Sufan movement

The Sufan movement (simplified Chinese: 肃反; traditional Chinese: 肅反; "against counterrevolutionaries") was a political campaign against political opponents in the People's Republic of China under Mao Zedong.[1] The term "sufan" is short for "肅清暗藏的反革命分子", and can roughly be taken as referring to a 'purge' of hidden counterrevolutionaries.[2] Historically, the earliest Chinese communist Sufan had been initiated by Zhang Guotao in 1932. The Sufan movement lasted from August 1955 to late 1956, during which 214,000 people were arrested and approximately 53,000 died.[3][4][5]

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On 1 July 1955, the Chinese Communist Party Central Committee issued a "Directive on launching a struggle to cleanse out hidden counter-revolutionary elements" (關於開展鬥爭肅 清暗藏的反革命分子的指示). On 25 August 1955, it issued "The directive on the thorough purge and cleansing of hidden counter revolutionaries" (關於徹底肅清暗藏反革命分子的指示). The targets of directives like these were individuals inside the communist party, the government bureaucracy, and military personnel. This was in contrast to the earlier Zhen Fan movement that had mainly targeted former Kuomintang personnel.

The targets of Sufan

The People's Daily, in an attempt to provide justification for the purge, reported that ten percent of Communist Party members were secret traitors and needed to be purged. This number appears to have been taken as a quota for the number of arrests that needed to occur.[6]

There were three categories of Sufan targets:

  1. Ex-Kuomintang personnel, regardless of war captive or surrender.
  2. Anyone with landlord or wealthy families.
  3. Students and literati.

In many if not all parts of China, the Sufan movement ended in late 1956.

Death toll

Chinese scholars have pointed out that during the Sufan movement, over 1.4 million intellectuals and officials were persecuted, 214,000 people were arrested, 22,000 were executed and a total of 53,000 died.[3][4][5][7]

Jean-Louis Margolin writes in The Black Book of Communism that one source indicates 81,000 arrests during the campaign (which he claims is rather modest), while another gives 770,000 deaths. He concludes that there is no way to determine which is accurate.[8]

See also

Notes
  1. Lieberthal, Kenneth. (2003). Governing China: From Revolution to Reform, W.W. Norton & Co.; Second Edition.
  2. According to Lin Yutang, 肅 (su) can be translated as 整肅 [zheng3su4]2, v.t., (in communist China) to purge.
  3. Wang, Gongbiao (2015). "日本侵略軍與中共暴政對中國人民造成傷害的比較". www.yibaochina.com (in Chinese). Retrieved 5 April 2020.
  4. Storm.mg (9 June 2018). "陳昭南專欄：遇到中共就失憶！國民黨還能騙自己多久？-風傳媒". www.storm.mg (in Chinese). Retrieved 5 April 2020.
  5. Luo, William (30 March 2018). 半资本论 （Semi-Capital）(第七版): 半资本主义与中国 （Semi-Capitalism in China） (in Chinese). 世界华语出版社. ISBN 978-1-940266-12-1.
  6. Jean-Luc Domenach, "Chine: L'archipel oublie" (Paris: Fayard, 1992) , p. 118
  7. "遒真言实：世界史头号罪人——不反毛，天理不容！". beijingspring.com (in Chinese). 2016. Retrieved 5 April 2020.
  8. Stephane Courtois, et al. The Black Book of Communism. Harvard University Press, 1999. ISBN 0-674-07608-7 p. 485

External sources
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