Part 06: November 14, 1966 (Mao Backs the Shanghai Rebels) to January 3, 1967
By: Cultural Revolution, Otd
Tags: China, Cultural Revolution, Communism

14/11/66 Mao convenes the Politburo Standing Committee to ratify Zhang Chunqiao’s decisively pro-rebel handling of the Anting rail incident.

14/11/66 Mao reminds the Politburo that the PRC constitution guarantees Chinese citizens’ right to organise: the Workers’ Rebel HQ is legal.

14/11/66 Tao Zhu makes a self-criticism for having opposed Zhang Chunqiao and the rest of the CCRG’s response to the Anting rail incident.

15/11/66 In Suzhou, Zhang Chunqiao signs an agreement with the Shanghai Workers’ Rebel HQ, agreeing to (a second set of) five demands.

15/11/66 Lin Biao comes under attack in a poster written by “Yilin Dixi” (a pseudonym), a Beijing Agricultural University middle schooler.

15/11/66 Yilin Dixi is disappointed that Lin’s command of theory is so poor, taking him to task for his 18/9/66 speech which belittled Marx.

15/11/66 Kang Sheng tells Xinjiang Red Guards that seizing US dollars from bourgeois households is “class struggle in the economic realm”.

15/11/66 The Central Committee voids all the damaging political labels applied to Red Guards, and suggests Party organs destroy their files.

15/11/66 The anti-Confucius liaison office in Qufu complain to the State Council for making the Sage’s “reactionary” tomb a protected site.

15/11/66 Outside Confucius’ family home, the Red Guards stage a mass rally and smash the State Council’s “National Cultural Relic” plaque.

16/11/66 Zhang Chunqiao reports to Mao on his handling of the Anting rail incident. Mao approves: “you can act first and report afterwards”.

16/11/66 On Mao’s instruction, Nie Yuanzi leads a delegation of Beijing students and teachers to Shanghai to support the rebels there.

16/11/66 Zhou Enlai addresses a mass meeting about the vast number of people coming to Beijing. He estimates 200 000 people enter every day.

17/11/66 Mao receives a delegation from Guinea. He congratulates Public Works Minister Ismaël Touré on their struggle against imperialism.

17/11/66 A conference of local leaders from all across China begins in Beijing, to discuss how to keep production going through the GPCR.

18/11/66 Copies of the 15/11/66 “Yilin Dixi” open letter to Lin Biao, which criticised Lin’s grasp of Marxism, are produced and distributed.

18/11/66 The Beijing Party Committee bans factories and schools from setting up their own prisons — violators will “severely punished”.

18/11/66 Students at Beijing 6th Middle School write to the CCRG. Murders have been committed at their school, but the police will not act.

19/11/66 Unannounced, Chen Boda leads a CCRG delegation to inspect Beijing 6th Middle School, just over the road from the Zhongnanhai.

19/11/66 Chen Boda heads straight to the music classroom, which has been converted into a prison and “interrogation” room since mid-August.

19/11/66 Two adults and a student have perished in the gaol. “Long live the red terror” is painted on the wall in blood (but whose blood?).

19/11/66 Chen Boda strongly admonishes the young Red Guards in charge and closes down the classroom prison, freeing its remaining inmates.

20/11/66 The CCP transmits, to all levels, Beijing’s instruction against Red Guards running their own prisons. Mao wants captives released.

21/11/66 At the Ministry of Education, a big-character poster goes up criticising the minister for being “confused” by the May 16 Circular.

21/11/66 After weeks of being occupied by Nie Yuanzi’s Peking University student opponents, her mouthpiece Xin Beida resumes publication.

22/11/66 Mao rejects the cautious views coming out of a conference of local leaders about how to stop the GPCR ruining economic production.

23/11/66 A Red Guard faction from the Beijing Forestry Institute puts up posters carrying the unusual slogan: “Long Live Liu Shaoqi!”.

24/11/66 At the Aeronautics Institute, ex-Red Guards opposed to the Red Flag faction put up a poster asking pointed questions of the CCRG.

24/11/66 Zhou Enlai asks Mao for approval to intervene in a Red Guard “investigation” into North West China Party Chief Liu Lantao’s past.

