In March 1970, I graduated from Beijing University and was assigned to Shangnan County, Shaanxi Province. After reporting to the placement office of the Shangnan County Revolutionary Committee, we were “borrowed” by the County Revolutionary Committee to help the military control group of the Shangnan County Public Security Bureau to work on the “one hit, three anti” special case. The full name of “one hit three anti” is “fight against counter-revolutionary sabotage, anti-corruption and theft, anti-speculation and anti-wastefulness”. The campaign was based on three documents issued by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) in 1970: the Instruction on Combating Counter-Revolutionary Sabotage, the Instruction on Combating Corruption, Theft and Speculation, and the Notice on Combating Spreading Waste.
This campaign was an important part of the Cultural Revolution. Beginning in June 1966, it was a campaign to overthrow those in power in the Party who had taken the capitalist road, to seize power, to cleanse the ranks of the class, and to send intellectual youth to the mountains and the countryside. The rebel faction and the Red Guards had run out of steam. The “red power” at all levels, i.e. the revolutionary committees, had been established and consolidated, and military control was imposed on some important departments. The authorities, that is, the powers that be, finally had their hands free to suppress the opposing forces or suspected opposing forces in society, and to sweep away all dissenting ideas among the people. It is said to be “one strike and three counterrevolution”, but in fact there is only “one strike”, that is, to crack down on counterrevolution, that is, to suppress political prisoners and ideological prisoners. The brutality and bloodshed is comparable to the campaign to clean up the class ranks. To deny the cultural revolution, we must deny the “one hit, three anti” campaign.
According to the “Chronicle of Shangnan”, the “One Hit Three Anti” campaign in Shangnan County started in March 1970 and ended in March 1971, which lasted for one year. During the campaign, 746 “nine kinds of people” were uncovered in the county, and 2,719 rural grassroots cadres were touched. Five people were designated as historical counterrevolutionaries and 10 as current counterrevolutionaries. 41 suicides occurred during the campaign, and 28 people died. The “Chronicle” also says that in June 1971, the county revolutionary committee implemented policies on the people and events uncovered by the “One Fight, Three Counterrevolution” campaign, and dealt with 195 people on a final basis. Among them: 133 people were dealt with according to the internal contradictions of the people, 62 people were dealt with according to the contradictions between us and the enemy, and 78 landlords and rich peasants were added to the list. (The “nine kinds of people” are traitors, agents, capitalists, counter-revolutionaries, landlords, rich peasants, capitalists, bad elements, and rightists.
The above description of Shangnan County’s “one hit, three counter” campaign is an evasive and light-hearted description. Only “nine kinds of people” and “rural grassroots cadres” are mentioned, and only such vague words as “uncovered” and “touched” are used. Only “suicide” and “death” are mentioned. Even so, it is clear that the campaign has hit a wide range of people. Shangnan is a small mountainous county, with a population of about 160,000 in 1970, and an estimated 90,000 adults. “About one percent of the adult population was “outed” and about three percent was “touched. “The most stinging part of the “Chronicle” is the bright end: “Implementing Policy. It is always the right policy at the top, but only the implementation at the bottom that goes awry. This is the most disingenuous statement. From March to August 1970, I helped the military control group of the Shangnan County Public Security Bureau to carry out the “one fight, three counter-attacks” special case. As far as I know, many people were arbitrarily arrested, sentenced, and even executed during the campaign. This is a fact that is deliberately avoided in the “Chronicle of Shangnan Events”.
I. Characteristics of the Movement
To sum up, this “one hit three anti” campaign has the following characteristics.
⒈, led by the county military group
The full name of the Shangnan County Military Control Group is “Shangnan County Public Security Organs Military Control Group”. The “public security organs” is the collective name for the former Public Security Bureau, the Procuratorate and the courts. This three-in-one group was responsible for filing, handling, deciding, and disposing of cases. There was no prosecutor’s office to prosecute, no court to try, and the Public Security Bureau did everything. The head of the county military management group is an active duty soldier, company-level cadres Han Xuejun. People call him Lao Han. The old Han is a thirty or forty year old man, at most a junior high school education level, even the documents can not read smoothly, no legal knowledge. The military control group has a temporary transfer of dozens of people, miscellaneous, the original what are there, as long as they are considered politically reliable, a little culture on the line.
⒉、Mass movement (movement of the masses)
During the campaign, the production brigade could arrest people and escort them to the people’s commune. As long as the Commune Revolutionary Committee agrees, they can be escorted to the county military control group, put into the county detention center, and imprisoned. Therefore, the detention center was overcrowded. Who gave the production brigade and the people’s commune the power to arrest and escort people to the county military control group? It could only be the county military control group. Instead of a mass movement, it should be a movement of the masses.
- rather left than right, rather heavy than light
In the process of filing, handling, fixing and disposing of cases, it is better to be left than right and heavy than light in order to expand the results of the movement. The more people are killed, the heavier the sentences, and the more people are arrested, the greater the results will be.
