Peng Zhen
The attack on Wu Han was an indirect attack on Peng Zhen, a pillar of the establishment that Mao wanted overthrown. Kang's role in the subsequent purge of Peng was to co-lead with Chen Boda the prosecution of Mao's charge that "Peng Zhen, the Propaganda Department, and the Beijing Party Committee had shielded bad people while suppressing leftists." The process took some time, but in May 1966 Peng Zhen, along with Luo Ruiqing, Lu Dingyi and Yang Shangkun were stripped of all official positions. In its verdict on the event long afterwards, the CPC Central Committee concluded, "Lin Biao, Jiang Qing, Kang Sheng, Zhang Chunqiao and others ...exploited the situation to incite people to 'overthrow everything and wage full-scale civil war.'". Yang Jisheng observes that: