(The First: Li Da Takes the Stand)

The Emperor: What is your name?

Li Da: My name is Li Da.

The Emperor: What grievances do you have? What accusations do you bring against Mao Zedong?

Li: In 1958 Mao Zedong fanatically launched the so-called Great Leap Forward, spreading absurdities like “The bolder the people, the greater the harvest.” When he came to Wuhan, I seized a brief chance to see him for ten minutes and earnestly warned him: “If your brain burns to 40 degrees, those below you will reach 41 degrees, and the Chinese people will suffer catastrophe.” I also said: “Lin Biao praises you as the pinnacle of Marxism-Leninism; do not let it go to your head.” Mao would not listen and bore a grudge against me.

When the Cultural Revolution began in 1966, I was struggled against for two months and tortured until I suffered massive gastric hemorrhaging. In July Mao swam in Wuhan; I asked my secretary to deliver him a letter pleading for help—there was no response. In August another mass rally of 100,000 was held to denounce me. I collapsed, vomiting blood and losing consciousness. Two days later, I died.

The Emperor: Mao Zedong, Li Da accuses you of causing his death. What is your defense?

Mao: At the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, Wang Renzhong asked me what to do about Li Da. I said criticize him within the school, do not beat him to death. But I knew once criticism began it would spiral out of control. I thought Li Da had opposed me—criticized my Great Leap Forward and my so-called pinnacle status, much like Peng Dehuai. If he were beaten to death, so be it. I did not care.

The Emperor: Li Da, Mao admits responsibility for letting the persecution proceed and for your death. Do you have further accusations?

Li: At the start of the Cultural Revolution Mao had already become the “Red Sun,” hailed as the Party’s “founder and creator.” Red Guards came to investigate me because at the First Party Congress I had been second only to Chen Duxiu and Zhang Guotao. I truthfully recounted the circumstances: at that time Mao had not yet joined the Communist Party; he was only in the Youth League. I told him then, “You should join the Party and organize it in Hunan.” He was casually acknowledged as a representative. I did not conceal the truth for the ruler. My honesty became one of the charges that I had “slandered the Red Sun.”

The Emperor: Mao Zedong, are Li Da’s statements true?

Mao: Li Da described the First Congress truthfully. He did not safeguard my “Red Sun” status. I indeed harbored resentment.

The Emperor: Mao Zedong admits Li Da’s accusations are true.

(The Second: Fu Zuogong Takes the Stand)

The Emperor: What is your name?

Fu Zuogong: My name is Fu Zuogong, cousin of Fu Zuoyi.

The Emperor: What grievances do you have? What accusations do you bring against Mao Zedong?

Fu: My grandfather Fu Wending had two sons, who named their ten sons according to Confucian virtues: Ren, Yi, Li, Zhi, Xin, Wen, Liang, Gong, Qian, Rang. I studied horticulture and after graduation managed a farm in Suiyuan and served as principal of a school founded by Fu Zuoyi. In 1950 I went to Beijing to visit him and was invited to work in Gansu, heading the Afforestation Section of the Forestry Department. In 1957 I was labeled a Rightist, dismissed, and sent to the Jiabiangou labor camp. I starved to death there in 1960.

When my cousin learned of it, he was shocked and personally joined an inspection team to search for my remains. The camp director lied that I might have escaped. In truth, the corpses were buried haphazardly and could not be found.

The Emperor: Mao Zedong, what is your defense?

Mao: Fu Zuoyi mentioned his cousin to me, but I did not know Fu Zuogong starved to death at Jiabiangou. The Anti-Rightist Campaign led to the deaths of many in labor camps across the country. I initiated it. I bear full responsibility.

The Emperor: Fu Zuogong, any further accusations?

