Focus 580; Mao: A Life

Good morning and welcome to focus 580 This is our telephone talk program. My name's David inch. Glad to have you with us as we begin another week's worth of programs on the program today in this first hour of the show. We'll be talking with Philip short who has quite a bit of experience as a foreign correspondent. He worked for the London Times The Economist and also the BBC various places around the world. He worked in China in the 1970s and early 80s and has returned there regularly ever since. He's the author of a recently published biography of Mao Zedong which is titled Mao a Life published by Henry Holt. And he's visiting the campus of the University of Illinois and was good enough to come and spend some time with us to talk about Mao and China. And we're pleased to have him here as we talk of course questions are welcome. 3 3 3 9 4 5 5 toll free 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5. Well thanks very much I appreciate you. Pleasure to be here. When you went to China just it was just after Mao died in 76. That's right he died in September 76.

And the BBC had been negotiating for some time to set up a bureau there. And they actually got permission about a month after his death. Bureaucracy grind slowly so by the time I got there and I went to set up the BBC bureau it was May June of 77 but not a lot has changed in that time it was still a very isolated very remote room we were about 20 correspondents in all and in Beijing. Half of them from the Eastern Bloc the former Soviet bloc countries half of them from the West and Beijing then was a place where even in the capital of China as a foreigner you walk down the street you drew a crowd of foreigners with uncommon. There was nothing imported except for Albanian olive oil. North Korean cigarettes and Rolex watches. Everything else was Chinese

made in a country that was still really very cut off from from the outside. It must have been tremendously challenging assignment for geographic. Absolutely true. I mean one could not ask for more. And in my case I just spent three years in Moscow so I'd been in a communist society and to come to China. Also communist but a very different kind of communism much more a much more dynamic system where people were more willing to think for themselves to struggle against each other within the Communist Party was amazing. Above all also a country with this extraordinary rich and ancient culture which despite the cultural revolution despite and still underpin Chinese life in all its variety. So it was great and it was one of the things I'm very glad about was that I was there at that time and therefore I'm in a position to make the comparison with China because China

is different. It really is. China today is becoming so much like the rest of Asia. You go to prevent capitals in China and frankly they look like small versions of Bangkok or Singapore you know loss and loss and concrete sky skyscrapers everyone using mobile phones. Successful young businessman driving around in sports cars everything you find everywhere else it. It's changing extraordinarily fast. And I would argue that although certainly China today is a dictatorship no question it's in no sense a democracy. It is not any longer in any meaningful sense communist. The economic system has become in practice capitalist and the party is a party which sees which is that in order to keep and to wield power it's not ideologically communist in any way and frankly no one believes in

communism in China anymore. You talk about the contrast between the Soviet Union and China when you came there talked about China being a much more dynamic kind of a place. And in addition to that we know the history of the revolution has also been rather destructive at that point. China had just gone through the Cultural Revolution and reading about Mao and some of the things that he said and apparently believed one gets the sense that he. The thing that he most wanted to avoid was a static kind of situation that is he had this idea that there should be in some sense a perpetual revolution. But he never really wanted to stop. Is that how much of that has to do with Mao himself. And is that or is it also in some way every flexion of China. I think it is it's it has to do with both. Ma was an extraordinary character I mean extraordinary as in a sense too weak. First of all he was a he was many different people rolled into one he was a

military strategist of of genius and in many senses I mean his military campaigns in the 1930s and 40s. Not any extraordinary successful but they were extremely subtle and well thought out. He was a Macchiavelli and politician fiendishly clever at manipulating others within the party. He was a visionary. He was a philosopher. He was a poet. He was a romantic. You know one remembers his the book not so long ago by his doctor about his. His relations with women. Yes he was a relation a romantic with women but he was also romantic in the sense you were just speaking about ideologically he he did believe in uninterrupted revolution. He wanted China to become a kind of red beacon to the rest of the world encouraging revolutionaries everywhere. It would be the Middle Kingdom Stober the Middle Kingdom in a very revolutionary sense. And his life which. Really spanned

