Editing Mao Zedong (section)

=== Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution ===
{{Main|Cultural Revolution}}
[[File:1966-11 1966年毛泽东林彪与红卫兵.jpg|thumb|200px|right|A public appearance of Chairman Mao and [[Lin Biao]] among [[Red Guards]], in Beijing, during the [[Cultural Revolution]] (November 1966)]]
During the early 1960s, Mao became concerned with the nature of post-1959 China. He saw that the old ruling elite was replaced by a new one. He was concerned that those in power were becoming estranged from the people they were to serve. Mao believed that a revolution of culture would unseat and unsettle the "ruling class" and keep China in a state of "[[Continuous revolution theory|continuous revolution]]" that, theoretically, would serve the interests of the majority, rather than a tiny and privileged elite.{{sfn|Feigon|2002|p=140}}

The Cultural Revolution led to the destruction of much of China's traditional cultural heritage and the imprisonment of many Chinese citizens, as well as the creation of chaos in the country. Millions of lives were ruined, as the Cultural Revolution pierced into Chinese life. It is estimated that hundreds of thousands of people, perhaps millions, perished in the violence of the Cultural Revolution.<ref name="maostats">{{cite web |url=http://necrometrics.com/20c5m.htm#Mao |title=Source List and Detailed Death Tolls for the Twentieth Century Hemoclysm |publisher=Historical Atlas of the Twentieth Century |access-date=23 August 2008}}</ref> This included prominent figures such as Liu Shaoqi.<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/05/cultural-revolution-china/482964/ |title=The Cultural Revolution's Legacy in China |last=Vasilogambros |first=Matt |date=16 May 2016 |work=[[The Atlantic]] |access-date=28 November 2019}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |url=https://reviews.history.ac.uk/review/1179 |title=Debating the Cultural Revolution in China |website=Reviews in History |access-date=28 November 2019}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Pye |first=Lucian W. |year=1986 |title=Reassessing the Cultural Revolution |journal=The China Quarterly |volume=108 |issue=108 |pages=597–612 |doi=10.1017/S0305741000037085 |issn=0305-7410 |jstor=653530 |s2cid=153730706}}</ref>

It was during this period that Mao chose [[Lin Biao]] to become his successor. Lin was later officially named as Mao's successor. By 1971, a divide between the two men had become apparent. [[Lin Biao incident|Lin Biao died on 13 September 1971]], in a plane crash over the air space of Mongolia, presumably as he fled China, probably anticipating his arrest. The CCP declared that Lin was planning to depose Mao and posthumously expelled Lin from the party. At this time, Mao lost trust in many of the top CCP figures. The highest-ranking Soviet Bloc intelligence defector, Lt. Gen. [[Ion Mihai Pacepa]] claimed he had a conversation with [[Nicolae Ceaușescu]], who told him about a plot to kill Mao with the help of Lin Biao organised by the [[KGB]].<ref name="Pacepa0">{{cite web |url=http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MzY4NWU2ZjY3YWYxMDllNWQ5MjQ3ZGJmMzg3MmQyNjQ= |title=The Kremlin's Killing Ways |author=Ion Mihai Pacepa |work=National Review |date=28 November 2006 |access-date=23 August 2008 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070808171854/http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MzY4NWU2ZjY3YWYxMDllNWQ5MjQ3ZGJmMzg3MmQyNjQ%3D |archive-date=8 August 2007}}</ref>

In 1969, Mao declared the Cultural Revolution to be over. Various historians mark the end of the Cultural Revolution in 1976, following Mao's death and the arrest of the [[Gang of Four]].<ref>Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution lasting until 1976:

* {{cite web |title=Marxists.org Glossary: Cultural Revolution |url=https://www.marxists.org/glossary/events/c/u.htm |access-date=6 October 2015 |website=[[Marxists Internet Archive]] |publisher=Encyclopedia of Marxism}}
* {{cite web |title=The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in China, 1966–1976 |url=http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/cultrev.htm |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190424130644/http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/cultrev.htm |archive-date=24 April 2019 |access-date=6 October 2015 |website=sjsu.edu |publisher=San José State University Department of Economics}}
* {{cite web |last1=Spence |first1=Jonathan |year=2001 |title=Introduction to the Cultural Revolution |url=http://iis-db.stanford.edu/docs/115/CRintro.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160131124840/http://iis-db.stanford.edu/docs/115/CRintro.pdf |archive-date=31 January 2016 |access-date=6 October 2015 |website=iis-db.stanford.edu}} – Adapted from ''[[The Search for Modern China]]''</ref> The Central Committee in 1981 [[Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party since the Founding of the People's Republic of China|officially declared]] the Cultural Revolution a "severe setback" for the PRC.<ref>"Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party Since the Founding of the People's Republic of China", (Adopted by the Sixth Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on 27 June 1981) ''Resolution on CPC History (1949–81).'' (Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1981). p. 32.</ref>

An estimate of around 400,000 deaths is a widely accepted minimum figure, according to [[Maurice Meisner]].<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YpV7vbvclfgC&pg=PA354 |title=Mao's China and After: A History of the People's Republic |edition=3rd |first=Maurice |last=Meisner |page=354 |publisher=Free Press |year=1999 |isbn=978-0684856353 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref> MacFarquhar and Schoenhals assert that in rural China alone some 36&nbsp;million people were persecuted, of whom between 750,000 and 1.5&nbsp;million were killed, with roughly the same number permanently injured.{{sfn|MacFarquhar|Schoenhals|2006|p=262}}