(Not reviewed by the speaker)

(October 5, 1968)

Time: Evening of October 5, 1968
Location: Great Hall of the People

Attendees:
Albanian side: Balluku, member of the Political Bureau, Vice Chairman of the Council of Ministers and Minister of National Defense, head of the delegation;
Marko, member of the Political Bureau, Vice Chairman of the Presidium of the People’s Assembly, First Secretary of the Party Committee of the Durrës District;
Çarçani, member of the Political Bureau, Vice Chairman of the Council of Ministers;
Teodosi, alternate member of the Political Bureau, Minister of Industry and Mining; Ambassador Natalaneli
Chinese side: Zhou Enlai, Chen Boda, Kang Sheng, Jiang Qing, Zhang Chunqiao, Yao Wenyuan, Huang Yongsheng
Interpreter: Fan Chengzuo
Recorder: Lian Zhengbao

Chairman Mao (hereinafter referred to as the Chairman): I have a bit of a cold.

Balluku (hereinafter referred to as Ba): Comrade Mao Zedong, I once again convey the most cordial greetings from Comrade Enver Hoxha and our Central Political Bureau, and extend congratulations on the achievements of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution carried out under your personal leadership and in accordance with your great Marxist-Leninist thought.

Chairman: Thank you.

Ba: Comrade Mao Zedong, we are very pleased with such great achievements. You told us dialectically in the past that the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution faced two possibilities: failure and victory. That was 20 months ago. Now there is only one possibility, and that is victory, final victory. This victory is being consolidated.

Chairman: The defeated classes will still struggle, so we cannot speak of final victory. We cannot say this for decades; we must not lose vigilance. These people are still here, this class is still here. On the mainland, there are remnants and dregs of the Kuomintang. Some have wormed their way into our central leadership organs or into local leadership organs. This time, they have been cleaned up one by one. In the past, the main leadership power in some factories was in the hands of these bad elements. Haven't you already visited the Beijing General Knitwear Factory?

Marko (hereinafter referred to as Ma): The head of the security department of their factory was the son of a rich peasant, and he was cleaned out this time.

Chairman: Only one?

Ma: They are still continuing. They are helping those comrades who made mistakes to correct them. For example, their deputy factory manager made a mistake. Though he comes from a good family background, he has never been able to get his thinking straight.

Chairman: So ideological work is necessary, including for some comrades who have made mistakes. Ideological work must be done. This is a task of paramount importance. It takes time; we cannot just cast all these people aside. These people are not the Kuomintang remnants and dregs mentioned earlier. They are members of the Communist Party who have made mistakes, falling within the scope of contradictions among the people.

Ba: These are contradictions among the people.

Chairman: There are two types of contradictions: first, contradictions between the enemy and ourselves; second, contradictions among the people. That is why this Cultural Revolution has been far more difficult than the battles we fought in the past. (All laugh)

Ba: Indeed! The work is much more complex, involving aspects of politics, ideology, society, education, culture, class, and more.

Chairman: So many rural people’s communes and production brigades must also be cleaned up one by one.
(To Premier Zhou) What other factories did they visit?

Zhou Enlai (hereinafter referred to as Zhou): Originally, they were going to visit the Capital Steel Plant today, but it may have to be postponed until tomorrow.

Chairman: Then it would be good to take another look. The Capital Steel Plant probably hasn’t carried out the cleansing of class ranks yet, has it?

Zhou: Some have already been cleaned out.

Yao Wenyuan (hereinafter referred to as Yao): The Xinhua Printing House is a better example for cleansing class ranks.

Chairman: The Xinhua Printing House has old-timers from four dynasties. It printed banknotes during the Beiyang Warlord period, printed banknotes during the Japanese occupation, and later, when the Kuomintang took over the factory, it still printed. After liberation, it printed for us Communists. The key people inside had not been moved. This movement has shifted them. If they aren’t cleaned out, it’s terrible!
Some Kuomintang lieutenant generals and major generals changed their identities and became workers. There are many colonels, lieutenant colonels, majors, and warrant officers. (All laugh)
One was once the garrison commander of Xi’an city and has now become a gatekeeper at one of our factories.

Ba: He is also guarding the gate now.

Chairman: We didn’t know about this for 18 years; now we know.

Ma: Even though he was at the main gate, you didn’t know. He was at the gate inspecting, guarding.

