Chapter 28 Section 3 Hu Yaobang's four speeches in the Northwest Group

Here I will only write about his speech at the Northwest Group Meeting.His speeches are neither too many nor too few.I remember that the first time he spoke was on the morning of November 13, 1978, which was the fourth meeting of our group. On November 10, 1978, after Hua Guofeng talked about the three topics of the conference, he went on to say, "The Political Bureau of the Central Committee decided to discuss one issue before discussing these topics, which is the general line and the general task in the new era. Under the guidance of the Party Central Committee, starting from January next year, the focus of the work of the whole party will be shifted to socialist modernization construction.Hua Guofeng told the attendees of the Central Work Conference that the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee and the Political Bureau of the Central Committee agreed that, adapting to the development of domestic and foreign situations, the nationwide mass movement to expose and criticize the "Gang of Four" should be promptly and decisively ended, and the entire party should It is absolutely necessary to shift the focus of work to socialist modernization.

During the first day or two of the group discussion, almost all the speakers followed Hua Guofeng's speech and expressed their position on the issue of shifting the focus from January 1979. On November 13, Hu Yaobang said in his Northwest Group’s speech on focus shift that the nature of the focus shift raised by Hua Guofeng was a matter of work policy and work deployment.He quoted Mao Zedong's saying that "if one wave is not settled, there will be another wave", and don't wait for the wave to be settled before starting a new task.He said that the "wave" of exposing and criticizing the "Gang of Four" has not yet leveled off, but has reached its crest, and this is the time to propose construction tasks.At the same time, he pointed out that the shift of focus does not mean that the work of exposing and criticizing the "Gang of Four" has been completed.He also cited major issues of right and wrong such as the "Tiananmen Incident" that must be thoroughly resolved.I totally agree with him.When discussing the shift of focus, many speakers held a similar position and agreed to shift the focus of work to modernization from next year, but must solve the problems that should be solved.

In his speech that day, Hu Yaobang said that exposing, criticizing and investigating the "Gang of Four" still had a lot of problems. To launch a large-scale mass movement, we must complete the task from the beginning to the end.First of all, he talked about the issue of criticizing the fallacy of the "Gang of Four". He said that there are many topics to be criticized, and we must not relax.Secondly, he talked about organizational work. He said that since the 11th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, in the struggle against the "Gang of Four", the handling of qualitative issues has been successful and complete.He said that the 170 members of the "Gang of Four" group who were expelled by the central government should not be in a hurry. They would rather wait two to three years for the final treatment. This does not prevent the focus from shifting.

Hu Yaobang also talked about cadres’ rehabilitation and policy implementation. Of the 17 million out-of-production cadres across the country, 17% were “censored” in previous campaigns. There are also 2 million out-of-production grassroots cadres who have been censored.For those who have been wronged, we should follow the spirit of thorough materialism, make mistakes and reverse the case.Otherwise, the factors that endanger stability and unity cannot be eliminated.In his capacity as head of the Organization Department of the Central Committee, he said that this matter should be basically completed before the 30th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1979, and some things can be "blown by the wind."

In this speech, he also talked about the "61 Traitor Group", the "Southern Traitor Group", the Peng Dehuai issue, the Tao Zhu issue, the Wang Heshou issue, and the Kang Sheng issue.Chen Yun's speech at the Central Working Conference was one day earlier than Hu Yaobang's speech.At that time, Hu Yaobang's status was much lower than Chen Yun's, and the content of his speech was substantial and specific, but a lot was cut out in the meeting briefing, and people in other groups knew less about it.If I didn't have notes, I wouldn't be able to recall so many of his speeches.In this speech, Hu Yaobang spoke very sharply about the Kang Sheng issue.He pointed out that Kang Sheng was the chief culprit in the "Cultural Revolution" and did many bad things. The International Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, the Organization Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the Central Party School sent him many materials. He believed that the "Gang of Four" should be renamed the "Gang of Five", Kang Sheng was the number one member of the "Gang of Five".

Hu Yaobang's speech this time did not "discuss the facts", but also raised a deep-seated question.He said, "The lessons of the Cultural Revolution must be summed up."He asked everyone to think about why Lin Biao and the "Gang of Four" were able to stay on stage for ten years?What is the fundamental lesson?Speaking of Kang Sheng's failure to conduct self-criticism, Mao Zedong made amends for him.He believes that life within the party is abnormal, pointing out that there has been a long-term phenomenon of "the party exists within the party, and the law exists outside the law".