he died at the age of 83. It spanned one of the most turbulent centuries in Chinese history and for much of that time he was he was the prime mover. The man who was determining the directions in which China would go and Juri ing that period China change from being decaying feudal autocracy to a modern nation state history was compressed. The changes which took our countries hundreds of years took place in 30 40 years. So for all these reasons and for that the vastness of the canvas on which his life was played out you're talking about a country which you know has between a fifth and a quarter of humanity. He he is a wonderful subject for a biography and an absolutely fascinating young man. What he certainly came of age at a major turning point in China's history and his generation. It was very important played a very important role. I think he and others of his generation felt

responsible for taking the helm and and leading so to speak and leading the country into that future so perhaps not surprising that he one might ask why Mao. But it's not surprising in a sense that because he was part of this generation that was there at the right time in the right place he was very lucky. You know there are generations which which people are in their late teens or their early 20s at periods of change. I'm thinking of May 68 in France or the 60s in the United States. You know civil rights Haight Ashbury I mean that was a good time to be young. Well I was part of one of those very privileged generations. But you know why did he why was it my rather than any of hundreds of other young men and that sort of position who came to dominate. And I think one reason his determination almost palpable will to prevail.

Which illuminated the whole of his life it was a major factor. The other thing which was very important with he grew up. Let's remember in the late 19th century in a little isolated village going to the village school learning the Confucian classics and communism many came much later. The result was the sort of the bedrock of his thought was traditionally Chinese. And he was able to relate these new ideas that came in first world war period the early 20s. These new ideas like communism and ironic has them and send the killers them to Chinese reality he could he could he could make it comprehensible communism comprehensible and acceptable to Chinese and. Most of the other is who had been to universities in Moscow and been to France were not as well tuned in with Chinese thinking and that I think was one of the key things that caused him to dominate as well as his own abilities. I mean he was

an amazing man. Well that's I think a major part of this story would be his rise to the point where he was leading the party and then later became chairman of the People's Republic and here this is something that took more than 20 years and this is a major chunk of history majors and give us life. But one does have to ask this question at the beginning point where you had a point where there were a number of individuals who were who were all part of this together and how it is that one got from that point to the end point when he was the he was the supreme leader and had managed to not only rise to the top but eliminate along the way eliminate opposition. Well it wasn't easy in the in the first 10 years or 12 years it was in the party. I mean he was out of power six times. He was literally in disgrace. So it was it wasn't. There was a kind of you know gradual climbing of the ladder. It was a much riskier more predictable

process than that. But he was able to assert himself promptly because on all the major issues he turned out to be right. And most of the others turned out to be wrong and that proved to be very important. After 1949 after they'd won power because when I insisted on rather completely in cloud cuckoo land schemes unrealistic schemes like the Great Leap Forward To which was this idea that by mobilizing the people China could outstrip the United States in. Industrial Development. They followed and they followed everybody follow the leadership the rest of the leadership went along with it because he had never been wrong. He was the guy who brought them from nowhere to winning complete power and China and at every tack of the way people the people that

argued against Mao they had proved to have the weak a case. So you know that that was a very important reason. The other reason was that was extremely good at political manipulation. He he would ally himself with a particular faction. He was so devious nobody could see and he planned you know if he were the way he was going what he was trying to do. And he would plan moves not just months but years in advance and let them slowly slowly slowly come to fruition. So he's a very clever political operator. Our guest this morning in this first hour focus 580 Philip short he's been a foreign correspondent for The London Times The Economist and the BBC and worked in China in the early 70s and early 80s. He is the author of a recently published biography of Mao Tse dong which is titled Mao a Life published by Henry Holt. Questions are welcome. We have a caller here we'll get to others are certainly welcome to call. All we ask callers as people try to be

brief just so we can accommodate as many different folks as possible but anyone is welcome to call 3 3 3 wy yellow or 9 4 5 5 that's for local folks toll free anywhere that you can hear us 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5. Here's a caller in Bloomington Indiana. Insulin number four. Hello. Hi hi. May I ask about China's forced abortion policies especially the. The abortion and infanticide of a girl babies. Maybe maybe we better explain. China has a one child per family policy. And. And the Chinese prefer boys. Over girls so if a married couple can only have one child they tend to abort the girls or kill them after birth. But two questions isn't it. I understand it's fairly clear that female infanticide is widespread in China. That's the first question. Second question by now killing all these girl babies it must have led to some kind of a shortage of young women in China. Too many men not enough women.

