(Not reviewed by Chairman Mao)

(February 12, 1965)

Time: 10:15 a.m. to 12:40 p.m., February 11, 1965
Place: Old Beijing Hall, Great Hall of the People
Participants:
Our side—Comrade Shaoqi, Comrade Enlai, Comrade Xiaoping, Comrade Peng Zhen, Comrade Chen Yi, Comrade He Long, Comrade Kang Sheng, Comrade Ruiqing, Comrade Liu Xiao, Comrade Yang Chengwu.
Soviet side—Andropov, Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU; Loginov, Minister of Civil Aviation; Kuznetsov, First Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs; Vershinin, Deputy Minister of Defense and Chief Marshal of the Air Force; Sidorovich, Deputy Chairman of the State Committee for Foreign Economic Relations; Chervonenko, Soviet Ambassador to China; Troyanovsky and Firsov, assistants to the delegation; Major General Antonov of the State Security Committee; Patapov, Deputy Director of the Guard Bureau.
Interpreters: Yan Mingfu, Li Fenglin
Recorders: Our side—Li Hanquan, Xu Ruixin, Sun Lin
Soviet side—Galenovich

Summary of the Conversation

I. On the question of dialectics. The Chairman said that things in the world are said to be independent of man's will. They are not transferred by the will of a class, nor by the will of a political party, nor by the will of an individual, nor by the will of U.S. imperialism. All affairs are determined by objective laws.

II. On the Vietnam question. Kosygin said that they gave Vietnam a series of weapons free of charge. Kosygin also said that on the Vietnam question, it would be best to coordinate with China and discuss it together. The Chairman said that U.S. imperialism has no strength; we fired a few shells at Jinmen, and it mobilized its Seventh Fleet and parts of its Sixth and First Fleets. The Chairman also pointed out that the Soviet Union's support for South Vietnam was too little. The Chairman said that the people of South Vietnam can fight on their own, and they will drive out U.S. imperialism themselves. The Americans attacking North Vietnam is a stupid thing; the problem is in South Vietnam.

III. On the questions of stopping open polemics and supporting so-called factional activities. Kosygin proposed, could top-level negotiations be held, and has such a time now arrived? The Chairman said, I am in favor of your open polemics. As for stopping the open polemics, I am not in favor. The open polemics will go on for ten thousand years; it seems that less will not do. Kosygin said that the war of words is the most formidable weapon; it has the greatest impact on the whole world and on humanity; it is more formidable than cannons. Kosygin advocated theoretical open polemics. The Chairman said, what's the point of that kind of open polemics, which is neither painful nor itchy. As for supporting so-called factional activities, we are "dogmatists," so of course we should support those people who have been expelled by you "Marxists." One shortcoming is that we are not as active as you are; you support those "Marxist" parties much more fiercely than we do.

IV. On the question of the March 1 meeting. The Chairman said, I am in favor of you holding it; I advise you not to change the date, nor is it necessary to change the name. If you change the date again, it will be disadvantageous to you, and you will lose prestige. Once the meeting is held, there will be something to write about. To always not hold it, and to always postpone it, what does that look like? A great party of Lenin! The Chairman said, the time is not yet ripe for a meeting of all the world's communist parties; it must be pushed back, for eight or ten years. The Chairman said, without resolving the Albania issue, no meeting can be held. I suggest that you cancel the old set of things you did to Albania, and say that that set of things was wrong; just this one sentence will do. The Chairman also said, if you want us to attend any meeting, you must cancel the open letter attacking us on July 14 of the year before last and that report and resolution of February of last year, say that these were wrong, and therefore cancel them, then we will be reconciled. You also have to cancel the line and program of the 20th and 22nd Congresses. Kosygin expressed that that was impossible.

