主题：关于毛的一本新书：《毛真的是恶魔吗？》 -- 细脖大头鬼

11. Three Millions Deaths in 1950-1951

At the beginning of the book, JC writes: “Mao Tse-tung . . . was responsible for well over 70 million deaths in peacetime” (p. 3). This is her main justification of comparing Mao with Hitler. We will examine each of the alleged death cases. Her first account of these 70 million deaths is three million deaths in 1950-51. In fact, this figure is grossed up from 0.7 million by JC’s arbitrary multiplication. These 0.7 million deaths, though a big loss of human lives, were related to the final stage of the civil war and the then on-going Korean War. It is questionable to classify them as deaths in peacetime.

During the “campaign to suppress counter-revolutionaries” in 1950–51, “some 3 million perished either by execution, mob violence, or suicide” (p. 337). The calculation is explained in the footnote: 700,000 were executed, “those beaten or tortured to death . . . . would at the very least be as many again. Then there were suicides, which, based on several local inquiries, were very probably about equal to the number of those killed” (p. 337 fn). Hence we get 700,000×2×2 = 2.8 million, roughly 3 million, as claimed by JC. There is no explanation why “those beaten or tortured to death . . . . would at the very least be as many” as those executed. Her claim that suicides “were very probably about equal to the number of those killed” is based on “several local inquiries”, with no detailed information.

To generalize an execution/killing ratio or a suicide/killing ratio from “several local inquiries” to the whole nation is hardly professional. Even if we apply this kind of generalization based on large samples, the result can be very unreliable. For instance, let us take 700,000 executions out of the total population of 550 million as a national ratio, and apply it to the “major target of Mao’s – the Roman Catholic Church” (p. 340). As “China had about 3.3 million Catholics at the time” (p. 340), we should expect at least a total number of execution of 700,000×3.3m/550m = 4,200. But JC assures us only “hundreds of Chinese Catholics were executed” (p. 340).

It is also questionable to call all of 700,000 peacetime deaths. When the People’s Republic of China was established in October 1949, almost half of its territory had yet to be liberated. Military campaigns continued into 1950 and even 1951 in certain parts of China. The Campaign to Suppress Counter-revolutionaries and “the land reform in the newly occupied areas, where some two-thirds of China’s population lived” (p. 337) were closed related to the last stage of the bloody civil war. Many, if not most, of the 700,000 people were executed for their military actions during the war, and cannot accurately be described as victims in peacetime. In a large part of China, bandits existed since the time people could remember. Mao’s army cleaned them up almost instantly. Killing, unfortunately, was necessary to provide Chinese the “peacetime” then.

Moreover, “China was hurled into the inferno of the Korean War on 19 October 1950” (p. 380). The war lasted three years till “an armistice was finally signed on 27 July 1953” (p. 394). During this period, especially at the early stage, Chiang Kai-shek in Taiwan called on his loyalists in the mainland to rebel against the Communists in every way possible to welcome the forthcoming liberation by the U.S. army and his own. Many answered, carrying out acts of subversive organization, propaganda, espionage, explosion, poison, arson, murder and even armed uprising etc. These acts also account for a significant part of these 700,000 executions.

12. 27 Millions Deaths in Jails/Labor Camps

JC’s second large group of Mao’s peacetime victims is those who died in Chinese government custody. The number is actually thrown out with a magic formula, in which the number of inmates and their annual death rate are not estimated professionally. Mao’s responsibility is not discussed, just assumed.

During Mao’s 27 years rule, “the number who died in prisons and labour camps could well amount to 27 million” (p. 338). The proof: “China’s prison and labour camp population was roughly 10 million in any one year under Mao. Descriptions of camp life by inmates, which point to high mortality rates, indicate a probable annual death rate of at least 10 per cent” (p. 338fn). So 10m×10%×27 = 27 million.

JC accuses Mao of killing a number of people x = a×b×c, where a = “China’s prison and labour camp population”, b = “annual death rate”, and c = the years of his rule. She does not explain why a = 10 million. Her justification of b = 10% is based on “descriptions of camp life by inmates”. If we apply this magic formula to Deng Xiao-ping, taking his reign as 1978–89, we get his responsibility for 12 million deaths. His successor Jiang Ze-min (1990-2003) gets 14 millions. JC does not show why Mao was responsible. It seems she simply blames Mao for every Chinese death whatsoever.

