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Mao Tsetung: Great Leader Of The Working Class

By VVAW

Death a Deep Loss, Life a Profound Inspiration

Mao Tsetung died on September 9 at the age of 82. Not only in China but around the world people mourned the passing of this great leader, teacher, revolutionary and communist. During his life he had come to represent the struggle for the complete emancipation of working people; the hope and realization that after the working class had kicked out the ownership class, the capitalist, and begun building a new society, that things could progress, that they did not have to turn back with the capitalists re-seizing power as in the Soviet Union.

His death did not go unnoticed by his enemies. Across this country magazines, newspapers and assorted commentators have gone into overtime to sum up Mao Tsetung's life. These "public opinion leaders" who only a short time ago would have commented on his death as merely the passing of another "communist tyrant" must now grudgingly offer "praise." Things have changed since the briefings we got before going off to. Vietnam about how we Americans were going to be fighting the ruthless guerilla ideology of Mao Tsetung thought. Remember being told that "guerillas were the fish in the sea of the people" and how we Americans were there to "dry up that sea." The military's evaluation of Mao, and his strategy and tactics fit with reality about as well as the explanation about how we were in Vietnam to defend the peoples' freedom and not Standard Oil's profit.

When many of us returned, we tried to sort out the conditions both from that war and in the society we had re-entered. We joined the anti-war movement to oppose the very war we fought in. There was a lot of confusion but one thing that stood out was that the "fish" were not swimming in a hostile "sea." Further, that guerilla war, "peoples war" was just--that it was a war fought by, for and with the support of the people. Our own experience taught us that fighting on the side without any support of the people meant sure defeat. We began to question more and more.

Things have changed a lot since our childhood when not eating our vegetables meant hearing about eating all our food because millions were dying of starvation in China. How our eating vegetables was supposed to help people starving in another country was always hard to figure out, but more than that, with time and the great achievements made by China we were able to figure out that it wasn't true that people were hungry in China. In fact, China had been able not only to feed its people but provide medical car for all, build up industry and change the countryside from ignorance to almost complete literacy. This stood in sharp contrast to other developing countries like India and even the United States and other developed countries.

Because these achievements could not be hidden from the people, the rich of this country used every trick to portray them as the achievements of a dictator, ruthless though benevolent. Even when writing about Mao's death, the media tried to portray Mao as the "ruler" of China; but Mao never "ruled" China. In China, the working class rules, along with the peasants. Mao has time and again led them and led them forward. But there is a big difference between a ruler and a leader. Mao was a leader, a leader who consistently fought those who would become the new rulers of the Chinese people.

Mao was not just an inspiration in the abstract, some icon without basis in substance other than his image on a poster or a button. He was in inspiration not because of one heroic act or ever a few, but because his whole life he remained a dedicated communist who stood with the people; in taking this stand, he learned from summed up and led their struggled, advancing society and helping to move it forward.

Throughout the entire course of the Chinese revolution until the end of his life, Mao Tsetung devoted his life to the people and became a great leader not only of the Chinese people but working and oppressed people around the world. His contribution to and development of the science of revolution apply not only the Chinese situation at the time, but apply universally. He was a great Marxist-Leninist who developed the line that even after the working class seizes control and runs the government under socialism, still the classes and class struggle exists. Further, he said that it was necessary for workers to constantly defend their power and advance society.

Mao will be remembered because his while life was in service to the people. As Mao Tsetung said, "All men must die, but death can vary in its significance. The ancient Chinese writer Szuma Chien said, 'Though death befalls all men alike, it may be weightier than Mount Tai or lighter than a feather.' To die for the people is weightier than Mount Tai, but to work for fascists and die for the exploiters and oppressors is lighter then a feather." Mao's death is heavy indeed.