V. On the question of uniting to oppose imperialism. The Chairman pointed out that now there is total and complete arms expansion everywhere; there is no détente in the world. Probably in ten years, objective circumstances will force us to unite; we are not completely split now. The Chairman said, we must have an army, and rely mainly on ground forces and conventional weapons. Do not lose morale in this army. As long as imperialism uses knives and guns, whether against you or against us, we must unite. Why are we quarreling now? It is because in peacetime, imperialism is playing a trick. It has taken over all your past slogans. The slogans of the Soviet Union are not much different from the slogans of the Americans. The Chairman also pointed out that it is possible that imperialism will make us stop the open debate. It is also fine for each of us to have our own differences, it is also fine to have slight differences, and it is also fine to have major differences. It is not only Marxists who can educate us; we must also be educated by the enemy. The Chairman also talked about how we do not want to enter the United Nations, we look down on it; it would be best to overthrow the entire United Nations, and for us, the Soviet Union, China, and some other countries to establish another United Nations, to set up a new kitchen.

VI. The Premier pointed out that the Soviet Union had once voted to agree to the United Nations sending troops to the Congo. Kosygin denied this, saying they cast a vote of opposition, and said that after he returned, he would use documents through their ambassador to prove this issue. The Premier also mentioned the issue of us buying four Soviet aircraft for Algeria, for which the Soviet Union asked a very high price. Kosygin also denied this matter.

Kosygin (hereinafter referred to as K): I am very happy to see you in such good health.

Chairman Mao (hereinafter referred to as Chairman): I probably won't die for the time being; Marx doesn't want me to go yet.

K: In any case, one is born to die.

Chairman: It will be soon. According to dialectics (laughter).

K: Speaking according to dialectics, it is hard to say now who will die first and who will die later. Everything must be in accordance with dialectics. (laughter).

Chairman: Please have a cigarette.

K: I don't smoke.

Chairman: You all pay attention to hygiene.

K: I specially selected non-smokers to form the delegation.

Comrade Zhou Enlai (hereinafter referred to as Zhou): Their two generals don't listen to him.

Chairman: I still have friends. You are very busy.

K: You must be very busy.

Chairman: I am not very busy.

K: No.

Chairman: I have few things to do; they are busy (recorder's note: referring to our leading comrades present).

K: You are also very busy. All the threads from these comrades finally converge on you, and are tied into a knot there.

Chairman: I rarely see them. Sometimes they talk with me for about an hour. I don't attend our Politburo meetings, and I sometimes attend Central Committee plenums and sometimes don't; I don't give reports either. Therefore, my work is relatively light.

K: You say so, but you always have to study various kinds of problems, study the development of dialectics, and consider the problems of your own country, and not only consider the problems of your own country. For politics, this is a very important point. So, you can never escape from such a situation.

Chairman: That is also true. I am interested in the development of dialectics. Things in the world are said to be independent of man's will.

K: Yes, subjective laws do not play a role.

Chairman: They are not transferred by the will of a class, nor by the will of a political party, nor by the will of an individual. All things are determined by objective laws.

K: Yes, I can only agree with this opinion of yours.

Chairman: For example, who wanted to fight the Americans? After the 1954 Geneva Conference, all the armed forces in South Vietnam were withdrawn, and the two hundred thousand French troops also ran away, but Ngo Dinh Diem wanted to kill people. This killing produced a National Liberation Front. At that time, what they were doing was called political struggle as the main thing, and guerrilla warfare as a supplement. Do you think it was transferred by this will? No. The second stage was called the parallel of political struggle and guerrilla struggle. Do you think this policy was listened to? No, it was also not working.

K: Of course, for example, the Americans, they always want to have capitalism everywhere, but it is not transferred by their will either. We hope the world will be all communist, but that is also not possible now.

Chairman: Now, it is called guerrilla warfare as the main thing, and political struggle as a supplement. This war is getting bigger and bigger. On the evening you arrived, the fighting started, and the next day the United States bombed North Vietnam. What's the big deal? One person died, and ten were injured.

Zhou: On the Vietnamese side.

Chairman: But the number of Americans killed in the South is much greater. Did you know what happened last night?

Zhou: Probably not yet, we haven't told them. It was actually after midnight. After one o'clock.