Chairman: Strange things abound! In his (pointing to Zhang Chunqiao) Shanghai, the Kuomintang also wormed their way into our factories, organs, schools, and even literary and art troupes.
Shanghai is considered China’s foremost industrial city. Not counting handicraft workers, service industry personnel, and commercial staff, there are over 1.2 million industrial workers.
(To Premier Zhou) How many in Beijing?

Zhou: 800,000.

Chairman: Beijing has 800,000 industrial workers. This also excludes the handicraft workers, service trade personnel, and commercial staff mentioned earlier. Of course, this already includes the 220,000 workers left over from old China. Before liberation, Beijing had 220,000 industrial workers; in 18 years, it has increased to 800,000.

Çarçani (hereinafter referred to as Cha): That’s four times the number before liberation.

Chairman: None have been properly cleaned up. Past cleanups were never thorough.
This time, for our National Day, we invited 10,000 worker representatives from across the country.
(To Premier Zhou) Out of Shanghai’s 1.2 million workers, how many did we invite?

Zhou: 700.

Chairman: Next are Beijing and Tianjin.

Zhou, Yao: And Liaoning, with 600 each.

Chairman: And some other cities.

Zhou: Other places had 500, 300, or 100; Tibet sent 20. These are just those invited to Beijing to attend the celebrations; many worker representatives were also invited to National Day observances in other cities.

Chairman: The most chaotic time was when you came last spring. You left in March, right?

Ba: Left on March 1.

Chairman: Last July, August, and September, for three months, the fighting was intense, with armed struggles. We put forward the slogan "Wage struggle by reasoning, not by force," but there were some people who insisted on using force.

Ba: They wanted a hot war. (All laugh)

Chairman: They all had weapons. Ostensibly, they were seizing guns, but in fact, the troops distributed guns to them. There were 1 to 2 million guns, divided into two factions: one supported one side, the other supported the other side, and they themselves commanded from behind.

Cha: That means it was plotted.

Ma: Some people supported both this faction and that faction.

Chairman: Even a family split into two factions, sometimes more: the husband supported one faction, the wife supported another, and the children supported yet another.
Some have negotiated peace and stopped fighting. Because most of those involved in the fighting on both sides were good people; those directing and manipulating them included both good and bad. Once the bad elements are identified and sorted out, peace can be made, and a revolutionary committee can be established. A factory can only set up one revolutionary committee, not two; a people’s commune can only set up one revolutionary committee, not two. They’ve had enough fighting too and don’t want to fight anymore. (All laugh) Is this revolution necessary or not? I think we can’t do without it.

Ba: Absolutely necessary.

Chairman: At that time, in Sichuan province alone, 360,000 guns that had been seized were recovered.

Ba: Not quite 400,000.

Chairman: Almost 400,000.

Ba: If it came to war, Albania’s total national mobilization for combat wouldn’t amount to much more than that. (All laugh)

Jiang Qing: Our Sichuan province has a population of 70 million.

Chairman: Sichuan has 70 million people. After the bad elements were sorted out, they stopped fighting.

Teodosi (hereinafter referred to as Ti): Western news agencies say you’re still fighting.

Chairman: They spread rumors, but not entirely. This "fighting" is true, but they hope we’ll keep fighting for 10 or 20 years.

Huang Yongsheng (hereinafter referred to as Huang): They hope we’ll stay in chaos forever.

Ti: Your northern neighbors spread the most rumors.

Chairman: Hmm! That’s true.

Ma: Because they very much want you to be in chaos.

Chairman: Revolutionary committees have been established in all provinces, municipalities, and autonomous regions across the country. Our neighbors are not too happy about that.

Ba: Indeed.

Chairman: One day, a comrade told me after listening to a Soviet broadcast: the Soviets said that the thrust of our current struggle in China is directed mainly against the working class.

Ba: Rumors.

Chairman: Some people do listen to foreign broadcasts.

Zhou: Some people now listen to foreign broadcasts.

Chairman: I don’t listen to anything — neither Chinese nor foreign broadcasts.
It seems the whole world will still be in turmoil, because contradictions and struggles exist. The question is how the turmoil will unfold, which is hard to say now. A world war? That’s one kind of turmoil. No world war, but local wars, like the Soviet Union’s current invasion of Czechoslovakia. One day, the Soviet people will rise up in revolution. Aren’t we also prepared for them to fight? We don’t want to fight, but if they insist, what can be done? If they want to fight, we’ll have to fight.
This time in China, during two and a half years of the Cultural Revolution, almost every factory, every locality, nearly every county has seen fighting. I say "nearly every" rather than "every" because many factories did not see fighting, many villages did not, and many counties did not. But quite a few places did fight. Without weapons, they made their own, even homemade tanks. In places with chemical and machine factories, the weapons made were rather good — they made small cannons, homemade cannons. Of the 3,600 cannons confiscated in Sichuan, 2,000 were homemade.