How is the shortage of women affecting Chinese society. Well that's quite a lot of questions all kind of piled in the let me in my enthusiasm to answer I just spilled my coffee. These these things happen in the best rounds anyway. You're not the first. Now you're quite right. There is a one child policy in China. It has been modified to some extent in the rural areas in that people can and often do have two children. It's discouraged but it is happening to some extent in the urban areas. Basically people have one child and I have to say in places like Beijing in the big cities the one child policy is pretty well accepted. There is no female and sent infanticide if people have a daughter or a boy in the cities I'm talking about that is not a problem.

Now female infanticide and abortion when you know these ultrasound tests show the fetus is female. Female infanticide has happened in China and in indeed in other parts of Asia as well. For hundreds and hundreds of years it's nothing new. The Catholic missionaries if you read The great deal of material which was gathered in the 1903 about this and it was already a big problem than the one child policy has certainly made it worse because Chinese peasants want a male to continue the family line. It's very much written into Confucian ideas that a male is important and they they do when possible get tests.

The only the only thing I would say to you is that if you talk to Chinese people too tickly educated Chinese even those who are against the government. Many many things will say the one point on which they support the Chinese government is this one China policy. I know that's a very controversial thing to say but you've got to remember there are 1.3 billion Chinese today. Even with the one child policy it's going to go up to 1.6 billion in 2040 without any kind of birth control. There would be a population which would not only be unfeasible there wouldn't be the food for it but which would grow so quickly that any kind of meaningful economic development prosperity and a better lives for Chinese Chinese families would not be possible. So they would argue it's justified. You I'm sure would not and many others listening with

you would not agree with that. But that's the way they see it. Kim Kim can I ask you about the effect that the fish has in it hasn't just produced a shortage of young women. Yes I'm sorry I think I forgot to answer that. You're right. There is an imbalance but it's it's not perhaps as great as you might think it is. I've seen figures suggesting something of the order of 53 percent to 47 you know 53 percent of boys to 47 percent of girls that sort of order. So the imbalance is there and that's quite a significant imbalance but it hasn't gone beyond that. Thank you very much. All right other questions are welcome if you'd like to give us a call 3 3 3 W I L L or a 9 4 5 5 same either way that's where champagne Urbana folks toll free 800 1:58 WLM. I think that many biographers in an effort to explain Mile have

put a good deal of significance on his relationship with his father saying that you know it was a difficult relationship. Mr. mile thought that young Zedong was never going to amount to anything that he was lazy he was no account he had much too much fondness for book learning more than he would just need to to run the farm. And it does seem that later on that that people like his father. Ended up sort of the bad end of an awful lot of the receiving end for receiving it. And yet the business and sort of so one one wonders I suppose one could make too much of this but how important was that informing him informing Mal's character. I don't think it was. You're quite right. Many many biographers have put a lot of emphasis on this and in some cases been you know attempts at psychological portraits based on the fact that was the eldest son and

when a young brother sibling came along he felt abandoned by his his his mother and so on and so forth. I do not buy that a tool as descriptions of his relations with his father. I think it's pretty normal for any adults. It's adolescent children are usually you know very often they have their moments of being intolerable. And I'm grateful and rebellion and rebel. So what's new. I think that there are interesting things in that family relationship nonetheless. One of them is that mom's father supported him through through his education. You rightly said his father thought I was too too interested in book learning he wanted to work on the farm or to become an apprentice so he could support the family and their old age. And I wouldn't have any of that. But when ma insisted on going off to Changsha the capital to a

secondary school and then doing teacher training the old man paid his fees. That that shows a an aspect of my father that doesn't write about doesn't talk about it. He he was actually when push came to shove generous. And it also tells you something about I was never grateful to his father for those sacrifices. And I think you know we talked about some of the better sides of his character to his skill that his abilities but he was very self centered. He was not loyal. He was not grateful to anybody his own political and what dominated his life. His father was one of the earliest cases where I was thinking of himself not of anyone else. Well it's a great departure from the traditional value of filial piety. Again that was that would have been symptomatic of his generation that was in some sense rejecting tradition.

