Chapter 36: Reassessing Deng Xiaoping: Fifty Percent Merit, Fifty Percent Fault — Four Major Errors in a Lifetime (Part I)

Deng Xiaoping (1904–1997), originally named Deng Xiansheng and later Deng Xixian, adopted the name Xiaoping in 1927. He was a native of Guang’an, Sichuan. At the age of sixteen, he went to France under a work–study program, worked for five years, joined the Communist Youth League, and became acquainted with Zhou Enlai, Li Lisan, and others. At the age of twenty-one, he studied for one year at the Sun Yat-sen University in Moscow. In 1927, he returned to China via Mongolia with Feng Yuxiang. That same year, after the breakdown of cooperation between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party, Deng served as Secretary-General for Communist Party affairs.

In 1931, Deng entered the Jiangxi revolutionary base area and served as Party Secretary of Ruijin County, standing together with Mao Zedong. Deng was attacked under Wang Ming’s political line and criticized during the “Mao–Deng–Xie–Gu” incident. In 1938, Deng became First Secretary of the Communist Party’s 129th Division, with Liu Bocheng as Second Secretary. In 1940, he participated in Peng Dehuai’s Hundred Regiments Offensive. During the Huaihai Campaign in 1948, Deng served as Secretary of the General Front Committee, commanding an army of 500,000 troops. In 1949, Deng became First Secretary of the Southwest Bureau of the Communist Party, with Liu Bocheng as Second Secretary. In 1954, he was appointed Secretary-General of the Central Committee and Vice Premier of the State Council.

During the Anti-Rightist Campaign of 1957, Deng was in charge of suppressing and designating Rightists. Deng later told his daughter that he regretted not making greater efforts to stop Mao from committing grave errors. Twenty-three years later, he acknowledged that the Anti-Rightist Campaign had been excessively expanded. Deng stated that the 550,000 people labeled as Rightists were more than one hundred times Mao’s original estimate. Some reports indicate that when workers labeled as “anti-socialist elements” are included, the total number of people nationwide subjected to criticism and repression reached 3.28 million. The figure of 550,000 was an offhand number given by Deng, not the result of an actual statistical count.

During the Cultural Revolution in 1966, Deng was criticized as part of the “Liu–Deng capitalist roaders.” However, Mao instructed Wang Dongxing to convey a message to Deng: “You must endure it and not be anxious. Liu and Deng can be separated. If anything happens, write to me.” In 1968, Mao again stated, “Preserve his Party membership; no serious problems have been found in Deng’s history.”

In October 1969, during war-preparedness relocation, Deng was sent to Nanchang, Jiangxi. He lived in the former office of the infantry school commandant, received a monthly living allowance, and occasionally worked at a tractor factory.

After Lin Biao died in a plane crash in 1971, Deng remarked, “If Lin Biao had not died, it would have violated natural justice,” and wrote to Mao. In 1972, Mao commented, “Deng may engage in investigative research,” and Deng was arranged to travel and conduct inspections in Jiangxi.

In 1973, Deng returned to his former residence in Zhongnanhai in Beijing and served as Vice Premier in charge of foreign affairs. Mao again promoted Deng to Chief of the General Staff and Vice Chairman of the Central Military Commission, returning him to the core leadership. In 1974, as Zhou Enlai’s illness worsened, Deng served as Acting Premier.

In 1975, Mao asked Deng to preside over the drafting of a resolution on the Cultural Revolution. Deng responded, “I am a man from the land of Peach Blossom Spring, unaware of the Han, let alone Wei or Jin,” indicating that he was not suitable for drafting such a resolution. Mao replied, “Xiaoping does not grasp class struggle—white cat, black cat; whether imperialism or Marxism-Leninism.” This led to the campaign to “Criticize Deng and Oppose the Right-Deviationist Reversal of Verdicts.”

In January 1976, Zhou Enlai passed away, and Deng delivered the eulogy. At a Politburo meeting, Deng made his third self-criticism and expressed hope to see Mao again. Mao instructed, “Big-character posters criticizing Deng should not be taken to the streets.” Hua Guofeng announced, “According to Mao’s proposal, Deng’s posts are removed, but his Party membership is retained.” Deng responded, “I am deeply grateful that the Chairman allows me to remain in the Party.” In June, Deng and his family were permitted to move back to their old residence on Kuan Street.

