Mao Zedong: The Fall Of China

China went through many procedures in order to become a modernized country. Mao Zedong was the start of the downfall in China and its people. Mao created a group of people, all who supported his ideas to make China more modern and civilized, but the results that happened due to Mao’s ideas ended up being more disastrous than helpful. The Great Leap Forward was the start of the decline of China, then the Cultural Revolution began which concluded with the Beijing Massacre. If Mao Zedong had just left China alone, China would have started to modernize by its self and would not have been rushed and forced to change as rapidly as it was.
The Great Leap Forward was a five year plan (1958-1961) thought of by Mao as a way to modernize China. China …show more content…
Mao gathered a group of people, including his wife, Jiang Qing, and his defense minister, to help him get rid of the other party and reassert his authority. Known in full as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, Mao shut down schools urging the youth for mobilization to take down the party leaders and embrace the spirit for modernization. The months after that the movement quickly rocketed as the student’s coalesced groups called the Red Guards and began attacking and purging members of the Chinese Communist Party, these groups were called “Red Guards”. Eventually, the enthusiasm of being in the Red Guards practically thrust China into a social state of confusion. Schools were closed and the economy started to become impaired. Groups of the Red Guards started to fight other groups of the Red Guards as each individual unit of guards had their own belief that they knew the best way about how China should proceed. In different areas the activities that the Red Guards had gotten greatly out bit out of hand. They turned their frustration on foreign people and foreign embassies got attacked. The British Embassy was burned down completely due to the overpowering force of the Red Guards. In October 1968, Liu Shao-chi , president of the “Peoples’ Republic of China”, was banned from the party and this was seen as the catalyst that ended the Cultural Revolution. Mao had been there for the removal of his rival in …show more content…
On June 4 in 1989, Chinese troops and security police officers decided to storm in through Tiananmen Square, and start firing indiscriminately into the crowds of protesters and citizens. Chaos developed, as thousands of the students tried to escape the riot that the Chinese forces were unleashing upon them. Other protesters fought back against the Chinese forces, stoning the troops that were attacking and overthrowing and setting military vehicles on fire. Reporters on the scene have estimated that at least hundreds, and perhaps thousands, of the protesters had been killed and as many as 10,000 were arrested. Tanks rampaged throughout the capital 's streets. The injured were rushed to the hospitals on bicycle rickshaws by distraught residents shocked by the military’s sudden, harsh and extreme response to the mass protest that was peaceful. The peaceful protests started with a march by many students in memory of the former party leader who had died a week before. As days passed, millions of people from all around the world joined in, frustrated and filled with anger by widespread corruption and calling for a democratic system. Throughout the day the government warned its people that they would do whatever was necessary to