The Great Leap itself was an ad hoc cluster of policies that emerged in 1958 due to three factors: initially pragmatic adaptations of work schedules, Mao’s increasing dislike of Nikita Khrushchev, leader of the USSR, and overly enthusiastic local Party cadres. The movement spun out of control, however, due to irrational exuberance and resulted in the greatest disaster in human history – the deaths of some 30 million people.
Distrust of Khrushchev
Mao was suspicious of Khrushchev first of all for the latter’s Secret Speech of 1956 in which he exposed the crimes of Joseph Stalin and attacked the cult of personality, which Mao was then cultivating; then for his doctrine of peaceful coexistence with the West, which Mao found revisionist; then for his invasion of Hungary during that country’s democracy demonstrations without consulting the larger Socialist sphere, meaning China; and finally for not sharing the atom bomb with his socialist brother (Mao). Khrushchev’s and Stalin’s refusal to give the bomb to Mao arose from their suspicion that he would not hesitate to use it.
Communes
In the winter of 1957-58, China sought to mobilize idle peasants to construct major water conservancy projects like dams, reservoirs, and dykes. Mao did not employ engineers, whom he characterized as useless, impractical bookworms, in the design or construction of these projects. He trusted instead in the socialist enthusiasm of the “Red” peasants, who could achieve great things, once freed from the bourgeois intelligentsia. As a corollary to the men being tied up working on the water conservancy projects, women were “liberated” to work in the fields. More and more of their household tasks were then collectivized until these collective groups grew into massive communes, which were hailed as the first sprouts of Communism. In the summer of 1958 Mao visited the commune in Henan named “Sputnik” (after the satellite the USSR put into orbit in October 1957, shocking the US) and proclaimed “人民公社好! (Communes are good!)” Soon every cadre in China was rushing to equal the performance of “Sputnik.” Private plots were taken away from peasants and local markets closed.
Crop experiments
On the communes, a number of radical and controversial agricultural innovations were promoted at the behest of Mao. Many of these were based on the ideas of now discredited Soviet agronomist Trofim Lysenko. The policies included close-cropping, whereby seeds were sown far more densely than normal on the incorrect assumption that seeds of the same class would not compete with each other, and deep-plowing (up to 6 feet), based upon the mistaken belief that this would yield plants with extra large root systems. Moderately productive land was left unplanted in the belief that concentrating manure and effort on the most fertile land would lead to larger per-acre productivity gains. To allay peasants’ fears of these new methods, a photo in the People’s Daily showed children lying on top of rice sprouts supposedly grown according to these principles.
The Great Sparrow Campaign
There was also a “People’s War” against crop-eating pests, especially sparrows. The peasants who killed the most sparrows by chasing them until they dropped from exhaustion were praised as model citizens.
Party Reaction
Meanwhile, local leaders were pressured into falsely reporting ever-higher grain production figures to their political superiors. Participants at political meetings remembered production figures being inflated up to 10 times actual production amounts as the race to please superiors and win plaudits – like the chance to meet Mao himself – intensified. The state was later able to force many production groups to sell more grain than they could spare based on these false production figures.
Backyard Furnaces
Knowing nothing of metallurgy and despising educated engineers, Mao encouraged the establishment of small backyard steel furnaces in every commune and urban neighborhood. Mao was shown an example of a backyard furnace in Hefei, Anhui in September 1958, which was said to be manufacturing high quality steel.
Huge efforts on the part of peasants and other workers were made to produce steel out of scrap metal. To fuel the furnaces the local environment was denuded of trees and wood taken from the doors and furniture of peasants' houses. Pots, pans, and other metal artifacts were requisitioned to supply the "scrap" for the furnaces so that the wildly optimistic production targets could be met.
Early Results
Mao had proclaimed that China would surpass Britain in steel production in 15 years, but when steel production showed a 30% increase in 1958, Mao declared it would take only 3 years for China to surpass Britain! Villages competed to emulate “Sputnik” as local cadres increased quotas for grain shipments. Buoyed by these enthusiastic estimates of grain production, Mao was elated and thought he could leap-frog the Soviet Union and beat them to the promised land of Communism through his style of peasant mobilization. Mao then encouraged peasants to have more children and eat not three, but five meals a day! On communes, peasants would receive food according to the socialist ideal of “to each according to his need.” Work points counted for only 30% of one’s allotment. Mao gloried in his “victory” over Khrushchev. China was caught up in a national euphoria.