25/11/66 Before sunrise at offices of the People’s Daily in Beijing, students emerge having spent the night talking politics with Chen Boda.

25/11/66 The last dregs of the Picket Corps storm into and smash the Red Guard 3rd HQ’s base near Tiananmen, injuring some of those inside.

25/11/66 The Qufu Party Committee start recruiting a 300-strong “Peasant Grave Digging Team”, preparing to help Red Guards dig up Confucius.

25/11/66 On Shanghai’s Cultural Plaza, 15 000 Red Guards hold a rally to “open fire on” the local “capitalist reactionary” Party Committee.

25/11/66 On a freezing cold Tiananmen Square, another Red Guard rally begins. Arranged at short notice, it is the eighth one since 18/8/66.

25/11/66 For four hours, Mao waves to a parade of “young revolutionary fighters”. Red Guards recite Mao quotes and sing The East is Red.

26/11/66 Beijing’s Red Guard rally resumes after yesterday’s parade. Students fill Tiananmen square and line the avenue to the airport.

26/11/66 Hundreds of different contingent of “Long March” Red Guards have walked to Beijing from all over China: from Jiangxi to Mongolia.

26/11/66 Mao is driven from Tiananmen Square to the airport, waving to crowds on the way. He reviews yet more Red Guards at the airfield.

26/11/66 As the rally ends, Red Guards try to cram through the airfield’s one and only exit. Many are trampled to death in the ice-cold mud.

26/11/66 The Party decides this should be the last rally, at least until spring. Mao has reviewed about 12 million Red Guards since August.

26/11/66 Shanghai workers opposed to the Workers’ Rebel HQ form the “Red Defenders Battalion” and start recruiting large numbers of members.

26/11/66 The Red Defenders Battalion call on Zhang Chunqiao to self-criticise. They reject the 5 “poisonous” demands he signed on 15/11/66.

27/11/66 Li Hongshan, a student at the Beijing Forestry Institute, puts up a poster criticising the Central Cultural Revolution Group.

27/11/66 At Peking University, members of a High School Red Flag faction criticise Lin Biao and the CCRG’s “new bourgeois reactionary line”.

27/11/66 The Red Flag members and sympathisers from other groups set up a “United Action” committee to coordinate resistance across Beijing.

27/11/66 Officials from the CCRG begin a set of meetings with the Red Guard 3rd HQ, to decide how to stamp out anti-CCRG student resistance.

27/11/66 Guan Feng completes a report for Jiang Qing, accusing Tao Zhu of following the Liu-Deng line since May. Jiang forwards it to Mao.

28/11/66 While reading out a standard list of top leaders considered Mao’s “comrades-in-arms”, Jiang Qing conspicuously misses out Tao Zhu.

28/11/66 The Central Military Commission announces Jiang Qing’s appointment as its cultural adviser, technically an active service role.

28/11/66 Tan Houlan leads a 20 000-strong rally outside the Confucius Temple in Qufu. Red Guards drag Confucius’ broken statue through town.

29/11/66 The August 1 Red Guards at the Beijing Aeronautics Institute publish a second big-character poster pointedly scrutinising the CCRG.

29/11/66 In Qufu, Red Guards break commemorative arches in Confucius’ cemetery. The local “Grave Digging Team” get to work with pick axes.

29/11/66 The anti-Confucius Red Guards write to Mao. In a “thrilling development”, they have removed or smashed various reactionary symbols.

30/11/66 On Portuguese-administered Macau, the local CCP newspaper calls for an escalation in protests against the “ruthless imperialists”.

30/11/66 Outside the colonial Governor’s Palace, 60 Red Guards join and politicise a local demonstration about planning regulations.

30/11/66 The “Capital Red Guard” paper prints an essay from an anonymous writer at the Geology Institute, satirising the majority faction.

30/11/66 The essay mocks those who only rebel to a bear minimum, protect leaders and “lick ass” — they just want a nice job after the GPCR.

30/11/66 In Qufu, Red Guards dig a 3-metre trench on the site of Confucius’ grave, but have failed so far to actually locate the corpse.

