[Marxism] Sino-Soviet Split

[Pieinsky]

Well, Calvin, you should look at the series of theoretical polemics that the 
CPC issued during the early 1960s criticizing "modern revisionism".  I 
probably have them somewhere up in the attic.  But you should be able to get 
them at a decent university library.  The turn of the CPC to flirting around 
with the Shah, Pakistan's military dictatorship, Pinochet, etc. was a later 
development of the early 1970s, at which time China's supposed interests as 
a nation-state were being foregrounded over ideological matters in the 
aftermath of the tumultuous Cultural Revolution.  Ten years earlier, the CPC 
was going after the CPSU under Khrushchev hard for practicing class 
collaboration and abandoning the goal of revolution, as the first generation 
of "revisionists" like Bernstein had done and been criticized equally hard 
by Lenin.  They claimed to be defending Marxism-Leninism as Lenin asserted 
in his day to be defending true Marxism from its epigones.  I don't think 
one should necessarily read backwards from those later developments and 
conclude, for instance, that what the Chinese said earlier was somehow 
fraudulent or disingenuous.  The earlier polemics should be read at face 
value.  However, it should also be noted that the roots of the split that 
took place in the early 1960s weren't exclusively ideological.  Mao and the 
other Chinese leaders were pissed off at the SU for its equivocal support, 
or lack thereof, in the run-up to the revolution in 1949 (this would be, of 
course, under Stalin who had apparently told them not to go ahead and seize 
power but find some modus vivendi with the Kuomintang), for the SU removing 
all kinds of valuable industrial equipment from Soviet-occupied Manchuria 
when they pulled out and for a general patronizing arrogance towards them 
during the 1950s.

best,
jay
www.neravt.com/left/





>
> Anyway, I have no wish to engage in Stalin or Mao bashing. I am interested 
> in any books or articles that discuss the circumstances in which the 
> Sino-Soviet split took place, and an objective appraisal of the decisions 
> made by both of those governments. Thanks to Jazz, Hari, and Carlos.