Chapter 24 The second part of the three dangerous words is coming

In the official discourses over the past two decades, 1989 was rarely mentioned, as if it did not exist if it was not mentioned.In order to avoid causing trouble, folk discourses often avoid talking about the entire 1989 years, and even the topic of recalling the 1980s stopped abruptly at the end of 1988.So some people joked that in China, after 1988, it will be 1990. A year gone, missing?For some people, it is an eternal memory, just like the title of the book published by the Hong Kong Journalists Association to commemorate the 89 June 4th Tiananmen Incident: "The People Will Never Forget".But will the people really not forget?For the vast majority of young people in mainland China, the 89 June 4th Tiananmen Incident has never entered their consciousness. They have never seen relevant images and reports, and no family members or teachers and friends have explained it to them.They don't forget, they don't know it at all.Therefore, in theory, given time, a whole year can be lost because people don't mention it.

2009 is the 90th anniversary of the May 4th Movement in 1919, the 60th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China in 1949, the 50th anniversary of the departure of the Dalai Lama in 1959, the 20th anniversary of the June 4th Tiananmen Incident in 1989, and the 10th anniversary of the suppression of Falun Gong in 1999. 96521, making everyone very nervous.So some people are joking, in the future, it will be good to enter every eighth and tenth, and next time after 2018, we will enter 2020 in advance. However, for He Dongsheng’s current generation of party and state leaders, 89 June 4 has little to do with them personally. They all entered the core of power after the mid-1990s, and they do not bear the original sin of 89 June 4.He Dongsheng recalled afterwards that the 2009 was not as dangerous as the turbulent 2008.However, shortly thereafter, the external environment changed again, and the world economy entered a period of ice and fire, which was bound to detonate internal conflicts that had been suppressed for many years. In addition, the party and government team at that time were about to change their terms. This was the biggest test for the party.

He Dongsheng said: Since 2008, a series of incidents in Weng'an, Guizhou, Shishou, and Tonghua Iron and Steel Works made him realize how vulnerable local governments are when facing mass incidents—like in Weng'an, the local government and public security personnel He actually abandoned his armor and fled, but in Tonghua Iron and Steel, if the state machinery is mobilized, it will be the industrial workers who will be suppressed.Where is the legitimacy of the Communist Party’s suppression of industrial workers? After those incidents, he participated in a central secret group to plan contingency plans, sand table deduce how to deal with large-scale turmoil in China in the future, and finally formulated several reserve plans. The joint planning meeting of the armed police summoned several thousand county party secretaries and leading local public security cadres to Beijing for intensive training.

In 2009, He Dongsheng had clearly realized that the global economy would face another more serious crisis, but as long as the Chinese government handles it properly, it will be an excellent opportunity to solve the long-term inextricable knot in China and turn the crisis For the machine.He Dongsheng even believes that whether China can enter a prosperous age ahead of schedule depends on the international situation and whether there is an internal opportunity in time, so that the current government can take the opportunity to rectify the chaos in one fell swoop and improve the reform and opening up that has not been completed for more than 30 years. .The so-called opportunity, to put it bluntly, is a big crisis, and only a big crisis can convince the common people to accept the autocratic big government.The Beijing model of one-party governance can be accepted by ordinary people for two reasons: one is beneficial to stability, and the other is that it can concentrate resources to accomplish major tasks.That is to say, maintaining stability is only a necessary condition for its legitimacy, because a democratic system may not be able to maintain stability. Take Taiwan as an example. You ridicule it with the chaos of democracy, but it can be as stable as the right to peace and the political situation.Therefore, it is not enough to say that stability can be maintained. It is also necessary to prove that one-party governance can accomplish major things that cannot be achieved by a democratic system. If this cannot be achieved, its existence value should still be challenged.What He Dongsheng was waiting for was this opportunity to do great things, which he privately called the "Proposal for Governing the Country and Peace of the World".This name is very old-fashioned, but He Dongsheng couldn't get rid of it. After thinking about it, he spent many sleepless nights with him.

