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msgtdameron's review
4.0
Where does a country get it's self esteem from? For the U.S. it's Valley Forge and Trenton. Canada Vimy Ridge. France the Bastille and Russia The Great Patriotic War. For Modern China it's the Long March. With out a basic understanding of how the Long March affected China since 1936 any casual observer of Asiatic affairs is at a lose. China is the Major player in Asia. They want to be the main player in the Pacific. To understand why one must look at what actually happened during the Long March. Why Mao conceived the Cultural Revolution and the Great Leap Forward all go back to how he achieved singular leadership of the party during the Long March. The affects of those two purges have both crippled and strengthened China at the same time. Crippled by forcing intellectuals into the fields. Strengthened by committing ALL of China to one single minded goal. That single mindedness is now driving the economy. Forcing the elite into the fields has made every person aware that they are expendable. Even the biggest investment banker understands that "If I cheat the party or the country I will find myself pulling a plow." Wouldn't we all like to see Bernie Madoff in the traces? Or the CEO's of Enron picking tomatoes? In China it happens. Why, the leadership, even today, understands how the Party and Country will turn on you if you cheat and none of them want to go to the Gobi Desert and try to grow peppers or dig coal by hand. This discipline comes from the Long March and it's long shadow. Dick Wilsons book is a great primer on this most important event in Chinese 20th Century history. A history whose long shadow is casting into the 21st.
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