Chapter 29 Liu Shaoqi returned to Hunan to investigate 1961

Journalist: “Didn’t you agree to rehabilitate a large number of right-leaning opportunists? Why not rehabilitate Peng Dehuai?”

Mao: “In 1960-1961, Liu Deng convinced me to vindicate more than one million right-leaning opportunists, Deng Zihui also restored the vice premier. Beidaihe meeting, Zhu De proposed to vindicate Peng Dehuai, I said: to invite Peng Dehuai back, Lushan thing a wind blowing, the three red flags do not want? The company’s main business is to provide a wide range of products and services to the public. The old Peng must not be overturned, he turned, I still into what?”

Journalist: “And then you instructed cadres to investigate the countryside?”

Mao: “Yes, my main purpose is to pass the buck to the following. 1961 January Beijing Central Committee meeting, I turned out the 1930s in Fujian wrote ‘investigation work’ to everyone, the implication is that I have long been realistic, these years not realistic, bragging and boasting, falsehoods, is to forget my teachings, to push the mistakes to the following. I encouraged the leaders to go down to investigate.

In April 1961, Liu Shaoqi and Wang Guangmei back home in Hunan Province to investigate 44 days, with only three secretaries around, without guards and other entourage, living in the production team empty piggery, sleeping on an old wooden bed of straw, two dining tables 4 benches, no electric light candles. Liu Shaoqi all the way deep investigation, see many heartbreaking scenes. He saw a telephone pole, written ‘Down with Liu Shaoqi!’ He saw a pole with the slogan ‘Down with Liu Shaoqi!’ written by a boy whose family starved to death 6 people a year and hated the Communist Party. Liu Shaoqi said: do not arrest him, understandable.

Liu Shaoqi convinced the cadres not to punish the peasants who stole food, the peasants said cadres big take, I am small take. He opened an investigation will apologize to the folks bowed and said sorry. He took a small wooden strip in his hand to pick apart human dung to see what was eaten, and what was eaten by livestock, what was the difference? During the investigation, Liu Shaoqi went to visit his sister, bringing 5 kg of rice, 2 kg of cookies, 2 kg of candy, 1 bottle of lard. He saw his sister lying in bed sick with hunger, and his brother-in-law had just died of hunger to go. Brother-in-law wrote a letter to him, reflecting the misery of starvation, the letter was intercepted, was buckled “destroy the Great Leap Forward” hat, tied to a tree criticism.

Liu Shaoqi heard the old peasants say: The Great Leap Forward starvation is not a mistake of one finger, it is 3 parts natural disaster and 7 parts man-made disaster. He went back to Beijing and said: ‘We can’t go on like this any longer.’”

Journalist: “It looks like Liu Shaoqi investigation, is very serious, hold a lot of sympathy. You also went to investigate?”

Mao: “No. I will only instruct others, I do not investigate, I just train the peasants, will not listen to them with that kind of sympathy.”

Journalist: “According to government statistics, how many people died of starvation in a few years?”

Mao: “A few years of national famine, according to government statistics, 37.55 million people died of starvation in four years.
1959, 5.22 million people died of starvation
1960, 11.55 million people starved to death
1961, 13.27 million people starved to death
1962, 7.51 million people starved to death

Henan, Anhui, Sichuan and Gansu were the worst hit areas, and the most people died of starvation.

In 1960, 40,000 people died of starvation in Jiangkou County, Guizhou, and the peasants struggling on the death line rose up. They were led by the secretary of the Commune Party Committee, whose children also died of starvation. Hungry, unarmed peasants were soon suppressed by the army. The governor of the county who had opened a warehouse to release grain drank a bullet and killed himself. The county party secretary who had misrepresented grain production threw himself into the river and died, sad and tragic. They were not thugs, they just wanted to live.

The actual number of people starving to death is more than the government statistics. International estimates are that 65 million people died of starvation, while domestic scholars generally think that 4,000 people died of starvation.” According to old cadres of the Ministry of Public Security, Yang Shangkun presided over the 1964 survey, and 96 million people died of starvation nationwide, the latest figure. To solve the famine, there are two keys, one is the dissolution of public canteens, one is the package to the household.”

Journalist: “Liu Shaoqi disaster relief you get away with?”

Mao: “three years of famine, Liu Shaoqi disaster relief white head, to support the crisis, I went to the south to get away with pleasure, deep study ‘Zizhi Tongjian,’ to Liu code name: Jade Emperor, I learned from Zhu Yuanzhang, to bring down the Jade Emperor, my political sinister and vicious, life is a mess, rogue tactics.”