Hoxha's Change of Course in Evaluating the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution – Repudiation of his Slanderous Attacks

Not only the modern revisionists in the leadership of the CP of China attack the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution directly and indirectly and denounce it in connection with the so-called "Gang of Four" – saying "Gang of Four" and meaning Mao Tsetung. Enver Hoxha takes a similar position, only that he attacks Mao Tsetung more openly.
To characterize his power of judgment and his morals, let us compare two of his statements which completely contradict each other. After the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution had begun, at the 5th Congress of the PLA on November 1, 1966, Hoxha said the following in his report:

"The PLA welcomes the Proletarian Cultural Revolution in China, the purpose of which is the relentless struggle against bourgeois revisionist ideology, which appears in people's minds in the field of culture and in every other area of life in the country, against the class enemies and all open and concealed revisionists who are trying to lead China back onto the capitalist road, and also against American imperialism and all reactionaries"(79)

Twelve years later Hoxha said on this same topic:

"The course of events showed that the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution was neither a revolution, nor great, nor cultural, and in particular, not in the least proletarian. It was a palace putsch on an all-China scale for the liquidation of a handful of reactionaries who had seized power."(80)

In this matter of principle Hoxha has had a complete turn of mind. Perhaps, one could object, he didn't have a complete picture of the situation at the 5th Congress in 1966, but five years later, at the 6th Congress in November 1971, he still took his original view:

"The triumph of the great proletarian cultural revolution initiated and guided by the great Marxist-Leninist Comrade Mao Tse-tung, is a victory and a source of inspiration for the whole revolutionary movement."(81)

Supposing that new facts and insights had led to his fundamentally opposite view, then it would have been his duty to practice candid, honest and objective self-criticism before the PLA, the Albanian working class and the whole international communist movement, which openly, honestly and objectively investigated the alleged mistakes of his former positive opinion. But Hoxha did no such thing.
Instead, this change of course is presented as proof for the never-failing "principled analysis and stand of the PLA in defending Marxism-Leninism". Once again he calls upon the faked diary, according to which he supposedly said as early as October 1966 about the Cultural Revolution:

"Nothing can be solved correctly, no correct Marxist-Leninist line can be decided or accepted, without the party, without the working class in the forefront. Any other road leads to mistakes, to things fraught with many dangers for the future."(82)

Ten years later, in April 1976, he described the Cultural Revolution as a revisionist power struggle:

"This revolution was the result of the struggle between two rightist, liberal revisionist trends over who was to seize power: Mao or Liu."(83)

Instead of criticizing the stand he took at the 5th and 6th Congresses, he says three months later, in July 1976:

"At some stage, when the truth about what Mao really was comes out clearly, the question will be raised as to why we have described him as 'a great Marxist-Leninist'? It is true that we have said this, but not with complete conviction. Then have we not been opportunists? No, we have always sought to do our best for the Chinese people and the Communist Party of China, which openly defended Stalin, and have had the best of intentions towards Mao personally."(84)

Which Communist is going to believe this? Especially when he again, according to the documents of the PLA, said exactly the opposite at the 7th Congress in November 1976:

"The work of this outstanding Marxist-Leninist represents a contribution to the enrichment of the revolutionary theory and practice of the proletariat."(85)

This obvious mendacity of the alleged diary is enough to expose Hoxha. Methods like this are incompatible with proletarian mentality. Not the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution and Mao Tsetung must be re-evaluated. But rather Enver Hoxha himself.

Let us now turn to the core of his slanderous attacks. In complete opposition to his earlier views, Hoxha now states in Imperialism and the Revolution:

"But the main thing was the fact that neither the party nor the proletariat were in the leadership of this 'great proletarian revolution'."(86)

He is not the first to make such allegations. The modern revisionists also claimed this during the Cultural Revolution and afterwards. For example, in a book called "Criticism of Mao Tsetung's Theoretical Views," published by a Soviet revisionist collective, it is stated:

"The Cultural Revolution is designated as 'proletarian' and was allegedly carried out in the interests of the proletariat, but the Chinese workers were, in fact, excluded from participation…. Mao Tsetung's followers counted on the political immaturity of youth … and took advantage of this to smash the Party organizations and other socialist institutions."(87)

How the arguments are alike! However, neither the Soviet revisionists nor Hoxha can prove them because they aren't true.

