Chapter 42 Chapter 41 Advocating the "Commune"

Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan were proud because they invented the "Shanghai People's Commune" after the "January Revolution".After careful investigation, the "invention rights" of the "Shanghai People's Commune" did not belong to Zhang and Yao.Chen Boda was a "commune fan". ※ ※ ※ On February 5, 1967, a monster called "Shanghai People's Commune" appeared on the banks of the Huangpu River in Shanghai. Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan presided over the inaugural meeting of the "Shanghai People's Commune" attended by millions of people.The congress passed the "Long Live the Victory of the January Revolution——The Declaration of the Shanghai People's Commune," which boasted of the new monster:

"The four seas are churning, the clouds and water are furious, and the five continents are shaken by wind and thunder." We, the proletarian revolutionaries in Shanghai, solemnly declare to the whole of China and the world: In the great storm of the January Revolution, the old Shanghai Municipal Committee and the Municipal People's Committee were smashed by us. Rotten, the Shanghai People's Commune was born... A new type of local state organ of the dictatorship of the proletariat, the new Shanghai People's Commune, appeared on the horizon with a brand new look, was born on the banks of the Huangpu River, and stood erect in the east of the world...

The Shanghai People's Commune is a new form of organization that, under the guidance of Mao Zedong Thought, completely smashed the state institutions that had been usurped by the counter-revolutionary revisionists and recreated the local state institutions of the dictatorship of the proletariat... Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan were proud because they invented the "Shanghai People's Commune" after the "January Revolution".Right now, the "January Revolution" is spreading across the country, and rebels everywhere are imitating the "January Revolution" in Shanghai, and they are all trying to seize power from the "capitalist roaders".The new regime established after the seizure of power will also follow the example of Shanghai, called "People's Commune".Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan have already boasted that the significance of the "January Revolution" in Shanghai is no less than that of the Paris Commune in France.

After careful investigation, the "invention rights" of the "Shanghai People's Commune" did not belong to Zhang and Yao.Chen Boda was a "commune fan".In the people's commune movement that swept across China in the 1950s, Chen Boda was an instigator. Even Mao Zedong said that the "right to invent" the people's communes belonged to Chen Boda.During the "Cultural Revolution", Chen Boda once again advocated the People's Commune. Dutch scholar Jaap von Gineken wrote a special section on "Shanghai People's Commune" in his book "Lin Biao's Ups and Downs" (Jaap Van Ginneken THERISEAND FALLOFLINPLAOPenguin Books Ltd 1976), which explored in great detail the ideological process of Chen Boda's advocacy of communes:

In March 1966, Chen Boda published an article in the "Red Flag" magazine to commemorate the 95th anniversary of the birth of the Paris Commune. Chen Boda himself has studied the history of foreign revolutions.Later, along with the young radical writers and journalists in his group of cultural critics in Beijing, he immersed himself in the philosophical and historical analysis of examples of how life-or-death moments in history consolidated nascent regimes.In the ninth article of the "Sixteen Articles", this issue is specifically mentioned: "The members of the Cultural Revolution Group, the members of the Cultural Revolution Committee, and the representatives of the Cultural Revolution Congress must implement a comprehensive electoral system like the Paris Commune."

At the end of August, the election principles of the Paris Commune were published in the "Red Flag" magazine: "All leaders are elected by the people. The elected must be public servants of the people and accept their supervision: electors can remove and replace the elected at any time People." Then, this electoral system was discussed in detail, but the negative lessons of the experience of 1871 were omitted from Marx, Engel, Len and Sze.Lin Biao also associated himself with the call for "great democracy." In the autumn of 1966, at the last mass meetings in Tiananmen Square, he said: "According to the principles of the Paris Commune, fully realize the democratic rights of the people. Without this kind of great democracy, it is impossible to launch a real Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution..."

Chen Boda advocated the Paris Commune again and again. Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan were "inspired" and initially planned to name the new government in Shanghai "New Shanghai Commune". At this time, the "Red Flag" magazine was preparing to publish an editorial "On the Struggle of the Proletarian Revolutionaries to Seize Power".According to Wang Li, one of the editorial writers, Mao Zedong asked Chen Boda, Wang Li, and Guan Feng to draft the editorial.Written by Wang Li and Guan Feng, hosted by Chen Boda.Wang Li said, "This editorial is a programmatic document of the chairman's idea of ​​seizing power. It was compiled based on the chairman's previous talks at the Standing Committee and individual talks. After the editorial was written, it was sent to the chairman for review. .'"

