Mao: The Unknown Story

Among the book's many themes, two appear particularly distressing: the degree of Mao's disregard for human life and suffering and the extent to which he was a product of the Soviet Russia.Marxism was perfectly suited for Mao: it justified constant war based on the theory of inevitable class struggle. As did the rulers in the Soviet Russia, Mao just labeled many of his adversaries members of a group that was declared an enemy of the people, and killed them. Early on, he showed a penchant for violence: in 1920s he personally approved various forms of torture. In 1930, in one Mao-occupied county alone there were 120 kinds of torture. The hysterical rallies and "thought examination" were a personal touch that Mao introduced in the 1940s into the practice of dictatorship. Just as in the Soviet Russia, in China oftentimes people were killed according to a quota imposed by the Communist Party. For example, in 1948, the CCP declared that 10% of the population were evil landlords, or kulaks. During the Great Leap Forward, torture and violent murder was widespread as a punishment reserved for the starved people "stealing" food. To the tens of millions who died from famine and overwork during the Great Leap Forward, Mao added over 3 million who died violent deaths in the wake of the Cultural Revolution.From Mao's early military campaigns, Moscow supported him in a variety of ways. It repeatedly protected Mao from his fellow Chinese Communist Party members who wanted to get rid of him. Moscow supplied him with money, industrial aid and, increasingly, arms (which under Stalin led to the Korean War and under Khruschev resulted in China getting nuclear weapons). Stalin personally assured Mao's safety from Chiang Kai-Shek by keeping Chiang's son as a hostage in Moscow (tellingly, Stalin did the same with Mao's two sons, but Mao did not appear vulnerable through his children). Moscow needed a strong leader who would promote the communist cause. In addition, Stalin, a former outlaw, may have felt affinity with Mao the bandit. Without Moscow's support Mao would have found it extraordinarily difficult to survive the conflicts with vastly superior forces of Chiang Kai-Shek or red military commanders, let alone rise to the top of the Party leadership.Of course, Moscow was not the only reason for Mao's ascension to power. Just as German aggression against Russia ultimately resulted in the formation of the Eastern Bloc, Japan's aggression against China diverted Chiang Kai-Shek's army from fighting Mao and resulted in Mao's survival. And the aggression of Germany, Italy and Japan in the 1930s was condoned by the western powers: Britain, France and the USA, who have to bear part of the responsibility if one is willing to go that far.The monstrous Mao was the same Mao who was well read, a connoisseur of opera, a writer of poetry and an occasional admirer of flowers and snow. The book would have benefited by shedding some light on the reasons for which a person, not devoid of sensitivity, would become so insensitive to human deprivation. An expanded account of his childhood and adolescence, beyond a few pages devoted to the first 17 years of his life, would have been welcome. In addition, I would have liked to see more of an analysis of how the political, economic and cultural environment in China encouraged Mao to become what he became.The book is one of the best biographies I have read. Even though some of its statements are debatable and the prose style is a bit awkward, the book makes clear and well-documented stand on its positions and provides an exhaustive reference for further research.As for the statements of some critics of the book that Mao did greatly advance Chinese industry, and that therefore his vilification in the book is very much one-sided, I believe that any achievement at the expense of people's lives, especially on the massive scale, was not worth it. Paying for the industrialization in Russia with grain in the early 1930s was not worth the millions of lives of those at whose expense it was carried out. Similarly, exporting millions of tons of grain to purchase modern industrial plants and using millions of kilograms of grain as a raw material to produce fuel for missile tests, was not worth the millions of Chinese who starved to death and exposed utter disregard for human life - the most horrible claim that a political system can ever make.

"Mao: The Unknown Story" is a thorough, well-research catalog of Mao's reign of terror. The authors vividly depict Mao's cruelty and manipulation. Mao's Cultural Revolution shows how ordinary students can become the fiends of the Red Guard.

