Chapter 53 One on one, face to face - Deng Xiaoping and Wallace (5)

Deng Xiaoping told Wallace: "I will step down at the 13th Party Congress next year. But as of today, all I have encountered is opposition." Before I knew it, the originally scheduled one-hour interview had already been exceeded. But Wallace's question list still has a lot of questions queuing up at the back!Don't ask, the opportunity is rare; ask, can the 82-year-old Deng Xiaoping agree? In the end, Wallace plucked up his confidence and asked Deng Xiaoping to extend the original one-hour interview time by another 20 minutes, even if it was 10 minutes. Deng Xiaoping readily agreed, and said with a smile: "I made another mistake and violated the one-hour agreement."

Deng Xiaoping's humor amused Wallace too. For the remainder of the session, Wallace asked two more big questions. Wallace asked: "You said that you want to live to be 100 years old, and then you can go to see Marx. At that time, Mao Zedong may still be sitting next to Marx. What can they say to you?" Wallace's question is somewhat humorous, but its difficulty cannot but be said to be high. It involves ideology and China's basic line. Deng Xiaoping thought about it for a while, and said tactfully and firmly: "I am a Marxist. I have always followed the basic principles of Marxism. In the past, we made revolutions and conquered the world, and we were able to establish the People's Republic of China because of this belief and this theory. After the victory of the revolution, we followed the principles of Marxism to build socialism. We are now building the "four modernizations," but people often forget what the "four modernizations" are, and they are the "four modernizations" of socialism. This is Our business today."

Wallace followed closely: "It has been 10 years since Mao Zedong passed away. What does he think about the current situation? The current leaders advocate the glory of getting rich, advocate personal happiness, allow private businesses, and prepare for political reform. The people have Freedom of speech, all these are different from what Mao Zedong advocated, what would Mao Zedong think?" "Some are different, but some principles are still the same." Deng Xiaoping replied quite simply, and he continued, "Now Mao Zedong Thought is still our guiding ideology. We have a "Resolution on Some Historical Issues Concerning the Party Since the Founding of the People's Republic of China" to answer these issues.”

"But I still don't know that China under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping is different from China under the leadership of Mao Zedong. It seems that China is now carrying out a new revolution, or at least trying to carry out a new revolution." Wallace used He observes and analyzes China with the eyes of a mature and experienced reporter, and it cannot but be said that his eyes are sharp. Deng Xiaoping said happily: "This statement is correct. We also said that what we are doing now is essentially a revolution. In another sense, everything we are doing now is an experiment. It is a new thing, so we have to explore and move forward. It is a new thing to do such a revolution, and it is inevitable to make mistakes. Our method is to constantly sum up experience, and correct mistakes as soon as possible, and do not make small mistakes into big ones.”

At this time, Wallace looked down at the time and said, "One last question. You are the number one leader in China. How long are you going to stay as the main leader and main advisor?" This is actually a big question about the reform of China's leadership position system. Deng Xiaoping said bluntly: "I advocate the abolition of life tenure and the establishment of a retirement system. You know, when I talked with Italian journalist Farage, I said that I can work until 1985. Now it has been more than a year. What am I thinking about? Personally, I hope to retire early. But this issue is more difficult, and it is difficult to convince the party and the people. I believe that retiring within my lifetime will be more beneficial to the continuation of the current policy, and it is also in line with the My personal belief has always been. But this matter needs more persuasion. In the end, I am a member of the Communist Party and must obey the party's decision. I am a citizen of the People's Republic of China and must obey the wishes of the people. I still hope able to convince the people."

Wallace smiled and said, "You told Farage that you were going to retire in 1985. What are you going to say to Wallace?" Deng Xiaoping said: "Let me tell you frankly, I am convincing people that I will step down at the 13th Party Congress next year. But as of today, all I have encountered is opposition." The interview was over, and Deng Xiaoping and Wallace walked out of Ziguang Pavilion side by side.In autumn, Zhongnanhai is shimmering with waves, towering ancient cypresses are verdant and straight, and chrysanthemums are blooming. It is really a cool autumn.Deng Xiaoping and Wallace chatted about daily affairs as they walked, relaxed and easy-going, and it could be seen that Deng Xiaoping was very interested in today's interview.As a reporter, Wallace was naturally more excited about his success.

Wallace asked Deng Xiaoping: "Director Deng, how many hours do you work every day?" "Two hours a day." "Then what do you do the rest of the time?" "Playing with the grandchildren and reading some books too." "How many grandchildren do you have?" "There are four. The youngest is only one year and two months old." That night, the Chinese side broadcast the short message from Xinhua News Agency mentioned at the beginning of this article. The next day, the People's Daily, the official newspaper of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, also published this news on the first page, and accompanied it with a news photo of Deng Xiaoping being interviewed by Wallace.

Afterwards, reporters from the world's major media began to try their best to find out the content of Deng Xiaoping's first face-to-face conversation with Wallace.The names of Wallace and Deng Xiaoping became world news for a while.However, the highly skilled journalists found nothing from their tight-lipped counterpart Wallace, which made Wallace's exclusive interview even more mysterious. It is said that this was also Deng Xiaoping's only one-on-one interview with a TV reporter. On the evening of September 7, CBS broadcast the exclusive news of Deng Xiaoping's interview with Wallace on the TV station. From then on, "Deng Xiaoping fever" suddenly boiled over the world.

China's "People's Daily" published the details of Deng Xiaoping's speech twice on September 8 and September 15. In September 1993, Deng Xiaoping's talk was titled "Answer to American Journalist Mike Wallace" and included in the third volume of "Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping". Deng Xiaoping, who made a sensation in the world, once again won the world.