Four Olds
Other stretches did not fare so well. During the Cultural Revolution (196676), hundreds of kilometres of the Great Wall—already damaged in the wars of the last century and eroded by wind and rain—were deliberately destroyed by fervent Red Guards who regarded it as part of the "Four Olds" to be eradicated in the new China. Quarrying machines and even dynamite were used to dismantle the Wall, and the pilfered materials were used for construction.