Protest, Purge, Promotion

Arriving at dawn in Peking's vast Tien An Men Square, the protesters began placing wreaths in honor of the late Premier Chou En-lai at the Monument to the Martyrs of the Revolution. By 10 in the morning nearly 100,000 people had massed on the huge cobblestoned square, in front of the Gate of Heavenly Peace. Suddenly, a scuffle broke out between demonstrators and militiamen guarding the monument; a student from Tsinghua University was badly bloodied. Some in the crowd tried to storm the Great Hall of the People on the northwest corner of the square; rallies were held on the steps and demands were made to file petitions with the party leadership. Later several cars were overturned and burned, and a fire engine rushing to the scene was wrecked, while policemen were assaulted, and several dozen were injured.

Around 5 p.m. the protesters broke into an army barracks bordering the square and set it afire. Black smoke could be seen drifting over the opulent tiled roofs of the adjacent Forbidden City and into the drizzly gray sky of North China. Early in the evening Peking's mayor Wu Teh addressed the churning mob through powerful loudspeakers, ordering them to disperse. Thousands of militiamen and soldiers marched into the square to restore order. In all, more than 1,000 people were arrested, and throughout the night 1,000 militiamen stood guard with fixed bayonets at the Martyrs' Monument to prevent another outbreak of violence.

That unprecedented day of protest was only the beginning of a momentous week in the history of the People's Republic of China. The country's Politburo, apparently meeting in Chairman Mao Tse-tung's private quarters in the Forbidden City, made several crucial changes in the country's leadership. First, the Peking leadership brought to an abrupt climax the intense ideological campaign against the notorious "capitalist reader" Teng Hsiao-p'ing (TIME Cover, Jan. 19), the wily little bureaucrat who only three months ago was considered Chou En-lai's sure successor as Premier. Because of the "counterrevolutionary incident that took place at T'ien An Men Square," the Politburo announced, Teng was being stripped of all his posts--Vice Premier of the government, Vice Chairman of the party and Chief of Staff of the army.

Mao's Wishes. The Politburo also said that in accordance with the wishes of Mao, it was naming a new permanent Premier: Hua Kuo-feng, 56, the relatively unknown Minister of Public Security whose appointment as Acting Premier ten weeks ago marked the first stage of the assault on Teng. Hua's confirmation as Premier had been predicted for some time by Sinologists. But few expected he would also gain a second and in some ways more significant post. Hua was also given a newly created title --First Vice Chairman of the Communist Party (there are now only two other Vice Chairmen). That clearly designated him as the leading candidate to succeed Mao Tse-tung eventually as Chairman of China's Communist Party.

No one could have anticipated the events that accidentally triggered Hua's appointment. Most extraordinary was the apparently spontaneous nature of the demonstrations that preceded the Politburo's decisions. The massive unruly crowds that gathered at T'ien An Men Square last Monday were celebrating Ch'ing Ming (meaning, pure and bright), China's traditional springtime festival for honoring the dead. For several days before the protest, tens of thousands of wreaths dedicated to Chou had been placed near the massive Martyrs' Monument in the middle of the square. Inexplicably, the wreaths were removed, apparently by militiamen, on the night preceding the protest. The crowd that arrived to honor Chou the next morning was obviously outraged by this gratuitous insult to the memory of the revered late Premier.

According to the handful of foreigners who were present, the protest soon expanded into a general expression of rage against the radical drift of Chinese politics since Chou's death. One eulogy pinned to a memorial wreath pointedly praised Mao's late second wife Yang K'ai-hui--an unmistakable slight to the Chairman's current (and fourth) wife, Radical Leader Chiang Ch'ing, who is Teng's implacable enemy. Even more astonishing, a poem circulated at the protest read: "Gone for good is Ch'in Shih Huang feudal society." Ch'in Shih Huang was the emperor who first unified China (3rd century B.C.) and with whom Mao has often identified because Mao, like him, created a new, more advanced era in Chinese history.

These subversive expressions of dissent hint at widespread frustrations among China's masses, which must trouble Peking's leadership. It seems clear that the leadership was apparently worried over further unrest and thus interpreted the demonstrations as a last-ditch effort by Teng and his supporters to counter the simmering, inconclusive ideological campaign against him.

