i felt touched by reading this. go read it. it kinda brings you back into perspective. and yes, im a huge mr brown fan. its the little things that matter. and the little things that are big and the big things that are little.

i was doing history just now. [read: dozing off on history] on the how communism came about in China, the Civil War 1946-1949, Mao Zedong and his political ideas, and after his death. To tell you the truth, i LOVE history, but modern Chinese history just doesn't interest me... Anyway, my textbook was praising Mao for being such a great leader despite his crazy policies.

I was wondering, after the disasters of both his policies, The Great Leap Forward 1958-1960, The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution 1966-1976 [they arent that great after all] where millions of people died, how can he still be deemed a "great" leader?

maybe it was his and his party's ability to unify the whole of China after years of Civil War and drive out the Nationalists.

Let me digress for a while. How did the Nationalists lose the war? There are a couple of reasons I read today, but perhaps the most important to me was the inability of the Nationalists to fight the Civil War. I mean how can anyone be so stupid? How can anyone with advantages such as a larger army, more advanced and up-to-date weapons, support from the USA lose? Well, aparantly, they can lose very badly. Basically, the people have lost faith in the Nationalists, leading to desertions from the Nationalists army to the Communists army. And the soldiers bring with them valuable weaponry to the Communists side. Very clever. The Nationalists were corrupt, inefficient, made gross tactical errors, and had their troops had a low morale. I guess it wasn't surprising that they lost in the end. The Communists on the other hand had peasant support. Which to me, at that time, in a backward country with a large population of peasants, was tremendously important. The Communists, after fighting for years with the Nationalists were experienced and more superior tactically, [ooo, that reminds me of the Israeli-Arab Six Day War in 1967 of how Israel used tactics to overcame the Arabs. Erm, but thats another story..]

Back to the topic. I guess Mao was "great" because he was able to control the whole of China. Hmm. But his policies showed that he didnt exactly carefully thought about them before he implemented it. Or that "if he got the peasants and people's understanding of the key ideas, they would put them into practice". Which is like putting too much trust into people? Digressing to the two policies again.

The Great Leap Forward. Simply a too ambitious and not well thought out plan. Emphasis was placed on building and improving infrastructure instead of agriculture. Which is weird if you think about China's main problems: overpopulation and starvation Shouldnt more emphasis be placed on agriculture to feed the people? And perhaps sell of the surplus for profits? This policy failed and brought about starvation [16 million people starved to death], decreased production and challenges to Mao's rule. Moreover, goods produced were not of good quality and was worthless, leading to a further decline in producton.

The Great Poletarian Cultural Revolution which led to massive destruction of valuable books, art, buildings. Well, Mao did get what he wanted when he implemented this policy - removing anyone that opposes him but at the same time, a loss of support for the CCP which is what brought the Communists into power at first. Ironic isnt it?

End of digression. However, i guess Mao was a "great" leader. Without him, China would still be messed up with the Nationalists. Without Mao, there wont be future greater Chinese leaders like Deng Xiaoping.

If you are still reading this, I think you deserve some congratulation. Well, as a prize, I would imagine throwing confetti for you. As simply, I have no mood to do any now. Its 1.11 am. My mom has yelled at me twice to go to bed. So I am now.

Oh wait. Did anyone watch Singapore Idol? Daphne is out! To tell you the truth, I never liked Daphne. I only caught like a couple of Singapore Idol episodes, but I never liked her performances, her image and her voice. But you know what? I'm impressed by the way she handled the situation. She was all smiles despite losing. Which is commentable.. I guess I'm a new found fan of Daphne now =)