Mao: The Unknown Story

Gao was beside himself with shock about how Mao had set him up, and he tried to electrocute himself, unsuccessfully, on 17 February. For this he was forced to apologize, but his apology was rejected with the Party’s customary pitilessness; this act of despair was branded “an out-and-out traitor’s action against the Party.” He was kept under house arrest, and finally succeeded in ending his life six months later, after accumulating enough sleeping pills to do the trick.

In the Communist world a conspiracy was always preferred to a lone schemer. To make up a “conspiracy,” Mao picked on the head of the Organization Department, Rao Shu-shi, who was accused of forming an “anti-Party alliance” with Gao, although the two were not particularly close. Rao had been the head of the CCP intelligence network in America, inter alia, and this was very possibly why Mao wanted him behind bars, as Mao was gearing up for a purge in his intelligence system. Rao was arrested, and died in prison twenty years later, in March 1975.

ON 26 DECEMBER 1953, having lit the fuse for Gao’s demise, Mao merrily celebrated his sixtieth birthday with his staff, drinking more wine than usual, even eating peaches, a symbol of longevity, though normally he did not like fruit. During the meal he hummed along to records of Peking opera and beat time on his thigh. Stalin had died, and Mao had successfully completed two maneuvers that were key for his Superpower Program: hammering his chief executive, Liu, into shape; and inoculating his top subordinates against any possible Russian contagion that might endanger his power.

Next day, when he arrived in picturesque lakeside Hangzhou, near Shanghai, he was in such good spirits that he could hardly wait to settle in before he ordered a game of mah-jong. Mao had been in Hangzhou thirty-two years before, in summer 1921, after the 1st Congress of the Communist Party. Then he had been a hard-up provincial teacher travelling on a Russian allowance. Now he was the master of China. His coming had been suitably prepared. A famous turn-of-the-century estate called Water and Bamboo had been picked for him. It was adorned with ponds and bamboo groves, and vines and palm trees, and enjoyed a panoramic view over the Western Lake. Villas next to it, and the hills behind it, were all incorporated into a single enormous estate, covering 36 hectares. The hill behind was hollowed out to provide a nuclear shelter. Mao stayed in an exquisite building, combining classical Chinese and exotic foreign styles, with pillars, doors and decorations which had been lovingly shipped in piece by piece by the original owner. But shortly afterwards, Mao had it torn down and replaced with his usual nondescript identikit structure. The creaking of the old timber had rattled his nerves with thoughts about assassins. He only felt safe in a reinforced concrete bunker.

Mao fell in love with the view. Every day, even in drizzle, he climbed the nearby peaks, which were specially cordoned off for him. He lingered over plum blossoms, sniffing at the petals. He chatted and joked with his staff. His mood was captured by his photographer, in a picture of a beaming plump-cheeked Mao, bathed in sunshine.

Soon the biggest snowfall in decades descended. Mao got up at the, for him, outlandish hour of 7:00 AM, and stood transfixed by the snow-clad southern garden. He then walked along a path blanketed with snow, which he ordered left unswept, to marvel at the lake in white. He tinkered with a poem.

Spring came, alternating between misty drizzle and dazzling sunshine, each day unfolding its masses of blossoms. During one pleasure trip, his female photographer, Hou Bo, gathered a bunch of wildflowers and presented them to Mao. Nobody seemed to know what the flower was called, so Mao said: Let’s name it the Hou Bo Flower.

Mao fancied a visit to the home of his favorite tea, Dragon Well village, which was nearby. The peasants were duly removed “for a mass meeting”—in fact for his security. But occasional surprise drop-ins were deemed safe enough, and so, on another occasion, Mao called in on one peasant house. The couple could not understand a word of his Hunan dialect, nor he theirs. Curious villagers started to converge, so Mao’s guards whisked him away.

On one excursion to the top of a hill, Mao saw a thatched hut on fire in the distance. The inhabitants were standing outside, helpless as the flames swallowed their home. According to Mao’s photographer, Mao “turned to me with a glance, and said coolly: ‘Good fire. It’s good to burn down, good to burn down!’ ”

The photographer was astonished. Sensing this, Mao said:” ‘Without the fire, they will have to go on living in a thatched hut.’

“ ‘But now it’s burnt down, where are they going to live?…’

“He did not answer my question, as if he hadn’t heard …”