Still a Comrade. The former Vice Premier had lived in a kind of political purgatory since he delivered the eulogy at Chou's funeral last January. Many analysts had wondered whether he might have been able to muster enough support in the military and party bureaucracy to stage another comeback (he had been rehabilitated by Chou in 1973 after having been purged "forever" during the Cultural Revolution of 1966-69). That prospect now seems impossible, even though Teng was allowed to retain his party membership ("if he behaves," according to the Politburo announcement). The residual honor was probably intended to mollify his remaining supporters. Explains Tufts University Sinologist Donald Klein: "That way, he can still be called 'comrade,' rather than just 'mister'--no small matter in China."

The elevation of Hua to his two new posts seemed to be an attempt by the party leadership to do something about its most explosive problem--ensuring an untroubled succession to the reign of the increasingly frail 82-year-old "Helmsman." Some arrangement for succession after Mao has long been desperately needed if China is to avoid a naked power struggle when he dies.

Hua's promotion and Teng's dismissal from office were both celebrated last Thursday in a giant, well-organized rally in T'ien An Men Square. Some 100,000 people waved banners, sang revolutionary songs and beat cymbals, gongs and drums as they hailed new Premier and Vice Chairman Hua.

The officially sanctioned rallies continued through the week; they seemed to be attempts by the leadership to prove there was broad, multifactional approval of Hua's promotion. In Peking, Foreign Minister Ch'iao Kuan-hua led 700 members of his bureaucracy in a parade of support for the new Premier. Meanwhile, throughout the country huge army delegations, as well as smaller air force and navy groups, marched in support of Teng's sacking--an important sign considering Teng's reputedly close connections with the military brass. In Shanghai, some 200,000 workers attended a mass rally lead by Vice Premier Chang Ch'un-ch'iao. Wall posters in the city--a center of radical strength--demanded the death penalty for Chou's discredited successor. HANG THE CULPRIT TENG they read.

Some of the rejoicing might have been genuine; on the other hand the party is well known for its ability to stage "spontaneous" expressions of mass support for its policies. Foreigners in Peking reported the citizenry seemed somewhat confused by the welter of events. Aside from the pro-Hua celebrants, who arrived in the capital by truck and chartered bus--and the thousands of troops encamped inside the Forbidden City to guard against another protest--most people carefully skirted the area near the Gate of Heavenly Peace.

Forever Tainted. Did the dismissal of Teng mean China's radicals had suddenly gained the upper hand? The tentative answer of most China specialists was no. Teng's dismissal was obviously a victory for the so-called Shanghai Mafia of leftists, led by Chiang Ch'ing. But there were strong indications that the promotion of Hua left Peking's moderates still holding the balance of power.

For one thing, in becoming First Vice Chairman, Hua leapfrogged over Politburo Member Wang Hung-wen, 40, a Shanghai radical and Chiang Ch'ing protege who since Chou's death had officially been No. 2 in the party, after Mao. At the same time, the change in leadership coincided with the sudden public reappearance of Vice Premier Li Hsien-nien, a moderate who was closely linked to both Chou and Teng. Hua, moreover, is viewed as a compromise candidate--a cautious, prudent centrist acceptable to all of Peking's contending groups. He might well have been favored by certain key moderates who believed the blunt, undiplomatic Teng, forever tainted by his Cultural Revolution disgrace, was too provocative a figure to head any consensus government.

As always, it was impossible for Western observers of the murky politics of Mao's Middle Kingdom to predict with any assurance that the succession problem had been solved for good. The fact that Hua has no strong factional ties, for example, could also mean he has no firm power base and thus could easily be pushed aside in a struggle after Mao's death. Hua, moreover, is well aware that being touted as the Chairman's heir apparent is a decidedly mixed blessing. All his predecessors ended as victims of purges as soon as Mao decided they were departing from, rather than perpetuating his ideological line (see box). Says one senior Washington analyst: "The struggle is hardly over. The position of the army remains a question mark. It is still a very fluid situation."

Meteoric Rise. Chou's successor has had a relatively meteoric rise. He is a native of Shansi province in northern China, where he joined the Communist Party. Hua went to Hunan prov ince as a minor party official about the time the Communists came to power in 1949. In the early 1950s, after gaining a reputation as an expert in agriculture, he was made party secretary in Mao's home county of Hsiang-t'an. Hua achieved brief nationwide notice by writing an article for Study magazine, the party's theoretical journal, on the changing class structure in that region. By 1958 he had become vice governor of populous (50 million) Hunan province. He emerged unscathed from the Cultural Revolution and in 1970 became the head of the province's revolutionary committee--a position roughly equivalent to Governor.