This editorial revealed a very important and unpublished sentence of Mao Zedong: "Chairman Mao referred to Peking University's first Marxist-Leninist poster in the country as the Declaration of the Beijing People's Commune in the 1960s. At this time, Chairman Mao wisely and geniusly predicted that our state institutions would emerge in a new form .” ※ ※ ※ Upon hearing the news, Beijing moved and prepared to establish the "Beijing People's Commune".Jiang Qing and Guan Feng were already discussing the leading members of the "Beijing People's Commune", wanting Li Guangwen, a rebel from the Party School of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, to be in charge, and Qi Benyu to participate.Mao Zedong disagreed with Li Guangwen and asked Xie Fuzhi to be responsible.

At this moment, Chen Boda called Zhang Chunqiao in Shanghai from Beijing.Wang Li was on the phone when he was on the phone.On the phone, Chen Boda informed Zhang Chunqiao of the upcoming editorial of the "Red Flag" magazine and the news that Beijing was preparing to establish the "Beijing People's Commune". Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan, who were eager to grab the top spot, immediately held an emergency meeting with the leaders of more than a dozen rebel organizations in Shanghai, and decided to change the name of the "New Shanghai Commune" to "Shanghai People's Commune" and hold an inaugural meeting first.

According to Wang Li's recollection, Mao Zedong asked him to call Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan, asking Zhang and Yao to join the leadership team of the new Shanghai regime, and told him that this was the decision of the Politburo Standing Committee and the chairman's opinion.However, Wang Li recalled: "The chairman didn't ask me to tell them to let Shanghai establish a commune." On the morning of February 12, under the call of Mao Zedong, Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan flew from Shanghai to Beijing.Wang Li greeted Zhang and Yao at the airport, and then accompanied them to drive straight to Zhongnanhai Swimming Pool.Wang Li recalled: "The chairman sat in the room, wearing his pajamas, talking to Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan."

