(3 August 1965)

[ André Malraux (1901–1976) – novelist and critic. In 1923, he traveled to the Far East with his first wife. During this period, he had frequent contact with revolutionaries in Vietnam, China, and the Soviet Union. After the failure of the Canton Uprising and the split between the Kuomintang (KMT) and the Communist Party of China (CPC), Malraux returned to France in 1927. Together with Corniglion-Molinier, he planned a raid on Saudi Arabia. Later, he and the writer André Gide vigorously defended the Bulgarian revolutionary leader Georgi Dimitrov, whom German Nazis had falsely accused of masterminding the Reichstag fire. At this time, Malraux was elected Chairman of the World Anti-Fascist Committee. In 1936, he joined the International Brigades supporting the Spanish Republic, serving as overall commander of the foreign air force units. During the Second World War, Malraux led several partisan groups; in the 1945 campaign to liberate Alsace, he served as overall commander of the Alsace-Lorraine Brigade. After the liberation of France, he stood politically shoulder to shoulder with General de Gaulle. From 1945 to 1946, he served as Minister of Information. From 1947 to 1952, he was a national delegate for the Rally of the French People (RPF). From 1 June 1958, he served as Minister of State attached to the Presidency of the French Republic, and subsequently also as Minister of Culture. ]

Mao: How long has Mr. Malraux been here?

Malraux: Fifteen or sixteen days. I met Vice Premier Chen Yi, made a trip to Yan’an and other places, and after returning I met Premier Zhou Enlai.

Mao: Oh, so you went to Yan’an.

Malraux: This visit to Yan’an taught me a great deal about the history of the Chinese revolution – much more than I knew before. Sitting today beside the greatest revolutionary of our time, apart from Lenin, I feel very moved.

Mao: You put that too well.

Malraux: In Yan’an, I saw the harsh conditions of the past, with people living in cave dwellings. I also saw a photograph of Chiang Kai-shek’s residence. Comparing the two, one understands at once why the Chinese revolution succeeded.

Mao: It conforms to the law of historical development – the weak can always defeat the strong.

Malraux: That is what I think as well. I, too, once led a guerrilla force, though the circumstances then could not compare with yours.

Mao: I have heard that – you fought as a guerrilla.

Malraux: I fought as a guerrilla in central France, leading a peasant army against the German forces.

Mao: At the end of the eighteenth century, the French Revolution overthrew feudal rule. The forces that overthrew feudalism at that time were not initially strong; they were weak.

Malraux: That is very interesting. Those peasants had never fought before and did not know how, but they made very good soldiers. Napoleon had many such soldiers under his command. I believe that before Chairman Mao, no one had ever led a peasant revolution to victory. How did you inspire such bravery among the peasants?

Mao: The reason for that is quite simple. We ate the same food as the peasants, wore the same clothes, and made the fighters feel that we were not a privileged stratum. We investigated rural class relations, confiscated the land of the landlord class, and distributed it to the peasants.

Malraux: Does the Chairman consider land reform to be the most important factor?

Mao: Land reform, and democratic politics. And another thing – you have to win battles. If you do not win battles, who will follow your lead? Defeats always happen, but there should be fewer defeats and more victories.

Malraux: Over the past two thousand-plus years of history, the peasants were used to losing battles, and not many were won.

Mao: We won many battles, but we also suffered defeats. Once we even lost our entire base area in the South and had to flee to the North.

Malraux: In spite of that, the people’s longing for the Red Army still endured.

Mao: Later, we established many base areas in the North, expanded the army, expanded the Party, expanded mass organizations, and the people of the North gained land. We liberated the big cities – Beijing, Tianjin, Jinan, and others. The army gradually grew to several million strong and fought its way from North to South. Another piece of experience is this: in China, it was necessary to unite with the national bourgeoisie and the bourgeois intellectuals. We united with those among the national bourgeoisie and the bourgeois intellectuals who did not side with the enemy. For a period, we even formed a united front with the big bourgeoisie and Chiang Kai-shek. If Chiang Kai-shek had not attacked us, we would not have attacked him either.

Malraux: Why did Chiang Kai-shek want to attack you?

Mao: He wanted to swallow us up, and he thought he could.

Malraux: Did he think the CPC was very weak?

