CHINA: ULTRA-COMMUNISM down on the farm

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP78-02771R000300120009-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 4
• Document Creation Date: December 12, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 25, 1998
• Sequence Number: 9
• Publication Date: November 13, 1958
• Content Type: MAGAZINE

Approved For Release 2001/11/16 : CIA-RDP78-02771R000300120009-4
.China: Ultra-Communism
Down on the Farm
ISAAC DEITSCHEIll
WHILL the world's attention has
been focused on the Quemoy
unit. Red Cline has been in the
duties of a new and gigantic do-
mestic upheaval. resulting Low an
attempt to organize the whole peas
-
entry, five huodred million people.
in "cumsnunot." This 1, the third
upheaval that rural Uinta has un-
dergone in this decade. First,. the
landlords were explopriated and
their land was shared out among
the peasants, who were officially en-
couraged to continue as primmer
farmers. Then, in the middle 19Ws,
more than a hundred million ptivate
farmstead, were reorgatii.red into
"co-operatives," modeled essentially
on Soviet collective farms. And now
the COMADUAIW CI:D.0CW Mien. SUOW-
ins ahead of then Soviet countee..
pane. axe going beyond that nage of
collectiviaation and replacing the
collective farm by the conuntane.
Of thee tines upheavals. Pone ha.
gone as deep as this gee. Leg nem
has made such ainepriaroads into the
traditional mode of life ci the peas.
angry which sill corotitutta lour-
fifths of China'. population. These
can be an doubt that the cleam
which initiated the 'movement for
the commune" is, ii nolY became of
the van Kale of the movement., one
of the most signibrant events of our
Use.
Faster and Farther
The Ws of the commune is not new.
Shortly after the Bolshevik Revoitt-
Lion, in the years 1918-1923, it was
tried out in Kumla on a snail scale.
has that eaperiment etxled is fail-
ure. The litunian communes had
been fanned by groups of idealists
who hoped to set an example for the
mass of peasantry. Within the com-
mune, which in this respect differed
essentially Irmo the kolkhaz of later
years. all private property WAS abol-
ished. Land, cattle, and agricultural
implements were owned in common.
The members of the commune were
not to get indisidual incomes but to
draw on the commune's income in
an esalitarian manner Of ''according
to their needs." The experiment
Failed bet aine the Rusin peasant
remained attached se his private
farmstead. Communist farming. or-
ganind on an extremely low level
of agricultural technique. was too
poot to attract hint. Aim a few ran
the trOOMUThelt. discredited and rich-
(Ades!, were diseased.
When Stalin later Act au to c eller.-
tiyin tanning be forbade every men-
tion of the commune. Ever since, the
commune has remained under some-
thing Litwin ideological halt its the
Soviet Mune. In the kolkhal ds.
peasants still own privately wen
plots of land and about ball the
cattle: diet, 'nide their produce en
the DIAI Leta. and they draw unequal
incomes from the kolkhor so that in
each there are "rich" and poor peas-
ants just as there are rich and poor
kolkhuses. The Russian collective
(arm has remained halfway house
between the private farm and ohs
eumnittee.
The Chinese leader% obviously nm,
utmost with shir dem, of collettivisatios% have wow stardiagly
habilitated the conutume,. They have
decided to move henceforth OM die,
road of collectivization fang nod
Farther than the Itienianso?deflte
the fact that p Ischeugallit and frol
charsivity their farming* fat behind,
the Russian. Uses Whit
visage is not le In esedeled needy
aa the early Soviet centenstak hut h.
is to be masa timer is it UM, dm
kolkhot Is The Mame celemene it
to be a *Ruth kart Wilt duo ibr.
Soviet initiates. 4 I& gondol
ten. Of wove twenty theseand
tansilies?about tan times ISOM than
in a kaftans slier nemely thirty ream
of nallectiviatinh. The Ulnae
have takes up the kin ed the "Agra(
town; which lUtrusloderv awe pat
forward, arbkh Stalin ropodiaiedg
and which Iiiirudadier rime dot do*
fOOOKitalif even new: The Chinese
Feasonia, saint she. Roams, ing
oot? to regain private plair of Ian&
implements, and tanks -Theyere
to go on Jiving its their print, hisso
within small households; histand aM
members of the commune are to he
homed In a dew ceneval hiodkiliqd
dwelling% wadi di* tree ertesendefil
dialog room. lautubis. schsolaster..,
until the structure at the village re.
smithies that of a collectivist town.