30/11/66 The anti-Confucius Red Guards dig up three of Confucius’ more recent relatives. They strip them naked and hang them from a tree.

30/11/66 Student Li Hongshan puts up a banner at the Forestry Institute, reading: “Kick aside the CCRG; let’s make revolution ourselves”.

30/11/66 Zhou Enlai forbids students in Jilin to “investigate” local leaders at mass meetings. Mao knows the history and there’s no problem.

30/11/66 Rebel Red Guards take over the offices of Liberation Daily — the Shanghai Party Committee’s official newspaper — and close it down.

30/11/66 The Shanghai Party Committee organises students to drive out the occupiers, but Wang Hongwen’s rebel workers arrive and repel them.

1/12/66 Red Guards resort to using dynamite to open Confucius’ tomb. But when they peer into the crater, nothing discernibly human is left.

1/12/66 The State Council issues a circular on Red Guard revolutionary networking: too many are doing it and it’s straining infrastructure.

1/12/66 Student Li Hongshan, who called for young people to sideline the CCRG, takes part in a public debate at the Forestry Institute.

1/12/66 Li Hongshan says it’s wrong to try to apply Mao’s writings from the 1920s to the 1960s, and for the unelected CCRG to lead the GPCR.

2/12/66 Allies of Li Hongshan mount a poster on Tiananmen, accusing the CCRG of continuing the bourgeois reactionary line of the work teams.

2/12/66 The Aeronautics Institute’s August 1 Red Guards publish a third poster “inquiring” into the CCRG’s arbitrary persecution campaigns.

2/12/66 In Macau, mainland radio broadcasts call colonial authorities “fascist” and accuse them of premeditated violence against protesters.

2/12/66 Mao reviews yesterday’s State Council circular on the issue of Red Guards’ revolutionary networking: Zhou Enlai should implement it.

3/12/66 In Macau, Red Guards demand to speak to the Governor. When this is denied, they storm the building. Outside, 2000 protesters gather.

3/12/66 Macau’s colonial authorities deploy riot police and tear gas. Chinese protesters set to work destroying symbols of Portuguese rule.

3/12/66 Portuguese colonial police shoot dead two protesters but still can’t quell Macau’s revolutionary rioting. Martial law is declared.

4/12/66 Macau remains under martial law. Tanks drive student protesters off the streets, with 8 killed and hundreds injured since yesterday.

4/12/66 The Red Guard 3rd HQ react to recent anti-CCRG dissidence with posters urging people to open fire on the bourgeois reactionary line.

4/12/66 Driving around Beijing with megaphones and loudspeakers, the Red Guard 3rd HQ pledge to “defend to the death” the CCRG and Lin Biao.

4/12/66 Lin Biao chairs an enlarged Politburo meeting to deal with a report into the GPCR’s impact on China’s industry and communications.

4/12/66 Lin Biao makes a speech to the Politburo on “grasping revolution; promoting production” and whether the GPCR is disrupting industry

5/12/66 Founded secretly on 27/11/66, the United Action committee of Red Guards reveals its existence, swearing to defend the Party and Mao.

5/12/66 The first campaign of United Action is to leaflet in support of the four Marshals’ remarks on 13/11/66, which criticised extremism.

5/12/66 United Action declare that since the CCRG has made them into outlaws, they are going to rebel. They call the CCRG reactionary.

5/12/66 Student Li Hongshan criticises Chen Boda at a debate. Yi Zhenya attacks the Red Guard 3rd HQ’s “reactionary” obedience of the CCRG.

5/12/66 Wang Li tells the Politburo that Tao Zhu’s focus on “economic production” is a red herring; simply an excuse to constrain the GPCR.

6/12/66 Lin Biao closes the enlarged Politburo meeting. The economic planners’ proposal to rein in the GPCR in factories is totally rejected

6/12/66 People are gawping at Confucius’ exhumed relatives, hanging naked from a tree since 30/11/66, so Red Guards burn them in a ditch.

7/12/66 At a meeting of the China-Japan Youth Friendship Association, United Action and Red Guard 3rd HQ members fight, verbally, for hours.