Then he introduced a sentence that Deng Xiaoping said: The party must have a large number of cadres who dare to think about problems, dare to speak, and dare to deal with problems.Advocates to expose the contradictions in life. Then he talked about the issue of the Central Task Force.He introduced in detail the huge organization of the central task force at that time, which task force managed which type of people, and so on.I won't write about it here. Hu Yaobang's second speech was on November 16, and he talked about agricultural issues. Hu Yaobang's third speech in the Northwest Group was on the morning of November 26, and he expressed his position on Hua Guofeng's speech at the Central Work Conference on November 25.Hu Yaobang made four points. The first point expressed his joy at Hua Guofeng's talk about solving a large number of problems since the "Cultural Revolution", such as the official redress of the "Tiananmen Incident" and the correction of a number of major unjust, false and wrong cases; If the atmosphere of criticism and self-criticism at this Central Work Conference is maintained, unity of purpose can be continuously strengthened; the third point is that in order to continue to clarify the major issues of right and wrong, it is necessary to come into contact with the issue of how to evaluate the "Cultural Revolution" and how to comprehensively evaluate Chairman Mao , This is something that cannot be avoided even if you want to avoid it.Hu Yaobang said that he advocated that the central government should clarify these two issues after careful preparation.He said that what we should pay attention to now is that we must not repeat the lessons of previous years. Whenever someone mentions that the "Cultural Revolution" had shortcomings and mistakes, it becomes a problem. The stick, thus arousing the dissatisfaction of the people; the fourth point is to respect the theory of practice, not to engage in the theory of genius and slavery, and to use practice to examine and test everything.

It should be said that Hu Yaobang's speech this time is a speech with a high perspective.I said this at that time, and I appreciate it very much. In his fourth speech, Hu Yaobang only briefly raised a specific opinion.He said that according to reports from the person in charge of the Beijing Prison, there are still more than 100 people in the prison because they opposed the "Gang of Four."He expressed the hope that relevant parties would look into it. Not counting the group speeches he made at our Northwest Group meeting, and Hu Yaobang’s speeches at the Northwest Group, I only recorded four of them.Hu Yaobang didn't make many speeches, but the first three were important and important speeches. I think readers will be very happy to introduce them now.For me, it is also a memorial.

Yaobang and I have known each other very early, and we met when we were in Yan'an.But we have become friends since we opposed the "Gang of Four" under the leadership of Comrade Xiaoping in 1975, and later we were criticized and punished together in "criticizing Deng and countering the Rightist trend of overturning verdicts". In September 1976, the "Criticism of Deng" was in a tense stage, and the Tangshan earthquake affected Beijing, which temporarily interrupted the movement.The people who are being punished and those who are being rectified are busy with anti-shock, but those of us who are being rectified can take a breath because of this.I took this opportunity to visit Yaobang's home at No. 6 Fuqiang Hutong. I saw how he was studying at home, and I was deeply impressed by his eagerness to learn.

You might as well make some descriptions of the environment in which he was studying at that time.Instead of building an earthquake-proof shelter in his yard, but not without earthquake-proof, he built something like a bunk bed in his office out of solid wood.Lying down, once the house collapses, you can avoid the bricks, tiles and sandalwood pillars from directly pressing on your body.In this way, the office becomes a temporary bedroom.And he was studying next to a big desk by the window in such a house.There are stacks of books on the table, and there are always books open and reading. When I went to his house, the two of them inevitably vented their dissatisfaction with "criticizing Deng".At that time, I don’t know why I didn’t think of the possibility of installing bugs beside us. I spoke without any scruples, but fortunately, there were no serious consequences.But this kind of talk is over in a few words, and after the meeting and conversation, it is natural to focus on theoretical issues.

