Mao’s ‘alleged’ Guilt in the Land of Famines – Part 4/8

November 14, 2011

Amazon reviewer W Y Lu of Hong Kong said, there is absolutely no evidence the atrocities Dikotter mentions were ordered from the top. In fact, quite the opposite – they were often uncovered, even by Dikotter’s own admission, by investigatory teams sent out by the central authorities (Note — and later by members of Mao’s personal bodyguard sent to verify the claims of starvation Mao was hearing from Party members, which he doubted at first.)

Lu says, the fact is, even using Dikotter’s figures (grossly inflated as they are), China’s mortality during the Great Leap Forward (GLF) was in fact slightly lower than that of India’s at the end of British rule – just 9 years earlier.

“The calculation is very simple,” Lu says. ‘Excess’ deaths are calculated by counting all the deaths that happen in one year, and subtracting them from a mortality the researcher assumes would have been the case had the GLF not happened. ”

Dikotter adopts a ‘normal’ crude mortality in China of 10 per 1000 people annually. He then counts deaths above this number as the excess deaths caused by the GLF.


facts about extreme poverty and hunger

Lu then points out that Dikotter also increased (inflated) the mortality numbers by 50% to allow for under-reporting and came up with an average annual mortality of around 27.3 per 1000 during the GLF.

However, Lu then says, “A crude mortality of 27.3 per 1000 in the late 50s & early 60s was in fact quite typical for developing countries. ”

Lu then points out that India and Indonesia’s mortality rates were 23 and 24 per 1000 respectively, and China’s mortality in 1949, just 8 years before the Great Leap Forward was 38 per 1000 (Source: China’s Changing Population by Judith Banister).

In her book, Banister mentions evidence that a famine did take place in China at this time and that the famine reduced fertility rates but says the fertility rate rebounded at least one year earlier than would be expected on the basis of grain production statistics, which can only be explained if supply and distribution of food improved considerably during 1961 as the government imported grain (from Canada and Australia—both allies of the US that broke ranks with the complete American embargo of China) and tried to ensure minimum supplies in famine areas.

Continued on November 15, 2011 in Mao’s ‘alleged’ Guilt in the Land of Famines – Part 5 or return to Part 3

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Recommended reading on this topic for those who seek the unblemished truth: From the Monthly Review, Did Mao Really Kill Millions in the Great Leap Forward? by Joseph Ball

From Griffith University, Australia, Poverty, by David C. Schak, Associate Professor

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of The Concubine Saga. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. This is the love story Sir Robert Hart did not want the world to discover.

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Mao’s ‘alleged’ Guilt in the Land of Famines – Part 3/8

November 13, 2011

Before I reveal new evidence to cast doubt on the claims of Mao’s critics in the West, two more books blame Mao for the loss of life due to the famine that took place during The Great Leap Forward (GLF).

In Mao’s Great Famine (September 2010), Frank Dikotter claimed, “that as many as 45 million Chinese died from starvation, execution, and maltreatment under forced labor.”

Then, in Eating Bitterness (February 2011), two editors that compiled this book claimed that some “30 million peasants died of starvation and exhaustion during the GLF”.

I find it interesting how two editors claim the loss life was from starvation and exhaustion while another author claimed it was from starvation, execution, maltreatment and forced labor with a difference of 15 million deaths, which is a huge disparity.

In addition, In Henry Kissinger’s On China (pg 184), he says, “The Great Leap Forward’s production goals were exorbitant, and the prospect of dissent or failure so terrifyhing that local cadres took to falsifying their output figures and reporting inflated totals to Beijing.” Then Kissinger says this led to the deaths of over twenty million people from starvation–twenty-five (25) million less than Dikotter’s inflated claim. Other’s have estimated the loss of life closer to 15 million.


Famines throughout the Ages: 19th to 21st Century

It appears, that as the false accusations and the fraud grows, so does the emotional language.

There is a name for books of this sort, and it is “Yellow Journalism” where writers take advantage of popular opinions and without valid evidence spread lies and exaggerations as if they were the truth. I’m sure those authors laugh all the way to the bank too.

Before I continue, I want to mention that in 1949, the average life expectancy in China was 36 and in 1960, it was 36.3 years of age, as you shall eventually see from a reliable source. It has been estimated that it took at least a decade for the Chinese Communist Party to establish a political/governmental infrastructure in all or most of China, which means goals to develop the country and improve health were not in full swing until about 1959.