In January 1977, after Mao’s death, Hua Guofeng, adhering to the principle of the “Two Whatevers,” strongly opposed Deng’s return. In April, Deng wrote to Hua expressing his support. In July, a resolution restoring Deng was finally passed, making him the third-ranking leader after Hua Guofeng and Ye Jianying. In November 1978, at a Central Plenum, Deng formally became the “core of leadership.”

I. The Four Upholds

In 1979, a conference of 5,000 senior cadres was held in Beijing to summarize historical experience. The majority of cadres strongly demanded repudiation of Mao Zedong and abandonment of Mao Zedong Thought. Wan Li stated, “This will be the last time we speak of Mao Zedong Thought.” Including Ye Jianying, Peng Zhen, and Lu Dingyi, a large number of senior central leaders agreed to remove Mao Zedong Thought. Deng Xiaoping instructed Hu Qiaomu to draft the “Four Upholds,” stating that “Mao Zedong Thought is the collective creation of the entire Party.” Hu removed the ultra-left content from Mao’s writings and recompiled the Selected Works of Mao Zedong. The insistence on “upholding Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought,” together with Party leadership, the dictatorship of the proletariat, and socialism, became four heavy clubs imposed upon the entire Party and the whole population.

In 1979, Deng Xiaoping suppressed the Democracy Wall movement at Xidan in Beijing and the calls for democratization, sentencing Wei Jingsheng and others to fifteen years in prison.

Regarding the personality cult of Mao Zedong, in 2009 a statue of Mao 30 meters tall, built from 8,000 granite blocks and weighing 2,000 tons, was erected in Changsha.

II. Refusing to Issue a Report Condemning Mao for the Starvation Deaths of Fifty Million

Deng Xiaoping did not deliver a Khrushchev-style four-hour report in 1956 denouncing Stalin for killing hundreds of thousands. Instead, in 1979 he insisted on upholding Mao Zedong Thought and continued to worship Mao Zedong. Had Deng Xiaoping possessed the courage to expose Mao Zedong’s responsibility for the starvation deaths of fifty million people, all of China would have erupted in thunderous applause and the world would have been shocked. Compared with Khrushchev’s denunciation of Stalin, Deng’s would have been even more explosive: Khrushchev’s was an atomic bomb; Deng’s would have been a hydrogen bomb.

However, Deng Xiaoping covered up for Mao Zedong and lacked the courage to lift the lid. As a result, even forty years later, no one has dared to lift it, making Deng inferior to Khrushchev in this respect.

As early as October 1959, the “Xinyang Incident” in Henan exposed massive starvation deaths in the Xinyang region. In one village in Guangshan County, out of ninety residents only a little over thirty survived. In Jiangzhai Village of Xixian County, out of 397 residents, only slightly more than ninety survived after a few months. Nearby mass graves held more than ten thousand bodies. In some villages, half the population died, forcing two villages to merge into one.

By the end of 1961, the Statistics Bureau of the Ministry of Grain investigated three years of starvation deaths and found that tens of millions were missing. The report was submitted to Zhou Enlai and Mao Zedong. Mao ordered, “Stop here; do not spread this externally.” Zhou followed the instruction and ordered the report destroyed and not circulated.

Mao Zedong remembered his 1950 visit to the Soviet Union to sign the Sino-Soviet Treaty, which included a secret Clause Seven stating that China’s population was too large and resources insufficient, and that without reducing the population by one hundred million, support could not be sustained. The detailed methods were to be decided by China itself. Mao remembered this.

According to the latest statistical data, the actual number of starvation deaths exceeded fifty million and reached ninety million, effectively fulfilling Stalin’s demand to reduce China’s population by one hundred million.

At the 7,000-Cadre Conference in 1961, Liu Shaoqi stated that mass starvation was “seven parts man-made disaster, three parts natural disaster.” In reality, it was “ten parts man-made disaster, with no natural disaster at all.” It was entirely due to Mao Zedong’s coercive policies that bound the peasants hand and foot and caused them to starve to death.