I remember the first time I went to his room, there was a copy of the third volume of Marx's "Outline of a Critique of Political Economy" translated by Liu Xiaoran on the table.Yaobang presided over the drafting of the "Outline of the Work Report of the Chinese Academy of Sciences" and mentioned that the argument that "science and technology are productive forces" is based on this book.But the drafting of that document is a thing of the past. The "Gang of Four" and their public opinion tools have long defined the "Report Outline" as "a big poisonous weed."I asked Yaobang: "Why are you still reading this book?" He said that in the "Criticism of Deng", some people in the Academy of Sciences said that he introduced "science and technology are productive forces" as a thesis of Marx, which distorted Marx, so he thought Take another look.Just ask my opinion.I have also studied this book.So the two of us found out the directly relevant discussion in the book.I remember the main ones are: ——"the accumulation of knowledge and skills, the general productive forces contained in the wisdom of society"; ——"Productivity, of course, includes science"; - "The development of fixed capital shows the extent to which general social knowledge and learning have become direct productive forces"; ——"The labor productivity of society is first of all the power of science." Of course there are others.After we studied this book together, we thought that although Marx did not write the sentence "Science and technology are productive forces" in the book, he clearly stated that meaning, saying that we distorted Marx's original intention was completely deliberately framed.During the discussion, I saw that Yaobang read Marx's book very carefully and understood it very clearly. Here's the thing about "movement".There was another meeting, and the topic was still Marx's "Outline of a Critique of Political Economy".That book is Marx's Notebook.Among them is a manuscript written by Marx, "Introduction to the Critique of Political Economy", which has been published by People's Publishing House.In this "Introduction", Marx talked about the relationship between production, exchange, distribution and consumption.When Yaobang saw me, he said enthusiastically that Marx spoke very well about the dialectical relationship between production and consumption.He paid special attention to the statement that the purpose of production is consumption, which has no direct relationship with the 1975 and 1976 movements. I don't know why he also attaches great importance to it.Later, when Yaobang actively advocated discussions on the purpose of socialist production in 1979, I remembered that conversation, which made me understand that what he did was the result of his own reading and practice, and was guided by theoretical thinking. These two conversations during the earthquake made me notice that Yaobang attached great importance to the study of Marxist classics. After Yaobang became the general secretary and moved to Zhongnanhai, I never went to his house again.I went to his residence in Zhongnanhai for the first time after his death, when Yaobang's family set up a mourning hall there.But before he moved out of Fuqiang Hutong during his lifetime, I still visited it several times.I never talk about work, always small talk.Once he was reading a thin booklet.I asked him what book it was, and I handed it over to him. It was "A Hundred Years of Surging History" written by Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Yoshida, published by World Knowledge Publishing House.I asked him how the book was written, and he said "very interesting".I found this book when I got home and finished it quickly.This is a summary of Shigeru Yoshida's history of Japan's development in the past century.As Yaobang said, "it's quite interesting".Some of them I remember very well.For example, when talking about the population issue, Shigeru Yoshida expressed a point of view: As long as you are talented, you are not afraid of a large population.I think it's very well said.The book also said that Japan attaches great importance to education, and school work is given priority. Whoever wants to go to the Japanese countryside, and which house is the best in the rural areas, does not have to ask whether it must be a school. In 1994, when I expressed an opinion on China’s population issues—“quality first, education first,” I remembered this book by Shigeru Yoshida recommended to me by Yaobang. This example made me notice that the scope of Yaobang's reading is not limited to classics, but also various books that he thinks are interesting.No wonder he has a broad horizon. Another time at his home, I saw "Huainanzi" open on the table.Seeing that I paid attention to this book, he said that there are some interesting words in the ancient book.He said that Huainanzi had a saying, "If you pay a salary, you can cook it for a few meters, and you can treat the small, but not the large."Then, the principle that the methods used to govern the small and the large, and to govern the family and the country are different.He also specially wrote the character "Cuan" with many strokes, saying that if this character is not simplified, it will be difficult to read the strokes when it is printed in relatively small characters.At that time, I was researching the importance of "credibility" in our country's economic work. When I came back, I looked through "Huainanzi", and found that there were two similar passages in "Taizu Xun" and "Xianyan Xun".If you put aside some difficult-to-recognize characters and difficult-to-understand sentences in classical Chinese, the meaning is clear. To run a family and run the country, you can’t use the method of burning as much firewood as you have at home, cooking as much rice as you have, but finding a way to solve it. Big problems that the country has to solve.I think this sentence can be borrowed to give play to a guiding ideology that should be paid attention to in our country's economic construction work, that is, in order to develop our country's economy as soon as possible, we should not just look at how much money we have at hand and how many things we can do, but must go through careful research to determine what can be achieved. With the help of the means of credit, try to find the money needed to achieve this goal.Through Yaobang's quoting of this sentence from "Huainanzi", I saw that he still attaches great importance to ancient books and can use the past for the present. There are many people who are eager to learn and understand Yaobang, and many old comrades praise him for this.Lu Dingyi is one of them.This was more than ten years ago.Once I went to Beijing Hospital to visit the old head of our Central Propaganda Department. He said to me: "Chairman Mao's mistakes were criticized by the Party Central Committee through the "Resolution on Several Historical Issues Since the Founding of the People's Republic of China". My mistakes are also big. Well, there is no one to criticize, so I have to criticize myself. After the founding of the People’s Republic of China, I was in charge of ideological and cultural work within the party. It should be pointed out that all leading cadres who participated in the work during the revolutionary period, who have not graduated from college, must all go to college. At that time, most people were still relatively young and could still read books. If I had done this at that time and the Party Central Committee accepted my suggestion, the development of our Party and the country would not be what it is now after the founding of the People’s Republic of China. The 'Cultural Revolution' may have been avoided. But I did not raise this idea, which caused great losses to the party and the country. The crime was 'delaying major national affairs'. It is useless to mention it later. I am too old to learn. , most people are like this. Only a small number of veteran cadres realize that their education level is low, and they work hard, study hard, and make great progress. Hu Yaobang is the first of such people. His books are really good. Few, very insightful, can come to a few poems and songs, and the characters are well written. He has become a big intellectual from a red kid." Lu Dingyi's words left a deep impression on me, His few words about Hu Yaobang's eagerness to learn are exactly the same as what I have seen with my own eyes.