8/12/66 As Red Guards meet Jiang Qing, she hints at who to go after next: mentioning Chen Yun and Bo Yibo in the same breath as Liu Shaoqi.

9/12/66 The Politburo adopts “Ten Points on Industry”, letting workers take part in the GPCR if it doesn’t get in the way of their day jobs.

10/12/66 At Peking University, big-character posters appear which criticise the Central Cultural Revolution Group — “Bombard the CCRG”.

10/12/66 Mainland authorities demand that Macau’s Governor accepts Chinese protesters’ demands and sacks officials responsible for violence.

11/12/66 Macau’s Governor meets local Chinese leaders, and agrees for the colony to compensate victims of the police (by borrowing $2m).

11/12/66 At a high school attached to Beijing Agricultural University, a poster appears which criticises Lin Biao, signed by “Yilin Dixi”.

12/12/66 Macau’s Governor accepts demands from the Guangdong Government, including banning the KMT in Macau and extraditing 7 KMT “spies”.

12/12/66 Incited by CCRG members, particularly Jiang Qing, rebel students invade the house of purged Mayor Peng Zhen and force him out.

12/12/66 In the Workers’ Stadium, Acting Beijing Mayor Wu De leads 120 000 Red Guards in “struggle” against his predecessor, Peng Zhen.

12/12/66 We De declares Peng Zhen’s clique “the scum of the Party” and some members of it, including Wu Han and Wan Li, suffer beside Peng.

13/12/66 In the small hours of the morning, crowds gather at the State Council to salute the national flag. Jiang Qing addresses them.

13/12/66 Jiang Qing applauds the crowd’s “spirit of insurgency” and pledges her support to destroy “the small clique of capitalist roaders”.

13/12/66 The Red Flag journal accuses anti-CCRG dissidents of being “a small group of capitalist roaders” attacking the “genuine left”.

13/12/66 Red Flag says targeting the spearhead of criticism is about right versus wrong. Wang Li extols dictatorship of the proletariat.

13/12/66 The US Air Force admits that one of its jets crashed in China on 20/9/65 and that its pilot, Philip E. Smith, is still being held.

14/12/66 Jiang Qing, Kang Sheng and Chen Boda meet with leaders from the Red Guard 3rd HQ and the Aeronautics Red Flag group.

14/12/66 Kang Sheng tells the rebel students that Li Hongshan, who criticised the unelected CCRG, “is a petty counter-revolutionary leader”.

14/12/66 At the Forestry Institute, factional opponents of anti-CCRG student Li Hongshan ransack his base and hold him for “interrogation”

15/12/66 The Party Centre issues “Ten Points on Villages”, legalising rural Red Guard groups (but they still need to do their farming work).

16/12/66 Lin Biao writes the foreword to a reprint of “Quotations from the Chairman” (the Little Red Book) in which he calls Mao a “genius”.

16/12/66 Chen Boda cuts (purged propaganda chief) Lu Dingyi’s stipend. He suggests Lu’s house arrest end and he be handed to the Red Guards.

16/12/66 The Forestry Institute put on a “meeting to criticise and struggle against Li Hongshan and his counter-revolutionary activities”.

16/12/66 Chen Boda attends a mass meeting of Beijing middle schoolers, discussing the Picket Corps’ opposition to “real” revolutionaries.

16/12/66 The Red Guard “patrols” have been taken over by bad elements and will be disbanded, Chen Boda’s “oath-taking meeting” announces.

16/12/66 As the oath-taking meeting ends, participants ransack Western District Picket Corps and United Action committee bases in Beijing.

16/12/66 United Action respond to the attacks on their bases with their own invasion of the Public Security Ministry: long-time adversaries.

16/12/66 Jiang Qing addresses high school Red Guards about the Picket Corps and other patrol groups: a handful of reactionary “little kids”.

16/12/66 Zhou Enlai is at the meeting, alongside his subordinates Wang Renzhong and Zhou Rongxin. Without warning, Jiang attacks the pair.

16/12/66 Jiang forces Wang and Zhou to stand before her and bow their heads, saying they enabled the patrols to act like “military police”.