As for how many starved, theories abound and cover a wide spectrum and all the higher numbers of deaths are easily challenged as two Amazon reviewers of Dikotter’s flawed and biased book demonstrate with impressive facts.

From these two Amazon reviewers, I learned something new I did not consider in my post of China’s Great Famine (1959-1961) Fact of Fiction.

Continued on November 14, 2011 in Mao’s ‘alleged’ Guilt in the Land of Famines – Part 4 or return to Part 2

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Recommended reading on this topic for those who seek the unblemished truth: From the Monthly Review, Did Mao Really Kill Millions in the Great Leap Forward? by Joseph Ball

From Griffith University, Australia, Poverty, by David C. Schak, Associate Professor

______________

Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of The Concubine Saga. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. This is the love story Sir Robert Hart did not want the world to discover.

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Mao’s ‘alleged’ Guilt in the Land of Famines – Part 2/8

November 12, 2011

To claim this famine on Mao’s watch was the worst in “modern world history” is a farce once we learn what “modern history” means.

In the West, “modern history” may describe the beginning of a new era, which was the European Renaissance (about 1420-1630).

The term “modern history” may also be marked by the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. If so, then “modern history” started between 1760 and 1830.

If we use 1760 as the beginning of “modern history”, then there are other famines that may claim the title of “worst famine in modern world history.” [Note: only famines with one million or more verified deaths will be listed here — there were many more than what’s on this page.]

In 1769 to 1773, there was the Bengal famine with 10 million deaths while India was part of the British Empire. To understand the British corruption that led to these deaths, I suggest reading Three Episodes in the Criminal History of the British Empire

In 1883-84, the Chalisa famine in India killed 11 million while India was still part of the British Empire.

Between 1810 and 1849, there were a series of four famines in China that took an estimated 45 million lives.

In 1845 – 1849, the Great Irish Famine killed more than one million people while Ireland was part of the British Empire.

Then in 1850 to 1873, because of the Taiping Rebellion in China, drought and famine caused the population of China to drop by over 60 million people. (Note: the Taipings were converted Christians influenced by Western religious beliefs and one goal of the rebellion was to convert China into a Christian nation.)


The Great Irish Famine manufactured by the economy of the British Empire

In 1866, the Orissa famine in India led to one million deaths from starvation, while still part of the British Empire.

Three years later in 1869, the Rajputana famine in India took another 1.5 million lives when India was part of the British Empire.

In Persia in 1870-71, famine took two million lives.

Between 1878 – 1880, there were famines in India, China, Brazil, Northern Africa and other countries.  Thirteen million died in Northern China and more than five million in India, which was part of the British Empire.

In 1921, famine in Russia took 5 million, while in 1937 another famine in China took the lives of another five million and then the Soviet famine of 1947 added one million more to the death toll.

The last major famine during British rule in India was the Bengal famine of 1943.  It has been estimated that some three to five million people died. [Note: at this point, more than 56 million died of famines in the British Empire—You may want to read How the British Empire Starved Millions… to learn more.]

Then, when we look at the number of major famines that have hit China since 108 BC, there were 1,828 or one nearly every year in one province or another and the famines varied in severity.

Moreover, in 1958-61, not all of China suffered from the so-called great famine, which has been blamed on Mao by many in the West. The provinces that suffered were Shandong, Henan, Shanxi, Anhui, Jaingsu and Sichuan — six of the twenty-three provinces in China.

To blame the famine and all loss of life due to starvation on Mao and the Maoists during the Great Leap Forward (1958 -61) and claim it was murder is a false accusation and an injustice. Mao was not a saint, but he was not guilty of this.

Continued on November 13, 2011 in Mao’s ‘alleged’ Guilt in the Land of Famines – Part 3  or return to Part 1

View as Single Page

Recommended reading on this topic for those who seek the unblemished truth: From the Monthly Review, Did Mao Really Kill Millions in the Great Leap Forward? by Joseph Ball

From Griffith University, Australia, Poverty, by David C. Schak, Associate Professor

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of The Concubine Saga. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. This is the love story Sir Robert Hart did not want the world to discover.

