China: Divided Army

The situation in China, reported the Soviet news agency Tass last week, “increasingly resembles civil war.” Fighting between the supporters and the opponents of Mao Tse-tung’s Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution spread along the thousand miles of Yangtze River from Chungking in the western mountains to Shanghai on the Pacific coast.

Wall posters in Peking announced that farmers were threatening to march through Kiangsu province to lay siege to Nanking and Shanghai. Mass move ments of refugees were reported, and the People’s Liberation Army massed troops at the border to prevent any from escaping into Hong Kong.

Probably not even Mao himself knew just how bad the situation really was. What was clear was that more and more elements of the army were siding with the anti-Maoists in the provinces in a spreading disaffection directly traceable to the by-now-famed incident in Wuhan. There, three weeks ago, General Chen Tsai-tao, whose command includes the vital Yangtze River hub city, seized two top Mao emissaries sent from Peking to bring Chen to heel. Peking negotiated the pair’s release; but despite frantic efforts since then, Mao has been unable to subdue the open rebellion in Wuhan.

Vicious & Cruel. Indeed, Mao’s efforts seemed to have fanned the revolt. Nearby regional commanders were reported siding with General Chen. Chen in turn was supplying arms and troops up and down the Yangtze to aid other anti-Maoist rebels. According to the Shantung provincial radio, two cities in that province struck at Maoist groups in coordination with Wuhan’s seizure of Mao’s envoys.

In Linyi, anti-Maoist party officials “instigated large numbers of peasants to enter the city and encircle, attack and beat up” Red Guards and Maoist officials. A similar “vicious and cruel suppression” was meted out to cultural revolutionaries in Tsaochwang. Fighting was also reported in Hunan, Mao’s home province, and in Kwangtung and Szechwan provinces.

Dismal Failure. Mao’s difficulties with the army stem less from the commanders’ opposition to Mao himself than from the soldiers’ distaste for the disorder that the Cultural Revolution’s Red Guards have created in their domains. Since the army’s men in the ranks tend to come from the regions where they are stationed, they put heavy pressure on their commanders to side with the local people and party officials against Peking.

No one knows better than Mao that for all his high status as the Sun King of Chinese Communism, the loyalty of the army is essential if his revolutionary dream is to come to pass. Last week Red Flag bluntly warned that the Maoists “face the danger of losing the army,” and Mao took action. First, he promised that all of the top brass who would come to the army’s 40th anniversary party and repent and switch to his full support “would be welcomed.” The ploy was a dismal failure: only four of China’s 13 regional commanders showed. Then, amid dark hints of a major purge, Mao summoned a meeting of the Politburo in Peking to discuss what to do next.

The choices are difficult. Unless Mao compromises and cools the Cultural Revolution or else thoroughly purges the army—if he still can—his troops are likely to remain uncertain and divided, making outright civil war an ever greater possibility.