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> First, the huge majority of those deaths were due to famine. Sir, that famine was in large part due to movements commandeered by Mao - such as the Great Leap
by samspenc 13y ago
> First, the huge majority of those deaths were due to famine.
Sir, that famine was in large part due to movements commandeered by Mao - such as the Great Leap Forward which completely decimated Chinese farming and agriculture.
- coldtea 13y agoYes, but that does not make it a deliberate policy of killing people. It was what it was thought at the time as necessary to bring China in the modern age. One has to ask if without it China would be what it is today -- or perhaps some broken half-aggrarian society, more third-world than one of the world's economic powers. Same way, as one has to ask if without Stalin's forced industrialization, USSR would be able to stand to the Nazis (and, if it could not, if Europe could). Besides the tragic human aspect, one has to see these kind of events with an impartial eye, just for their long term effects.
- RockyMcNuts 13y agobut by the time Mao died, China was a broken way-more-than-half-agrarian society, and below a lot of third world countries. Kind of like North Korea today. The best one can say is, China was a basket case before Mao, he established a strong system of central control and a level of human development ie literacy and medical care, and those paved the way for development after Mao.