The Lin Biao Centennial, hooray!

The Lin Biao Centennial, hooray!

(monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com)

Today, December 5th, 2007, Monkey Smashes Heaven celebrates the centennial of Lin Biao, Mao’s “closest comrade-in-arms.”

1. Lin Biao was the main person to articulate that Maoism is a universal and “higher and completely new stage” of Marxism. In this sense, Lin Biao , along with Chen Boda, was the main originator of Maoism as Maoism.

2. Even though Lin Biao never came out and said that there was no significant first world proletariat, his line as articulated in Long Live the Victory of People’s War! downgrades first world struggles to playing an insignificant role in the world revolution. At a minimum, Lin Biao’s work implied an orientation to the third world to the near exclusion of the first world. Many of Lin Biao’s readers understood the full implications of this great work, which is at the heart of contemporary Maoism.

3. Lin Biao’s foreign policy saw Western imperialism headed by the U$A and Soviet social imperialism as working in concert to oppress the peoples of the world. Lin Biao did not recommend a tactical alliance with social imperialism, he also did not recommend or acquiesce to de facto tactical alliances with Western imperialism. In addition to opposing Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping, Lin Biao, along with the left Cultural Revolution Group in 1967, opposed Zhou Enlai and Chen Yi. Zhou Enlai, Chen Yi and Deng Xiaoping were the architects of what would eventually become the out-and-out Three Worlds Theory. Lin Biao continued to oppose Zhou Enlai, especially in 1970.

4. Lin Biao revolutionized the PLA. Lin Biao argued against the analogue of the Theory of Productive Forces in the PLA very early on. His Four Firsts policy of 1960 was a direct refutation of the Theory of Productive Forces in the military sphere. Lin Biao raised the slogan of “politics in command” in the early 1960s. Lin Biao placed the PLA on a Maoist footing, thus giving Mao the institutional power base to launch the Cultural Revolution. The PLA became known as a great school of Maoism under Lin Biao.

5. Lin Biao’s economic policy was opposed to the Theory of Productive Forces in its most obvious forms, in both practice and theory. Lin Biao was one of the main opponents of the power block, with Zhou Enlai and the right wing of the PLA at its center, that actually did restore capitalism in the 1970s.

Lin Biao was the staunchest defender of Mao after Mao came under attack in connection to the Great Leap Forward. Lin Biao favored a vigorous return to a Maoist concept of economic development that favored things such as: mass mobilization, elimination of material incentives in favor of moral incentives, elimination of self interest in favor of “serve the people,” the elimination of the distinction between mental and manual work, the elimination of the distinction between town and country, the restriction of bourgeois right, communization and expansion of the Dazhai model, egalitarianism, extension of military discipline to society as a whole, and an increase on education and indoctrination of the population with Maoism.

In those provinces where Lin Biao was strong after 1968, there was an emphasis on reaching communism, and even “utopian” goals like eliminating the commodity system of exchange. Even though Lin Biao represented a different trend than the left Cultural Revolution Group and mass movements, he incorporated some of their program into his own. Lin Biao sought a return to the more “utopian” and positive aspects of the Great Leap Forward development model, while solving the problems associated with the Great Leap through unleashing the “spiritual atom bomb” of Maoism, Maoist military discipline, and putting Maoism “in command of everything.”

Those who spin fanciful theories about Lin Biao, “waving the red flag to oppose it,” out of one or two lines said to have been in the draft Report to the Ninth Congress by the ghostwriter Chen Boda, should take a look at Lin Biao’s overall record and the program that he was pushing, especially in his own power base. They should ask themselves if Lin Biao’s overall practice was opposed to the Theory of Productive Forces or not. They should apply the same scrutiny, the same microscope, that they have been applying to Lin Biao to the other top Maoists. They ought also use the telescope approach and ask themselves which years of the Cultural Revolution represented the height of proletarian power.

6. There is a question of whether or not, given China’s conditions, the cult of Mao was inevitable and necessary. After all, the cult gave the Maoists the ability to by-pass the revisionist bureaucrats and appeal directly to the masses at the outset of the Cultural Revolution. The same question applies to the axiomatic approach to Maoism. If these methods were inevitable and necessary under such circumstances, then it is idealist and utopian to criticize the Maoist camp on this alone. The question might come down to one of degree.

Even though Lin Biao was not the only offender, he pushed the cult to extremes. Lin Biao probably saw the cult as a way to by-pass the bureaucracy of the Party and state. He probably saw it as a useful tool to mobilize the masses. Lin Biao thought China’s people needed to be unified under a single thought, Maoism. However, Maoism was never untangled from Mao or the cult. The Maoists, including those who criticized Lin Biao on this point, never fully broke from cult methods.

7. What was Lin Biao’s view of culture? Lin Biao supported the Maoist line on culture. Jiang Qing began her rise in the 1960s under Lin Biao’s patronage, as cultural advisor to the PLA. Lin Biao supported Jiang Qing’s line in art, even raising the slogan “in culture, learn from Jiang Qing.” Lin Biao’s speech in 1966 initiated the campaign against the Four Olds. Lin Biao placed an emphasis on the super-structure. The struggle in the super-structure has implications for the base, thus implications for preventing capitalist restoration. Lin Biao pushed socialist moralism embodied in the “three constantly read articles.” Lin Biao raised the slogan “fight self, repudiate revisionism,” “revolutionizing our minds” and so on. It is probable that Lin Biao thought that cultural programming of social motion could replace bureaucratic control, thus setting the basis for elimination of the state and reaching communism. Such a theoretical outlook would be compatible with Lin Biao’s economic approach and social vision.

8. There is little, if any, evidence that Lin Biao ever launched a coup against Mao. Documents like the “Outline for Project 571” strike critical readers as clumsy forgeries. It would be rather easy, if tedious, to refute the minutia and cast overwhelming doubt on the police version of history inherited by the so-called “New Communist Movement” regarding Lin Biao. However, Maoists have better things to do. Since the coup allegation rests on next to nothing, the burden of proof rests on Lin Biao’s detractors. As if we care anyways, line is what matters, not biography. People who raise the coup as a way to oppose Lin Biao’s overall line should be called out and exposed. We should not give them any room to maneuver.

Lin Biao was a great Maoist leader. His accomplishments far outweigh his defects. We are using this day as an opportunity to promote real Maoism by further undermining those who raise the bogy of Lin Biao. We are using this opportunity to underscore Long Live the Victory of People’s War!’s role at the heart of contemporary Maoism. We have nothing to gain by pandering to the rot in the so-called “International Communist Movement.” Maoists should not hold back.

MSH plans to continue researching the Cultural Revolution and Lin Biao. Other articles relating to the Cultural Revolution and Lin Biao:

MIWS article with commentary by MSH: Lin Biao excerpt on the theory of the productive forces

KKKracker KKKrackpots in a tizzy over MEChA, Lin Biao

Movie review: Mao’s Bloody Revolution Revealed (with Philip Short, 2007)

1967: Robert Williams on the principal contradiction

Really supporting the GPCR vs. Opportunist Yapping

Shubel Morgan’s video adaptation of Long Live the Victory of People’s War!

Movie review: Morning Sun (2003)

Lin’s Biao’s b-day (2006)

Maoism vs. “Just Pretty Tulips”

MIWS Document: The Essence of “Theory of Productive Forces” Is to Oppose Proletarian Revolution

MIWS Document: Long Live the Victory of People’s War! (English)

MIWS Document: Vive la victorieuse guerre du peuple! (French)