K: What happened?

Chairman: The South Vietnamese guerrillas...

Zhou: A little south of the 17th parallel.

Chairman: Wiped out three companies of puppet troops and an American military barracks.

Comrade Luo Ruiqing (hereinafter referred to as Luo): Officers' dormitory.

Zhou: Thirty-three killed, seven wounded.

K: Good.

Comrade Yang Chengwu (hereinafter referred to as Yang): Thirty-three killed, seven wounded, a total of forty.

K: Good, good.

Zhou: (to Comrade Yang Chengwu) How many puppet troops were wiped out?

Yang: Wiped out three companies of the main force of the puppet troops.

Luo: News from foreign news agencies.

Zhou: This is all foreign news.

K: Comrade Mao Zedong, we talked with the Vietnamese comrades like this: we want to provide them with surface-to-air missiles, so that they can cover Hanoi and other areas that the Vietnamese comrades think need to be protected. We also want to give them some artillery.

Chairman: Oh.

K: And tanks.

Chairman: Oh.

K: And torpedo boats, and a series of other weapons.

Chairman: Good.

K: These are all given to them free of charge. The purpose is to support them.

Chairman: Right.

K: Because they don't have missile experts, we must send our military officers there, and these officers will train them there. If there is to be military action, our officers will also participate.

Chairman: To gain experience.

K: After they have been taught, they will come back.

Chairman: Airplanes are not of much use. I am talking about American airplanes.

K: In addition, I told Comrade Zhou Enlai this, that on the Vietnam question, it would be best if all the actions we are prepared to take could be coordinated with you. I also told the Vietnamese comrades this point, and they also agreed. They also expressed it this way, that on the Vietnam side, it would be best if our actions could be discussed together with you. We think this way, that if the Americans are now taking risks and provocations in the political sphere, this does not show that they have strength.

Chairman: What strength do they have? Now it's just four aircraft carriers. It has a total of twelve aircraft carriers, and only one-third have come. But in 1958 when we shelled Jinmen, it sent six aircraft carriers. We fired a few shells, and its Seventh Fleet was not enough; it transferred a part of the Sixth Fleet from the Mediterranean, and a part of what fleet from San Francisco?

Zhou: The First Fleet.

Chairman: A few shells mobilized it. It was mobilized and had nothing to do, so it rested in Singapore for two weeks, and rested in the Philippines for a while, and then returned to its original position, and went back to the Mediterranean. So, the American navy that we are tying down here, this Seventh Fleet, is the strongest of its fleets.

K: We are tying down nearly half a million troops in Germany.

Chairman: Half a million?

K: Half a million. And we ourselves have sent nearly half a million to Germany. The front line there is about the same as here, no smaller than here. If we were to waver a little there, they would immediately eat us up.

Chairman: So, you focus on that side, and we focus on this side. This is the Americans telling us to cooperate.

K: That's right, he helps us.

Chairman: The Americans are reaching out everywhere. They have a total of 2.7 million troops, and nearly one million are all over the world, mainly in Europe and Asia.

K: He has to disperse his forces like this now. They themselves know that this does not show they have strength.

Chairman: He has eighteen infantry divisions, and half of them are abroad.

K: His infantry divisions have slightly more men than ours; one division has twenty thousand men, and our division has ten thousand men.

Chairman: Right. His eighteen infantry divisions are equivalent to less than thirty of our divisions.

Zhou: About thirty. Because our divisions have more than ten thousand.

Yang: Less than thirty divisions.

K: Eighteen American divisions are equivalent to more than thirty Chinese divisions?

Zhou: Not quite, because one of our divisions has more than twelve thousand men.

K: A Soviet division has ten thousand men. Our divisions have fewer men than yours. But in terms of equipment, such as tanks, we have more tanks than an American division.

Comrade Mao Zedong, I would like to ask you such a question. In the past, you once wrote a letter to Khrushchev through our ambassador in Beijing. This letter said: should we meet together and discuss all the issues that have matured. And at that time you also said that if we could have top-level negotiations, then in two hours we could solve problems that ordinary people could not solve in four years.

