FIGHT FOR COMMUNISM!
	International Communist Workers Party
ICWP@Anonymousspeech.com

NOTE:  Due to an editing error, the article in the last Red Flag about the Chinese Cultural Revolution misleadingly listed its dates as 1966-1976.  This is the view of the Chinese government and most Western writers.  But from the standpoint of the masses –especially the “ultra-left” – the real revolution was suppressed by 1968.  This article—and others to follow – will draw lessons of this real revolution. 
The Cultural Revolution opened on May 25, 1966 with Nie Yuanzi’s big-character poster “Ignite the Cultural Revolution!”  She accused Beijing University leaders of trying to suppress “the strong revolutionary desire of the vast number of faculty members and students” who wanted to “wipe out all ghosts and monsters and all Khrushchevian counter-revolutionary revisionists – and carry the socialist revolution through to the end.”
Nie was carrying out the line of Mao’s new Central Cultural Revolutionary Group.  This body was charged with ridding the educational and cultural systems of right-wing ideology. Its work-group had visited her campus.  Mao praised Nie’s poster and got the national party newspaper to reprint it on its front-page. The masses were aroused.
Splits in CCP Leadership
Contradictions within the Chinese Communist Party leadership had been sharpening.  All CCP leaders said the main goal was increasing production.  But Liu Shaoqi’s faction wanted more “individual responsibility” (capitalist incentives).  Mao’s faction wanted the “socialist road.” 
None recognized that socialist principles (“to each according to work”) defined essentially capitalist social relations.  None fought for communist social relations (“to each according to need”).
Both factions opposed the “bourgeois reactionary line” of the Soviet Union.  Both aimed to root out the old regime’s “ghosts and monsters.”  Actually, most of the old bourgeoisie had already fled to Taiwan, or the government had bought their property.  Those working in industry and commerce were closely supervised by the CCP.  They were hardly a problem. 
No party leaders, including Mao, saw that socialism was transforming the CCP into a “red” bourgeoisie.  But by 1966, the Party-led bureaucracy had squashed Mao’s attempts to rid the Party of “rightist tendencies.” He argued that mass transformation of culture and education alone could guarantee socialism’s victory.  He decided to mobilize the masses to criticize his opponents.  But he did not mobilize them for communism.
The masses surged ahead of Mao, taking the struggle from the schools to the workers.  Students organized themselves as Red Guards. Their first units mainly included offspring of party, army and government bureaucrats. 
Liu’s group tried to stop them.  Its June 6 “Eight-Point Decision” stated that Party members should not publicly criticize other members.  Wall posters, meetings and demonstrations should stay on campus and off the streets. They thought that their “work teams” could subvert the movement.  This had worked to control previous “anti-Rightist” movements.  Liu sacrificed some high education officials, trying to pacify the students. 
Students soon tried to kick Liu’s work teams off 39 Beijing campuses.  These students were attacked as “disrupters, Rightists and counter-revolutionaries.”  Work teams dug up dirt on them from extensive Party files and persecuted them.  Some students crumbled under the pressure.
In late July Mao dissolved Liu’s work teams.  On August 5 he signed a big-character poster, “Bombard the Headquarters.”  A CCP Central Committee conference approved the “16-point Decision.” This clarified that the Cultural Revolution should criticize “power holders in the party who follow the capitalist road.”  It was not aimed at “rightists” among the masses, no matter who called them “rightists.”
Red Guards:  One Divides into Two
More youths became Red Guards.  New “revolutionary Red Guard” (or “rebel”) units formed.  Many new activists were industrial apprentices or part-time, second-class “contract” workers.  Some had been industrial workers during the Great Leap (1958-60) who were laid off and forced back to the countryside.  Others were small-scale merchants or peddlers.  The CCP considered these strata “suspect.” 
The “rebels” expanded the attack to local and higher party committees. Party authorities mobilized original Red Guard units to attack the “rebel” Red Guards as “Rightist.”
Since nobody was mobilized for communism, the fighting often seemed random.  All shouted support for Mao.  All denounced leading “capitalist roaders” like Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping.
Mao cancelled fall classes.  The Party allowed millions of students to travel free, all over China, to spread the Cultural Revolution. Mao welcomed millions in Tien An Min Square, making no distinction between competing Red Guard contingents. 
“Rebel” groups tried to contact factory workers.  Local party and trade-union officials set up the first workplace Red Guard units to protect themselves from the “rebels.” By November, however, “rebels” had penetrated the factories and formed many new “Revolutionary Red Guard” units.  
The “Rebels” sharpened the contradiction between the masses and the party.  They demanded the destruction of the files used to condemn people for their background.  In November, Mao supported them on this and other points.  Most Red Guards thought he could do no wrong.  They would pay dearly for this illusion.
Party and government organizations were losing influence.  The revolutionary Red Guards were becoming stronger.  The masses were moving far beyond what Mao had planned. The next article in this series will describe the 1967 “January Storm.”

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