For stating “seven parts man-made disaster, three parts natural disaster,” Liu Shaoqi was persecuted to death during the Cultural Revolution. Deng Xiaoping did not rehabilitate Liu Shaoqi and continued to cover up Mao Zedong’s monstrous crimes.

III. The Sino-Vietnamese War: Attacking Vietnam to Save the Cambodian Communists — A Failed Rescue

The Sino-Vietnamese War was an unjust war launched by the Chinese Communist Party against Vietnam, lacking legitimate cause. The CCP claimed it was a “counterattack in self-defense,” but in reality deployed 300,000 troops along fourteen routes to invade Vietnam, capturing twenty Vietnamese towns and cities. The war lasted one month and unfolded in three stages. Casualties on both sides exceeded one hundred thousand and were roughly equal, but the fighting took place entirely on Vietnamese territory, causing greater destruction to Vietnam.

In January 1979, Deng Xiaoping visited the United States and told President Carter, “Some people say the tiger’s backside must not be touched; I insist on touching the tiger’s backside.” Carter smiled without responding, seemingly not fully understanding. Deng obtained tacit U.S. support and returned home to proceed without restraint.

In November 1978, Deng Xiaoping had just been recognized by the CCP as the “core of leadership.” His decision in 1979 to “punish Vietnam” was a war intended to establish his personal authority.

The Sino-Vietnamese War severed diplomatic relations between China and Vietnam for ten years and wiped out more than a decade of Chinese support for Vietnam against the United States. The immediate cause was Vietnam’s invasion of Cambodia in December 1978. On January 7, 1979, Vietnamese forces captured Phnom Penh, forcing the Cambodian communists into the jungle. The Cambodian communists were close allies of the CCP, and their leader Pol Pot had visited Beijing as recently as October 1978, where Hua Guofeng and Deng Xiaoping led a welcoming rally of 100,000 people in Tiananmen Square. Vietnam’s capture of Phnom Penh was seen as an intolerable loss of face, prompting China to “teach Vietnam a lesson.”

Pol Pot was a notorious mass murderer. Out of Cambodia’s population of eight million, two million died. Phnom Penh was turned into an empty city as the entire population was driven into rural labor. Vietnam’s invasion of Cambodia was partly triggered by Pol Pot’s massacre of large numbers of ethnic Vietnamese. However, Mao Zedong had cultivated an exceptionally close relationship with Pol Pot, and Hua Guofeng and Deng Xiaoping continued to maintain ties with this mass murderer, leading to the so-called “punitive” war against Vietnam.

Deng Xiaoping’s war to “punish Vietnam for invading Cambodia and destroying the Cambodian communists” produced mixed results, with losses outweighing gains and damage to China’s international reputation. Vietnam gained more strategically. The United States adopted a neutral stance: “Vietnam withdraws from Cambodia; China withdraws from Vietnam.” Both sides were effectively given equal punishment.

IV. The Removal of Hu Yaobang

Hu Yaobang was a rare CCP leader capable of leading the nation away from Mao Zedong. He directly confronted Hua Guofeng’s “Two Whatevers,” which held that whatever Mao Zedong had decided or said must never be altered.

In 1978, Hu Yaobang led the nationwide debate on the criterion of truth, asserting that practice is the sole criterion for testing truth and the only criterion for judging whether the Party’s line is correct. This negated the “Two Whatevers” and greatly liberated the thinking of the entire Party and the whole population.

The Cultural Revolution had produced massive numbers of wrongful convictions. With extraordinary resolve, Hu Yaobang not only redressed the injustices of the Cultural Revolution but extended rehabilitation back to the 1930s and 1940s, rehabilitating those wrongly labeled as “Trotskyists” during earlier purges, including early leaders such as Qu Qiubai, Li Lisan, and Zhang Wentian. Officials seeking rehabilitation queued outside Hu’s home. A popular saying emerged: “For hardship, go to the Organization Department; for injustice, go to Yaobang.”

Hu Yaobang proposed that the people stand above the Party, that the people come first, and that Party members must be loyal to the people. “The people’s nature is higher than Party nature.”

