Yao Wenyuan
The leftist literary critic Yao Wenyuan, later appointed to the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party and who became known as one of the Gang of Four, fired one of the opening shots in this struggle on November 10, 1965 when he published an article in Wenhui Bao attacking Wu and his play on the grounds that Hai Rui was metaphorically equated with Marshal Peng Dehuai, who had criticized Mao for launching the Great Leap Forward and who had been purged as a result. Yao Wenyuan argued that therefore Wu Han had equated Mao himself with the un-approachable Ming emperor who dismissed the righteous Hai Rui from office.