From a Chinese lady named Esther Cheo during Mao Zedong’s “Great Terror” of 1950-52:
“'We were taken in a lorry to the place of execution...The victims were kneeling down beside cheap coffins, their hands tied behind their backs with wire. About six security police moved nonchalantly along shooting them in the back of the head. As they fell, some of their heads split open, some just fell with a neat little hole, while others had their brains splattered all over the dusty ground and on to the clothes of the next victims.’ As she turned away in revulsion, a cadre [Communist Party guard] grabbed her by the shoulders. ‘Take a good look!’ he shouted. ‘This is what the revolution is all about!’" (Frank Dikötter, The Tragedy of Liberation, Chapter 5, “The Great Terror”)
This is indeed what Leftist revolutions are all about. Welcome to the death culture of the Left.
As I suggested in my first article in this series, I greatly encourage everyone to read historian Frank Dikötter’s trilogy on Mao Zedong: The Tragedy of Liberation, Mao’s Great Famine, and The Cultural Revolution. (Dikötter has a fourth book on the CCP, China After Mao, which is also worth reading.) These books enlighten us to the true nature of the Communist Party in China, an exemplar of modern Leftist philosophy. Those with eyes to see can perceive the seeds of Mao Zedong’s actions in modern American Leftism. It is frightening to behold.
Upon coming to power in China in October 1949, Mao began to implement socialism in all its “wonders” (actually, he had begun to do so earlier in the areas of China he controlled). As socialism always does, the economy quickly degenerated into total chaos (a la Joe Biden’s). Millions of Chinese were destitute, starving, and turning against the communist “revolution.” However, rather than blaming his failed policies on his failed economic theory, Mao attacked his enemies—“counter-revolutionaries” who were trying to “subvert” the “revolution.” It’s never the fault of the Left or their policies. So, since he had total power, Mao began doing what Leftists have been doing since the French Revolution: imprisoning and killing massive numbers of innocent people. As recounted in the previous column, even children as young as 6 years old were accused of “spying,” and were tortured and killed. It was a sickening example of true atheistic Leftism.
Mao started his killings in the countryside because his “land reform” policy led to revolts in the villages. Dikötter picks up the tale again:
“Mao sent Tao Zhu, the man popularly characterized as a ‘tank’, to crush all opposition, killing 15,000 people by March 1951. Over 100,000 were sent to prison, where many died of starvation and sickness. In parts of Yulin a fifth of the entire population was put behind bars. ‘Guangxi: 450,000 bandits pacified; 40,000 killed; one-third may or may not have deserved death.’ By the time the campaign ended in October 1951, a total of 46,200 had been killed, or 2.56 per thousand of the total population in the province. In other words, more than one person out of every 400 had been executed.”
This was in one small area of China, and space forbids me to list all the killings in all the areas that Dikötter mentions (read his book). Even he could only give a small sampling because he was not given access to archives in most parts of China when doing his research. But here is another example:
“When Li Xiannian, the leader of Hubei [province], went to see [Mao] in Beijing in January 1951, a mere 220 counter-revolutionaries had been liquidated in his province. The killings accelerated. By February 8,000 suspects had been executed, followed by a further 7,000 in the spring. Soon 37,000 people had been eliminated, as parts of the countryside descended into a reign of terror where cadres ruled by the gun... Some local officials refused to stop the killings, using terror as a routine tool of control.”
As one paragon of communist virtue announced:
“‘If I am not allowed to kill people, I won’t help out with production and I won’t mobilize the masses. I’ll just wait till you issue me with your permission and then I’ll work on the masses.’ In the end, more than 45,000 people were killed, or 1.75 per thousand of the population in Hubei [province].”
Do you think Leftists won’t do this in America if they get total control and feel the need to do it? I guarantee they will because they have done it everywhere they’ve obtained power. Why are American Leftists different? Those who murder unborn babies and mutilate children are of the same philosophical (and moral) stock as their predecessors in Russia, China, North Korea, Cuba, Cambodia and elsewhere.
As Dikötter notes, guilt or innocence was totally irrelevant to Mao’s Leftist murderers:
“But even those who survived the terror with their reputations intact now lived in fear. The party had no compunction in executing innocents, so innocence was no guarantee of survival. The unpredictable nature of the campaign was of course the very basis of terror, as nobody could be quite secure in thinking that they were beyond reproach.”
This is Leftism in all its glory, folks. Guilt, innocence, age, gender—none of that means anything to those who are obsessed with power. Indeed, if killing is the only way to maintain that power, they have demonstrated all over the world absolutely no compunction whatsoever about obliterating as many innocent people as they deem necessary, regardless of age.
More from Dikötter and China in a subsequent article. Be warned, folks, and be on guard. This philosophy is the philosophy of the leadership of the Democratic Party in the United States. I only hope that, unlike the Russian and Chinese people, Americans realize it before it is too late. And we have no excuse for not doing so.
Check for a lot more articles, as well as audio and video podcasts, on my substack: mklewis929.substack.com. Free signup. Read my western novels, Whitewater , River Bend, Return to River Bend, and Allie’s Dilemma all available on Amazon. You can follow me on Twitter: @thailandmkl. And rumble: lewandcou