Hu Yaobang criticized the concept that “ownership by the whole people means ownership by no one,” arguing that the people received no tangible benefits and calling for change.

Hu Yaobang cracked down on corruption among the “princelings,” raiding their homes and provoking deep resentment among Party elders. In early 1987, the “1986 Student Movement” erupted across China. Large-scale demonstrations broke out in seventeen major cities, including Shanghai, Guangzhou, Beijing, Wuhan, and Tianjin, demanding democracy, freedom, and human rights, and opposing official profiteering and corruption, shocking Zhongnanhai.

Party elders groundlessly blamed Hu Yaobang for indulgence that allowed the movement to spiral out of control. Hu proposed convening a meeting to discuss the response, but Deng Xiaoping refused and instead ordered Hu to attend a private talk at a designated location. Deng accused Hu of failing to oppose bourgeois liberalization and of not upholding the Four Cardinal Principles, and informed him that he must attend a “Party life meeting.”

The “Party life meeting,” chaired by Bo Yibo and attended by twenty to thirty senior Party elders, took the form of a Cultural Revolution–style struggle session, with participants speaking in turn. Wang Zhen accused Hu of standing on the wrong political line. Deng Liqun spoke for five hours, denouncing Hu for failing to heed senior leaders and for inaction against “spiritual pollution.” Only Xi Zhongxun pointed at Bo Yibo and angrily condemned the use of Cultural Revolution methods to force Hu from office as a violation of Party principles.

After seven consecutive days of denunciation, Hu Yaobang was approved to resign as General Secretary while retaining his position on the Politburo Standing Committee, ranked last. When the meeting ended, Hu left last. Unable to walk further, he sat on the steps and wept alone.

V. Hu Yaobang Humiliated While Speaking, Leading to His Death from a Heart Attack

On April 8, 1989, Zhao Ziyang chaired a Standing Committee discussion. Li Tieying, Director of the State Education Commission, requested funding to improve student meals and expand cultural and recreational facilities in order to prevent university students from taking to the streets again. Hu Yaobang spoke, calling for an examination of root causes: problems of Party conduct and clean governance. He stated that students’ demands were anti-corruption, anti-privilege, and called for the implementation of political reform.

As Hu had just begun speaking, Standing Committee member Yao Yilin interrupted him, saying, “You’re talking about that student movement again. Haven’t you already self-criticized it? Why repeat the same old tune? If you want to talk about Party conduct, I want to talk about agriculture and grain production!”

Premier Li Peng then interjected, saying, “Comrade Yaobang must correct his attitude and not anger Comrade Xiaoping again. If you want to talk about Party conduct, my urgent priorities are industrial production, the fiscal deficit, foreign trade exports, and foreign exchange shortages.”

Faced with such treatment from people who had been his subordinates just two years earlier, Hu Yaobang felt extreme humiliation. His face alternated between red and pale as he clutched his chest. Zhao Ziyang was about to intervene and invite him to continue when he saw Hu’s face turn ashen. Hu raised his hand slightly and said, “Comrade Ziyang, I need to ask for leave…” His head tilted to one side, and he collapsed in his chair. Hu Qili, seated beside him, quickly supported him, shouting, “Call a doctor! Call an ambulance!”

Zhao Ziyang immediately stood up and said, “This is a sudden heart attack. Do not move him. Lay Yaobang flat and wait for the doctor. Does anyone have nitroglycerin?” Jiang Zemin and Qin Jiwei both took out tablets they carried with them, and Hu Qili placed one in Hu Yaobang’s mouth.

Eight minutes later, an ambulance with doctors and nurses arrived and took Hu Yaobang to the 305 Hospital, where he was resuscitated.

News that Hu Yaobang had suffered a heart attack after being humiliated at the meeting quickly spread through Beijing’s intellectual and cultural circles.

Seven days later, on April 15, 1989, Hu Yaobang died. His death triggered massive public mourning in Beijing, followed by suppression by the authorities, which in turn sparked hunger strikes by students and citizens. Ultimately, Deng Xiaoping approved the deployment of 200,000 troops and several hundred tanks. On the night of June 4, a four-hour crackdown was carried out, resulting in a shocking incident in which more than 30,000 people died, stunning China and the world.