Then sweeping changes are no be
carried ant within thee Se sit is
and we an told that *beet a third
of the peatentryanote dais lie
bon people, has already AO the
innetmea.
Chinese'
*Ober that
plOn lest-
loth& la
and
orPsnlitik the
tin* dis.
did, lissir Wag tiolely
'AL 4iedaninautly
For the napply of implements.
v.itcion, and transport. Swan farm.
keg it completely dependent on the
NS_. Ii. as54kpproved For Refloat Wilafildelibleas:selistill;Whinschli7i71R000300120009-4 as
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state-owned industrs_ In comtast, the
Chinese commune is to combine
local industry with farming
The reform has also an important
military aspect. The commune is to
possess its own militia, a tetritorial
military unit tied to the productive
unit. so that the "armed hand" of
the comnitme will participate in pro
ductive work and that "productive
work will increasingly be organ-
ized along military lines." This again
is an idea that was originally devel-
oped in Russia, in the early years of
the revolution, when Trotsky "mili?
tariwd" labor and organized the
bulk of the Red Army as territorial
militias attached to productive units.
These experiments weir gradually
abandoned in Russia aftet the civil
war. The workers revolted against
the militarization of labor, and in
later years the militias were consid-
ered to be inadequate tor modern
warfare. Further, since Trotsky had
been the originator of these experi-
ments, a stigma has attached to them
ever since. Mao Tw-turig, however.
has not been averse to drawing his
ideas from the main fount of Com-
munist heresy. His scheme has in
deed a super-Trotskyist flavor; Trots-
ky never attempted to militarize
labor on the scale of Man's plan, and
he undertook the experiment onlY
under the stress of Russia's economic
collapse in the final phase of the
civil war.
MAO'S SIM Peri for this stupendous
undertaking are varied and in-
terconnected, and they are all rooted
in the manifold disproportions be-
tween Chola a,pirati2nis 'and re
solutes. flute is, first of all, the
general Li k 01 balance between
China's population and wealth Mao
and his pupils are no Malthusiatic
they hold that the larger the natiron's
tnanprnver, the mote ;in it pioduce
(espec tally when it does not have to
praline(' lot profit onIN) and the
quit km r AU the nation's wealth
grow
But Mao realiees that althoughi
this printiple mar hr valid in the
long run, the immediate pressure of
China's population on its means of
subsistence is severe, and that it must
become even more severe with the
popular expectation of a higher
standard of living Sv concentrating
the whole rural popufation in large
but compact productive units and
ittotwitit Mg a new division of
labor within the units, Mao hopes
he will he able to achieve a dramatic
rise in the national pioductivity of
labor.
Mao 1elieve.1?his entourage tells
eversone who cares to listen-that he
has as olded and can continue to
3VOld Stalin's major errors in col-
let tivization and Industrialization.
In collectisization. Mao says. Stalin
relied primarily 041 coercion. In in-
dustrialization, he relied almost ex-
clusisely on largewate and long
term schemes, as a consequence of
which all links between industry and
farming were severed for a time.
S411: let larmirai, unstipportell hy
small-scale local insfusny, was bound
In fall behind badly dining the
transition prtiod, before the new
industry was ready so provide it
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Approved For Release 2001/11/16
with ClIongh Ma( ti Artois, and
len drier,
The Plan's A(bantatges
These, then, ate the major mistakes
against which Mao is on his guard
Of coins( the Chinese leaders, too,
base thun ambitious large-scale arid
long -term industi iiit st berries that
should alio% I hunt in osertAke Creal
Britain industrially within a few
sears. China's ii tat output is atm-cads
ethotit ;4% high as Britain's. and its
output of steel ts about halt is large
But men atter China has won this
rate ? a rate watched with bated
breath ti the whole it Asia--its !WI
rapita industrial output will still he
onis one twelfth ot one-thirteenth of
the British flitita's large wale intim
trs will not sei ha able In absotIi
mot t? than a tiny Irattion ()I its twat
silt plus; and its agr iculttire may still
remain 'Riau% of iron, steel, and
mai h Mery . lien( e Mao's emphasis
on the combination of intlustrs and
apiculture within the commune.