Chairman: Oh? Did I say that? In what year was that said?

Zhou: It was said to Chervonenko in 1962, the time when you said fish still swim and women still give birth to children. It was when Chervonenko came to the Chairman's room.

Chairman: In my house? Was it said to you (recorder's note: referring to Chervonenko)?

Chervonenko: Yes.

Chairman: Then there must be a record.

K: I just want to ask, has this time now arrived?

Chairman: What I said at that time was that I approved of your method. I approved of your open polemics. I said, first, the sky will not fall. Second, trees will still grow. Third, fish in the river will still swim. Fourth, women will still give birth to children. It is not because of our open polemics that these trees will not grow, and so on. I said, what's the big deal? I said, this open polemic is just a war of words, not a single person will die. So, I was in favor of your open polemics. As for stopping the open polemics, I am not in favor. Do you know in what year it will stop? We told the Romanians twenty-five years. Because there are many problems that probably need to be clarified through open polemics. Later, some people said it wouldn't do, that the open polemics must be stopped, and that so-called factional activities could not be supported. We raised the price, and I said, it will take ten thousand years, it seems that less will not do (recorder's note: when the Chairman said this, Kosygin laughed).

As for supporting so-called factional activities, I said, we are "dogmatists," so of course we should support those people who have been expelled by you "Marxists." You see, haven't the expelled people already formed several parties? One in Australia, one in Ceylon, one in India, one in Belgium, one in Brazil. These are the famous ones. Your parties, those "Marxists," want to expel these "dogmatists," so we, the "dogmatists," have the right to support them. One shortcoming is that we are not as active as you are; you support those "Marxist" parties much more fiercely than we do, we just support them a little. Very few people approve of us, and many people approve of you. It is said that there are a total of over one hundred parties in the world, and sixty-two of them approve of you, while those who approve of us are a minority. In our party, there are also some people who approve of you. This Chen Yi is one who approves of you, and Zhou Enlai also approves of you.

K: We also approve of them.

Chairman: They advised you not to hold that meeting.

Zhou: The March 1 meeting.

Chairman: I am in favor of you holding it. People like me, Liu Shaoqi, and Deng Xiaoping, and also people like Kang Sheng, are called "dogmatists," stubborn and unyielding. People like Peng Zhen, He Long, and Luo Ruiqing are all the same. You see, we also have factions here. They always advise you not to hold it, but I advise you not to change the date. You shouldn't have changed the date last year; it would have been fine to hold it on December 15. This year, on March 1, if you change the date again, it will be disadvantageous to you, and you will lose prestige. To say not to hold it, to change the name, not to call it a drafting committee, once this meeting is held, there will be something to write about. To always not hold it, and to always postpone it, what does that look like? A great party of Lenin! I am on your side, in favor of you holding the meeting. But they are against you, not in favor of you holding the meeting. You see (recorder's note: when the Chairman said this, Comrade Shaoqi and Comrade Enlai laughed).

K: Comrade Mao Zedong, what you said about the trees, the fish, and the women is all correct; one cannot but agree with this statement. Because what is at work there are objective laws, and everything will continue as you said. Of course, there is another aspect to this issue. In fact, when we talk about the struggle of our entire revolutionary working class, when we talk about our communist movement needing to unite to fight and confront imperialism, our unity at present plays a decisive role in the world. We should say that our party and our people hold the Communist Party of China in very high esteem.

Chairman: I believe so.

K: I am not just saying this superficially; I am talking about the substance. Because on this issue, we have no need to tell lies now. Because our strength lies in our struggle. If our forces can be united, our strength will increase tenfold. When you talk about the issue of no one dying in our war of words, I should say that the war of words is about ideology, it is the most formidable weapon, it has the greatest impact on the whole world, on humanity, it is more formidable than cannons.

Chairman: More formidable than cannons?