Mao: We had many base areas, with a population amounting to one fifth of the national total, and an army of about one million. Chiang Kai-shek was different: he had an army of more than four million and American aid. Our base areas were large, but they were scattered, and we had no foreign aid.

Malraux: Was there also a reason that Chiang Kai-shek believed only in the power of the cities?

Mao: He had cities, foreign aid, and at the same time a larger rural population than we did.

Malraux: I once visited Russia and discussed this question with Gorky. I talked with him about Mao Zedong – at that time you were not yet chairman. Gorky said the greatest difficulty for the CPC was having no big cities. I asked him then: without big cities, will they fail or succeed?

Mao: Did Gorky give you an answer then? (Malraux shakes his head.) He did not know China’s conditions, so he could not answer you.

Malraux: Gorky often said that peasants everywhere are the same. But I believe conditions differ from place to place.

Now I will raise a question: China wants once again to become a great China. Several centuries ago, China was a strong nation from a technical point of view – silk, for example. Later, Europe became the technically advanced power, with weapons and munitions. Now China also has weapons and munitions and will become a great power again. Of course, China does not need to become a power in the European mould. China wants to become a great power in China’s own way – what, I wonder, does that require?

Mao: It requires time.

Malraux: We hope you have all the time you need, and in good measure.

Mao: At least several decades. We also need friends. For example, our coming and going with you, establishing diplomatic ties – that is friendship. We have friends of many kinds; you are one kind. Another friend is Chairman Aidit of the Indonesian Communist Party, who is now also visiting Beijing. We have yet to meet him. We share points in common with Aidit, and we share points in common with you.

Malraux: These common points are not the same.

Mao: Some are. For instance, how to deal with American imperialism, and how to deal with the British two-faced approach. You are more clear-cut than Britain.

Malraux: In fact, only France opposes the American “escalation” in Vietnam.

Chen Yi: The British support the American aggression against Vietnam, whereas you oppose it.

Malraux: Britain has the Malaysia issue.

Mao: Britain and America want to make an exchange.

Malraux: Since President de Gaulle’s return to power, France has ended its colonialist stance. France gives Algeria several hundred million francs in aid every year. It was I who personally went to four African countries to proclaim their independence. In President de Gaulle’s view, China and France share one absolute common point: if there is a dual American-Soviet world hegemony, then neither China can become a true China, nor France a true France.

Mao: Naturally – one is your ally, and the other is ours. Your ally, the United States, has no good intentions toward you. Our ally, the Soviet Union, also has no good intentions toward us.

Malraux: After Lenin’s death, people spoke of the Soviet Union and thought of Stalin. After Stalin’s death, the Stalinist system was overthrown, or partly overthrown. Yet the Soviet leaders falsely claim that the Soviet system has not changed. That is what Khrushchev told me personally. I think the system today is different; although the words used are the same, the content is very different.

Mao: And he went further, saying they must build communism – something even Stalin never said.

Malraux: I feel that Khrushchev and Kosygin give the impression that the Soviet Union is no longer what one once idealized.

Mao: He represents the interests of one stratum, not the interests of the broad masses.

Malraux: They have even altered the methods of government administration.

Mao: The Soviet Union wants to take the road toward the restoration of capitalism. The United States very much welcomes this, and Europe welcomes it too. We do not.

Malraux: Does the Chairman truly believe they want to go back to the capitalist road?

Mao: Yes.

Malraux: I think they are trying to move away from communism. But where they are going and what they are looking for – even they themselves are not clear in their thinking.

Mao: They are using precisely this muddled method to confuse the masses. They have their own experience too. Does the French Socialist Party really pursue socialism? Do the French Communists really believe in Marxism?

Malraux: In the French Socialist Party, only seven percent of the membership are workers; the rest are mainly office employees. In that respect they are strong, because they have the trade unions, which are composed of office workers. And then there are members who are vineyard owners from the South – landlords. As for the French Communist Party, the French communists, that is another matter. The role of the French peasantry is not the same as in China: it is not only an absolute minority, but its proportion of the population is also much smaller. For the French communists to play a meaningful role, there are only two possibilities: one is to seek strength among the intellectuals, the other is to seek it among the genuine proletariat. Emotionally, the French communists might lean toward China, but because France’s concrete conditions differ from China’s, in practice they lean toward the Soviet Union.