Thai industrs can he only of a
most hatkward tharatter: it will con
sin of primitive workshops and will
be based on old fashioned. handi
trait. But even this is better than no
irnitistrs at all "The commune's
pi Unitise %Tit ksfroys f a ii keep the
commune's farm supplied with
plows until enough tractors and ma
thines are forthcritning from the
model ir government-built plants I AI
I-al rural was also soon ab
thr? slirphis tilt .il population
and gist' many prelirninais
industrial training before thev are
transferretl to to industrs "I-he
commune is to serve as a resersom
of semi skilled industrial manpowei
On which the planning authorities
tail gtarlualls
1 he ',ultra's aspect of the tom
mune. which has been greatls plased
up during the Quentin (11%14, fits Ili
%ilk dn. p.. Item kltrads some sears
ago Peking pionitilgated a law unto
dm mit roost if/onion. but at has been
a dead tenet 1 he alined ii rt iidVe
Mit liemut ill .4 lot..1 I 14111 10 take in du
mats Ih1hill.1ls ol %citing men a?ho
CS (IV ('.1 U iki ollir ItAlle for [Millar%
I-bet r h.i% e not twen enough
ks., etluirment. not
enough traftoinv staffs \on. the mil
lions of ior 'not la I f otos( I nu. me Ho
Fervor at least palarrifloars
78--o2771 RcItidltfoLiotid?r-4"1"' " t"'?
tO br4-04Ot, a AplitffifedIFISPReldtistbnethl ilvANAuPoPir1343077 "kimono fro eretJatti vi tat )5O
Killed military manpower. not led to Any comparable conflict stay find it easier to take the peas-
Final!), it goes without saying and shock. The peasantry was drawn ants a stage further toward the cora-
that Peking's rulers expect to gain into the cooperatives gradually and mune. He still proceeds with great
obvious political ads antages. It mildly. 'Ibe fanners provetbial in- caution and keeps hi avenues of re
should be easier to exc.!! political divitlualism. whith revolted against treat open. He plans to draw out the
control /nee a paasantly concentrat. Stalin's raw surgery, appean to have whole process of reorganization over
ed in ,Xgrotowns than oter a dia. fallen into a coma under Mao's an a number of years. He delays the in-
persed rural population esthetic titatMerit trocluction of an egalitarian distribu-
The differente in results has tion of income within the commune
Are the Chinese Different?
shown up quickly. Stalin's and tries to give due weight to indi-
II the obtectives of the Chinese zation was followed by a steep and vidual rewards and incentives. He
movement for communes are clear prolonged decline in the productivi- warns the Communists against the
enough. its prospects are hazy. How, ty of Soviet agriculture and the death use of coercion against the peasants,
one wonders, have the Chinese peas- of millions in famines. Mao's colkc- and at the same time he seeks to
ants received the latest orders and tivization, on die contrary, has led to overwhelm the peasantry's mind
slogans issued horn Peking? How do A steady rise in farming ?wpm. This with a most intensive propaganda
they react to this blow that Mao's has been accounted for in pan by for the commune. With an already
party has struck against private prop- the building of anti-flood dams and favorable start, with the use of such
erty and the traditional way of life by largeocak irrigation works, which varied ways and means, and with so
of rural China? Are the Chinese were more easily undertaken with much subtlety, his regime may we-
peasants really desoid of the "indi- collectively organized labor than ceed where no other Communist
vidualistic instincts" that have made with the old-time individualistic vit. government has succeeded.
peasants in so many other countries lagers. In any case, this year China However, this is only a hypothet-
put up a desperate resistance to col- has a record harvest, neatly twice k-at view of the prospects; some
?lectivization? When the Soviet peas- as large as last year's and more than time must elapse before the reaction
ants revolted against Stalin's forcible three times larger than the last liar- of the Chinese peasantry can be
collectivization, they slaughtered half %est before the revolution. The ganged. It is twill possible that the
their cattle, smashed implements. achievement is all the more remark- e?perirnent will crash spectacularly
and set fire to their crops, thus to able because it has born obtained and Cause grave social turmoil.
