leadership still clung to certain of the theoretical propositions which had produced the "great leap forward." There is reason to believe, moreover, that this allegation, when applied to the dominant "party-machine" leaders surrounding Mao Tse-tung, was true.
As the first of these theoretical propositions, the Soviets charged that the Chinese leaders continue to proclaim the basic rationale for the "great leap
Mao Tse-tung's so-called theory that the basic wealthts manpower." Speaking at almost the same point Tn time, Peng Chen (another leading member of the "party-machine" group) appeared to reaffirm this theoryctober National Day address when he lauded Communist China's "general line of socialist construction" as "capable of mobilizing to the maximum extent thelabor enthusiasm of all the Chinese people to
'Indicating tne effectiveness of this strategy, Peiping's National Day Red Flag editorialctober was devoted largely to explaining in defensive tones why the "modernlander, curse, tease and viciously attack China's socialist construction."
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overcome all difficulties and propel all our tasksat leap-forward speed." (Underlining supplied)
The Soviets also charged that "the Chinesestill oppose moral incentives to materialtheory the Chinese Communists espousederhaps most candidlyin the key speech by Chouecember) whichanifesto ofto lead the international Communist movement. speech, Chou angrily denounced Khrushchev'swith individual "material incentives" andin socialist productioniolation oftheories of Marxism-Leninism." By contrast,that "true" Marxist-Leninists recognize and"the enthusiasm of the laboring masses forproductionocialist society" and "giveto political education which heightensconsciousness of the masses." (Underlining . '
Peiping's increasingly intensive "socialistcampaign3 was the best evidence,that the dominant Chinese leaders still opposed "moral" to "material" incentives in production. Asin4 People's Daily editorial, the ultimate objective of this campaign was "to transform the people's morality and gradually foster loftyethics and social customs." More concretely, as the same editorial made abundantly clear, these "lofty Communist ethics" meant "plain living and hardusterity and sacrifice. Viewed in this light, the chief problem confronting the Chinese Communists in the winteras the same problem (only considerablywhich had confronted them when Mao Tse-tung Issued the first callleap forward" in the winter ofto persuade the long-suffering Chinese people to produce more and consume less in order to accelerate economic development and transform backward Chinareat world power.
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VI. CONCLUSIONS
As stated at tho outset of this paper,rucial question in assessing the future course of domestic policy in Communist China is the extent to which Mao Tse-tung and his lieutenants have learned the lessons of failure of their "leap forward" approach to economic development. As preceding chapters have sought to demonstrate, Chinese Communist development policy forecadeeries of cyclical advances and retreats in successive attempts to implement this "leap forward" strategy. Conceived bothumming-up of what has gone before aad as an attempt to predict what lies ahead, the final chapter of this paper will discuss the key question of whether Communist China's leaders have in fact absorbed the major lessons of their "leap forward" experience.
Based on the findings of thisell as on more recent developments), the answer to this question oust be an equivocal "both yes and no." On the one hand, there is abundant evidence that the Chinese Communist leadership, well aware of serious errors in past efforts to translate these theories into practice, is attempting to apply them now with considerably more realism and practicality. As indicated in the preceding chapter, developments since the important Tenth Plenum of the CCP central committee in the fall2 strongly suggest that what the Peiping regime is now attemptingcontrolled leap" in economic development.
Perhaps the best single statement of the basic theory underlying Communist China's "leap forward" approach to economic development was made by Mao Tse-tung (in anwith Edgar Snow In the fallhen he asserted that "the Chinese people are China's greatest resource since they are available for transforming the country without capital outlay." Expressed explicitly orin this statement are the three main ingredients of Communist China's distinctive "mass-line" approach to economic construction: hat the basic wealthountry is its manpower; hat this manpowor Is "available"
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for mobilization and regimentation by the Chinese Communist party (in an accompanying statement Mao informed Snow that "the Chinese people would have toery narrow line for the foreseeablend that great numbers of people would have to do the same thing at the same time and accordingrescribedhat this massive mobilization of human labor power can be effected without resort to material incentives.
It should be noted that this "leap forward"strategy resembles in important respects Stalin.'s program of forced economic development in theorced draft program ofackward agrarian economy in which personal incentives and material well-being were considered to be of relatively little consequence. It should also be noted that thisto make greater use of China's most abundant resource, labor, to compensate for the lack of physical resources, capital and technologyerfectly rational policy in economic terms provided (and itrucial proviso) that it is Implemented with reason and restraint.
That the Peiping regime still clings to the basic theories underlying this "leap forward" strategy ofis strongly suggested by the "socialistcampaign under way in Communist China for the pastampaign which is again asserting withstridency that "politics must take command" over the economy and that political indoctrination rather than material incentives is the key to development of China's backward economy. This campaign has recentlyew stage of intensity in which the political commissar system of the People's Liberation Army is being extended to all departments of the national economy for the express purpose (in the words of Mao Tse-tung) "of arousing the -revolutionary spirit of the millions and tens of millions of cadres and masses on the economic front."
