The Cultural Revolution and Leadership Crisis in Communist China

Abstract

The proletarian cultural revolution, which was signaled by an attack upon an historical play in November 1965, nurtured by the rampage of the Red Guards beginning in August 1966, and intensified by the Revolutionary Rebels' seizure of power early in 1967, is the most drastic and extensive rectification campaign and purge ever to have occurred in the Chinese Communist regime. It has split the top leadership, rocked the foundations of party rule, and plunged the whole country into internal strife. By the spring of 1967, the central authorities on mainland China had, at one time or another, broken down in a number of major cities as well as in some remote areas. Judging by newspaper headlines, it looked as if mainland China were on the verge of disintegration. While tlhe world has been stunned by the confused and incredible news which originated from all sorts of wall posters, the experts also have, to a staggering degree, been confounded by the turmoil. As recently as the summer of 1966, few specialists would have considered it even remotely plausible that Communist China would be heading toward such a great upheaval. Recent spectacular developments have dramatized once again how little outside analysts really know about that country.