K: Yes. And you know this too. When we talk about needing to meet and discuss some issues, we are not trying to solve all the problems that have accumulated in our rather long period of dispute all at once. Because circumstances are changing, conditions are changing, and there are also various kinds of disputes. Some disputes are worthy of attention and should be discussed in a calm atmosphere. We are not against open polemics. But the open polemics we advocate are theoretical open polemics, and we should not insult people or put labels on others in the polemics. And I believe that as long as humanity exists, this kind of polemic will not stop.

Chairman: What's the point of that kind of open polemics, which is neither painful nor itchy? I am in favor of the kind of open polemics in your letter of July 14 of the year before last and the report of February of last year.

K: I would like to talk to you like this. When we talk about the issue of polemics, I want to say, you should not think that we are afraid of this kind of polemic; we are not afraid of this kind of polemic. I would like to put it more crudely. When people fight, they should know why they are fighting. If people fight without knowing why, then the audience will have a question: why are they fighting? I would like to give an example. We once suddenly had such a dispute. You said that in the struggle for the cause of socialism and communism, one should rely on one's own efforts.

Chairman: Hmm.

K: So, on whose strength do we rely? Who do we rely on? Therefore, there should be no dispute on this issue. So, I completely agree with your opinion; if not by relying on one's own efforts, how else can one be reborn?

Chairman: Exactly.

K: Should we rely on the strength of the Americans to build communism?

Chairman: Exactly.

K: I give this example to illustrate what? I want to illustrate: should we clear away this nonsense, that is, to clarify what problems there are. As for some problems, for example, as you said, to drag them out for a while, for ten thousand years, we also agree; if they are not mature, it is also fine to put them off for twenty thousand years.

Chairman: One hundred thousand years is also fine.

K: But what we have in common is much more than what we have in disagreement. Let it be X years, any number of years is fine.

Chairman: (in English) X, Y, Z.

K: Once I had an informal conversation with a group of communists abroad. They expressed such an opinion, which is the opinion of ordinary party members in Western Europe. What are they concerned about? They said, we are people who are fighting under capitalist conditions, we are fighting for the ideas of communism and socialism, we are Marxist-Leninists, and we fully understand these objective processes that are happening in the world. But we never imagined that the struggle between communist parties would be so sharp. This struggle has put us foreign Marxist-Leninists in a state of disintegration. Originally, we should have used all our strength to oppose the capitalists and imperialists in our own countries. But now we cannot do so, and under underground conditions, we must constantly consider whether the Chinese communists are right or the Soviet communists are right.

Chairman: Right.

K: So, they said, we have a question: sometimes imperialists can come to an agreement on some issues, why can't you? I believe that now the entire communist world, all our Soviet people, the Chinese people, our army, our soldiers, are all waiting and hoping that this problem can be solved. The problems we cannot solve can be debated theoretically, and we can even have a theoretical journal.

Chairman: You already have a journal.

K: We have many journals, and you also have many journals.

Chairman: The one in Prague.

K: The one in Prague is not ours, it is everyone's, and it is also yours.

Chairman: How is it ours?

K: It is everyone's.

Chairman: It often scolds us.

K: I would now like to talk about the issue of holding a meeting. First, this meeting was not convened by us, but by many parties. The drafting committee and multilateral consultations are two different things. We know that you also advocate this, that you are not against convening a meeting of all the world's communist parties now, for example, eighty-one, or eighty-nine, or ninety, how many parties, it is not clear now, however many there are, we will convene that many.

Chairman: But the time is not yet ripe. In the past, we said it would take four or five years, but now it seems that is not enough, it must be pushed back, doubled, to eight or ten years. The time is not yet ripe now, the issues have not been fully debated.

K: It is difficult to agree with this view, I cannot agree with this view.

Chairman: For example, who do you support in India?

Zhou: Dange.

Chairman: He holds a congress, and you send a delegation.

Zhou: Ponomarev.

Chairman: The other faction, we did not send any delegation. Nor did we send a telegram of congratulations, did we?