Wang Li remembered that Mao Zedong discussed three issues in this talk, the first of which was about the "Shanghai People's Commune". Mao Zedong's speech, Zhang Chunqiao delivered it in Shanghai on February 24, 1967.According to the original text of the record conveyed by Zhang Chunqiao in the archives, it is recorded as follows: Chairman Mao said: The Paris Commune was established in 1871, and it has been 96 years since its birth.If the Paris Commune had not failed but triumphed, then, in my opinion, it has now become a bourgeois commune, because the French bourgeoisie did not allow the French working class to stay in power for so long. This is the Paris Commune.The other is the form of the Soviet regime.When the Soviet regime came out, Lenin was very happy at the time, thinking that it was a great creation of the workers, peasants and soldiers and a new form of the dictatorship of the proletariat.But at the time he did not think that this form could be used by workers, peasants and soldiers, by the bourgeoisie, and by Khrushchev.From the point of view of the present Soviets, it has changed from Lenin's Soviets to Khrushchev's Soviets. The chairman also said: Britain is a monarchy, doesn't it have a king?The United States is a presidential system, and the essence is the same. Both are bourgeois dictatorships. There are many other examples. The puppet regime in South Vietnam is a presidential system, and Cambodia Sihanouk next to it is a kingdom. Which one is better?I'm afraid Sihanoukville is better.India is a presidential system, and Nepal is a kingdom next to it. Which of the two is better?It seems that the kingdom is better than India.Looking at it now, in ancient China, there were three emperors and five emperors. The Zhou Dynasty was called the king, the Qin Dynasty was called the emperor, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom was called the king, and Tang Gaozong (that is, Wu Zetian's husband) was called the emperor.He said, you can see that the name is changing, but we can't look at the name. The problem is not the name, but the reality, not the form, but the content.The presidential system, the kingly system, the monarchy, the so-called bourgeois democracy, these are all forms.We are not in name, but in reality, not in form, but in content.In English, the title of president and principal is the same word. It seems that the name of principal is much lower than that of president, which is the same in English.Therefore, the Chairman said that the name should not be changed too much. He also cited Wang Mang in history, who liked to change his name the most.As soon as he became emperor, he changed all the official positions and changed the names of all counties across the country. The chairman said that it was a bit like the Red Guards changing the names of all the streets in Beijing.After he changed it, he still couldn't remember it, and he still remembered the old name.It was difficult for Emperor Wang Mang to issue the edict, and it was so changed that he didn't even know the name of the county.Write the old name in the edict, so that the exchange of official documents is very troublesome. The chairman also said: drama is a form that China can use, foreign countries can use, the proletariat can use, and the bourgeoisie can also use.We can also imagine that in the People's Republic of China, both classes can use it, the proletariat can use it, and the bourgeoisie can also use it.If we are overthrown and the bourgeoisie comes to power, they don’t have to change their name, and they can still be called the People’s Republic of China, but it’s not a dictatorship of the proletariat, but a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie.Like the Soviet Union, it did not change it, and it was still called the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.This question is mainly to see which class is in power and who is in power. This is a fundamental problem, so it is better for us to play it safe and not change our names. ※ ※ ※ The chairman said that now there is a problem. All provinces and cities want to call it People's Commune. Just like Shanghai, some places have also called it. Recently, the Chairman has repeatedly considered this issue.I didn't think about it that way at first, but if I continue to think about it this way, all provinces and cities are called people's communes, and what is the State Council called?What is the name of the People's Republic of China?The chairman said that in this way, there will be changes in the political system, the issue of the national system, and the issue of the name of the country.Should it be changed to the People's Commune of China?Has the chairman of the People's Republic of China become the director or president of the Chinese People's Commune?When this problem occurs, the problem of foreign recognition or non-recognition occurs.Because of the change of the country name, foreign ambassadors are all invalidated, and the ambassador is replaced again, and the chairman said, I guess the Soviet Union will not recognize it. He dare not admit it, because it will bring trouble to the Soviet Union. Why did China have a problem? A Chinese People's Commune?The bourgeois state may admit it. There is another question. The chairman considers that if they are all called communes, what should the party do?Where is the party?Because there are party members and non-party members in the commune, and there are party members and non-party members among the committee members of the commune, so where should the party committee be placed?There must be a party!There is a core!No matter what it’s called, it doesn’t matter if it’s called the Communist Party, the Social Democratic Party, the Social Democratic Labor Party, the Kuomintang, or Yiguandao.It must have a party, Yiguandao also has a party, and the commune must have a party. The commune cannot replace the party, so Chairman Mao said, I think it is better not to change the name!Don't call it a commune!We still follow the old method, we still need people's congresses and elect people's committees.He said: These name changes are all changes in form and do not solve the problem of content. Is the temporary power organization established now still called the Revolutionary Committee... What Mao Zedong said left Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan speechless and extremely nervous.Zhang and Yao took the lead this time and fell hard. According to Mao Zedong's instructions, the "Shanghai People's Commune" announced on February 24, 1967 that it was renamed the "Shanghai Revolutionary Committee". Chen Boda, the "theoretician", also had to admit his major theoretical mistakes. In fact, if you reread the letter Kang Sheng wrote to Mao Zedong on August 3, 1959 on Lushan Mountain, you will find that the real "invention right" should be granted to this "big scholar"—he had already It is proposed to change the People's Republic of China to "People's Commune of China": When Engels discussed the state of the dictatorship of the proletariat, he proposed not to use the word "state" but to use the ancient German word "community" (Cemeinwesen) or "Commune" in French.It can be seen that the word "commune" is not equal to "communism" (although the foreign words are very similar).Neither the Paris Commune nor the Guangzhou Commune are social systems that practice communism.According to Engels' letter, not only our agricultural cooperatives can be called "people's communes", that is, the "People's Republic of China", but also "Chinese people's communes".This not only does not violate Marxism-Leninism, but conforms to Marxism-Leninism... Despite the constant discord between Chen Boda and Kang Sheng, they are surprisingly consistent on the extreme left! According to Wang Li's recollection, Mao Zedong's conversation with Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan lasted about two hours.Chen Boda should be allowed to participate in this important conversation, because Zhang and Yao went to Shanghai as "researchers" of the "Central Cultural Revolution".What's more, what we are talking about is about the "Shanghai People's Commune". Zhang Chunqiao announced the establishment of it after calling Chen Boda for instructions and obtaining his approval. At the end of the conversation, Mao Zedong asked Wang Li: "Did you tell them what you wanted them to do?" Wang Li knew in his heart that the first "they" in Mao Zedong's words refers to Chen Boda and Jiang Qing; the second "they" refers to Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan. Wang Li replied: "I talked about it a little bit. I will talk about it in detail after the chairman meets." Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan left Mao Zedong's place, and only learned about Beijing's latest "political situation" from Wang Li: The day before yesterday—— ——On February 10, Mao Zedong severely criticized Chen Boda and Jiang Qing at the enlarged meeting of the Politburo Standing Committee, especially Chen Boda in his words, saying that his overthrow of Tao Zhu was "one Standing Committee overthrowing one Standing Committee".Mao Zedong asked Chen Boda and Jiang Qing to conduct inspections, and the "market" has changed. No wonder Mao Zedong deliberately left Chen Boda aside in this talk!Zhang Chunqiao regretfully said to Wang Li: "When we formally establish the commune, just make a phone call to ask the chairman for instructions!" Zhang Chunqiao's implication is very clear: unlucky for him!He had asked the group leader Chen Boda for instructions, and now Chen Boda suddenly "depreciated". No wonder Mao Zedong spent so much time, collecting extensive references, and refuting the "communes" with various examples from ancient and modern China and foreign countries...