Hua did not achieve true national prominence until 1971--the year in which Defense Minister Lin Piao tried to overthrow Mao. Hua reportedly led a purge of pro-Lin Piao elements in Hunan. Possibly as a reward for his services to the Chairman, he was called to Peking to run the secretariat of the State Council, handling, in particular, China's agricultural affairs. In 1973 he was elevated to the 22-member Politburo; early last year he became one of the country's twelve Vice Premiers and head of the Ministry of Public Security, China's extensive but little-known police and militia apparatus.

A stout six footer, Hua has a thoughtful and serious bearing. The few diplomats who have met him are impressed with his grasp of the issues and his skill in handling complex situations. Although he has had little experience in foreign affairs, Hua, while Acting Premier, was designated to conduct discussions with former President Richard Nixon in Peking last February. During those talks he was careful and cautious, often referring to briefing papers to explain the Chinese position. He confirmed the basic foreign policy guidelines set down by Chou Enlai: China's desire to normalize relations with the U.S., its willingness to be patient on the Taiwan issue and its continuing hostility toward the Soviet Union.

Hua has plenty of domestic problems to solve. One, certainly, is the danger of a recurrence of the T'ien An Men protests. That could easily happen if the radicals, who control China's press, continue to attack the reputation of Chou Enlai. Already there have been derogatory statements in some party journals that Chou's emphasis on turning China into a totally modernized state was revisionist. There have been recent reports of fighting between pro-and anti-Chou factions in Nanking and Canton.

On a deeper level, Hua will have to deal with burning resentments and dissatisfactions in China that go far beyond the issue of Chou's reputation. Says Merle Goldman, professor of Chinese history at Boston University: "There is an underlying feeling in China that the values represented by Cultural Revolution-type policies are resented by the population." Last week's violence showed that many ordinary Chinese are irritated by Mao's radical style, particularly the perpetual, bullying disruptions in daily life caused by the Chairman's periodic ideological campaigns.

Occasionally, these dissatisfactions surface. Last spring, for example, there were strikes and work stoppages in Hangchow, apparently over the issue of higher wages. Even the official press admitted that the 11,000 troops sent into the factories to put down the disturbances dealt "ruthlessly" with the troublemakers. There are also enduring resentments over the role and privileges of party officials in China. Eighteen months ago, a 100-yd. wall poster in Canton attacked the abuses of a system run by powerful party cadres. While it reaffirmed the validity of Marxism-Leninism for China, the wall poster also pilloried "a force of civil officials who share vested interests" and the "fascist autocracy" that had sprung from the cadres' privileges.

The most serious problem remains the debilitating dispute between radicals and moderates in the Peking leadership. In part, the conflict is genuinely ideological and involves such issues as educational policy, technology and the need for political indoctrination. But increasingly it has become a naked struggle for power. China has a severe generation gap. Most of the leading moderates, such as Li Hsien-nien and Defense Minister Yeh Chien-ying, are venerable party bureaucrats. The radicals, by and large, are young cadres who made personal power gains during the Cultural Revolution--gains that are now threatened by the rehabilitation of Chou's old guard. Says one U.S. analyst: "There were a lot of young people with lousy educations who were promoted despite their lack of ability. These so-called helicopter promotions--those who rose straight upward fast--are trying to stay at high altitude."

Impressive Gains. The continuing power struggle does not necessarily mean China is hovering on the brink of major civil strife. The governing bureaucracy functions effectively. The military appears to be stable and--so far, at least--has shown no signs of rebelling against party authority. Impressive gains have been made in industry and agriculture. One crucial but little-noted factor making for stability is that top-level quarrels in Peking sometimes do not have very much effect in the vast impassive interior of the country. The debate over revisionism in education, for example, has for months captured the headlines of the national press, yet only about half the provinces have taken part in it and then usually with meetings and discussions in a few universities and institutes. Although not always the case, at times the masses can subtly ignore the issues that shake the leadership.

Sinologists agree on the obvious: the real test for China will not come until after the disappearance of the major symbol of authority, Chairman Mao. The Great Helmsman's death, especially in the absence of a figure like Chou Enlai, who was supremely skilled in the art of political balance and compromise, could easily remove the constraints that now keep the factions under control. Indeed, some analysts believe last week's violence would not have happened had Chou still been alive. That view may exaggerate the late Premier's indispensable skills. But there is no doubt that the critical question facing China today is whether or not Hua Kuo-feng can develop into the Chou-like leader needed for the transition ahead.

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