If there is not a timely and major crisis, it will be dangerous when the current government expires and changes.Firstly, the CCP’s power transition has always been like this, and the power struggle among the various factions within the party will be very fierce; secondly, there have been many events in the past few years. Since the financial tsunami in 2008, social conflicts have intensified. Leaving an excuse, dragging it to the party congress in this way, it seems a foregone conclusion that those in power will be dismissed from get out of class.He Dongsheng was not a core member of the establishment, but as a veteran of the two dynasties at the time, he knew who was not bad and who was worse than the other, and he was more willing to help some technocrats with no background to gain power.But even so, he is unwilling to be involved in the eye of the storm of power struggles, and he does not want to see great turmoil in China's political situation due to the change of office.He is only an alternate member of the Politburo, and he cannot accomplish a major event by himself, and needs God's help. For example, a year or so before the change of term, a suitable big crisis occurs, and the Politburo decides to invoke and implement the "plan for governing the country and the world" step by step. In this way, He Dongsheng thought to himself, China will be saved, although future generations will probably not know his deliberate contribution, and will not think that the Trojan Horse "Proposal for Governing the Country and the World" was carefully crafted by He Dongsheng for the permanent ruling of the party. If it really brings prosperity , all credit will go to the highest party and state leaders.

He Dongsheng has long seen the crisis of Western financial capitalism, and his personal investment strategy is to bet against the US dollar.For so many years in Zhongnanhai, at first, like other officials, he tried to move renminbi abroad and exchange it for U.S. dollars, but about ten years ago, he was no longer optimistic about U.S. dollar assets, so he exchanged most of the overseas U.S. dollars for Canadian dollars as his own. The cost of giving birth to a son to study in Bibang, and buying a house in the old bourgeois high-end bungalow area of ​​Shannas in Vancouver.The remaining US dollars were bought in gold mines, minerals such as oil, and energy stocks, intending to hold them for a long time.More importantly, he decided to keep the renminbi, or invest in the hard commodity of renminbi, that is, domestic real estate.He doesn't play domestic stocks because he has no time, hates the dishonesty and opacity of the whole game, and doesn't want people to think he is greedy for money.Over the years, his anti-American investment strategy has brought him considerable returns and strengthened his views on the international economy.When the financial tsunami raged in 2008, He Dongsheng had expected it for a long time, but he was still shocked, which prompted him to comprehensively reflect on his own economic theory, reconstruct the world economy and China's development path in his mind, and combine ideas with The policy is cleverly combined in his "plan for governing the country and calming the world".

He saw that the developed countries headed by the United States, because of their two-party or multi-party democratic system, have neither the ability nor the determination to subdue the monster of globalized financial capitalism.Elected politicians in the United States are subject to interest groups: Wall Street, large corporations, the military industry, local forces, churches, labor unions, public relations lobby groups with special interests, and also take care of the media and public opinion. Small fights, dare not bear the pain to scrape the bone to heal the wound, let alone make a drastic move.The market fundamentalists and the right wing of the Republican Party in their country are constantly dragging their feet and adding to the chaos. They are completely out of touch with the times, and they have destroyed but not contributed.He Dongsheng is disheartened and has no hope for Western representative democracy, and he does not believe that those financial decision-making officials in the United States who are inextricably linked to Wall Street have the courage to make correct decisions to save the world economy.On the contrary, he increasingly believes that China's post-totalitarian autocratic government is capable of controlling the current stage of globalized financial capitalism, if China has a correct understanding of globalized financial capitalism.

However, He Dongsheng knows that it is not enough to have a correct understanding of China's affairs, because party and government departments at all levels have been overly controlled by interest groups and corrupt officials, and they will distort or resist even correct policies.Therefore, He Dongsheng thought that only through an unprecedented crisis can those in power at that time realize a real dictatorship, and the government orders will be effective, laying a solid foundation for the prosperous China that is ready to go.However, although He Dongsheng expected the world economy to experience more serious turmoil than in 2008, he did not expect the crisis he expected to come so soon. On the first day of panic, the Politburo decided to activate a freshly prepared contingency reserve The plan is called "Ice and Fire Prosperity Project".This plan was of course the collective wisdom of the Politburo Standing Committee members at the time, but it was in every way in line with He Dongsheng's secret "plan for governing the country and the world".

What's wrong with America first?How to learn from our China, the country prints money and sells bonds, saves the car company that cannot be saved, and injects capital into the bankrupt bank, and the money is not spent on ideas.As a result, credit is no longer active, housing prices continue to bottom out, the market is still shrinking, and the unemployment rate is still rising, while the dollar is going down step by step. Investors in the United States do not want dollars, and investors in the world do not want dollars. Even Japan, The central banks of Russia and Taiwan dare not only hold US dollars, and the long-term and short-term interest rates of US bonds are difficult to sell.The U.S. dollar once rebounded at the beginning of 2009, but it has fallen by another 25% in the following two years. Finally, the world’s confidence in the U.S. dollar reached a critical point. Within one trading day in February, the nightmare suddenly came, and the U.S. dollar was destroyed. Panic selling followed by the US stock market crash, gold at $2,000 an ounce, the chairman of the US Federal Reserve and the Secretary of the Treasury resigned, and Nobel Prize-winning economists Stiglitz and Krugman confirmed that the US has officially entered the peak period. The Great Inflationary Recession is what the Chinese media call the period of ice and fire.