Ba: Very interesting.

Chairman: So armed struggle has at least two advantages: First, it tempered the masses. The masses fought and even learned to make weapons. After 18 years of peace, not handling swords and guns might not be so good! That’s one advantage. Second, it exposed the bad elements. Do you understand? (To Balluku)
Beijing is considered relatively civilized, but even here, seven universities split into two factions and fought.

Zhou: In the first half of last year, there was also armed struggle in the outskirts of Beijing, in Tongzhou and Changping.

Chairman: Some people even borrowed our old wartime slogan, calling it "encircle the cities from the countryside."

Ba: That was a slogan from your revolution.

Chairman: At that time, the countryside encircled the cities because the cities were ruled by the Kuomintang and the Japanese. Now the Communist Party leads, and it’s the dictatorship of the working class. How can we practice "encircling the cities from the countryside"?

Ba: Exactly.

Chairman: In every people’s commune, one person from each production team was sent to surround the city, and they were paid wages. Wages varied by place: some got 5 jiao a day, some 1 yuan a day, some 2 yuan a day. If someone was killed, their family got 200 yuan — "material incentives" at work. Jiangxi, Hunan, Hubei, Shanxi, Anhui, Shaanxi, Sichuan, Guangdong, Guangxi all had "encirclement of the cities from the countryside." Guangdong wasn’t so intense. Baoding was very fierce, mainly because two army units split into two factions: one unit supported one faction, the other supported the other. Both factions were Communist Party. Has this problem been resolved yet?

Huang: Not yet; there hasn’t been time to deal with it.

Chairman: These places that saw fighting may not be so bad when viewed in historical context. This account can’t be entirely blamed on Liu Shaoqi. Your 38th Army supported one faction, the Hebei Provincial Military District supported the other. How can the blame be put on Liu Shaoqi? Later, we brought the two sides together, held meetings and study classes here, reached an agreement: they stopped fighting, handed in their guns. And the result? After returning, two months later they were fighting again. (All laugh)

Ba: They broke the agreement.

Chairman: Exactly! Reach an agreement, break the agreement; reach another, break it again — three or four times, like negotiations between two countries. (All laugh) That’s why we criticize the "theory of multiple centers" — this is the reason. A university splits into two parts, both armed, with their own domains. A small city like Baoding splits into two factions. Aren’t these two centers? There are many such centers nationwide, probably hundreds of thousands of people involved. I’m not so anxious about it, that’s all. Once this is pointed out, they dare not keep fighting.

Cha: Armed struggle will eventually stop.

Chairman: Zeng Mei, political commissar of the Hebei Provincial Military District, and Li Guangjun, commander of the 38th Army — these two are relatively stubborn in their thinking. We should transfer Zeng Mei to be the commander of the 38th Army, and Li Guangjun to be the political commissar of the Hebei Military District. Give it a try and see if they remain stubborn.

Ba: That way, they can reach an agreement.

Chairman: If someone makes a mistake in one place and can’t talk to the masses, in another place the masses may welcome him. Transferring people is a relatively good method. Henan is an example: swapping the military district commanders solved the problem. None of these people are bad elements, but in the past, they supported one faction against the other, which had a very bad influence among some of the masses.

Cha: The word "selfishness" is also at work in this.

Chairman: Exactly.

Ba: This is struggle. Also, some people fail to see the situation clearly all at once and make mistakes, but these people are not bad cadres. They are still loyal to the Party, and their mistakes can be corrected.

Zhou: At the rally welcoming you at the Workers' Stadium yesterday, there was a contingent from the 38th Army, and their discipline was very good.

Chairman: This is a unit that is highly capable in combat.

Zhou: They transferred a regiment to the Seventh Ministry of Machine Building, and they did very well.

Ba: With the Chairman's assessment now, this army is still very good.

Chairman: So among those supporting the "Left," some also made mistakes. These good people who made mistakes cannot be counted within the contradictions between the enemy and ourselves. They only fought one battle, but it wasn't a fight between the 38th Army and the Hebei Military Region forces; they stood behind as advisors.

Ba: Very interesting.

