Reply to Comrade Chen Y [1]: This critical document [2] is well written and deserves the
attention of all overseas agencies. We should revolutionize it. Otherwise, it will be very
dangerous. We can start with Vienna. Please decide.
Mao Zedong
September 9




[1] Chen Yi was then a member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, Vice
Premier of the State Council, Minister of Foreign Affairs, and Director of the Office of Foreign
Affairs.
[2] This refers to a letter from an Austrian to the Compilation Bureau of the Works of Marx,
Engels, Lenin, and Stalin in the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China,
published in the ninth issue of "Brief Report on Foreign Affairs During the Cultural
Revolution," compiled by the Secretariat of the State Council's Foreign Affairs Office on
September 8, 1966. The letter, while praising China's Cultural Revolution and the actions of
the Red Guards, also criticized the excessively luxurious clothing and vehicles used by the
Chinese embassy personnel in Vienna, requesting that "the relevant authorities be reported
and that immediate measures be taken to correct the situation." Also submitted to Mao
Zedong along with this issue of the bulletin was a document titled "A Letter from the
Tanzanian Masses Sharply Criticizing the Bourgeois Ideology and Style in China's Foreign
Affairs Activities," published on September 8 by the Cultural Revolution Preparatory
Committee and Provisional Secretariat of the Central Committee of the Communist Youth
League. The letter criticized the Chinese embassy in Tanzania for its ostentatious and
extravagant diplomatic activities. Mao Zedong's comments were included in Bulletin No. 9.