some extent defeating collectivization with the most primitive technical
even while they themselves were be- means, mainly on the basis of co- Dassinhig with No Praia
ing crushed. Is some such determined operated manual labor. In Ruwia these latest Chinese de-
? revolt now latent in the Chinese Unlike the Soviet peasants of the velopments have been greeted with
countryside? Or are the peasants 1930's, the Chinese have wen their reserve and tacit irony. Pravda pub.
joiningthe communes with enthusi- well-being improving rapidly with lished the decree of the Central Com-
asrn," as Peking claims and as some collectivization, however modest that tnittet of the Chinese Communist
recent western travelers believe? improvement may be by any western Party on September II, but more
It is difficult not only for outsiders standard. These benefits seem to than a month later the Soviet press
and foreign travelers but even for have weakened their attachment to still refrained from giving its bless-
the rulers in Peking to judge what private farming and perhaps even ing to the move. White its pages were
Is going on in the hearts of a mass reconciled them to a collectivist full of declarations of solidarity with
of half a billion people_ Rut it may economy. Having secured this favor- China over the Quemoy conflict and
be that Mao Tse-rung and his party
are now getting dividends from the
caution and flexibility with which.
in contrast to Stalin and his follow-
ers, they arranged the opening phases
of collectivization some years ago.
Stalin at first attempted to impose
wholesale collectivization at a stroke
and to confiscate all the peasants'
belongings: only bloody resistance
forced him to retreat, to compromise,
to make concessions to the peasants'
"property instincts" in order to save
the general lramework of the collec.
tive farm. The initial collision, how-
ever, was so violent that memories
of it survive in the Soviet Union to
this day and even now weigh upon
relations between state and peas-
antry. The Chinese collectisization
Norontber 13, 1954
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ot K1,45Ing II 11:414, 1,) 5l.441.5 Odle!
(101111'5111 ;44 MCIII1011
was made tit this latest and moat
momentous domestic development.
Such silence speaks louder than any
amount of comment.
Not Only is MOSCOW skeptical
about Mao's latest inidettaking, it
also senses hurray. Khrushchea may
resent the Lit t that Mao is fulfilling
the Agiotown scheme. which he him.
self had to abandon. More inipor
'ant, the whole trend of Chinese
domestic policy is in implicit con-
flict with Soviet policy. Kfinithchea
has Just made a series of important
concessions to the peasants. relaxing
the Stalinist tigora of collectiviza?
tion: he has sold the state-owned
machine tractor stations to the colr
let tive farms, he has treed the peas-
ants Irons compulsory tood cle-
liveties, and he 11.15 attempted to
place the economic relationship be-
tween state and i.ieasantry on uxue-
thing like a market basis. .1O Soviet
ears there is something almost blas-
phemous in the Chinese talk about
the commune's superiority to any
ordinary collective farm, it only be-
cause for years to come the Chinese
commune will be based on a tech:,
nit-al level of fanning far lower than
that prevailing in the Soviet kolkhoz.
Similarly, the Chinese territorial
militias with their "soldier-citizens"
and "soldier-laborers" have too
intuit of the cam I,. 11u1sliesik aura
about them to please the present
Soviet rulets.
Evidently the Chinese leaders are
taking their talk about their own
"road to bocialism" much more seri-
ously than the Russians like. Sootier
or later these implicit divergencies
between the Soviet and Chinese at.
titudes may give rise to new con
troversy in the Communist camp.
The whole course of collectivization
in China is unmistakably, if only
implicitly, a critique of the Soviet
road to socialism.