Zhou: No.

Chairman: So, we say, our support is not enough, your support is full.

Comrade Liu Shaoqi (hereinafter referred to as Liu): It's the same in Ceylon, you sent a representative, we did not. It's the same in Belgium.

K: Comrade Mao Zedong, they came to Beijing to see you, that's about the same. Either send someone there, or they come to you, this does not change the substance of the matter.

Chairman: So, in the future, there will still be time for such exchanges, bilateral and multilateral.

K: We think exactly so, this is multilateral consultation, to talk together.

Chairman: So I am in favor, don't change the date, don't change it to some consultation committee, just hold it on March 1 and be done with it.

K: Comrade Mao Zedong,...

Chairman: So what if a few dozen parties don't come?! And it's not a few dozen parties, it's only twenty-six parties in total, so what if a few parties don't come?!

K: Comrade Mao Zedong, I have already discussed this issue with Comrade Zhou Enlai. If some parties meet together, they will absolutely not discuss the positions of other parties; they will only be prepared to talk about how to approach the issue of convening an international conference. What complications do you think such a practice would have for the international communist movement? We believe it would only be beneficial, with no harm at all.

Chairman: Just hold it.

K: If they were to meet together and formulate a program for the next international conference, then I would completely agree with your opinion that this practice is wrong.

Chairman: Whether you formulate a program or not, you go ahead and hold it; we are not at all against it, and in fact, we are in favor. But we will not participate, that's all.

K: Why won't you participate? Why?

Chairman: There is no need, you wrote it in your letter.

K: What you said is not right, the letter did not say there is no need.

Comrade Peng Zhen (hereinafter referred to as Peng): The letter of July 30.

K: Comrade Mao Zedong, I would like to...

Chairman: It doesn't matter if some parties don't participate, you can still hold it.

Zhou: It was written in the letter of November 24, and also in the letter that convened the March 1 meeting.

Chairman: Wasn't it you who did it? The letter of November 24 was not done by Khrushchev.

K: You should take into account the new situation and new conditions in our Moscow. But you are completely unwilling to see these.

Chairman: We have seen some.

K: Comrade Mao Zedong, you can see that we now treat all your actions with great attention and respect. We listen to every word you say, we analyze every word you say, and we do so without any prejudice, completely objectively.

Chairman: That's not necessarily true. Your newspapers never publish our articles.

K: We publish all the documents given to us. We even published a summary of Comrade Zhou Enlai's report to the National People's Congress. But you did not publish my report to the Supreme Soviet. We publish all the documents you give us.

Chairman: It can be seen that we also have faults! We did not publish your report.

K: This is not a fault, how can you say that!

Chairman: Of course it's a fault, not publishing the report of a premier like you. You see how generous you are, publishing Zhou Enlai's report.

K: Comrade Mao Zedong, why do you say that? You brought up this issue, saying we don't publish your things, not me. We don't think this is a fault at all. I just mentioned this in passing.

Chairman: I was saying that we published the materials of July 14 of the year before last and of February of last year, but you did not publish a single one of our replies.

There is also the issue of Albania, how will you resolve it? Without resolving this issue, no meeting can be held. This issue can only be resolved by your two parties, you and Albania. Without resolving this issue, no meeting can be held. Bullying Albania, a country with a population of just over a million, is not proper. In what year did you and Albania...

K: Comrade Mao Zedong...

Chairman: ...restore past relations, then we will be happy, and at that time we can talk about some international conference. As long as this issue is not resolved, it is not possible.