Yes you're absolutely right. When when told his his life story to a good snow in 1936 he had a sentence and I hated my father. And that that when they produced a Chinese translation of it that sentence was taken out because it would resonate so badly with Chinese readers that anyone would say I hated my father. We want to as you have said perhaps part of his genius or his reason for his success was the ability to take Western ideas socialism Marxism and to be able to apply them to the Chinese case which was different and I think you know one of the things that he's been credited with is the idea that whereas the Marxist thought that the revolution was going to come from the the urban workers Mao used the countryside and peasantry as his base. But he didn't start there. I think earlier on he and others thought it indeed would be urban workers that would lead the revolution and later he came to

this idea that not all had that in fact that's that's where it would happen. What what led him to that understanding or that change. It's it's very interesting that you can understand why these young men these young intellectuals look to the proletariat for the revolution because you know to them the peasantry was everything that was most backward most most blinkered most benighted about China. It was that they were trying to get away from. They were looking to the industrial workers as you know the shining heralds of the new industrialized revolution industrialized state. And interesting that the people who kept on saying to the Chinese Communist look don't forget the persons with the Russians with the comment first and foremost. And the there's some very interesting and amusing

telegrams correspondence between Moscow and and the Chinese communists in the early 1990s where you can see the Russians getting more and more fed up with the two snus of these stupid Chinese intellectuals who will not understand the peasants in capital letters other people you should be thinking about. So there was a lot of pressure from them which the Chinese really did not want to know about. There were a few experiments in southern China the peasants really got interested when he went to his home province he went back to his home province in the winter of one hundred twenty six spring of 27. And there had been a huge peasant uprising and he wrote a report. It's a remarkable document because it's almost kind of lyrical and it's revolutionary intensity. Talking about the present as being an opera of popular will that no force can resist. Well that turned out to be

premature but in the end he was right. We're just about at the midpoint here. Let me just mention again our guest is Philip short. He has been foreign correspondent for the BBC for The Economist for the London Times and also for a number of years worked in China. His return there regularly ever since his home now is in southern France and he's visiting the campus here to talk with journalism students and was good enough to come and talk with us about his recent biography of mounted on which the title of Mao a Life published by Henry Holt. And again you have questions you can call us three three three. W. Wilde toll free 800 1:58 wy look he had two at least two tragic mistakes. The great leap forward in the Cultural Revolution. Which were his attempts to to engage in cultural social engineering at a level maybe unprecedented in the history of the world and. I think as you point out in the book that as a result of his

policies more he managed to kill more of his own people than any leader in world history more than Hitler more than Stalin more than Pol Pot. What if it's possible to answer such a big question what was he trying to do. Yes I missed picking up on the word kill. More people died under his rule. There is a distinction because of the sanction of responsibility. And most of those who died 20 I mean 25 million people died of the famine in the fall of the Great Leap Forward. The numbers who were killed because of purges or political movements that set in motion directed very much less. Now what was Mao trying to do. Basically I don't think his views are his. His broad aim changed that much since he was a young man and it was to make China strong. To give China back its

pride and in a way when when the communists came to power in 1949 he made a speech from Tiananmen Square proclaiming the establishment of the People's Republic. He said you know the Chinese people have stood up well it's a simple phrase but it sums up a lot of what he's done. China in the time when he was a young man had been humiliated by the foreign powers foreign powers including America America Britain France Japan. There were discussions in the European parliaments about partitioning China dividing it up into spheres of influence the British were going to have the Yangtze Valley the French were going to have the southwest China. It it sunk about as low as any great country can. It had no control. So to make China's stand up now come ahead to the Cultural Revolution the great leap forward in the Cultural Revolution the Great Leap was basically an attempt to make China strong