16/12/66 The patrols are guilty of using weapons and murdering, says Jiang. She hints at the fact that Zhou Enlai provided material support.

16/12/66 Kang Sheng speaks next. He brands anti-CCRG student Li Hongshan a counter-revolutionary, much to the delight of his young audience.

16/12/66 Zhou Enlai speaks, saying he agrees with Jiang Qing’s words but suggests leniency in dealing with the (very young) patrol members.

17/12/66 Public Security Ministry officers carry out an early-morning raid and arrest an Aeronautics Institute anti-CCRG dissident student.

17/12/66 Forestry Institute rebels put anti-CCRG Li Hongshan through struggle, then turn him over to the Public Security Ministry’s custody.

17/12/66 At a meeting of Red Guards visiting Beijing from across China, Chen Boda says “if the enemy does not surrender, make him perish”.

18/12/66 Kuai Dafu, the Qinghua student radical favoured by the CCRG, goes to the Zhongnanhai for a private meeting with Zhang Chunqiao.

18/12/66 Zhang Chunqiao tells Kuai to go after two certain reactionaries at the heart of the CCP — and to make sure he goes “all the way”.

18/12/66 Tan Lifu, blamed for the “bloodline theory” that class is mainly inherited, is arrested for spreading this “reactionary” idea.

18/12/66 Red Guards update the CCRG and Public Security Minister Xie Fuzhi on their collaborative arrests of anti-CCRG student dissidents.

18/12/66 Jiang Qing tells Red Guards to send their captives to the Public Security Ministry (not the untrustworthy Public Security Bureau!).

18/12/66 Jiang says Wang Guangmei should go to Qinghua University to be criticised. So should Bo Yibo, for attacking Kuai Dafu on 3/7/66.

18/12/66 CCRG member Guan Feng tells the rebel students that the Picket Corps’ elite sponsors must be dragged out and shot “without mercy”.

18/12/66 On Jiang Qing’s orders, Beijing Red Guard groups have been scouring Chengdu all month for long-purged PLA Marshal Peng Dehuai.

18/12/66 Geology Institute East is Red members locate Peng. They tell him Geology Vice Minister He Changgong (a friend) has been arrested.

19/12/66 Peking University Red Guards apprehend a student who criticised the CCRG. They turn him over to the Public Security Ministry.

19/12/66 Following Zhang Chunqiao’s instruction to unify the rebel students at Qinghua, Kuai Dafu founds the “Qinghua Jinggangshan” group.

20/12/66 Lin Jie, who works for the CCRG, says that those who criticise it are class enemies and US spies; to be “suppressed without mercy”.

20/12/66 Qi Benyu writes a letter to rebel student groups. He says it’s permitted to name Tao Zhu in critical posters (unbeknownst to Tao).

20/12/66 Kuai Dafu, chemistry sophomore and leader of the Qinghua Jinggangshan, sets up a team to compile “The Selected Works of Kuai Dafu”.

21/12/66 Zhou Rongxin and Wang Renzhong, top officials working for Zhou Enlai, are arrested for having provided support to the Picket Corps.

21/12/66 Provisions to let Red Guards travel around the country for free as “revolutionary networking” are, at least in theory, abolished.

22/12/66 At Qinghua University, the Jinggangshan group calls for Wang Guangmei, Wang Renzhong and Bo Yibo to return to campus for criticism.

22/12/66 Red Guards from the Beijing Geology East is Red group return to Marshal Peng Dehuai’s Chengdu house, after finding it on 18/12/66.

23/12/66 Xu Ming, the purged Vice-Secretary of Zhou Enlai’s State Council and mother of the Red Guard Picket Corps’ leader, kills herself.

24/12/66 Student Tang Wei resigns from Qinghua’s Jinggangshan group, criticising its leaders for condemning Liu Shaoqi without due process.

24/12/66 At the Beijing Workers’ Stadium, purged General Luo Ruiqing is dragged on stage to be struggled against before 10 000 Red Guards.

24/12/66 Lin Biao has arranged for the rally to seem spontaneous (“the cadres must not go on stage”). Luo’s associates are also persecuted.

