Bombard the Headquarters

Bombard The Headquarters – My Big-Character Poster (Chinese: 炮打司令部——我的一张大字报) was a short document written by Chairman Mao Zedong on August 5, 1966 during the 11th Plenary Session of the 8th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and published on the Communist Party's official newspaper People's Daily the same day.

It is commonly believed that this "poster" directly targeted Chinese President Liu Shaoqi and senior leader Deng Xiaoping, who were then in charge of Chinese government's daily affairs and who tried to cool down the mass hysteria which had been coming into shape in several universities in Beijing since the May 16 Notice, through which Mao officially launched the Cultural Revolution, was issued.

Much larger scale of mass persecutions came after the publication of this big-character poster, resulting in turmoil of the whole country and the death of thousands of "class enemies", including President Liu Shaoqi.

The original text of the poster was:

全国第一张马列主义的大字报和人民日报评论员的评论，写得何等好呵！请同志们重读这一张大字报和这个评论。可是在50多天里，从中央到地方的某些领导同志，却反其道而行之，站在反动的资产阶级立场上，实行资产阶级专政，将无产阶级轰轰烈烈的文化大革命运动打下去，颠倒是非，混淆黑白，围剿革命派，压制不同意见，实行白色恐怖，自以为得意，长资产阶级的威风，灭无产阶级的志气，又何其毒也！联想到1962年的右倾和1964年形“左”实右的错误倾向，岂不是可以发人深醒的吗？^[1]

English translation:

China's first Marxist-Leninist big-character poster and Commentator's article on it in People's Daily are indeed superbly written! Comrades, please read them again. But in the last fifty days or so some leading comrades from the central down to the local levels have acted in a diametrically opposite way. Adopting the reactionary stand of the bourgeoisie, they have enforced a bourgeois dictatorship and struck down the surging movement of the great cultural revolution of the proletariat. They have stood facts on their head and juggled black and white, encircled and suppressed revolutionaries, stifled opinions differing from their own, imposed a white terror, and felt very pleased with themselves. They have puffed up the arrogance of the bourgeoisie and deflated the morale of the proletariat. How poisonous! Viewed in connection with the Right deviation in 1962 and the wrong tendency of 1964 which was 'Left' in form but Right in essence, shouldn't this make one wide awake?

See also

• Cultural Revolution

References