economically a great economic power. It failed disastrously. And after that kind of gave a point economics which were he recognized not his strong point. I mean he really didn't understand economics. So. To make China strong in what way. Ideologically the point of the Cultural Revolution it was not a power struggle per se it was an attempt to sow radicalize Chinese thought and the minds of the Chinese people that his revolutionary ideas would live on. And as I said I use this phrase China becoming like a red beacon you know an ideological holy grail shining out to the rest of the world. That was what he wanted. And of course it wasn't what the Chinese people wanted so it failed. And I think you know part of the tragedy of Mao was that he knew by the time he died he was sufficiently

lucid to have recognized that because her evolution was a failure. But in the sense it had a sort of silver lining because all this tumult all this anarchy. The company of the Maoist interlude immunized the Chinese people against belief in great leaders. It made them put a premium on stability which is has been the basis for China's growth since my eyes that for this extraordinary dynamic and vigorous society that you find in China and I think it's interesting it has been observed and I apologize when more this was your observation or something I read somewhere else that what it is that he managed to do rather than so much perhaps influencing the way people acted there or the way people lived what he did influence was the way people thought. That I think is the great difference between Stalin and I mean

Stalin cared about what people did. Hitler cared about who they were what race cared about what they thought. But the problem was I mean the great contradiction and this in a way is what makes my Such a fascinating character are the contradictions in him. He he wanted them to arrive at their own ideas he didn't want to dictate and say you must think this. He wanted people to work things out for themselves. But the moment that they thought something he didn't like he they you know people thought in ways that he didn't approve of he couldn't accept it. So we have a couple of other callers. Let's go to or go to Champagne first. That's number one. Hello hello yes hello. Yes go ahead. Were a pile of apologies I'm not quite sure we have things set up that apparently the caller can't hear us. I'm having Can you hear me. Yes we can you

know can you hear us. Yeah go ahead. I missed a short. Yes hi I just want to ask something connected with maybe what you mentioned before that not just about what you want you want your opinion on the sort of lost in Legacy of Mao the Chinese revolution and the contribution and I don't mean so much in terms of what you mentioned about making China great stability but in terms of regional Some of them pretty with the Chinese revolution. So a lasting legacy. In terms of the position of women the liberation of women which was the central plank in the part of the Chinese Communist Party the attempts to break the sort of latitude as far as you can develop a notion of equality which I suppose in places like Europe took to happen via the French Revolution and it's just it's just the lasting effect of that in China and also in terms of the sort of issues maybe interesting to compare the position of China today with where many of

these questions are still yet to be sort of dealt with I think it's a very very good point. If you do compare China today with India and particularly in the case of women's rights there's a huge difference. I think there's no question that Chinese women in the countryside have a better deal than Indian women. They have more freedom to choose who they marry. And I'm trying to give you a pragmatic answer because if I give you an answer which you know just follows the marriage laws in China it would all sound wonderful is that everybody has complete equality well that that is not so but it's a lot better than that in India. And you asked about you know the extent to which women's equality had become a reality. You've got to go back to the starting point because in China at the turn of the century even into the 1920s

in many cases women had virtually no rights. They met all marriages were arranged. They had no choice whatever of who they were to marry they didn't have property rights they didn't have the right to own money and so on and so forth. Well if it's coming from them. The Chinese women are in many most respects under the law. Just about all respects the equal of men. Well you then have to ask yourself how much does that play through in practice and you can ask that question about the United States you can ask it about Britain. You can ask it about any country but at least the legal framework is there. And in reality to put peculiarly among the younger generation you know kids of 20 20 in the early 20s in practice as well. Equality does work out pretty well. OK thank you.