24/12/66 East is Red members in Chengdu try to contact their Beijing HQ for instructions on what to do with Peng Dehuai, but get no reply.

24/12/66 Wang Dabin, leader of East is Red’s Chongqing branch, arrives in Chengdu. He is furious that nobody has abducted Peng Dehuai yet.

24/12/66 East is Red students in Chengdu are “rightists” and “traitors”, says Wang Dabin. They start discussing how to arrest Marshal Peng.

25/12/66 While the East is Red students are still plotting Peng Dehuai’s capture, Aeronautics Red Flag seize the Marshal during the night.

25/12/66 Wang Dabin leads the East is Red students to arrest Marshal Peng, but he’s already been taken. Instead, they ransack his house.

25/12/66 At 4AM, Marshal Peng’s bodyguards arrive at his home to find him gone. Aeronautics Red Flag are holding him at the railway station.

25/12/66 Around 6000 Qinghua students (mostly members of Kuai Dafu’s Jinggangshan group) march to Tiananmen Square for a “great action”.

25/12/66 The students pledge to “thoroughly crush” the reactionary line of Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping. They put up posters and sing songs.

25/12/66 In the freezing wind, the rally “criticises in absentia” Liu Shaoqi’s wife Wang Guangmei — bête noire of rally organiser Kuai Dafu.

25/12/66 The rally breaks into marching columns. People chant “Liu Shaoqi must confess his crimes!” and “Battle Liu-Deng to the bloody end”.

25/12/66 Zhou Enlai cables Marshal Peng Dehuai’s captors in Chengdu, ordering them to involve the PLA in his transport and not to abuse him.

26/12/66 Zhou Enlai tells the Qinghua Jinggangshan group, led by Kuai Dafu, that they ought to stop using the slogan “overthrow Liu Shaoqi”.

26/12/66 Zhou also tells Jinggangshan that Mao has not (yet) approved their request to bring Liu’s wife Wang Guangmei back to campus.

26/12/66 A Shanghai workers’ group meet with Jiang Qing, Chen Boda, Zhang Chunqiao and other CCRG members to talk about their contracts.

26/12/66 Workers complain that the contract system is too loose and allows enterprises to exploit them with the Labour Ministry’s blessing.

26/12/66 Moved, Jiang Qing tells workers to wipe away the “capitalist” contract system. “I am getting so angry!” she shouts through tears.

26/12/66 Trying to reduce tensions, United Action hold a “Rally to Establish Public-Spiritedness” and invite the CCRG and Red Guard 3rd HQ.

26/12/66 No CCRG or 3rd HQ members attend United Action’s rally, and so their attempt to mollify the left with self-criticism seems futile.

26/12/66 Film of autumn’s Red Guard rallies is played. United Action cheer when Mao or Zhou Enlai appear. They boo Jiang Qing and the CCRG.

26/12/66 Angry at the CCRG’s absence, members of the crowd storm the stage. They lead chants to overthrow “certain members of” the CCRG.

26/12/66 After the rally, United Action members exit the hall and march to protest outside a rebel faction’s base at the Forestry Institute.

26/12/66 The United Action breakaway group chant slogans attacking “arrogant” Jiang Qing, and calling for Chen Boda to be given a “scare”.

26/12/66 Mao is 73 today. He invites top leftists to dinner, although not Kang Sheng or Lin Biao (it is supposed to be a party, after all).

26/12/66 Mao toasts “to the unfolding of a nationwide all-round civil war!” and celebrates the rebels “rising up in Party and state organs”.

27/12/66 In a moment of privacy Jing Xizhen, Peng Dehuai’s aide, tells him of Zhou Enlai’s 25/12/66 instructions. The Marshal is stunned.

27/12/66 “Did he really call me comrade?” asks Peng. He did: Zhou is trying to protect him. Peng covers his face and trembles at the news.

27/12/66 In Chengdu, Aeronautics Red Flag (who are holding Marshal Peng Dehuai in custody) meet with the Wang Dabin’s East is Red group.

27/12/66 Red Flag and East is Red agree to share custody of Marshal Peng, overseen by the local PLA command (as per Zhou Enlai’s orders).

