Farewell to Gorbachev

Author: Jin Zhong

Gorbachev (1931-2022 Gorbachev) died of illness at the end of August amid a global wait-and-see on “where is the Xi Jinping regime going”. He has been a beacon in my heart for a long time. When I came to Hong Kong in the 1980s and chose the value of in-depth exploration of Chinese communist totalitarianism, Mao Zedong’s “anti-revision struggle” was still a desert in overseas political circles. When I was the editor of “The Seventies”, I suggested and published a chapter on China that was deleted by the CCP in the Chinese version of “Memoirs of Khrushchev” (translated from the English version by executive editor Li Tingyao); Contention” also presided over the publication of the full text of Lin Biao’s coup program “Minutes of the May 71 Project”. In the “Open Magazine” edited by me, a large number of reports and comments on the evolution of the Soviet Union were published. Mr. Xu Xing, a senior observer of Soviet issues, was the chief editor. At the end of 1991, the Soviet Union declared its disintegration. To break the myth of “The October Revolution”, we intuitively feel that we can’t miss it: in 1993 and 2014, Yang Manke’s “The Disintegration of the Soviet Union” and Xu Xing’s “The Fall of the Communist Empire” were published. The on-site recording and analysis of the ins and outs are only seen in the Hong Kong publishing industry.

The collapse of the Soviet Union was not without serious resistance

After watching the fire from the other side for 40 years, I gradually gained a clear idea about the failure of the CPSU and the disintegration of the Soviet Union:

1. Communism On the basis of Marx’s grand historical view, Lenin established a one-party dictatorship of the Soviet regime through the civil war in 1917, destroying the capitalist civilization under the Russian tradition. Especially after Stalin (Stalin) came to power, in the name of class struggle, millions of dissidents were massacred (including the purge of most of the old party members in 1938). It is far behind the West, the national income has declined, and the agricultural products are not as good as in the Tsarist era. History has proven that the violent practice of Marxism-Leninism has failed and must be changed. This is the Soviet-Russian consensus since the 1950s, and even Putin said that “going back to the past is a no-brainer”.

Second, the death of Stalin in 1953 was a turning point. The CPSU is an orthodox party, “non-Stalinization” seeks inspiration for the Second International, and “Khrushchev revisionism” comes from this. “Peaceful coexistence, peaceful competition, and peaceful transition” became the new line of the CPSU. Hearst was in power for ten years and stepped down in 1964, laying the foundation for reform. Bornezhlev held power for 18 years, and died three consecutive general secretary from 1982 to 1985. In order to continue the fortune of the empire, Gorbachev, as a post-war generation of elites, came out as the times require! In 1985, he was elected general secretary of the party. Proposed a new thinking of “opening” (glasnost), which was rehabilitated in 1988 by former leaders such as Bukharin and Trotsky. In 1990, it was decided to abolish Article VI of the Constitution, announcing the abandonment of the one-party dictatorship. After the August coup, Yeltsin and Gorbachev announced the dissolution of the Communist Party.

3. Regarding the disintegration of the Soviet Union, a special explanation must be made. The Soviet Union is a federal state, which originated from Lenin Stalin’s national theory. As early as 1903, they advocated in the party program that “all nationalities in the country have the right to self-determination.” Lenin further explained that the right to self-determination is “political self-determination, that is, the right to separate and establish an independent state.” Consequently, the Soviet Constitution (Article 72) stipulated until the end that the 15 republics “reserved the right to withdraw freely from the Soviet Union”. With such a theoretical and constitutional basis, the three small Baltic states, dissatisfied with the Soviet Union’s annexation, took the lead in 1988 when they entered the democratization reform and declared independence from the Stalinist unitary Soviet Union. Eastern Europe, Poland and other countries continued to rebel. On Christmas Day in 1989, the CCP besties, the Romanian couple Ceausescu, were shot by the insurgents. In 1990, Yeltsin was elected chairman of the Russian Soviet, declared the independence of the Russian Republic, and quit the Communist Party. Ukraine, Belarus, etc. declared their independence, and the “Warsaw Pact” also announced the dissolution of the “819 Coup” against Gorbachev in 1991, when the building was about to collapse.