The Aftermath
Then, awakening from Mao’s Socialist fantasy, China faced the morning after.
Crop Yields
The weather in 1958 was very favorable and the harvest should have been good. Unfortunately, deep-plowing and close-planting didn’t actually work (the photo in the People’s Daily had been doctored), and the amount of labor diverted to steel production and construction projects meant that much of the harvest was left to rot uncollected in some areas. This problem was exacerbated by a devastating locust swarm, caused when the locusts’ natural predators were killed as part of the Great Sparrow Campaign.
Backyard Steel
The backyard steel was so impure that it snapped under pressure. The output of these furnaces consisted of low quality lumps of pig iron which was of negligible economic worth. During a visit to a traditional steel works in Manchuria in January 1959, Mao learned for himself that high quality steel could only be produced in large-scale factories using reliable fuel such as coal. However, he decided not to order a halt to the backyard steel furnaces so as not to dampen the revolutionary enthusiasm of the masses. The program was only quietly abandoned much later in that year.
Water Conservancy
Most of the dams built by peasant know-how collapsed under the strain of winter rains – one that collapsed in 1975 killed 200,000 people. Shortages of fuel and severe erosion resulted from deforestation.
Starvation
Although actual harvests were reduced, local officials, under tremendous pressure from central authorities to report record harvests in response to the innovations, competed with each other to announce increasingly exaggerated results. These were used as a basis for determining the amount of grain to be taken by the State to supply the towns and cities, and to export. This left barely enough for the peasants, and in some areas, starvation set in. By early 1961, an estimated 30 million had starved to death. Stories still circulate of peasants eating tree bark or clay, or even of cannibalism, whereby peasants would starve one of their children, then trade with another family, who would make a soup of the emaciated body.
Party Reaction
Local cadres still had increasing quotas to fill. Some Party officials who saw the suffering of the peasants committed suicide, or were replaced by cadres who had no such qualms. Authorities even ordered that statistics be destroyed in regions where population decline became evident. Mao refused to open the state granaries as he dismissed reports of food shortages and accused rich peasants of hiding grain.
During 1958–1960 China continued to be a substantial net exporter of grain, despite the widespread starvation in the countryside, as Mao sought to maintain face and convince the outside world of the success of his vision. Foreign aid was refused. When the Japanese foreign minister told his Chinese counterpart Chen Yi of an offer of 100,000 tons of wheat to be shipped out of public view, he was rebuffed. Even as the peasants didn’t have enough to eat, grain was sent to the industrial centers and even exported to the Soviet Union to repay a 1949 loan from Stalin. China’s net grain exports in 1959 and 1960 would have been enough to feed 16 million people 2000 calories per day.
The Lushan Conference
In July 1959 at the Lushan Conference, Defense Minister Peng Dehuai confronted Mao with the situation in the countryside, but no one backed him up. Mao replaced Peng with the more pliant Lin Biao, accused Peng of sabotaging socialism and put him under house arrest. As to the famine, Mao refused to budge. He could not admit failure and no one dared to question his judgment. Mao blamed rich peasants and bad weather.
The Ninth Plenum
The agricultural policies of the Great Leap Forward and the associated famine continued until January 1961, when, at the Ninth Plenum of the Eighth Central Committee, Mao finally relented and allowed Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping to institute their emergency policies of reducing the communes, restoring individual plots, reopening markets, allowing sideline occupations, and making households responsible for meeting their quota, after which they could keep the surplus. Grain exports were stopped, and imports from Canada and Australia helped to reduce the impact of the food shortages, at least in the coastal cities. The exact number of famine deaths is difficult to determine, and estimates range from 18 to 42 million people, the deadliest famine in the history of the world. Economic recovery began immediately, but the Party’s credibility had been shattered.