Yang Shangkun served as Director of the General Office of the Central Committee for twenty years and was long a trusted confidant of Mao. When the Cultural Revolution began in 1966, he was groundlessly labeled a member of the “Peng–Luo–Lu–Yang Anti-Party Clique.” He was first demoted and sent to Guangdong, later placed under isolation and struggle sessions, and was not rehabilitated until 1978. In the 1980s he served as President of the State. More than forty years after Mao’s death, whenever Mao thought of Yang, he felt guilt in his heart and wished to apologize to him in person. The two departed spirits soon met.

Mao came straight to the point: “The Cultural Revolution wronged you for twelve years. You know that in bringing down Liu Shaoqi, the original team all had to be replaced—you too had to be removed. There was no charge that could really be pinned on you, so we had to give you the ‘anti-Party’ label and transfer you away.”

Yang: “I understand. Before I left, I asked to see you. You even made sarcastic remarks, saying, ‘It’s so hot in Guangdong—what are you going there for? Fine, then go work in the Pearl River basin for two or three years, then in the Yellow River basin for another two or three years.’”

Mao: “You were sent off to Guangdong as Party Secretary, and after only half a year you were further demoted to Deputy Secretary of the Zhaoqing Prefectural Committee, correct?”

Yang: “Yes. I wasn’t well suited to Guangdong’s climate. I requested a transfer to Shanxi, but was reassigned to Linfen instead. When the Cultural Revolution broke out, I was placed under isolation for investigation and struggle sessions, and endured it all until returning to Beijing in 1978.”

Mao: “What were you accused of during the Cultural Revolution?”

Yang: “The charge was ‘installing a listening device for Chairman Mao,’ engaging in espionage.”

Mao: “I knew you had no intention of eavesdropping on me. That was an exaggerated political accusation. In fact, it was within your normal scope of work. But by nature I never liked recordings or leaving documentary traces. I often changed my mind—what I said could change at any time. I didn’t like people digging into my past words, so I didn’t like keeping archives.”

Yang: “But that conflicted with my duties. My responsibility was precisely to keep records for reference. Recordings were made to ensure none of your words were omitted. Your words—one sentence could equal ten thousand; missing even one would be serious. The documents I compiled from recordings were always submitted to you for review. Never once was a transcript circulated without your approval. How could that be eavesdropping?”

Mao: “You liked to keep diaries too, didn’t you? I heard you even published them.”

Yang: “Yes, I liked keeping diaries for reference and reflection. The Central Party Literature Press selected and published some of them, though entries involving sensitive high-level personnel matters were not included, so as not to reveal internal relationships.”

Mao: “People who like keeping diaries tend to be bookish—honest, and careful about evidence when they speak. I never liked writing things down; I didn’t want anyone grabbing hold of something against me.”

Yang: “In my diary there is an entry from the summer of 1962, when I went to Sichuan for a small investigation and asked Liao Bokang about deaths from famine there. Liao said that in the Fuling region, adding up all the counties, 3.5 million people had died; in Yingjing County of the Ya’an region, the county Party secretary said half the population had died. In some villages, not a single person survived; there was no one left to bury the dead, so people from other villages had to be sent. Those sent to bury the bodies had no food, yet had to dig graves—a heavy labor task—so the buriers themselves died. Then people from still other villages had to be brought to bury those who had buried the dead. Liao told me: ‘The number who starved to death in Sichuan is at least 2.5 million more than my own estimate. But in my official report, I only said ten million died.’”

Mao: “If that is so, then the national figure of 37 million deaths from famine has some basis.”

Yang: “That is why one says: without investigation, one does not know; once investigated, one is shocked.”

Mao: “How was your family? Your wife—was she all right?”

Yang: “My wife was also persecuted during the Cultural Revolution, but her health remained good. We married in 1929 and stayed together our whole lives. I consider us fortunate. My own health was fairly good too—not like Peng Dehuai, who was tormented to death.”

Mao: “You were an honest man. You and your wife weathered a lifetime together without scandal—not like me…”

Yang: “I have not forgotten old comrades. In 1996, at the age of eighty-nine, I led more than one hundred relatives of martyrs such as Wang Ruofei and Qin Bangxian to Yan’an to sweep the graves and commemorate the fallen.”

Mao: “You have a strong sense of human feeling.”

Yang: “During the 1989 Tiananmen incident, I opposed sending in troops to suppress it. Deng Xiaoping ultimately decided to send them. But he did not punish me; I continued to serve as President. Afterward, I advocated rehabilitation, but to this day it has not occurred.”

Mao replied perfunctorily: “I think it should be rehabilitated as well. Nearly thirty years have passed.”

After this conversation between Mao and Yang—having spoken candidly and said nearly all that needed to be said—they rose, took their leave, and departed separately.

NEXT: 52. Ulanhu (1906–1988)