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Tuesday, December 18

The legacy of Lin Biao

by Mike on Tue 18 Dec 2007 11:51 PM EST

Lin Biao (front) addresses the
Peking celebration rally, 1966

It was interesting to read the article "Remembering Lin Biao" from Workers World a couple of weeks ago. The well-written piece was very informative and included some important background information on an individual who has been all but forgotten by much of the West since his death in 1971. "Remembering Lin Biao" was written on the occasion of the centennial of Lin's birth and accurately praises Lin as "an outstanding military leader in China's anti-feudal, anti-imperialist revolutionary war..." To this day, revolutionary groups including elements from India's Naxalites and Nepal's Maoist insurgency still look to Lin as an important strategist. One of Lin's more important contributions to revolutionary theory includes his 1965 piece "Long Live the Victory of the People's War!" which elucidated the doctrines of People's War and set a course for revolution in developing countries around the world. In addition to his work as a military strategist, Lin was capable of speaking on complex components of Marxism-Leninism, as in the matter of his discussion of the theory of the productive forces from his "Secret Address to the Eleventh Plenary Session" in 1966. By the late 1960s, Lin was honing his skills as an up-and-coming political leader, preparing for the role of Mao Zedong's successor.

It is important, however, to note that Lin's legacy is not one-sided by any means. It is relatively well-known that Lin's political differences with Mao and with Zhou Enlai led him to flee the People's Republic of China in relative disgrace in late 1971. In the course of Lin's hasty exit, he met an untimely end which remains shrouded in mystery to this day. But from an historical perspective, Lin's role as the so-called "architect" of China's Great Proletarian Revolution is much more significant than the circumstances of his controversial death. The Cultural Revolution is now widely regarded by much of the world's revolutionary left as a campaign fraught with errors and excess. Indeed, the greatest push to Lin's ascent to power came in the early years of the Cultural Revolution after the purge of Lin's political rival Liu Shaoqi. In one of the more unfortunate chapters of the Cultural Revolution, Liu Shaoqi was ultimately killed after a lengthy period of imprisonment, abuse and medical neglect. In a manner of speaking, the legacy of Lin Biao is – at the very least – tainted with the blood of Liu Shaoqi and many others who suffered needlessly during the Cultural Revolution. Moreover, it was Lin's political miscalculations which ultimately paved the way for the political dominance of China's "Gang of Four," led by Jiang Qing. The darker, latter portion of the Cultural Revolution saw Jiang complete the posthumous sacking of Lin with an extensive and pervasive campaign of public criticism. The downward spiral which Lin created through his own mistakes was to ultimately swallow him like some kind of Orwellian memory hole. Lin Biao's image and name were quickly erased from China's collective memory following his demise. Chinese citizens went so far as to publicly tear out pages from their Little Red Books which featured introductory notes by Lin, including Lin's legendary directive to China's masses:

"Study Chairman Mao's writings, follow his teachings, and act according to his instructions."

The Workers World piece notes that Lin's portrait was returned to public display in the Beijing Military Museum in July 2007, amounting to a nunc pro tunc recognition of Lin as a "hero" of the People's Republic. However, the move by itself is not necessarily an indication of a full-scale effort to rehabilitate Lin. His 100th birthday ultimately came and went with no fanfare or formal recognition by the PRC. Lin's legacy – with so many considerations regarding his political character and his relationship with Mao at at the time of his demise – is an issue which all sides of the controversy, from anti-revisionists to post-coup market socialists, will have difficulty reconciling for some years to come.