13. The Superpower Program

Throughout a large part of the book, JC repeated alleged that Mao started a secret “Superpower Programme” in 1953 and continued up to his death to pursue his dream of world dominance. This definitely sounds very alarming to the Western world, echoing the theory of “China threat”. But she does not provide any evidence such a program ever existed. The word program should mean an explicit plan, not someone’s hidden ambition. The word superpower did not even exist in the Chinese language in 1953.

In Ch. 36, titled “Launching the Secret Superpower Programme”, we read: “in May 1953, Stalin’s successors in the Kremlin agreed to sell China ninety-one large industrial enterprises. . . . It was in effect Mao’s Superpower Programme. Its utterly military nature was concealed, and is little known in China today” (p. 396). Right after that, Mao forced through “collectivization of agriculture” and “ordered the nationalization of industry and commerce in urban areas, to channel every single resource into the Superpower Programme” (p. 412). During the Suez Canal crisis in 1956, Mao realized that the only thing he could offer Egypt were “small arms such as rifles”, and hence became “more impatient to speed up his Superpower Programme” (p. 425). Later he silenced dissent through the Anti-Rightist Campaign and launched the Great Leap Forward “to accelerate his Superpower Programme” (p. 444). In spite of the setback during the famine, “becoming a superpower had remained Mao’s dearest dream. This was partly why he had carried out the Purge – to install new enforcers who were more in tune with his demands. After this process was complete, he started to accelerate the Programme” (p. 573). Even to the Western world, “Mao began seeking relations with America, in order to gain access to Western technology for his Superpower Programme” (p. 601).

Mao’s superpower ambition, even if it truly existed, is not the same as a program. According to Webster’s New World Dictionary, the word Program means: (i) “a proclamation”, which means “something that is proclaimed, or announced officially”; (ii) “a prospectus”, which means “a statement outlining the main features of a new work or business enterprise”, (iii) “a plan or procedure for dealing with some matter”. In one word, a program is something proclaimed, announced or stated explicitly regarding concrete features, objectives or procedures of certain undertakings. It is not something completely hidden in one person’s head but never expressed either in papers or in words.

Within the whole book, we cannot find any record, written or spoken by Mao or his colleagues, referring to a Superpower Programme. Its name is dubious, because Mao maintained China belonged to the third world (p. 650) and would never seek to be a superpower (declared by Deng Xiaoping at UN in 1974). Even if he had a plan to become a superpower, he could hardly use that name. In fact, the word “superpower” did not exist in the Chinese language until the 1970s. How could Mao have “first outlined his Superpower Programme” in 1953 (p. 432)? If Mao used another name or just a code, what was it? “It”? “That”? “The Thing”? Without a name or even a code, how could Mao and his colleagues discuss and implement it?

Without evidence of its existence, JC gives two examples as components of Mao’s Superpower Program. One is the “ninety-one large industrial enterprises” sold by the Soviet Union to China in 1953. She does not explain what kind of the “utterly military nature was concealed” in these hydro-power plants, dams, tractor factories, mines, steel mills, truck factories, oil refineries, machine-tool factories etc.

Her other example is of course the atom bomb. Several nations have possessed such weapons before China and after. JC offers no explanation as to why China’s possession of them must be a part of a Superpower Program. She does remind us though that, “In March 1955 the US said it would use nuclear weapons under certain circumstances. Eisenhower very deliberately told a press conference on the 16th that he could see no reason why they should not be used ‘just exactly as you would use a bullet or anything else’. . . China seemed to be in real danger of a US nuclear strike” (p. 414). She does not mention that before Eisenhower, during the Korean War, General McArthur requested to drop 20+ atom bombs on Beijing and other Chinese cities, and his plan was only vetoed by President Truman after a long and hotly contested discussion. Nor does JC mention that, after Eisenhower and before China had its atom bomb, “JFK was ready to use nuclear bomb on China” too (The Independent 27 Aug. 2005). But she knows that “China seemed to be in real danger of a US nuclear strike” by “bombing and strafing more Nationalists-held islands”, which are within China’s own territory (p. 414). JC probably knows whether other nuclear nations faced the same nuclear threat. At the moment of its first bomb exploded, China pledged never to use nuclear weapons first. JC probably knows if other nuclear nations did the same. Does JC think they all have Superpower Programmes?