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The “Mandate of Heaven’s” Gobal Revelation – Part 2/2

May 15, 2011

Global history shows that not all previous civilizations collapsed at the same time.

After the Western Roman Empire (500 AD) and the Han Dynasty (219 AD) were gone, the Byzantine Empire thrived in the Middle East for almost a thousand years (500 – 1453 AD), while the Tang Dynasty survived until 906 AD and the Yuan Dynasty (the Mongols) to 1368 AD to be replaced by the Ming then Qing Dynasties.

The British Empire survived until 1947 then vanished as an empire as the United States became a global super power after World War II.

However, many people are not aware of The Mandate of Heaven’s cycle, which leads to behavior that repeats the same mistakes that caused the fall of other civilizations.

American style democracy, capitalism, socialism, jet planes, the combustion engine, telephones, electricity, the Internet, and the iPad are not going to save civilization, as we know it today.

The reason for this is that human nature is what causes the downfall of civilizations.

History shows that during the good times at the height of a civilization such as Rome or the Han Dynasty, most people take the quality of life for granted as if it will never end.  Once that happens, the end begins.


The Mandate of Heaven explained on a global scale by Warren Edward Pollock

In the video, Warren Pollack explains how the Communist Party returned China to stability after chaos and anarchy swept China after the fall of the Qing Dynasty. If the Party continues to maintain domestic stability and keep people working, China may survive as the civilization it is becoming for a few centuries before the next collapse.

Since Mao died in 1976, the internal goal of the People’s Republic of China has been domestic stability. With domestic stability, we see China returning to that period in the dynastic cycle where harmony and prosperity rules leading to a period of stability.

To understand what happened in China, I suggest reading The Roots of Madness.

Edward Pollock says, “If China stood as the world’s top country, it would not act like the United States, which has been irresponsible, lazy and greedy and engaged in robbery and cheating. They (US)  have brought economic recession to the whole world.”

If we look to the dynastic cycle as a guide, it would seem that the United States has entered the cycle’s stage of decay moving toward a collapse.

However, with the weapons of mass destruction that America has in its arsenal (more than any other nation even the USSR), could the US, like a drowning man, pull the rest of global civilization down with it?

Return to The Mandate of Heaven’s Global Revelation – Part 1

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

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Chiang Kai-shek

July 23, 2010

Chiang Kai-shek (also known as Jiang Jieshi) was born on October 31, 1887. His family was from the upper class and was wine merchants. At 18, he attended a military college in Japan. Chiang had four wives during his life. His first wife died in the Second Sino-Japanese War. His second wife contracted gonorrhea from Chiang (a known womanizer) soon after they married. His most famous wife lived to 106 and died in 2003. Before one marriage, he converted to Christianity as a condition to marry.

After training in Japan, he went to Russia to study the Soviet government and decided he did not care for the Communists. Returning to China, Sun Yat-sin appointed Chiang to command a military academy

Under Sun Yat-sen the Communists and the Nationalists worked together to rule China, and Soviet advisers provided the help needed to increase their power since most of China was ruled by warlords.

However, when Sun died in 1925, Chiang led the Kuomintang army north to defeat the warlords and destroy the Communists.

Meanwhile, in Shanghai, the Communist Party had organized labor unions to improve working conditions in the low paying sweat-shop factories. During Communist organized labor strikes, these factories were shut down.

When Chiang Kai-shek army reached Shanghai, he joined forces with gangsters then went on a killing spree known as the White Terror. Tens of thousands of workers, who belonged to the labor unions organized by the Communists, were hunted down and killed along with their Communist leaders. One of the few to escape was Mao Zedong.

For the next few years, Chiang would rule China unchallenged until 1931, when Japan invaded. During the early months of the war, Chiang ignored Japan and continued hunting for the Communist survivors, who had fled into the countryside.

In 1949, when Mao won the civil war, Chiang Kai-shek took the survivors of his nationalist army to Taiwan where, protected by the US military, he declared brutal martial law and ruled as a dictator until he died on April 5, 1975 at the age of eighty-seven.

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of My Splendid Concubine [3rd edition]. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. This is the lusty love story Sir Robert Hart did not want the world to discover.

#1 - Joanna Daneman review posted June 19 2014

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China’s Holistic Historical Timeline

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