While the basic theories persist, there are at the same time haunting memories of the "great leap forward" fiasco which make for continued caution in theof these theories. These memories encompass some or all of the following "mistakes" of the "great leap
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foiward"which regime spokesmen freely hat over-rapid development of heavyhad caused "grave damage" to tbe national economy, particularly to agriculture and light industry; hat economic decentralization had produced waste anddue (in Maown words) "toand bad organization on the lowerhat overzealous local cadres had promoted the commune program "too quickly and on tooad falsified production achievements to such an extent that the central committee had 'lost itsnd had forced impractical production techniques upon the peasants.
esult of tbe conflict between theseof "leap forward' development and these recent failure, there has been an ambivalent,m bout recent Chinese Communistin the field of economic policy. This qualityparticularly marked in recent directives tothe economic front who are enjoined to -place theof socialistevolutionlzatlon")place and at the same time promote moremethods ofodernization.") oetween the demands of political orthodoxyrationality is well illustrated by theinstructions to China's economic cadres whichthe4 issue of the Peiping Ta Rungto strengthen ideological and political worksame time improve economic and technical work; launch mass movements and at the same timeand centralizedodrive and initiative and at the samein the scientific spirit;oindoctrination and at the same time
Confirming the view that the Chinese Communistis currently more concerned with "revolutionlzatlon" than "modernization" is the recent revelation tbat acommissar system modeled after the People'sArray has been established in all departments of the national economy. Although it is clear that theof this new political network is designed to tighten
no forejg'n disse^^cntro^lej jisseu
controls over the economy and society of China (anRed Flag commentary called for the formationiant^ politically disciplined "army of socialist economic construction" in the image of thet is not yet clear whether the Peiping regime views this new systemreventive measure tourther drift away from revolutionary Ideals orreparatory measure aimed at mobilizing the Chinese peopleew "production upsurge" or "leap forward" in the future.
Since these objectives are not incompatible, it is likely that Mao Tse-tung had both in mind when he called upon all departments of the national economy "to establish and strengthen political work by emulating the Liberation Army and thus arouse the revolutionary spirit of theand tens of millions of cadres and masses on the economichere is little question that popular apathy and concern for material welfare has deeplythe Peiping regime since the fall2 asin the mounting intensity of the, "socialistcampaign. At the same time, the ultimate objective of the "socialist education" campaign all along has been to accelerate economic development by fostering theof "plain living and hard struggle." Furthermore,reparatory measureew "all-outhich seems sure to come in time, this political network appears to provide precisely the basic-level organization that was lacking when the "great leap forward" was launched.
The question of the timing of the next "all-outis, of course, crucial. In this connection, recent evidence suggests that the Peiping regime is engagedairly protracted gearing-up process preparatory toew upsurge in economic developments pointed out in the preceding chapter, there arereports that the "socialist education" campaign,as political and ideological preparation, is to be carried out at different levels and ln successive stages extending Several Chinese Communist officials have indicated that grain purchases from the Host will continue for another two yearsor the purpose of building up grain stocks, presumably another preparatory measure lookingew economic advance.
by the chairman ot the National Economic Commission, in an interview with Anna Loui.se Strong,implies that Communist China will initiateall-out advance" in economic development asit has completed repayment of its debt to thein
If the Chinese Communists have in fact decided to postpone their next "leap forward"-likehis would help explain the ambiguous, contradictory tone of recent pronouncements on economic policy noted above. While intensifying political activity and strengthening its political control structure, the Peiping regime, mindful of its "great leap forward" failures, at the same time is advocating caution and restraint, and appears reluctant to make any radical changes in its present ad hoc pattern of economic and social controls. Another factorew "all-out advance" at this time is uncertainty about future economic development policy reflected in continuing admissions through the spring4 of "many new problems in socialist revolution and socialistor which solutions must be found."
Whatever these solutions may turn out to be, there is good reason to believe that they will be shapedby political and ideological factors rather than by considerations of economic rationality. The economic policies which appear best suited for Communist China's economic developmentong-term program of all-out aid to agriculture which would entail postponement of industrialization; ustained birth control(which even under optimum conditions can have little effect on reducing population pressuresdditional measures to maximize incentives andin agriculture;xtensive development of economic relations with the Sovtet bloc or the Free World in order to secure the machinery and technical assistance necessary for new industrial growth. With
the possible exception of the birth control program (the status of which is stillowever, the Peiping regime has not only not adopted the policies outlined above but during the course of tbe pastonths hasincreasingly to oppose them.
As this paper has attempted to-demonstrate, the personality, conceptions and patterns of thought of Mao Tse-tung also support the view that Communist China's future development policy will be*shaped primarily by political and ideological factors ratber than byof economic rationality. Although the record shows that Mao can be flexible when danger threatens, it shows even moreroclivity for simplifiedand organizational solutions to the complex problems of economic development. By insisting that the "science" of Marxism-Leninism does provide the answers to China's problems of economic development, the Chinese leader has tended to emphasize appeals to doctrine and faith rather than to reason and experience as the fundamental criterion in the solution of these problems. Mao's continuing penchant for rapid and inexpensive organizational(the most recent being the establishment in all departments of the national economyolitical commissar system modeled after the People's Liberation Army) suggests that he is still convinced that the "mass line" which had proved so successful in the political and military struggles of the revolution can be applied to the infinitely more complicated process of economic development. Since these conceptions have produced periodic attempts to "leap forward" in the past, it can be predicted with somethat there will be yet another attempt to incite an "all-out advance" in economic development in the future.
In addition to these political and ideologicalperhaps the basic source of the persistent strain of irrationality in Chinese Communist development policy is the fundamental contradiction between Peiping's grandiose ambition to rapidlyreat world power and the paucity of means at its disposal. It is this fundamental incompatibility between ends and means which seems tothe Chinese Communist leadership to experiment with radical innovationsontinuing searchhort-cut
to industrialization and great power status. Although Mao Tse-tung and the dominant leaders of the Chineseparty have undoubtedly learned some lessons from the excesses and more flagrant mistakes committed during the "great leap forward" era, they do not appear to have learned the most important lesson of< the. "leap forward" strategy itself is incapable of solving Communist China's staggering problems of economic development.
Original document.
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