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Mao Zedong Quotes
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Mao Zedong , also known as Chairman Mao, was a Chinese communist revolutionary who became the founding father of the People's Republic of China, which he ruled as the Chairman of the Communist Party of China from its establishment in 1949 until his death in 1976. His theories, military strategies, and political policies are collectively known as Maoism.

Mao was the son of a wealthy farmer in Shaoshan, Hunan. He had a Chinese nationalist and anti-imperialist outlook early in his life, and was particularly influenced by the events of the Xinhai Revolution of 1911 and May Fourth Movement of 1919. He later adopted Marxism–Leninism while working at Peking University, and became a founding member of the Communist Party of China , leading the Autumn Harvest Uprising in 1927. During the Chinese Civil War between the Kuomintang and the CPC, Mao helped to found the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, led the Jiangxi Soviet's radical land policies, and ultimately became head of the CPC during the Long March. Although the CPC temporarily allied with the KMT under the United Front during the Second Sino-Japanese War , China's civil war resumed after Japan's surrender and in 1949 Mao's forces defeated the Nationalist government, which withdrew to Taiwan.

On October 1, 1949, Mao proclaimed the foundation of the People's Republic of China , a single-party state controlled by the CPC. In the following years he solidified his control through land reforms and through a psychological victory in the Korean War, as well as through campaigns against landlords, people he termed "counter-revolutionaries", and other perceived enemies of the state. In 1957 he launched a campaign known as the Great Leap Forward that aimed to rapidly transform China's economy from agrarian to industrial. This campaign led to the deadliest famine in history and the deaths of an estimated minimum of 45 million people between 1958 and 1962. In 1966, Mao initiated the Cultural Revolution, a program to remove "counter-revolutionary" elements in Chinese society which lasted 10 years and was marked by violent class struggle, widespread destruction of cultural artifacts, and an unprecedented elevation of Mao's cult of personality. The program is now officially regarded as a "severe setback" for the PRC. In 1972, Mao welcomed American President Richard Nixon in Beijing, signalling the start of a policy of opening China to the world. After years of ill health, Mao suffered a series of heart attacks in 1976 and died at the age of 82. He was succeeded as paramount leader by Premier Hua Guofeng, who was quickly sidelined and replaced by Deng Xiaoping.

A controversial figure, Mao is regarded as one of the most important and influential individuals in modern world history. He is also known as a political intellect, theorist, military strategist, poet, and visionary. Supporters credit him with driving imperialism out of China, modernising the nation and building it into a world power, promoting the status of women, improving education and health care, as well as increasing life expectancy as China's population grew from around 550 million to over 900 million under his leadership. Conversely, his regime has been called autocratic and totalitarian, and condemned for bringing about mass repression and destroying religious and cultural artifacts and sites. It was additionally responsible for vast numbers of deaths with estimates ranging from 30 to 70 million victims.

✵ 26. December 1893 – 9. September 1976
Mao Zedong photo
Mao Zedong: 181   quotes 18   likes

Mao Zedong Quotes

“What is knowledge? Ever since class society came into being the world has had only two kinds of knowledge, knowledge of the struggle of production and knowledge of the class struggle. Natural science and social science are the crystallization of these two kinds of knowledge, and philosophy is the generalization and summation of the knowledge of nature.”

Mao Zedong

Original: (zh-CN) 什么是知识？自从有阶级的社会存在以来，世界上的知识只有两门，一门叫做生产斗争知识，一门叫做阶级斗争知识。自然科学、社会科学，就是这两门知识的结晶，哲学则是关于自然知识和社会知识的概括和总结。 note: "整顿党的作风"
Source: "Rectify the Party's Style of Work" (1942)

World , Science , Knowledge , Nature

“The chaos caused was on a grand scale and I take responsibility. Comrades, you must all analyse your own responsibility. If you have to ***, ***! If you have to fart, fart! You will feel much better for it.”

Mao Zedong

Speech At The Lushan Conference http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-8/mswv8_34.htm (23 July 1959)

Feeling

“Our comrades must understand that we study Marxism-Leninism not for display, nor because there is any mystery about it, but solely because it is the science which leads the revolutionary cause of the proletariat to victory.”