27/12/66 Both factions accompany Marshal Peng into a train. Zhou Enlai stipulated not to use aircraft (as rebels control Beijing airport).

28/12/66 In Beijing, Zhang Chunqiao receives a phone call telling him that his home in Shanghai has been ransacked by the “Scarlet Guards”.

28/12/66 The Scarlet Guards, a workers’ group opposed to Wang Hongwen’s Rebel Workers’ HQ, have not in fact done anything to Zhang’s home.

28/12/66 The PLA detonates a 300kt dirty atomic bomb (Hiroshima was 15). China’s fifth nuclear test is another step towards a hydrogen bomb.

28/12/66 Members of United Action invade the Ministry of Public Security in Beijing, demanding that their arrested comrades be released.

28/12/66 Zhang Chunqiao phones his wife. He says “the peach of Shanghai is now ripe” — Mayor Cao Diqiu cannot be allowed to pick it first.

29/12/66 Zhang Chunqiao phones Wang Hongwen, leader of the Shanghai Rebel Workers’ HQ. It’s time to “wage a blow-for-blow struggle”.

29/12/66 Mao convenes Politburo and CCRG to hold a “joint meeting to offer Wang Renzhong some views”, under Zhou Enlai’s chairmanship.

29/12/66 A devoted follower of Mao, Red Guards have discovered some of Wang’s slightly over-familiar poems about the Chairman and are angry.

29/12/66 Peng Dehuai arrives in Beijing. Student leader Wang Dabin leads him through the station in chains, claiming to represent the CCRG.

29/12/66 After dark, 100 000 members of the Rebel Workers’ HQ assemble on Kanping Road in Shanghai. They are met by 20 000 Scarlet Guards.

29/12/66 Mao tells Tao Zhu his problems aren’t so bad (Jiang Qing is just narrow-minded and intolerant) but he should soften his work style.

30/12/66 Two hours past midnight in Shanghai, Wang Hongwen leads 100 000 Rebel Workers HQ men into battle against the 20 000 Scarlet Guards.

30/12/66 After four hours of workers fighting with clubs and sticks on Kanping Road, 91 people are wounded and the Scarlet Guards retreat.

30/12/66 As the Kanping Road chaos unfolds, disguised in a floppy hat and old army tunic, watches a visitor from Wuhan called Jiang Zemin.

30/12/66 The “Wuhan to Guangzhou Rebel Troop for Grabbing Wang Renzhong” threaten to go on hunger strike unless Tao Zhu speaks to them.

30/12/66 Tao agrees to see the rebel Red Guards, but the second he does so they harangue him with accusations. A planned arrest is averted.

30/12/66 The State Council asks Aeronautics Red Flag to stop its “Red Sea” campaign to paint all of Beijing’s doors red — it’s confusing.

30/12/66 Jiang Qing visits He Long’s son at Qinghua University. She says she can prove his father’s crimes: “You tell him, I can touch him”.

30/12/66 Jiang Qing, Yao Wenyuan and other CCRG members praise Qinghua Jinggangshan. Their 25/12/66 march showed revolutionary leadership.

31/12/66 Rebels from the Propaganda Department write a big-character poster: “Tao Zhu practises the Liu-Deng Bourgeois Reactionary Line”.

31/12/66 The Shanghai Rebel Workers’ HQ issues an (illegal) arrest warrant for the defeated Scarlet Guard workers. They capture 240 members.

31/12/66 Thousands of Shanghai Scarlet Guards set off to lodge complaints in Beijing but are intercepted by Rebel Workers in nearby Kunshan.

31/12/66 For the second time, members of United Action make a foray into the Ministry of Public Security, trying to get detainees released.

31/12/66 At a PLA rally, Marshal Ye Jianying gives a self-criticism for belittling excessively fanatical Red Guards at a 13/11/66 rally.

1/1/67 At 3AM, Zhou Enlai tells Shanghai Party Chief Chen Pixian (convalescing after cancer surgery) to get back to work and restore order.

1/1/67 Two hours after Zhou’s phone call, Chen Pixian convenes leaders (including Wang Hongwen) to deal with the Scarlet Guards in Kunshan.