At this time, of course, the economy in most parts of the world is not doing well.What about China?China is also in danger, with stagnant exports, a sharp increase in the unemployment population, and a stock market that has continued to fall to the limit. This time, the economic growth will probably not escape from positive to negative. In 2009, the act of stimulating the economy by relying on direct investment from the national financial appropriation helped to ensure GDP growth, but it did not really stimulate consumption and domestic demand. A lot of money was invested in suspicious large-scale projects and fixed assets, and the main beneficiaries were The bureaucracy and the crony interest groups of central enterprises have instead encouraged state-owned enterprises to monopolize the market and reduced the space for private enterprises.

The most terrible thing is the sharp depreciation of the dollar.Before 2004, China's annual foreign trade surplus was not large.But since 2004, China has become less and less in need of imported industrial products made in foreign countries, while exports have become more and more fierce. The foreign exchange reserves have suddenly climbed to more than 2 trillion US dollars, and then lost more than one-third of their value in one day. .It turns out that although China has been yelling for a long time, it is not like the central banks of Japan, Russia, Taiwan and other places that are releasing US dollars. Instead, they are still supporting the US dollar and buying US dollar assets. It is not because they do not want to gradually decouple from the US dollar, but because Lack of other options.We are already paving the way for bilateral currency exchange arrangements with Japan, South Korea, ASEAN, and Shanghai Cooperation Organization countries. We are already actively asking the United States to issue RMB-denominated bonds, which are called panda bonds by foreign media.So it's not that we don't make preparations, it's just that the time is running out. We can only hope that the US dollar will not fall for the time being, but it is unexpected that the US dollar will fall so soon.But politics is cruel. Just because of the crime of shrinking sovereign wealth, coupled with the negative growth of the domestic economy that can be expected afterwards, the previous government has lost all prestige in the party. , will definitely step down, it will be a moment of love and hatred.This is the most important reason why the previous government resolutely decided to adopt the Ice and Fire Prosperity Plan.That's right, since there is death and death, it's up to the next government to fight against the odds and draw out the bottom line in order to turn things around. The day when the U.S. dollar depreciated was the eighth day of the first lunar month. China had just passed the Lunar New Year holiday, and except for some factories, the market was fully open.Almost every news outlet reported that morning that the world economy was in a recession.In the afternoon, there was a rush to buy food and daily necessities in various cities, and by the evening people were panicking. Where has the state apparatus gone? In fact, the public security, armed police, and the People's Liberation Army across the country were on alert that day. The central government announced to governments at all levels that the whole country was in a state of emergency, and the Ice and Fire Prosperity Plan had been launched.This action is interlocking, and the whole country must play a game of chess and go according to the predetermined plan in order to achieve full success. The first ring, except for the immediate martial law in Xinjiang and Tibet, there is no central order in other places, and the state apparatus is not allowed to be deployed.In other words, the state apparatus waits.What are you waiting for?Wait and see how long it takes for real chaos to appear.Wait and see how long the populace can endure the anarchy.Waiting for that moment, the people call on the government not to abandon them, begging the state machinery to come out and save themselves.That is to say, until the people of the whole country willingly commit themselves to the giant spirit again. If large-scale vandalism occurs, or residents flee their living areas collectively, it will be a signal for the state apparatus to dispatch.As a result, the people spent six days in panic and rumors flying all over the sky. On the seventh day, according to the situation reported in various places, there were already signs of turmoil. Or the phenomenon of residents fleeing collectively.On the eighth day, the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, the People's Liberation Army and the armed police marched symbolically into more than 600 cities across the country, and were greeted by residents without exception.This shows that in a well-off society, people are more afraid of chaos than dictatorship, and Chinese society is not as disorderly as imagined, and the vast majority of people yearn for stability. As long as the finger is not directed at the government, everything will be easy to manage. That afternoon, the public security, the armed police, and the People's Liberation Army jointly announced a severe crackdown on the evil forces. Social order was restored immediately, and even stealing behaviors disappeared abruptly.The government also announced the opening of a warehouse to distribute rice from the central grain reserve. The daily ration is limited and it is completely free. Anyone who comes 24 hours a day is welcome to ensure that the common people will not worry about going hungry.What's interesting is that common people don't like the taste of the multi-crop rice used in the state's grain reserves. Fang Caodi asked He Dongsheng angrily: "Why? Why do you want to scare the common people like this?" He Dongsheng said as if lecturing: The moment when the crisis begins is very critical, and it