Mao Zedong

"Rectify the Party's Style of Work" (1942)

Science , Study , Understanding , Victory

“All relatively complete knowledge is formed in two stages: the first stage is perceptual knowledge, the second is rational knowledge, the latter being the development of the former to a higher stage.”

Mao Zedong

"Rectify the Party's Style of Work" (1942)

Knowledge

“Deaths have benefits. They can fertilise the ground.”

Mao Zedong

Remarks to top Communist officials (9 December 1958), quoted in Jung Chang and Jon Halliday, Mao: The Unknown Story (2005), p. 457
1950s

Death

“The army must become one with the people so that they see it as their own army. Such an army will be invincible, and an imperialist power like Japan will be no match for it.”

Mao Zedong

(zh-CN) 军队须和民众打成一片，使军队在民众眼睛中看成是自己的军队，这个军队便无敌于天下，个把日本帝国主义是不够打的。
1930s, On Protracted Warfare (1938)

People

“"War is the continuation of politics." In this sense war is politics and war itself is a political action; since ancient times there has never been a war that did not have a political character.”

Mao Zedong

(zh-CN) “战争是政治的继续”，在这点上说，战争就是政治，战争本身就是政治性质的行动，从古以来没有不带政治性的战争。
1930s, On Protracted Warfare (1938)

Time , War , Sense

“Armed with Marxist-Leninist theory and ideology, the Communist Party of China has brought a new style of work to the Chinese people, a style of work that essentially entails integrating theory with practice, forging close links with the masses and practicing self-criticism.”

Mao Zedong book On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People

(zh-CN) 以马克思列宁主义的理论思想武装起来的中国共产党，在中国人民中产生了新的工作作风，这主要的就是理论和实践相结合的作风，和人民群众紧密地联系在一起的作风以及自我批评的作风。
1950s, On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People (1957)

People

“We must have faith in the masses and we must have faith in the Party. These are two cardinal principles. If we doubt these principles, we shall accomplish nothing.”

Mao Zedong

(zh-CN) 我们应当相信群众，我们应当相信党，这是两条根本的原理。如果怀疑这两条原理，那就什么事情也做不成了。
On the Question of Agricultural Co-Operation (July 31, 1955)
1950s

Faith

“Weapons are an important factor in war, but not the decisive factor; it is people, not things that are decisive. The contest of strength is not only a contest of military and economic power, but also a contest of human power and morale. People necessarily wield military and economic power.”

Mao Zedong

1930s, On Protracted Warfare (1938)

War , People , Decision

“Criticism and self-criticism is a kind of method. It is a method of resolving contradictions among the people and it is the only method.”

Mao Zedong

Talk at an Enlarged Central Work Conference (30 January 1962)
1960s
Original: (zh-CN) 批评和自我批评是一种方法，是解决人民内部矛盾的方法，而且是唯一的方法。

People

“The basic ideological programme of the great proletarian Cultural Revolution is 'to combat selfishness and criticize revisionism.'”

Mao Zedong

Source: Directives on the Cultural Revolution (1966-1972)

Selfishness

“No need to be afraid of tidal waves; human society has been evolved out of 'tidal waves.'”

Mao Zedong

Source: Directives on the Cultural Revolution (1966-1972)

“Who are our enemies and who are our friends? This is the first and foremost question of a revolution and it is also the first and foremost question of the great Cultural Revolution.”

Mao Zedong

1967
Directives Regarding the Cultural Revolution (1966-1972)

Question

“I like rightists, I am comparatively happy when these people on the right come into power.”

Mao Zedong

Excerpt of meeting with Nixon 1972, quoted in The Road to War: Presidential Commitments Honored and Betrayed https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Road_to_War/SDb3PSD__KwC?hl=en&gbpv=0 (May 9, 2013) by Marvin Kalb. Also quoted in "Nixon Asserts That Western Rightists Pleased Mao" https://www.nytimes.com/1978/05/02/archives/nixon-asserts-that-western-rightists-pleased-mao-secret-kissinger.html, The New York Times. (May 2, 1978)
1970s

Happiness , People

“Those writings of mine aren't anything. There is nothing instructive in what I wrote.”

Mao Zedong

Excerpt of meeting with Nixon 1972, quoted in The Road to War: Presidential Commitments Honored and Betrayed https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Road_to_War/SDb3PSD__KwC?hl=en&gbpv=0 (May 9, 2013) by Marvin Kalb
1970s