ItArosomv appears to be as appre-
IV" hensive about Mao's present
"ultra radical deviation from Stalin-
ist or post-Stalinist orthodoxy as it
was two years about his "ultra-
liberal" Hundred Flowers policy. In
Moscow's view, Mao went too far in
promising freedom of expression and
was compelled to reicnixise mono-
lithic discipline. Is he not now in-
211
tIOn.001., III Ilan 114,151011, .44.1111
1114 1,t.t,..41111%., 5,111:l4.n,...5. hI .t/(, pt
the ((minima? lir tioth (as" 'sfao...
ambitions ma% llaite eX1 petted
China's resoun es .4tal possibilities
When he tried to t arm de .51,41 iii
film (trailer than the Russians had
carried it. he ignreed the tirtunt
stame that the haw tactor behind
Smiet tie-St.. hlnhI,4 tion was soviet in
dustrial 41141 tlfIlfan011.11 InOgIe55.
WhI4 fi had Ix tome iinorn;Jatible with
many c4 the *mallet Tian practices id
the Stalin eta
MAO has Sitl(r ths, o% ed that his
ICSSAVSiii ?1111C1.111/4115.111. 44 ((ltd ill
with the mass thy !Hurt that is IT-
quired iti the initial phase of lotted
industrialization On the offal band.
Moscow is inclined ro rasa the view
that China is industrialls and social-
ly Wu backward for the -Advanced
forms of socialism- which Mao now
attempts to hostel the soviet ('Mon.
551111 its pti5,4 /lid stair-ill/611,d 11.,111%
.1/1.1 Its V.P.?115 4-'91411.1C .1 .1fis .11
/r1.40/ kitig I lass. still shrink, ti-mi ii.?
postnE the \!,;:iinown and du ,oin
Mint on 11, peasaritia which t? tt la
rivets (mall weakei v is a yis the stau-
Old the 1.111)411 Winking lass (Ilan
IS illt? (.111111-Se lie.1,1411tn is II not
then, iv< Les of 11.io to (lets the
intlisidualisen ol his peasantr1
Frin1,1 %kr the questions pondered
b? the gsrattlians (II orthodox%
and the poll( %maker% in \f,ow
ltut moth more than otthoders% and
dogma is insolsed. If the movement
fin di . torminine slut eedi itt Irlitmt
the Smiet tillers Inas well he tt min
ed or Wiser) to follow in Mao's 11)01
steps ? Khrushchey mas then take Ill)
oat e again his Agrotown scheme. and
the upheaval now shaking tnt al
China 11111 well spread to the 'soviet
;n ion.
Pandit Nehru 's
One-Party Democracy
GEORGE BAILEY
TilL CAR% of "Crito in the Congress
c \ipilm?-?F wilt tip immediatels
when, earls Last ? las . Nehr,i expressed
his intention of withdrawing -for
some time" from office. The (Loom
did not die down even when, shortly
aftei ward, he w?ttled 10f a month's
vat ation and agreed to stav on. A
number of things lent substance to
the widespread contention that the
Congress Party was disintegrating
First, there was the dramatic success
of the Communist Party of India in
the state of Kerala last sear, when
the Communists managed to form a
coalition government there. Next
came a goveinmental crisis in the
suit of Orissa, when the Congress
held ministry tesigned on orders
from the centin patty high cons
mand. Shortly afterward. a (1 filfilSrd
intraparty scandal broke out in the
Punjab, where some of the chief
minister's relatives had abused their
Family connections tor polltiral put
poses. Finally. Congress Part) ralitli
dates were sunessively defeated in
by-elections in Devicolam (Kerala)
hy a Communist and in Get-goa
(Punjabi by an independent.
Their weir. other somber chat-lop
ments. The government's much
hetalded and strongly hailed Gan
monks Development 11 (4t .4141
seemed to be bogging down. I he
chronic anemia Of India's foreign
exchange teserves had become ac
despite Prime %finish.' Nchro's di
versionary
Rio for All this, atsd serious as
much 01 it WAS and still Is, tht
Congress Party crisis soon became on
ly the crisis that might have been il
Nehru had resigned. The fact that
he did not resign decided the issue -
at least 1111 the present and in otrahls
tot a long time to tome.
%ill in Kt.. dab( oh to 4'15.514104n
Nehru's prestige in his boon
cocoon fie is the (failing of thr
people And tas lie once [sutured him
self in a thapter of his aritobrog
taphv which has been expurgated
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