will be difficult to clean up if it is not handled well at the beginning.This crisis is super serious enough to trigger mass incidents across the country.It starts from the economic aspect, but it will detonate all kinds of deep-rooted social conflicts that have been dormant for a long time. If the government's response is too mild and fragmented, the people will not be satisfied and their resentment will be even greater. The class can't accept it again, and will rebound.No matter what we do, it will only be pointed at the government. This was the case in China at that time. Except for group incidents involving ethnic minorities, which may be ethnic group-to-ethnic group incidents, general group incidents are the opposition between the masses and the government.Many ordinary people have come to an opinion that the problem of not causing trouble will not be resolved, so any trivial matter will easily turn into a mass incident. If mass incidents occur across the country at the same time, and the spearheads and grievances are all directed at the government, our scenario deduction shows that it is impossible for the government to extinguish fires one by one, or to appease groups by groups, no matter how many police forces, troops, and armed forces If the power is not enough, the state apparatus will collapse. Conversely, as long as the spearhead is not directed at the government, it is not easy to form mass incidents.Individual outlaws causing trouble do not constitute mass incidents. Therefore, first of all, it is necessary to prevent the common people from pointing all the blame at the government at the same time. After deduction and deduction, the only way to win in danger is to let the people frighten themselves, fearing that the government will abandon them and fear that there will be no government.Anarchy is what Hobbes called the war of all against all. In his book "Giant" or "Leviathan", in the state of nature, human life is solitude. , poor, dirty, rough and short.There is no guarantee of life and property, that is the ultimate horror.Think about it seriously, people say they are afraid of chaos in China all day long, isn't that what they are afraid of?Because they are afraid of anarchy and chaos, everyone is willing to kneel in front of an unlovable giant spirit, because only this giant spirit can protect their lives and property, that is to say, let the country become the only legal monopoly of violence , there is no other choice.That is to say, only when people really feel that in the face of a catastrophe, we can only count on us, the Communist Party, can we continue to concentrate resources to do big things. Xiaoxi pushed He Dongsheng back: "Now we are talking about the government and anarchy, but I didn't say that the government must be your Communist Party!" He Dongsheng said: "There is no point in arguing about this, anyway, the two are the same thing now." Xiaoxi asked: "You created anarchy, and you have already deceived the people. Even the people in Beijing welcome the People's Liberation Army into the city. What else do you want? Why do you still have to crack down? Do you know how many people will die in vain every time there is a crackdown?" Fang Cao said, "I almost died in this crackdown." He Dongsheng said: "Speaking of conscience, I also hope that this is the last time we carry out crackdowns. However, the previous government had to do so in order to show toughness before the change of term, and to really handle the next big thing well. The global economy entered In the cold winter, if China wants to save itself, it needs to use strong medicine to adjust the economy, but in this way, the society may get out of control, the government orders will be distorted, and the people will make trouble. The country must completely control the society, tame the people, and everyone must be obedient to survive together. Difficult times. How to tame them? In 1983 when the market economy was chaotic, Lao Deng also launched a crackdown, and June 4, 1989, was another form of crackdown. Do you understand? In order to achieve great things, sacrifices are inevitable.” Xiaoxi and Fang Caodi felt that He Dongsheng's words were unreasonable and wanted to refute, but He Dongsheng motioned for him to finish speaking first.He said: In 1816, that is, the second year after the end of the Napoleonic Wars, the effects of the war disappeared, Britain experienced a great recession, and its national debt was 2.5 times its GDP.Unfortunately, in 1815 Indonesia had the largest volcanic eruption in human history, and the global ash cloud covered the day, which led to a complete loss of European crops in the following year.The prime minister at the time was Liverpool, do you know who his advisor was?It is the famous economist Ricardo.Seeing that the Great Recession was about to cause social chaos, they only used one trick to deal with the crisis.Which trick?It is to obtain the consent of the parliament to abolish the Habeas Corpus, that is, the British habeas corpus. Whoever makes trouble will be disobedient. The government can not follow the law or follow the procedures.As a result, throughout the Great Recession, the troublemakers in Britain did not dare to make trouble, and the economy recovered a year later.Amazing, right? Of course, people will suffer and starve during this period, and in the past, most of the capitalist recessions were cyclical, one or two years, and it would be fine to survive.But this time, just like the Great Depression in the 1930s, it can be dragged on for ten or eight years. If it can't hold on, the government has to step in.My point is that stability is always the first priority, but stability is not the goal. Stability is for the sake of accomplishing great things. Therefore, in extraordinary times or emergencies, we must first crack down hard, and then, while the effects of crackdown are still there, we should let go and push for new policies.