1/1/67 At Chen Pixian’s meeting, some rebels blame the city’s chaos on him paying back-dated wage demands. Others demand bigger pay-outs.

1/1/67 Wang Hongwen, leader of the largest mass organisation in Shanghai, sits in the corner and nods off. He thinks the meeting is a sham.

1/1/67 Shanghai Mayor Cao Diqiu approves measures to placate rebels, such as moving long-term “temporary” workers onto proper contracts.

1/1/67 A pair of staffers from the Zhongnanhai write slogans on President Liu Shaoqi’s house: “Down with China’s Khrushchev: Liu Shaoqi!”.

1/1/67 In its New Year editorial, the People’s Daily calls upon readers to “Carry Out the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution to the End”.

1/1/67 The People’s Daily predicts a year of “nationwide all-round class struggle” against capitalist roaders; the wording finalised by Mao.

1/1/67 The United Action Committee pledges to “crush the left-deviationist line” and protect the Party’s “loyal and courageous cadres”.

1/1/67 Marshal Peng Dehuai writes to Mao and apologises for letting him down with his work in Sichuan. He gives Mao his “last salute”.

1/1/67 Liao Zhengguo, commander of the Shanghai PLA garrison, orders the city’s militia to hand in their guns for “inspection and repair”.

2/1/67 Yao Wenyuan writes in The People’s Daily: “Criticising the Reactionary Two-Faced Zhou Yang” (Tao Zhu’s Propaganda Department deputy).

2/1/67 Wang Hongwen, leader of the Shanghai Rebel Workers’ HQ, flies to Beijing to discuss developments in Shanghai with Zhang Chunqiao.

2/1/67 Zhang tells Wang Hongwen not to help Shanghai’s leaders end the chaos — “that would make them happy!” — but to attack them over it.

2/1/67 CCRG members Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan are promoted to the Party’s informal but powerful Central Caucus, chaired by Zhou Enlai.

2/1/67 Having resigned from Kuai Dafu’s Qinghua Jinggangshan group, Tang Wei sets up the “Mao Zedong Thought Column” in opposition to it.

3/1/67 At Qinghua University, Tang Wei’s Mao Zedong Thought Column holds a massive criticism of fellow rebel Kuai Dafu’s Jinggangshan group.

3/1/67 Shanghai Scarlet Guards, protesting in Kunshan after having failed to reach Beijing with their petition, cease disrupting transport.

3/1/67 Liu Shaoqi’s daughter Liu Tao puts up a big-character poster at Qinghua University — “Witness the Despicable Soul of Liu Shaoqi”.

3/1/67 Rebel Red Guards clash with more pro-establishment factions in Nanjing’s city centre, blocking a vital Yangtze River crossing.

3/1/67 In freezing Shanghai, rebel workers and student equip themselves with safety helmets and iron bars to storm local newspaper offices.

3/1/67 Hundreds of Shanghai enterprises’ accountants queue outside banks to withdraw cash, preparing to satisfy rebel workers’ wage demands.

3/1/67 At Peking University, Jiang Qing and Kang Sheng defend Red Guard leader Nie Yuanzi from rivals, who they brand counter-revolutionary.

3/1/67 Jiang Qing calls Nie Yuanzi’s allies-turned-critics Kong Fan and Yang Keming reactionary, and suggests “smashing their social base”.

3/1/67 Shanghai mass organisations endorse a “message” to the city. Party Chief Chen Pixian approves a printing order for 200 000 copies.

3/1/67 Red Guards break into Liu Shaoqi’s house to lecture him for 40 minutes. They order him to recite passages from Mao’s Little Red Book.

3/1/67 Foreign Minister Chen Yi discusses the Foreign Languages Institute’s two Red Guard factions with his subordinate Qiao Guanhua.

3/1/67 Chen says “one lot wants me struck down, the other wants me roasted. I don’t know the difference”. Qiao suggests the latter is worse.

3/1/67 “Qiao you old bureaucrat,” teases Marshal Chen, “Still calling them children? Why, those people are Daring Revolutionary Generals!”.