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The Cultural Revolution in Inner Mongolia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2009

Paul Hyer  and
William Heaton
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Extract

A significant aspect of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution has been to reveal the least stable areas of China geographically and politically. One of these is Inner Mongolia. Also, the events of the upheaval— in direct contradiction to the Maoist dictum that “the Party must always control the gun, the gun must never be allowed to control the Party”— have caused a breakdown in Party and Government authority and a shift to military control in many parts of China: administrative organs at provincial, municipal and local levels have been replaced by People's Liberation Army (PLA) directed “Revolutionary Committees.” In most areas of China, the political upheaval can be ascribed to a power struggle between the Party, Red Guards and other semi-organised groups. However, the Cultural Revolution in the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region takes on added significance in that “local nationalism” among the Mongol national minority played an important role in the conflict between the established political structure and the efforts of the Maoists to “seize power.”

Type
Research Article
Information
The China Quarterly , Volume 36 , December 1968 , pp. 114 - 128
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 1968

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References

1 For a useful analysis of what has happened in China during the Cultural Revolution see Johnson, Chalmers, “China: The Cultural Revolution in Structural Perspective,” Asian Survey VIII: No. 1 (01, 1968)Google Scholar

2 See Rupen, Robert A., Mongols of the Twentieth Century, (“Indiana University Publications: Uralic and Altaic Series,” Vol. 17Google Scholar: Part 1; The Hague: Mouton and Co., 1964), pp. 226–227; 259–260; Lattimore, Owen, Nationalism and Revolution in Mongolia, New York: Oxford University Press, 1955, pp. 28–29Google Scholar.

3 Wei Nei-Meng-ku tzu-chih ch'u kai-k'ung (Survey of the Communist Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region), Taipei: Intelligence Bureau, Defense Department, Republic of China, 1961, pp. 57–58Google Scholar. A combined Soviet-Outer Mongolian force occupied Inner Mongolia at the close of the war and there was some discussion of a federation of Outer Mongolia and Inner Mongolia. The plan was supported by many Inner Mongol nationalists but was doomed to failure by the rapid rise of the Chinese Communists.

4 Hyer, Paul, “Ulanfu, Leader of Inner Mongolia,” (unpublished manuscript, Brigham Young University, 1963), p. 4Google Scholarand passim.

5 Net Meng-ku kai-k'uang (see note 3), p. 115.

6 Chang Chih-i, A Discussion of the National Question in the Chinese Revolution and of Actual Nationalities Policy, translated from the original draft by Moseley, George and published as The Party and the National Question in China, Cambridge: The MIT Press, 1966, p. 141Google Scholar.

7 “The Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region (1949–1952)” in People's Daily, 20 January 1952, translated in Current Background, No. 190, 22 06 1952, pp. 26–32Google Scholar.

8 Nei Meng-ku kai-k'uang, pp. 260–261.

9 Schwartz, Henry G., “Communist Language Policies for China's Ethnic Minorities: The First Decade,” The China Quarterly, No. 12 (10–12, 1962), pp. 170–182CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

10 Chia-ho, Yuan, “Chung-kung k'ung-chih-hsia te wei Nei Meng-ku tzu-chih ch'u” (The Chinese Communist controlled Inner Mongolian autonomous region), Fei-ch'ing yen-chiu (Studies on Chinese Communism, I:11 11, 1967), p. 96Google Scholar. The Fei-ch'ing yen-chiu emanates from the Intelligence Bureau of the Nationalist Defence Department in Taiwan. Despite the use of pejorative titles much of the information it contains is factual and without apparent bias.

11 Ibid. p. 77.

12 Ghosh, Stanley, Embers in Cathay New York: Doubleday and Co., Inc., 1961, p. 137Google Scholar.

13 Methods by which the Regional Autonomous Areas are controlled by the Chinese Communists are discussed byHinton, Harold C. “The National Minorities in China,” Far Eastern Economic Review XIX:12 (22 09 1955), pp. 369–370Google Scholar.

14 For a resumeé of issues confronting the Chinese Communist political élites seeFarnsworth, Lee and Horiuchi, Russell, “The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution and Political Crisis in China” Utah Academy of Arts Letters and Sciences Proceedings XLIV:1 (1967), pp. 53–54Google Scholar.

15 An account of the shift in minority policy may be seen inMoseley, George, “China's Fresh Approach to the National Minority Question,” The China Quarterly, No. 24 (10–12 1965), pp. 15–27CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

16 Yuan, p. 90.

17 Radio Inner Mongolia, 30 January 1963.

18 Radio Inner Mongolia, 18 April 1966.

19 Inner Mongolia Daily, 17 May 1966.

20 Yuan, p. 92.

21 Wen-hsin, Lu, “Nei-meng tung-luan wen-t'i te yen-hsi” (An Analysis of the Disturbances in Inner Mongolia), Fei-ch'ing Yen-chiu 1:7 (07 1967), p. 68Google Scholar.

22 Ibid.

23 Radio Inner Mongolia, 25 August 1966.

24 This movement, sometimes referred to as the Socialist Education Movement is more completely discussed inBaum, Richard and Teiwes, Frederick C., “Liu Shao-ch'i and the Cadre Question,” Asian Survey VIII:4 (04 1968), pp. 323–345CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

25 Yuan, pp. 93–94.

26 New York Times, 10 September 1966.

27 Inner Mongolia Daily, 24 September 1966.

28 Lu, p. 70.

29 Yuan, pp. 94–95.

30 Ibid.

31 Ibid.

32 Lu, p. 70–71.

33 Ibid. See also, Current Background No. 852, 6 May, 1968, pp. 118–119; 132–134.

34 Lu, p. 70.

35 Yuan, p. 97.

36 Radio Inner Mongolia, 23 January 1968; Foreign Broadcast Information Service, 24 January 1968.

37 NCNA, 3 November 1967.

38 Ibid.

39 Ibid.

40 Newhauser, Charles, “The Impact of the Cultural Revolution on the Chinese Communist Party Machine,” Asian Survey, VIII:6 (06 1968), p. 483Google Scholar, No. 46.

41 Over the years, the number of Mongol refugees from Inner Mongolia trickling into the Mongolian People's Republic has gradually increased. During the Cultural Revolution, Peking-Ulan Bator relations deteriorated rapidly, particularly after the purge of Ulanfu. Teng Hai-ch'ing mustered a demonstration of more than 150,000 students in Huhehot to protest against “fascist atrocities” committed by Ulan Bator revisionists against China in June 1967 (see Lu, pp. 71–72). Note also that the Chinese have claimed that the capture of Ulanfu agents dealt a “telling blow to Mongolian Revisionism…” (see p. 13 above).

42 There is some speculation that some of the materials used by the Ulanfu insurgents might have come from across the border. This speculation cannot yet be supported by concrete evidence.