The Cultural Revolution was initiated by a circular of the Central Committee on May 16, 1966. This document was written during the two-line struggle against the followers of Liu Shao-chi and was distributed for discussion in the entire Party. It says:

"The whole Party must follow Comrade Mao Tsetung's instructions, hold high the great banner of the Proletarian Cultural Revolution, thoroughly expose the reactionary bourgeois stand of those so-called academic authorities who oppose the Party and socialism, thoroughly criticize and repudiate reactionary bourgeois ideas in the sphere of academic work, education, journalism, literature and art and publishing, and seize the leadership in these cultural spheres. To achieve this, it is at the same time necessary to criticize and repudiate those representatives of the bourgeoisie who have sneaked into the Party, the government, the army and all spheres of culture, and to clear them out or transfer some of them to other positions."(88)

Based on broad discussion of this circular, the Central Committee of the CP of China passed its 16-point resolution on the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, giving an outline for carrying it out. It says about the leadership by the Party and the tasks of the Party committees:

"What the Central Committee of the Party demands of the Party committees at all levels is that they persevere in giving correct leadership, put daring above everything else, boldly arouse the masses, change the state of weaknesses and incompetence where it exists, encourage those comrades who have made mistakes but are willing to correct them to cast off their mental burdens and join in the struggle, and dismiss from their leading posts all those in authority who are taking the capitalist road and so make possible the recapture of the leadership for the proletarian revolutionaries."(89)

As a result of the militant struggle of the masses against the bourgeoisie on the ideological front and based on the strengthening and broadening socialist consciousness, not the Party was liquidated but rather the headquarters of the new bourgeoisie. In the movement "struggle – criticism – transformation", which spread over the whole country, the Party and state officials were remoulded, so that many of them could remain in office and do good work afterwards. The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution did not become, as Hoxha claims, a movement to liquidate the Party, but, on the contrary, a movement to consolidate the proletarian Party in class struggle.

In the same ay one can prove that Hoxha's slanderous assertion that the Cultural Revolution did not put the leadership of the working class into effect is nothing but an empty lie. He claims:

"Thus the working class was left on the side-lines, and there were instances when it opposed the red guards and even fought them. … The party was disintegrated. It was liquidated, and the communists and the proletariat were totally disregarded."(90)

It is a fact, however, that the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution was initiated by the resolution of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on August 8, 1966, and was led by reliable Communists, workers, peasants and class-conscious members of the Red Guards, not, of course, by party officials against whom the struggle was directed, the capitalist roaders.

Accordingly, it was stated in the bulletin of the enlarged 12th Plenary Session of the 8th Central Committee of the CP of China:

"The working class must exercise leadership in everything, to establish the dictatorship of the proletariat in the superstructure, including all the various spheres of culture, to fulfil the tasks in all stages of struggle-criticism-transformation put forward by Chairman Mao and to carry the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution through to the end."(91)

Because of the long tradition of bourgeois ideology in schools and universities, the bourgeoisie still had a lot of influence, especially in the educational institutions. It is no coincidence that the Cultural Revolution began here. In the course of its development it spread out to the factories and villages. Before the Cultural Revolution, most factories had overemphasized production.

With "struggle – criticism – transformation" proletarian politics was put in first place. Revolutionary factory workers formed worker's propaganda teams which went to the various government and state bodies and other social institutions to exert control in the interests of the working class, to show where conditions were bad and to educate the officials. Their tasks were described as follows:

"As regards intellectuals, they must be re-educated by the workers, peasants and soldiers so that they can integrate themselves with the workers and peasants. The workers' propaganda teams should stay permanently in the schools and colleges, take part in all the tasks of struggle-criticism-transformation and will always lead these institutions."(92)

Hoxha's intentions are clear. By claiming that there was no leadership by the Party and the working class, he is attacking the Cultural Revolution as the highest form of class struggle and concrete form of the dictatorship of the proletariat against the bureaucratization of the Party, the state and management apparatus.