Thank you. Let's go to Herb Anna line too. Hello. Good morning. Could you give us approximate chronological date of the great leap forward in the Cultural Revolution. And could you say more about those two great events in China's history. And I'll hang up and listen. Yes OK fine. You know your requests for chronology is very well taken. I should have been more more precise as we went along. I mean the key dates if you like just to put it in perspective 1911 the Emperor was overthrown and the first Chinese Revolution 1921 the Communist Party was formed. Nineteen twenty seven The guerrilla war begins between the communists and the nationalists 1909 the communist when the People's Republic is declared. And we then come on to nine hundred fifty eight The Great Leap

Forward is launched and the great leap. It was an attempt by my to first of all the decision was made. They'd already cooperate co-operative vised I'm afraid that is the word I have to use agriculture. They made big cooperatives rather than individual farms but the decision was made in 1958 to go further than that and to make communes and communes were going to be bigger. First of all thousands some cases more than 10000 people in one administrative unit they were going to have their own sort of local government school has responsibility for schools and all was sorts of things and they were to be the unit of production. And the idea was that by getting getting people together in very large numbers. And mobilizing those people to work very hard. Then China could catch up with Britain Katty the idea was to catch up with Britain in steel

production in three years and catch up with the United States. And among the the aberrational thrown up by this. It was a very technical you know sort of a very ideological policy a very metaphysical metaphysical in some ways among the aberrations thrown up by it was this idea of backyard steel fitnesses where people went around collecting pots and pans and radiators and anything else that might be made of iron and smelting it down and producing some kind of gun which no one could use or do anything with but which in theory was you know a step towards making steel. And it was a disaster. You do need practical experience you do need technique in order to industrialize human willpower is not enough. So with all the people who've been taken off the fields to work in these backyard steel factories and one thing and another the harvests were extremely poor or famine set and 25 million died. Mom

refused initially challenge her over this policy. He riff dug in his heels and refused to reverse it which made things worse and then eventually he did have to sit. By now we're nine hundred sixty one sixty two for the next three years he kind of sulked and worried about whether China was going eventually to become revisionist or capitalist and the result of that sulking and his growing concerns over China's future ideological state was the Cultural Revolution broke out in 1956 and lasted in its acute for home till 1969 but in other forms it really went on that thinking went on till Mao's death in 1076 as I said it was you know it was an attempt to buy buy really almost reenacting a civil war between Red Guard groups between workers groups. It was an attempt to radicalize thinking and it was very violent. You know a million people died in the Cultural Revolution. They didn't just

use their fists. There were incidents in one provincial capital the rival groups use anti-aircraft missiles against another each other and an entire city block was just wiped off the face of the earth. This was quite tough stuff. What one. The question's been raised about this I'm sure is just how much mom had to do with it and how much of this was the responsibility of others including his last wife John Chang and the famous gang of four. It could had could have been at a certain point at that point you could not have fingered the great helmsmen you would have to find someone else to blame. How much did indeed he have to do with it. He had everything to do with it. It was a very convenient excuse afterwards for those who didn't want to blame him for everything that had gone wrong in the Cultural Revolution. A very convenient excuse for them to be able to point to his wife and

the other so-called radical leaders but it was mom who launched everything it was me who orchestrated it and he did so. Knowingly Now I'm not saying that he wanted people to fight with anti-aircraft missiles I know he didn't he but he recognized that in the turbulence that he was stirring up there was a great potential for violence and there would be a lot of people killed. It proved very difficult once you stirred it up to kind of calm it down to you know bring some kind of order back to China which is why it took three years rather than three months as he originally thought. But it was his doing he wanted it. And when he died just before he died he rated the Cultural Revolution Still as one of the two major things he had attempted in his life and one had been to overthrow the nationalists and wind power in China for the Communists. The other was the Cultural Revolution.

But on the cultural revolution if you read between the lines there are you know questions in his mind about how successful it would prove. We have about 10 minutes left in this part of focus 580 We're talking with Philip short. He's been a foreign correspondent for the for the BBC and also for the London Times and has written a biography of mud Saddam which came out earlier this year titled Moua Life published by Henry Holt. Questions welcome 3 3 3 9 4 5 5 toll free 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5. Here's color in champagne. Line 1 Hello hello. Hi this is the young from champagne. I have tomorrow passed away. China has me making pretty good progress there. But do you think. Can you talk about what problem the country has and what the suggestions you have. Maybe it's too general. What problems the country has not China has. Yeah well like I can tell you from the mainland or a yes or no from me. Yeah