Singing and sunglasses
The extreme of preferring the left over the right and the heavy over the light is to slaughter people. The central document stipulated that killings should be approved by the revolutionary committees of provinces, cities and autonomous regions and reported to the central government for the record. Later, we heard that the central government was going to withdraw the right to approve killings. The people of the county military control group said, “We must kill quickly, or it will be too late.
The final step in the process of establishing the case, handling the case, and finalizing the case was discussed by the Standing Committee of the County Revolutionary Committee, and the results were reported to Shaanxi Province. The Standing Committee of the “Three Combined” (i.e. “military, cadres, and group”) was composed of military personnel, i.e. the head and political commissar of the county armed forces, liberated cadres, and representatives of the masses, roughly 15 people in total, with one-third of each party. The case was discussed as follows: the case officer of the county military control group reported the case; the “military” side first sang a high note and proposed to convict a serious crime; the “cadres” side was more moderate and lightened the case on the basis of affirming the “military” side’s opinion; the “cadres” side was more moderate. The “military” side is the first to sing a high note, proposing a felony; the “dry” side is milder, and lessens a bit on the basis of affirming the “military” side’s opinion; the “group” side has no independent view of its own, but only agrees. If the “military” side insisted on its own opinion, no one dared to disagree. In the end, the crowd agrees and the final result is reached.
II. Cases that I know of
The following are some of the cases I know and remember now, which occurred only during the period from March to August 1970 when I was helping to work on special cases in the military control group in Shangnan County.
- The bloodiest case
Soon after we arrived at the county military management group, we were arranged to visit the “Shangluo area ‘one fight, three anti’ campaign results exhibition” located in the county revolutionary committee. The “Liu General Division counter-revolutionary riot group” was the biggest case in the exhibition. The case of “Chief Master Liu” occurred in Zhen’an County in Shangluo Region and the neighboring Ankang and Xunyang Counties in Ankang Region. Originally, there was a mass organization called “Six General” in these areas during the Cultural Revolution. In order to facilitate the fabrication of the charge, in the process of handling the case, the name of the organization became “Liu General”, meaning “Liu Shaoqi General Command”. Then add “Division” out of thin air and become “Liu General Division”. Then the “Division” was forcibly turned into “Division”, which finally became “Liu General Division”, meaning “a division of Liu Shaoqi’s General Command “. It was just like a magic trick. Through brutal torture to extract confessions and beatings, this mass organization was turned into a counter-revolutionary insurgent group. A total of 29 people were sentenced to death. There were huge photos of the executions at the exhibition, and the scenes were horrific. According to later revelations, 53 other people were killed and forced to die during the case. There were countless other victims. In 1982, the Shaanxi Provincial Party Committee “vindicated” the case. In 1982, the Shaanxi Provincial Party Committee “vindicated” the unjust case of “Chief Master Liu”. This was already 12 years later.
In the first six months of the campaign, two people in Shangnan County were sentenced to death for the crime of “counter-revolution”. Both of them were members of the commune. Both were poor peasants. The first one, Nie Jinfu, was a young man in his twenties and less than thirty years old, a member of the Tsouma Commune and an undergraduate of Wugong Agricultural School in Shaanxi. He was found to have written a “reactionary diary” that “viciously attacked” the socialist system. Nie Jinfu did not accept the death sentence, saying that Deng Tuo, Wu Han and Liao Mosha were not sentenced to death in the “three villages”, so why was he sentenced to death? The military control group replied that it was the central government’s business to deal with the “three villages”, not yours. After Nie Jinfu was executed, his uncle was prevented from going to the execution site near the county to collect the body, and only the next day he used a truck to pull the body step by step over the mountains and back to his hometown, more than 10 kilometers away, for burial. The second name is Party Guanglin, a single man in his 40s, a native of Zhaochuan Commune. “Vicious attack” remarks are: Chairman Mao good a forced, told people to starve. Liu Shaoqi is good, divided into their own land, have food. Dang Guanglin accepted the death sentence and said: I cursed Chairman Mao and deserved to die. Party Guanglin was executed after no relatives to collect the body, the county military control group had to ask people to bury the body.
- The most detailed case known
Wu Shengzhang, a middle-aged man in his 40s, family composition landlord, a member of the Xianghe Commune. Wu Shengzhang studied Buddhism at the Daxing Shan Temple Buddhist College in Xi’an before 1949. Wu Shengzhang is a Buddhist, and the world, and rarely interact with others. Wu Shengzhang was an educated person, and when he had free time at home, he wrote poems and essays, mostly about Buddhism. After writing, he threw the book into a basket hanging in the corridor and never showed it to others. When the “Fight Three Against” campaign came, he was suspected. The militia searched his home for his poetry books and dug up evidence of his guilt.