Chairman: We had not anticipated this matter. Wasn't it supposed to be the Cultural Revolution? How did it turn into this? This is a social phenomenon that emerged, with various factors behind it—factors of mountain-stronghold mentality, anarchism, and also elements of contradictions between the enemy and ourselves. There are bad people in society. For instance, behind the "Red Flag" faction in Guangdong stood the Kuomintang.

Huang: In the military, there were two people—one director of the Political Department and one deputy director—who supported two different factions. It wasn't just a matter of support; they engaged in some erroneous things.

Zha: He did this consciously.

Chairman: This time, the Party, government, military, and civilians have undergone a relatively thorough purge—cleansing and exposing themselves.

Take the 700 million people as an example. Bad elements probably amount to about one in a thousand, referring to those with serious contradictions between the enemy and ourselves. In Guangdong, those rooted out included former Kuomintang soldiers, military police, police, KMT officers, KMT party members, members of the Three People's Principles Youth League, and followers of the Yiguandao sect. A rough count puts the number at 400,000. Guangdong has a population of 40 million, so 400,000 accounts for one percent of 40 million. These 400,000—who once served as KMT military police, police, or party members—are not all bad people. If calculated at one per thousand, that would be 40,000 out of 40 million. What should be done with these 40,000? Kill them? We do not advocate killing people. Sending them to Taiwan wouldn't be good either. We still have to give them work, make them labor, and reform them through labor. They are still part of the labor force. They have children. If you kill them, their children will forever bear a grudge. The main thing is that we have rooted out those we previously didn't know about, those who were hidden. Now that we know, it's easier to handle—we can reform them.

Zha: If they had disguised themselves and not been discovered, that would have been bad.

Chairman: Yes, that would be dangerous. It will probably take another six months to a year to complete the work of purifying class ranks and consolidating the Party. In this way, we can maintain a period of tranquility—10 to 20 years. We can't say that this round of action has been completely clean, nor can we claim that everything done was absolutely correct and free of errors. From what we know, quite a number of people will still need to be rehabilitated.

When the masses take action, once they get going, they can be very fierce and not so civilized anymore. There were also instances of violent struggle, beatings, putting tall hats on people, and staging "jet-style" bullying. To say that we Chinese are so civilized—I'm not entirely convinced. When the masses get riled up, they are no longer so civilized. So this requires guidance, telling them not to do this; these methods cannot solve problems. Ji Dengkui, the Secretary of the Henan Provincial Party Committee, told me that the masses subjected him to "jet-style" treatment a hundred times. Isn't he here in Beijing for the celebrations this time? He went up on the Tiananmen rostrum. I asked him: "How are you? After being subjected to the 'jet-style' so many times?" He said: "It's all right, perfectly fine."

T: What does "jet-style" mean?

M: Does it mean tying both arms tightly with a hemp rope?

(The Chairman stood up and demonstrated the "jet-style" action himself; Yao and Huang demonstrated as well.)

Chairman: Before the movement, many people were often ill, requiring expensive medicines and recuperation—spending seven or eight months a year resting. Once the Cultural Revolution came, their illnesses vanished.

Zhou: According to preliminary statistics, very few people have been admitted to sanitariums since the movement began.

Chairman: This illness is, on the one hand, a decline in spirit, a decline in revolutionary will; on the other hand, with the revolution accomplished, they just want comfort and ease.

Ba: Their minds also deteriorate.

Chairman: Exactly! Once the Cultural Revolution started, they no longer wanted comfort and ease. A handful even actively participated in factional violent struggles, directing one faction from behind the scenes, or directing both factions.

Ba: Then they perked up.

Chairman: Zhou Jianmin, the Party Secretary of the Beijing Petroleum Institute, manipulated both factions, telling one side: "Fight!" and telling the other side: "Fight!" His aim was to protect himself.

Zha: The two factions fought, and he protected himself. They are like those who "throw stones at people while hiding their hands behind their backs."

Chairman: Now both factions have exposed him, so he has no way to hide.

Zha: Now the target has been identified.

Chairman: The hidden hand has been caught.

All right! I'll stop my chatter here. Do any other comrades have something to say?

Ba: I am extremely grateful to Comrade Mao Zedong for this constructive conversation. All of these teachings from you, I will convey to our Party. On behalf of all the comrades present here, I wish you good health. May you live as long as the boundless heavens!

Chairman: Don't talk like that.

Ba: This is the wish of our Party. Your long life without bounds will bring blessings to your people, to your Party, and to the entire international communist movement.

Thanks to Visarion for collection and arrangement.