Fu: At Jiabiangou 1,500 Rightists starved to death. I was one of them. Driven by hunger, I scraped pig feed from a sty and collapsed there. Three thousand Rightists lived like primitives in dugouts. In winter there were no wild vegetables; we boiled dry leaves and grass seeds, causing bloating and constipation. In desperation, people dug through one another’s excrement for undigested kernels. By November 1960 dozens died daily. Bodies were dragged into the sand and hastily covered—“buried in sandbags.” Some, crazed by hunger, dug up corpses and ate the organs—cannibalism among the living.

In 1961 Liu Lantao discovered the tragedy and closed the camp. A doctor was left behind to fabricate medical records, omitting the word “hunger.” Decades later writers and filmmakers documented the truth, but memorials were destroyed and films banned domestically. The bones remain scattered; the souls still wander.

The Emperor: Mao Zedong, are these accusations true? Why forbid commemoration?

Mao: His account is true. As for forbidding memorials—because I was the chief architect, and Deng Xiaoping executed the campaign. To uphold the “Four Cardinal Principles,” he could not fully repudiate me, only say it was “expanded excessively,” blur the past, and move on. Thus monuments cannot stand and films cannot be shown.

The Emperor: Do you now consider this right?

Mao: I now fully accept guilt. The Rightists should be completely rehabilitated, survivors compensated, families consoled, and solemn memorials established.

The Emperor: Mao Zedong fully assumes responsibility for the Anti-Rightist Campaign.

(The Third: Liu Shaoqi Takes the Stand)

The Emperor: What is your name?

Liu Shaoqi: My name is Liu Shaoqi.

The Emperor: What accusations do you bring against Mao Zedong?

Liu: Mao launched the Cultural Revolution to overthrow me. In 1966 he conspired with Lin Biao to seize control of the Party center. I was forced into repeated self-criticisms and sidelined. I asked to resign as State Chairman and return home to farm, to end the chaos. Mao refused. He wanted to “beat the drowning dog” and destroy me.

My wife Wang Guangmei was publicly humiliated before 300,000. Red Guards besieged Zhongnanhai day and night. I was beaten and dragged barefoot. I raised the Constitution, saying I was State Chairman, and that this humiliation disgraced the nation.

I was imprisoned in my office, denied medical care, and after more than a year of torture I became incontinent and delirious. In 1968 I was secretly flown to Kaifeng, left to die in confinement, cremated under a false name, and expelled from the Party as “the biggest capitalist-roader, traitor, and spy.”

The Emperor: Mao Zedong, your defense?

Mao: Liu Shaoqi’s accusations are entirely true. I intended not only to topple him but to disgrace and kill him. The charges were fabricated.

The Emperor: Liu Shaoqi, any further accusations?

Liu: My wife was imprisoned for twelve years. Even her elderly mother was jailed and died there.

The Emperor: Mao Zedong?

Mao: True. I wanted him ruined, his family destroyed.

The Emperor: Mao Zedong admits full guilt.

(The Fourth: Lin Biao Takes the Stand)

The Emperor: What is your name?

Lin Biao: My name is Lin Biao.

The Emperor: What accusations do you bring against Mao Zedong?

Lin: Mao used me to control the army and safeguard him. I flattered him as the “Four Greats,” “a single sentence worth ten thousand,” turning him into the “Red Sun.” After Liu Shaoqi fell, I became second-in-command. By 1969 we diverged. I wanted to focus on production; he insisted on class struggle. He no longer trusted me and sought to elevate Jiang Qing. I resisted but was outmatched. I fled; my plane exploded over Mongolia. My family perished. Mao caused our deaths.

The Emperor: Mao Zedong, your defense?

Mao: Lin Biao speaks the truth. After he helped me defeat Liu Shaoqi, I no longer wanted him as number two. I intended Jiang Qing as successor. I secretly ordered his plane destroyed to prevent complications with the Soviet Union. Publicly I said, “Let him go.”

The Emperor: Mao Zedong admits plotting Lin Biao’s death and bears responsibility.

NEXT: The Great Trial Day Seven