Dear Comrades,
I report to you, that Mao and the CCP have officially ditched their Great Leap Forward program. It is about time! Violence, death, destruction, famine etc. have all become the norm. Many of these catastrophes have clouded peoples memories to even why the program was initiated, and what it intended to do. For a refresher, It was Mao’s attempt to turn our country into an industrialized nation and away from an agrarian society. Further we had to owe the Soviet Union a large amount of grain, as a payback unit (debt), so we were tasked with producing an immense and unrealistic amount. So, what went wrong??
We thought we knew better than science. We were so desperate to increase grain production, and generally produce more, that we resorted to arrogantly thinking we can’t go wrong. Military leader, Peng Dehaui commented on this disaster in his paper: “Critique of the Great Leap Forward”. He wrote: “Because they were raised at every level, some quotas, which could only be met after…dozen years, became targets to be fulfilled in one year or even a few months. By so doing, we divorced ourselves from reality and lost the support of the masses.” These desperate measures, were specifically planting crops too close to each other, and digging 6 feet plus into the ground which essentially destroyed the crops; and was a foolish attempt by us ignoring what we have known about the basic laws of science and nature. Specifically, Mao thought this concept of planting crops very close to one another and digging deep in the soil, was the answer! He instructed us that this concept, called (deep ploughing ) will kill off the insects, and help promote growth of crops faster. He said: Deep ploughing helps weeding. Digging up roots in turn helps elimane insects…once we can go down to the grass roots, we can increase production.” Instead, as we have seen play out, the crops needed room to grow, and digging too far down destroyed all the soil.
If things couldn’t get worse, we also interfered with nature. Mao banked on eliminating the four pests, which were rats, sparrows, flies, and mosquitos. He wrote: “The less we have of these four pests, the better for us; because these four pests harm the people and directly affect the health of the people.” We now have figured out that killing all the sparrows, enabled all the locusts to directly eat our crops. We have confirmed that our attempt to disrupt nature, directly caused this great famine.
As a result, tens of millions of people became starved, overworked, and physically ill. Because of these policies, crops could not grow properly and the forced quotas called for desperate measures taken by the people; which in turn caused chaos. It was this mass famine that created mass suffering, which created mass desperation, which then created mass violence, which coupled with everything else, created mass death. Unrealistic forced quotas for grain and crop production, the failure of the deep ploughing method, and arrogantly disrupting the flow of nature, and negligently ignoring basic laws of economics and science, allowed this disaster to happen.
Mao’s attempt to force nature to collectivize certainly failed. I like the way you juxtapose science and Mao’s policies. Unfortunately, we have too many comrades and too few scientists and intellectuals. This madness needs to stop in the countryside! Communism has failed on its promise of prosperity, especially the rhetoric of the Yenan years. I wonder if the party will turn back to intellectuals to rehabilitate the country after this man-made catastrophe.
Unfortunately, as there is no model for our country to follow (what with the Soviet Union’s collectivization being a disaster and their leader now becoming part of our country’s downfall), the Party has made some mistakes that I’m sure they will be able to learn from for the future. I hope that industrialization does eventually work and make China rich so we have enough money to actually feed our people who worked so diligently during the Great Leap to realize Mao and the Party’s goals. It doesn’t help that so many cadres in the countryside were completely corrupt either, erasing any of the progress the agricultural workers managed to make.
Deceivers and the self-serving around every corner, I believe the blame can only be served as the feet of these malfeasers. I disagree with the assessment that Mao is to blame for the failures of recent years. Even Peng Dehuai, cast aside for his obvious false platitudes, had more than a few great things to say about our gracious Chairman. This is the man who has led us through thick and thin, who cast off the oppressive nationalists and foreign invaders, why would he now stop at the finish line to seek pain and suffering? No! The Chairman has been betrayed by local cadres and officials who sought to ingratiate themselves with the party, however, this rouse can only last so long, thus their scheme has surfaced for all to see.
I can not agree with you in fear of being labeled a Rightist; however, the problems you lay out are indeed destroying our nation. Fortunately, I believe we will be able to return from it quickly under the leadership of the Party.