“Don’t laugh at the landlord who has no power, no land, no power, no leisure. June flies fall soup guest, innocent buried Li Haibin.” This is about the suppression of the landlord Li Haibin. It is too easy to describe this as a landlord giving vent to his grievances and crying out for the injustice of his suppressed accomplices. When Wu Shengzhang saw that the crops of the production team were not growing well, he wrote, “The seedlings withered and died, and the wormwood became the king. His son was unable to find a date because of his family’s poor composition, so he wrote, “It’s hard to get married for the sake of composition. These are all reactionary poems that “viciously attack” the socialist system. He wrote a short article comparing Mao Zedong’s thought to Laozi’s Tao Te Ching and Buddhism’s Prajna Sutra. As a Buddhist, these sutras were sacred in his mind. However, the intention of his praise was characterized as a “vicious attack” on Mao Zedong’s thought. Since he had attended the Daxingshan Temple Buddhist College, he was suspected of being a secret agent who had lurked from the Buddhist College, and the county military control group sent someone to Xi’an to investigate. When the investigation did not yield evidence, he was called a “special suspect”. Wu Shengzhang’s family lived in a remote mountain village more than 40 kilometers from the county town, which was not even accessible by road, and was escorted to the county military control group to be arrested and convicted. The iron fist of the dictatorship of the proletariat reached out to every corner of the land, and no one could escape.
In the meeting of the standing committee of the county revolutionary committee, after the case officer of the county military control group reported the case, the political commissar of the county armed department, Lai, first sang a high note: Wu Shengzhang deserved the death penalty for his crime. Wang Xun, a decentralized cadre from the province, had a different view, but he did not dare to sing against the “military” side. Just listen to him first echo: the crime is extremely evil, deserve to die, that is certain. Then he went on to say: “But can we not consider leaving him alive so that we can dig out other agents, so that the results will be greater. It was clear that Wang Xun was going to say life imprisonment. Other cadres followed, saying: Yes, this would be more fruitful. However, Political Commissar Lai was unmoved and insisted on the death penalty. No one dared to express a different opinion. The representatives of the crowd echoed in unison and said: Kill! The case was reported as a death sentence. The provincial government approved 17 years of imprisonment. Wu Shengzhang was spared death. However, 17 years of imprisonment for writing these verses was too unjust!
- The most absurd case
Ruan Anh Vu, a young man in his 20s, a landlord of family composition, and a native of Chengguan Town. Because someone revealed, Ruan Yingwu said to the wall with red paint sprayed into the head of Chairman Mao: like a lion’s head. Despite his denial, he was sentenced to five years in prison for “viciously attacking Chairman Mao”.
Yu Guogui, a middle-aged man in his 50s, was a poor peasant of family composition, a member of the Xianghe Commune, and chairman of the Poor Peasants Association of the production brigade. During the “one hit three anti” campaign, Yu Guogui often led slogans at the criticism and struggle meetings. Once, he shouted “Support Chairman Mao, Down with Liu Shaoqi!” He shouted “Support Liu ××, Down with Mao ××!” He was sent to the county military control group. He insisted that he didn’t mean to shout the wrong words but was just confused. As a result, he was released from education and his position as chairman of the Poor Association was revoked.
Tong Laosan, 16 years old, male, middle school student, from Xianghe Commune. Exposed by his teenage peers as having insulted Chairman Mao and Jiang Qing (not to be repeated here). Fled the country after the crime. Arrested from his sister’s home in Baoji City and returned to Shangnan County. The result was educational release.
An elementary school student, male, other circumstances unknown. On his way home from school, holding a piece of chalk, when he encountered a wall, he touched the chalk to the wall, drawing a chest-high white line as he went, and mumbling the words “snort …… snort …… “, think this is fun. In some places, the white line crosses over the low quotes and statues of Chairman Mao. Elementary school students were twisted as counterrevolutionaries and sent to the county military control group. The result: after a period of detention, they were released to go home. The child could not recognize the way home, so the military control group had to send someone to take him home.
The case of “treason”. Name and other details are not known. He was suspected of attempting to commit treason after buying an atlas of China. According to his own confession, he looked for a route on the map and tried to sneak across the border from Inner Mongolia to the Soviet Union. Was twisted and sent to the county military control group. The outcome of the case is unknown.
The case of the “secret agent”. There was a young man in Longwo Commune who had a rural cable radio speaker in his bedroom, with a pull-wire switch to control the speaker’s on/off. This young man’s hands are cheap and active, leisurely lying on the bed with hands to pull the switch to play. Therefore, the cable broadcast intermittently, somewhat like the radio transmitter ticking. This sound was heard, and the young man was taken as a spy and sent to the commune. The commune cadres found Mr. Yang of the junior high school class attached to the elementary school in Longwo commune and asked if this could send telegrams. Mr. Yang, a graduate of the radio department of Xi’an Jiaotong University, almost died laughing after hearing it. Needless to say, the commune cadres listened to Mr. Yang’s answer, the young man was released. Alas, one less agent to catch in Shangnan County.
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