This coup proves that Xi Jinping’s claim that “no one is a man” of the collapse of the Soviet Union is completely inconsistent with the facts. The coup d’état not only mobilized the army and placed Gorbachev under house arrest, but also instigated the Gang of Eight, including the vice president, the prime minister, the defense minister, the head of the KGB, and the chairman of the National Security Council. A chance to be a hero. Ye arrested eight criminals and declared the Communist Party illegal. After Gorbachev returned to the DPRK, he also announced his resignation as general secretary, suggesting that the CPSU find a way out on its own. The dissolution of the CPSU officially took effect on November 6. In the next four months, the republics became independent, the KGB was dissolved, Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus established the “CIS”, and the remaining 11 republics followed suit. On Christmas Day 1991, Gorbachev stepped down, the red flag fell, the Russian tricolor flag was raised, and the Soviet Union officially disintegrated.

The crystallization of the revisionist evolution of the CPSU in the past 30 years

It can be seen that it was a group of “boys” who were counter-reform that accelerated the fall of the Soviet Communist Party and the disintegration of the Soviet Union. In fact, Gorbachev, the protagonist of the whole play, from beginning to end, his original intention is full of reformism: to transform the CPSU into a democratic and humanitarian party, and then be good to the country. This is what he talked about and wrote about many times afterwards. In reviewing his domestic and foreign policy, there are indeed traces to be found (a few years after 2000, he formed the Social Democratic Party)… It is a fact that Gorbachev’s reforms led to the “destroy of the party and the country”. Nature evokes a worldwide bipolar response:

One pole is the reaction of Beijing’s power center and its vassals – one is reminiscent of Khrushchev’s death in 1971, and the People’s Daily published only a small message “Khrushchev is dead”. The Maoist party’s schadenfreude had already been vented in the coup d’etat of Hearst in 1964: a large number of articles celebrated the success, and Zhou Enlai was sent to explore the bottom line. Today, because they want to get close to Putin, no one at the top dares to express their hidden hostility. We know that the CCP has long identified Gorbachev as a “traitor of the communist movement”. Borrowing Putin’s campaign language, he cursed “the collapse of the Soviet Union is a major tragedy for the entire nation.” Of course, it refers to Sang scolding Huai. Looking at it calmly, from the overall perspective of Gorbachev’s funeral, the people have not, and the government will not forget this politician who left unparalleled revolutionary footprints in Russian history. In addition to rehabilitating the oppressed, the ITAR editorial and Gorbachev’s political achievements during his tenure are the two most prominent aspects of Taiwan’s democratization: “opening the press and banning the party.” The source of Putin’s power is still attached to Russia’s post-independence constitutional universal suffrage system.

Therefore, the “one-sided praise of the West” for Gorbachev is completely true and reasonable! This is the opposite reaction. Western dignitaries and celebrities, no one even said “but”, no one related the plight of the Soviet Union after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, and even today’s war of aggression against Ukraine, has something to do with Gorbachev’s “openness” and liberalization, let alone View the collapse of the Soviet Union as a failure of Gorbachev’s reforms. The right of peoples to self-determination, especially after World War II (which became one of the purposes of the United Nations), has been one of the indisputable cores of universal values. As far as I know, the view that the disintegration of the Soviet Union will help the United States to dominate the world is not the mainstream vision of American public opinion and bipartisan political circles. Americans all know that their country’s problems are not easy. They preferred Gorbachev to Khrushchev. Politicians under the tenure system understand better that making wise decisions at critical junctures is not an easy task.

Gorbachev’s memoirs describe how he went from “Son of the Twenty” to eradicating “Stalinism” and replacing it with the expansion of individual and national rights, his “new thinking” seeking to see the Soviet Union as “the world”. Public Enemy” transformed into part of the democratic world. He especially misses his long-dead wife Raisa and the long years he spent in Stavropol (the Territory), and the daily walk was a beautiful moment for them to discuss the history of the Soviet Union in depth (Raisa, with the wisdom of a philosophy professor and his later chief advisor). Before he entered the high-level, he had visited Eastern Europe and Western countries many times… There is no doubt that the emergence of the Gorbachev era was the result of the continuous opening and reform of the CPSU after Stalin’s death. The unveiling of the 20th National Congress, after 35 years (1956-1991) of twists and turns! Khrushchev’s morning sun rises, there must be a dazzling sunset.