yeah well you know about the problems. Probably better than I do but let me let me tell you what I think the problems are. And I I do go back now every year I was lost about three or four months ago. The biggest problem I think is corruption. I'm not saying anything new in that it's particularly acute in the more remote districts because you find county party committees who who really do behave like little local spots because they are in remote areas and that's from the you know on hopefull lot of china is away from the main highways away from the main cities. It's still a predominantly rural agricultural country because far away they can they can do what they like and there's very little control over them. And because it's deep and fierce resentment among the people. Higher level corruption is a problem too. You know the

red princelings they the children now probably in their fifties of the older generation of communist leaders have immense power because they have connections they have. They have links they can they can get get approval for big import export projects and so on. And there's a lot of corrupt activity. Now the Communist Party leadership and the government tries to crack down on it. But it's not really something that you can end until you have a much more pluralistic system with checks and balances and a greater degree of rule of law which raises the big question. I said China today is communist only in name but it is a dictatorship. When is it going to become a real working democracy. And the one part of that I think one simply cannot answer. You can say that there are trends on the way which point to a more democratic system

emerging. Let me just mention one. There is now a middle class in China which is becoming more and more established people own their own houses their own apartments they have a stake in society. They are becoming in many ways and political aspirations will undoubtedly follow which means a democratic system. But how you get from here to there. Well we will have to kind of watch this space over the next year and probably decades. But that's the direction and I think it's an irreversible direction in which China is going. OK thank you to another caller here. Ban the line too. Hello. Yeah. Given the timeline timeline you gave earlier I was curious if you could say anything about what Molly thought was happening for example to the United States during you know the 60s if you if you thought it was encouraging or maybe just you know

an aberration. And also along the way if you could tell it tell me a little bit about how much information you had about what was going on in the outside world and where you focused his attention. Yeah he he did follow to some extent what was going on in the United States the civil rights movement for example. He met some black leaders Robert Williams went over to Beijing and they met. But it has to be said the United States was not at the forefront of Ma's attention until the later part of the decade when he started revising his view of the great power triangle. By then relations between China and the Soviet Union were extremely bad. Not on the point of war but but not that far away from it and decided to make a strategic partnership with the United States Nixon responded and that you know

the result was the Nixon visit to China in the early 1970s Mao's main attention in foreign policy terms was on two things the Soviet Union and China's neighbor. And also you know the great pioneer by the other focus of the communist world and on the third world which thought was important for its revolutionary potential. We are just about the point that we're going to have to stop. My apologies to him We have some people that we can't take. You know what I think probably one of my favorite quotes about history comes from one of Miles So see it's this famous quote that John ly apparently was asked at one point what he thought of the French Revolution and he said too soon to tell. That would be something the Chinese would say given the fact that the country had a very long history. And I think today probably Chinese feel that the rest of the world doesn't really appreciate the. Doesn't really appreciate the

fact that it is a country with a long history and that it was a world power at the time when the rest of the world were you know howling barbarians. Well what do they think about their place on the world stage or the place that they should have. It's a question which is I the john life story is delightful I suspect it's apocryphal but it fits perfectly. I think they do take this terribly long view of history. You know they still argue about the rights and wrongs of prime ministers who lived 2000 years ago and that's why I think it's going to take them a long time to find find what kind of place they want to put in the history. But China is China's place in the world. Well. The Middle Kingdom is not just you know. A western expression I mean the Chinese do in deep deep regard themselves in that slightly arrogant way they are the middle kingdom and nationalism because Communist ideology has so eroded

nationalism has become more and more important and it's one of the things not which really is you know it's the glue which codes keep it helps to hold China together. From which two things. When the United States pushes over human rights something's fine. It's something that the U.S. and the West should do but we should do so subtly when we use it as a bludgeon all the nationalist hackles rise and it's counterproductive and it also makes it much more difficult for China to make concessions over Taiwan and over Tibet. Well I'm sorry to say we'll have to stop because we've come to the end of the time. Our guest Philip short if you'd like to read his biography of amounts along it's titled A life and it's published by Henry Holt. Thank you very much. Thank you.