The Great Leap Forward and the Five Year Plan came about
because of China’s need to modernize.
Mao intended for China to “stand up”[1], and
it was clear that he intended to create a nationalistic, cosmopolitan
China. During the nineteenth century,
China had been invaded by the Western powers, made to sign unequal treaties,
pay reparations, and grant extraterritorial privileges. One of the main reasons
for Mao Zedong’s Great Leap Forward was the need for China to develop without
relying on foreign powers. In order to
do this, Mao and others developed a system modelled off of Stalinism, with a
few distinct differences.
Part of this system was the Five Year Plan for economic
development. It allowed for a complete
change of China’s economy under communism, even though, according to some, it
happened too fast for it’s own good. The
intention was to turn China into a major industrial power, by focusing on
urban, industrial, and infrastructure projects.
“It was through the implementation of the policies of the
industrialization of the state and the
collectivization of agriculture that the Soviet Union succeeded in building up”[2]. City housing standards were improved upon,
and workplaces started to be organized based on communist principles. Industrial and urban workers had more readily
accessible medical care and educational facilities, as well as subsidized
housing. In order to provide these
services and control the standards, the state ended up controlling a
significant amount of industrial enterprises.
The power of the state grew exponentially.
Aside from the Soviet Union, China was experiencing a period
of relative isolationism and economic ban.
Part of the drive to industrialize was the desire to no longer be
reliant on imports from markets overseas.
In the more rural parts of China, they organized the
peasants into communes and collectivized land, in order to improve efficiency
and equality[3]. Each commune was intended to be a
self-sustaining community for agriculture and other small scale industry, such
as steel production using backyard kilns.
In fact, Mao encouraged the peasants to stop growing crops and to
produce steel instead. He did this in
the hopes that China’s steel output would increase to the point where it
surpassed Britain’s steel production, thus proving the superiority of the
Marxist style government.[4] The communities were equipped with communal
daycares, mess halls, and kitchens, under the assumption that this would allow
for more labor to be spent on major projects for the development of agriculture
and industry[5].
The Great Leap Forward was a failure, but it’s effects were
numerous and far-reaching. Mao stepped
down as chairman the year after it began, and the whole program was criticized,
especially by the Minister of National Defense, Peng Dehuai[6]. Peng was eventually replaced by Maoist
supporter Lin Biao, who ordered a purge of Peng’s supporters from the military.
China’s foreign policy became more militant as well. Previously, China’s foreign policy had been
governed by the “Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence”[7], but
after the Great Leap Forward began, this gave way to a harder policy. When the Great Leap Forward started,
Nationalists held the islands of Matsu and Kinmen, and the People’s Republic of
China began a massive bombardment of the two islands in late August 1958.[8] There was also an assault of propaganda
against the United States and a declaration of intent to reclaim Taiwan.
China had retaken control of Tibet in 1951, but when the
social revolution spread there, tensions rose, eventually coming to a head in
the 1959 Tibetan Uprising. Thousands of
Tibetans fled into India, dissolving the sympathy that had previously existed
there, which led to a brief war between China and India. China eventually claimed part of India as
it’s own, and the Soviet Union gave India its support, thus increasing the
tensions between China and the Soviets.
This was one among several reasons for their split. There were also smaller disputes that followed,
such as when a group of Red Guards attacked the Soviet embassy housed in
Beijing[9],
as well as larger disputes, like the Sino-Russian border war[10].
The Soviets, previously one of China’s strongest supporters,
eventually reduced the amount of economic aid and technical aid going into
China, as well as refusing to continue to assist them in the production of
nuclear weapons. Mao maintained that the
reason for the split was that the Soviet Union had deviated from true communism
and the Communist Party of China criticized them as “Revisionist Traitors”[11].
Mao believed that the only way to overcome China’s
traditional, feudal past was to advance economic development. Although his various programs had and led to
problems, in the end, that was what allowed China to become a significant world
power.
[1]
The Sun Shines Over the Sangkan River, trans.
by Yang Hsien-yi and Gladys Yang (Beijing:Foreign Language Press, 1954), pp.
203-217.
[5]
Renmin Ribao, Dec. 14, 1965. Trans
adapted from Selections from the China
Mainland Press (here after SCMP) 3609 (Jan. 4. 1966).
[6]
Trans. Adapted from Memoirs of a Chinese
Marshall-- The Autobiographical Notes of Peng Dehuai (1898-1974), trans.
Zheng Longpu (Beijing:Foreign Languages Press, 1984), pp. 510-20.
[7]
Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence,
Peking, 3 June 1954, United Nations
Treaty Series, vol. 299, United Nations,
pg. 57-81.
[10]
Burr, W.; Richelson, J. T. (2000–2001). "Whether to "Strangle the
Baby in the Cradle": The United States and the Chinese Nuclear Program,
1960-64". International Security
25 (3): 54–99.
[11]
Chambers Dictionary of World History,
B.P. Lenman, T. Anderson editors, Chambers: Edinburgh:2000. p. 769.
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