Mao: They oppose us.

Malraux: As a party, they oppose China, but the workers, intellectuals, and peasants do not. At present, the inner-party conflict is very intense. The French Communist Party is like a very lazy person, trying to accommodate both sides. You have probably observed many instances of this.

Chen Yi: They are not accommodating us.

Mao: A party can change. Plekhanov and the Mensheviks were once Marxists, but later they opposed Lenin, opposed the Bolsheviks, and broke away from the people. Now it is within Bolshevism itself that changes have occurred. In China, there are also two prospects: one is to resolutely follow the Marxist-Leninist road; the other is to follow the revisionist road. There are social strata in our country that want to take the revisionist road. The question is how we handle it. We have taken some measures to avoid taking the revisionist road. But no one can guarantee what road will be taken in a few decades.

Malraux: Is the revisionist stratum in China now widespread?

Mao: Fairly widespread – not many in number, but influential. These are old landlords, old rich peasants, old capitalists, intellectuals, journalists, writers, artists, and a part of their children.

Malraux: Why are there writers among them?

Mao: Some writers are ideologically anti-Marxist. We took over the old apparatus wholesale. Originally, we had no artists, journalists, writers, professors, or teachers. These people were all left behind by the Kuomintang.

Peyre: I have the impression that Chinese youth are now being nurtured in the direction the Chairman advocates.

Chairman: How long have you been here?

Peyre: Fourteen months. Traveling from Guangzhou to Beijing, I learned many things along the way. Later, on diplomatic field trips, I visited central and southern China. I had the honor of visiting the Chairman’s hometown, Shaoshan, and also went to Changsha and Sichuan. Recently I made a tour of the Northeast – very interesting. In factories, communes, on the streets, and in theatres, I have tried as much as possible to be in contact with the people. I feel that young people lack those contradictions that cause you so much concern.

Mao: You have observed one aspect of the picture, but not the other. A society is not a single body; it is a complex entity, and two kinds of possibilities exist.

Peyre: I sense a force that guides young people, moving them in the direction you have pointed out. Contradictions will of course remain, but the direction is affirmed.

Mao: Contradictions are bound to exist.

Malraux: In the Chairman’s view, what is the next aim in the struggle against revisionism? I mean domestically.

Mao: To oppose revisionism – there is no other aim. We oppose embezzlement, theft, profiteering, and all the foundations of revisionism. Not only outside the Party, but inside it too.

Malraux: What is the next goal? If a Party Congress is convened, for example, it must fix a target. Would it be the agricultural question? Because I feel that the industrial question is already resolved, or at least has been put on a sound path.

Mao: Neither the industrial question nor the agricultural question has been resolved.

M: I visited a textile factory in Xi'an. In France, textile factories were closely linked to revolutions—this was true in 1789, 1830, 1840, and 1851, especially in Lyon. This was because textile workers were the most impoverished. In Xi'an, I saw that the local textile industry had already reached the level of pre-Liberation Shanghai. Most of the machinery is Chinese-made, with more machines and fewer workers. It is clear that the Chinese Party can carry out the policies it intends to in the textile industry. But on the contrary, in agriculture, the limited arable land puts the Chinese government in a difficult position. Are you now considering launching a large-scale movement in agriculture that goes beyond the scope of the people's communes?

Mao: There will be no changes in the organizational structure and production relations of the people's communes, but changes in technology have begun.

M: Do you think more arable land can be added?

Mao: Some can be added, but the main focus is on increasing the yield per unit area. There is a great deal to be explored there. Let's not discuss it further today. Please send my regards to your president when you return.

M: Regarding foreign policy issues, I have already discussed them with Premier Zhou and Vice Premier Chen, so I won't repeat them to the Chairman. Today's discussion has been about the fundamental issues of greatest concern to His Excellency President de Gaulle. Thank you for the meeting today, and I convey President de Gaulle's greetings to Your Excellency.

(While departing)

Mao: I have met with French parliamentarians.

M: I trust the words of parliamentarians the least.

Mao: Their attitude toward the United States is not as clear-cut as yours.

M: That may be because I bear greater responsibility.