K: Comrade Mao Zedong, have you not noticed that after our October plenum last year, we have not said a single bad word about Albania, whether in the public press or in our internal documents? When we held a consultative meeting in Warsaw, we sent an invitation to the Albanians, asking them to attend the meeting. They replied with a letter full of abuse, scolding us very harshly. But we did not scold them back. Our seven parties, including the Romanian party, discussed this issue. We believed that their letter was groundless. We just wrote this one sentence. We believe that our invitation to the Albanians to participate in the consultative meeting is still valid. Comrade Mao Zedong, I would like to invite you to entrust your comrades to collect all the materials related to Albania after the October plenum, and see what we said about Albania after the October plenum, and what the Albanians said about our new leadership. Please study these materials objectively. We are willing and are taking measures to restore diplomatic relations with Albania in terms of state relations. We sent them a letter on this issue, but they returned it to us unopened. So, what can you suggest we do?

Chairman: I suggest that you cancel the old set of things you did to Albania, and say that that set of things was wrong. Just this one sentence will do. To criticize a socialist country at one's own congress, and then take action to sever diplomatic relations, you must say that all this was wrong, then things will be loosened up, and they will be happy. If you don't talk about these major things, don't talk about past events, don't talk about what you did in the past, then how can they be happy? We are not happy either.

K: You are only talking about one side of it.

Chairman: If you want us to attend any meeting, you must cancel the open letter attacking us on July 14 of the year before last, and that report and resolution of February of last year. Just say that these were wrong, and therefore cancel them, then we will be reconciled.

K: Comrade Mao Zedong, this is impossible.

Chairman: This is impossible?

K: Comrade Mao Zed-ong, if you are willing to clarify the issues (and we are willing to clarify them), then let's meet and study the issues. Probably you also need to cancel many things. Especially when you cite the example of Albania, it is not accurate. These things may be based on incorrect materials given to you from one side. Our diplomatic relations with Albania were not severed by us; they were severed by the Albanians.

Chairman: Oh? Is that so?

Liu: It was about reducing the number of people in the Soviet embassy in Albania. They restricted them, and then diplomatic relations were severed. They were all withdrawn. Restricted to sixteen people. Because they restricted the Albanian embassy in the Soviet Union to only sixteen people.

Peng: At the 22nd Congress, you criticized Albania. This is true, isn't it?

Chairman: You see, he is attacking your 22nd Congress. He is a die-hard, just like me. You should cancel the line and program of the 20th and 22nd Congresses.

K: What you are attacking is not it; you are attacking the international communist movement.

Chairman: What I am attacking is the line adopted by the 22nd and 20th Congresses.

K: Attacking the 20th Congress as well?

Chairman: Attacking the 20th Congress. I do not approve of it. What, Stalin was so bad, there was a cult of personality. And then later, it turned into Khrushchev also having a cult of personality. I just don't know how you people do things. This Khrushchev is a good man, why did you get rid of him?

K: Of course we can talk about why we removed him. Didn't you say you removed him?

Chairman: Was his health not good? We did not remove him. We did not confiscate his photos, nor did we confiscate his books; they are still being distributed here.

K: This is your business; we cannot express an opinion on this matter. If you want to distribute Khrushchev's speeches, that is your business, if you are willing to do so.

Chairman: We still engage in the "cult of personality," we worship Stalin; we have never removed Stalin's portrait. Khrushchev's portrait, or whatever, we don't remove either. It's just that the sales are not wide. It's a pity, the sales are not wide. What happened to this comrade Khrushchev?

K: Comrade Mao Zedong, as for what happened to him, it would be most convenient for you to ask Khrushchev himself.

K: You go and invite him.

Chairman: We will send an invitation now, can your delegation agree? He is a treasure.

K: We have already talked with you, with Comrade Zhou Enlai, and discussed this issue in great detail.

Chairman: Have we talked?

Zhou: I said we were not satisfied with that explanation. Because the substantive issues were not discussed.

Chairman: Let me and Khrushchev have a debate.

K: Of course, who you want to debate with is your business. But we have a party, and he does not represent our party now, so...

Chairman: He doesn't

--- Notes

Alexei Nikolayevich Kosygin (1904-1980), Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Soviet Union, member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU. In the 1960s and 1970s, he was mentioned in the same breath as Brezhnev and Podgorny, and was one of the three horses of the troika at the time. Known as an economic expert and a pragmatist.