Red Guard Organizations Hóngwèbīng Zǔzhī 红卫兵组织

◀ Q Comprehensive index starts in volume 5, page 2667.

Red Guard Organizations Hóngwèbīng zǔzhī 红卫兵组织

During the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976) Red Guard organizations, made up of hundreds of thousands of students, were de- voted to a personal glorification of Chinese Communist Party leader Mao Zedong and a campaign against foreign or traditional culture.

ed Guard organizations were an important fac- tor in the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976), par- ticularly from 1966 to 1968. They were created Red Guards encouraging loyalty to the party from junior and senior high school students and college and encouraging industry. Collection Stefan students who made it their cause to become the personal Landsberger. guards of Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader Mao Zedong (1893–1976) and China’s socialist revolution. The Red Guards were founded on 29 May 1966 at Quinhua to other schools and colleges in Beijing and then to the University Middle School in Beijing as a reaction to criti- rest of the country. Red Guard activities centered on a cism of Mao in the play Hai Rui (Dismissed from Office) personal glorification of Mao and on an assertive cam- by the historian Wu Han. They used demonstrations and paign against foreign or traditional culture. Such ac- slogans to express their disapproval of their schools and tivities were focused by Mao’s campaign to eliminate faculty. the “Four Olds”: old thought, old culture, old customs, Mao, using the Red Guards as a powerful tool in his and old practices. His campaign began in late 1966, political struggle with his rivals in the Communist Party and the activities were in large part those of the Red and the government, gave his blessing to the Red Guards Guards. Mao’s attack on the “Four Olds” was a personal by sending them a personal letter in which he praised their campaign, and the Red Guards implemented physical campaigns and by witnessing the participation of almost measures based on his philosophies. These measures in- 10 million Red Guards in six huge rallies in Beijing late cluded attacking foreign fashions and hairstyles, renam- in 1966. ing streets, and attempting to redirect street traffic after The Red Guards, encouraged by Mao, quickly spread determining that the color red should signify “go.” Such

1865 R © 2009 by Berkshire Publishing Group LLC 1866 Berkshire Encyclopedia of China 宝库山中华全书 measures turned violent as Red Guards began torturing intervention by the Central Committee of the Chinese and killing people who were deemed to have “bad class Communist Party kept the Red Guards from storming backgrounds,” destroying stores that sold luxury goods, Beijing’s Imperial City. burning theater and opera props, smashing Confucian The Red Guards by 1967 had splintered into factions tombstones, and ransacking cultural treasures such as whose members violently contested one another’s loy- Han dynasty (206 bce – 2 2 0 ce)archaeological sites, alty and commitment while continuing to arrest, torture, the Ming portion of the Great Wall, and religious sites and harass those Chinese whom they regarded as threats such as mosques and Buddhist monasteries. Only direct to the revolution, including scholars, translators, and

This poster from the Cul- tural Revolution shows Red Guards and members of the People’s Liberation Army sporting red bands on their arms and hold- ing copies of Mao’s “Lit- tle Red Book.” The Red Guards’ initial patriotic glorification of Chairman Mao and the Communist Party turned quickly into violence. These student groups mobilized by Mao in the late 1960s tar- geted “reactionaries”— including a number of artists, intellectuals, scientists, and teachers— as well as symbols of both bourgeois and traditional Chinese culture. The Red Guards were respon- sible for the torture and death of many victims they thought as “feudal” thinkers, as well as for the looting of shops that sold luxury goods, the burning of theater and opera props, and the smashing of Confucian tombstones and other ancient arti- facts. Collection Stefan Landsberger .

Two Red Guard propaganda posters from 1967, vilifying specialists, scholars, authori- ties and “people who entrenched themselves in ideological and cultural positions” during the Cultural Revolution. People falling into those categories were called “Monsters and Demons” (牛鬼蛇神，niugui sheshen). The poster on the left reads: “One hundred clowns – drag out the counterrevolutionary revisionist elements and expose them!” The poster on the right says “A Host of Demons.” Collection Stefan Landsberger.

military officials. Red Guards confiscated gold, jewelry, stopped by official force and ceased to be an important and valuable real estate and destroyed art collections and element of the Cultural Revolution. priceless records. Alarmed by the horde of Red Guards, in March 1967 the government took the first step in curbing Margaret SANKEY their activities by ordering them to cease national net- working and travel. In 1968 the army was dispatched into Further Reading schools and colleges to restore order and to control the Chan, Anita. (1985). Children of Mao. Seattle: University Red Guards. of Washington Press. In the end the Red Guards, although deeply commit- Jing Lin. (1991). The Red Guards’ path to violence: Politi- ted to Mao and the revolution, created nothing new, but cal, educational, and psychological factors. Westport, they terrorized China for more than two years in the name CT: Praeger. of tearing down the old. The Red Guard organizations, Yan Jiaqi & Gao Gao. (1996). Turbulent decade: A history which mobilized hundreds of thousands of students, were of the Cultural Revolution. (W. Y. Kwok, Trans. & Ed.). too dangerous to be allowed to continue. They had to be Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. Reforms since 1978–1979 ▶