History judges the Maoist Communist Party against the Soviet Union

Such a historic project, a group of dictators in Zhongnanhai who “fight the world and rule the world”, not only could not understand it, but also adopted an extremely arrogant attitude. The Soviet Union attempted to gather a “horizontal line” of northern latitudes, and would not hesitate to fight a nuclear war with “social-imperialism” — this was a conspiracy between Mao and the US imperialists, and it is well documented. Unfortunately, Emperor Mao passed away in 1976 without leaving his edict and the overall situation undecided. Fifteen years after the great cause of Soviet revisionism, the merits and deeds have been successful, ending the Cold War and ending the maddened Soviet-Eastern communist system in the twentieth century. The Communist Party built by Lenin and Stalin was completely buried. Gravedigger Mikhail Gorbachev, at the age of sixty, was the general secretary of the Soviet Communist Party and the president of the Soviet Union. Auspicious, he lives to this day, with a long life of ninety-one. History has judged.

In recent years, Russia has had a “Thank You Gorbachev Movement”. Economist Yavlinsky said at the funeral: “Today, we are all here to thank Gorbachev. Thank you Mr. Gorbachev for giving us An opportunity, but we did not take advantage of it.”—We have seen this opportunity. It is impossible to overestimate this opportunity. Because whether in the Soviet Union or China, for this opportunity to bring light, millions of innocent, kind, and outstanding people have already given their precious youth and lives. Their bones are not left, and even their names are unknown. It is regrettable that China’s tragedy is centered on the wake of the Soviet Union. In other words, if the Communist Party gave up its violent line of the King of the Mountains and “walked the Russian way”, countless people could have avoided sacrifice. It is a pity that several generations of party leaders in Zhongnanhai have been caught in a fascination, talking about revenge.

Looking for China’s Devil Terminator?

Our search for the “Devil Terminator” group saw in Gorbachev a modern version of the truth that “fortresses are most easily broken from within.” The Russians have experienced the tragic anti-fascist Great Patriotic War. Facing the stubborn fortress of Stalinism, they adopted tenacious reason, law, referendum and negotiation to achieve peaceful nirvana, which is also like their initial proposal of “peaceful transition”. ”, however, was a transition back to the social democracy of European civilization. In such a big historical return, there was no bloodshed and no war. Even if the Gang of Eight and their accomplices who staged the coup d’etat committed suicide, all but one were released on bail and pardoned. Behind the epoch-making feats of Gorbachev and Yeltsin, the whole Russian society The melon of culture is ripe.

The success of the democratization of the Soviet Union was when the blood of the 1989 democracy movement was still in its infancy. How many dreams of “Chinese Gorbachev” have been triggered! Since the CCP came to power, it has spared no effort and spared no expense, just to “strike the world with iron”. They killed the second generation of Hu and Zhao, and the fifth generation of red soldiers took over. The ten years of Xi’s regime have been spent in the nightmare of the collapse of the Soviet Communist Party and no man to stand up. If it is assumed that the people cannot shake the impregnated Communist Party, then, does China have Gorbachev? … One can’t help thinking that in the dark Cultural Revolution, there was still the Lin Biao clique who came forward to kill Mao and defect. Isn’t their “May 71 Project Minutes” also trying to reform the people? If the No. 2 figure is suitable and flew to Irkutsk to fight with the Soviet Union, how can the consequences be underestimated?

Woohoo, it’s been fifty years since things have changed! Gorbachev abolished the one-party dictatorship and achieved national self-determination with seven years of work, and it has remained stable so far. The reminder he left is that it is entirely possible for the evolution within the totalitarian Iron Curtain to undergo essential degeneration and subversion. What is the way forward for China? The failed Lin Biao incident has indeed proved that the top powers of the CCP are not monolithic, and opportunities always exist. But in the face of the huge differences in history, culture, and ethnic background between China and Russia, who can be optimistic that the peaceful transformation of the Soviet Union will be repeated in China?

(2022-9-6 New York)