This is an important book, and although it has some flaws, it is a book that everyone interested in the history of the Twentieth Century or in the variety of human experience or in the nature of tyrannical minds should read.Several books in recent years have revealed some details of the horrors of China's Modern Dark Age, the period under Mao, notably including Jung Chang's own book on the Cultural Revolution, Wild Swans. But nothing can quite prepare the reader for the story Chang and Halliday tell here.Mao apparently lacked even the slightest impulse of conscience or ethics, and one comes away from this book thinking even the murderous tyrant Hitler had overtones of boy-scout values by comparison. Apart from the sheer toll of Mao's ruthless and often idiotic decisions - estimated at 70 million souls - there are individual stories here that simply leave one gasping.Were even half of what is reported accurate, one must conclude Mao was a sadistic psychopath. He cared almost nothing for wives, lovers, children, colleagues, the people of China, or even the secular religious idealism of communism. He didn't care for most Chinese culture or history, although he was a man who spent a lot of time reading. He enjoyed watching private films of rivals being tortured or killed. He wasted vast amounts in a poor country on protecting himself and trying to gain super-power status.Mao was utterly about Mao achieving control over the lives of others, and he valued anyone not a minute longer than he or she was useful to that end or until Mao's paranoid fear and jealousy over potential rivals were aroused.The first part of this book is less well written and less gripping than the second part, starting at the end of World War II. Flaws, especially in the first part, include things like repetition of points, sometimes as many as three times; an annoying habit of highlighting a key phrases of a document in italics and yet adding the bracketed information that the emphasis is the author's; and some awkward phrasing. Also, this is not a complete biography of Mao, dealing as it does largely with his public life.The authors are relentlessly negative about Mao, not a good approach to biography. Even so great a tyrant as Mao surely had achievements and qualities that should be included and analyzed.Still, this is a valuable book. Because archival material on Mao's rule is still not available from China - after all, Mao's portrait graces every denomination of the national currency, the yuan, and his body lies pickled in his Beijing tomb the same way Lenin's does in Moscow - the authors were able to secure a huge wealth of material from Russian archives. A remarkable number of documents and copies of documents concerning Mao are preserved in Russia. The authors also interviewed figures who survived Mao's Terror.The second portion of the book also gains force from specific stories of certain people who dealt much to their regret with the Great Helmsman. What a gruesome story it is when Chou En-lai (who is viewed here as a brilliant, ruthless, and murderous servant rather than a sensitive man trapped in a madhouse) is diagnosed early with cancer. Mao, who had to approve special medical treatment for high officials, refused permission for an operation. Only when it was too late did Mao relent. And this was Mao's treatment of an extraordinarily talented man who had given him years of exhausting, faithful service!Another harrowing story is Mao's treatment of Liu Shao-ch'i and especially his remarkable wife, Wang Guangmei, one of the few authentic heroes in the book, who was selected for torture and imprisonment only because she and Liu Shao-ch'i were such a loving couple.Mao's betrayal of Luo Ruiqing (known as Luo the Tall) is breathtaking. Luo served him slavishly, and Mao valued his unquestioning, prompt carrying out of idiotic orders. Yet when Mao was planning the Cultural Revolution (actually a cover for launching a huge purge and vengeance against figures like Liu Shao-ch'i), he badly needed Lin Biao's cooperation, and Lin hated Luo as a rival. So, after a brief reluctance, Mao threw Luo to the wolves to secure Lin's support.A number of times, Mao saw to it that certain Red Army forces were slaughtered by Nationalists only because it served his interest in defeating a rival for power.In an early missile test, Mao insisted that a then-undependable Chinese missile carrying a live atomic warhead be tested on a target across 800 kilometers of China containing many towns and villages. The test succeeded, but the same missile, minus the warhead, failed and crashed in subsequent tests.The Great Leap Forward, which is widely known to have been a terrible failure, here takes on the added dimension of an entire nation being reduced to near-starvation in order to have something to export to the Russians in exchange for military technology. Other officials were reduced to tears on seeing the miserable hardships and death induced by the Great Leap, but no words even slightly moved Mao who cared not a whit that millions died slowly and miserably. Indeed, saying the least wrong word about the Great Leap was a sure ticket to expulsion, torture, and execution.Go read a light comedy after you finish this book.

Firstly, the book is very biased, and the author is very personal. No wonder for that, as anyone whose family would live in that period would be .Read the book for the history of that period it is phenomenal. Book could have been much shorter but author has a point to put so she makes it a point to keep you interested.Now to mao. What to say about this bandit?pure evil... Only lesson I got from this book is that who is exploited in this world ? People who do not have power ...So come what may be knowledge in mind and be strong in body..This book tells about all the evils in communism but don't worry it also tells how America also helped mao get power..So if you are a weak country looking for a tent to be in communism or capitalism. My answer would beBe strong first and then make your own capitalistic society which benefits the poor ultimately...Do not be in any camp american or Russian...

Was man liest, ist z. T. kaum zu ertragen, aber die Quellen sind offenbar völlig verlässlich. Selbst heute müssen noch Zeitzeugen leben. Ein Kritiker nennt es `a bombshell of a book'! Und wirklich, man fühlt sich nach der Lektüre einiger Passagen fast körperlich verwundet.

Ouvrage remarquable confirmant les travaux de Simon Leys, la bête noire de la presse bien pensante aux ordres comme libération ou le monde. Simon Leys a chèrement payé son intégrité, puisque le CNRS, repère de gauchistes, a refusé son recrutement pour des raisons purement idéologiques.

The author goes deep into the life of Mao scrapping the official portrait and describing Chairman Mao as an selfish cold individual. The most interesting part is that Communism wasn't something Mao was really interested in, but rather used it to gain absolute control and dominion on others.A must read for the those who like political science and history.

The true Mao nude and real ,the serial criminal of the China Revolution .