Clandestine Agent: The Real Agnes Smedley

2007 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 106-114 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arthur M. Eckstein
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Communist Party ◽  
Chinese Communist Party ◽  
Government Officials ◽  
The Real ◽  
Innocent Victim ◽  
American Writer ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Agnes Smedley ◽  
The Chinese Communist Party

This essay reviews a new biography of Agnes Smedley, a radical American writer and journalist who secretly worked for the Soviet Union and the Chinese Communist Party on various endeavors, including espionage. When Smedley was accused in the late 1940s of having been a Soviet spy, she staunchly denied the allegations and depicted herself as an innocent victim of a McCarthyite smear. Ruth Price, the author of the new biography, initially expected to find that Smedley had indeed been unjustly accused of spying for the Soviet Union. But as Price sifted through newly available materials from Russia and China, she made the disconcerting discovery that Smedley had in fact eagerly served as an agent of influence and spy for the Soviet Union and the Chinese Communists. This case illustrates some of the complexities that arise when assessing why certain Western intellectuals and government officials decided to become spies for the Soviet Union.

Latin America and the Soviet-Chinese Conflict (the 1960s – mid-1970s)

2021 ◽  
pp. 149
Author(s):  
Andrey Schelchkov
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Communist Party ◽  
Chinese Communist Party ◽  
New Left ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Communist Movement ◽  
The Chinese Communist Party

The disagreements and rupture between the Chinese Communist Party and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) were the most important event in the history of the International Communist Movement in the 60s and 70s of the 20th century, which had a huge impact on the fate of communist parties around the world. Latin America has become a place of fierce rivalry between Moscow and Beijing for influence on the political left flank. Moscow's tough opposition to any attempts by the Chinese Communist Party to increase its influence in the continent's communist parties without resorting to splitting them caused a backlash and a change in the policy of criticism within the parties to a policy of secession of independent “anti-revisionist” communist parties. Maoist communist parties emerged in all countries of the continent, opposing their policies to the pro-Moscow left parties. Maoism was able to penetrate not only the old communist movement but also the ranks of socialists, leftist nationalists and even Christian democrats. It often became the ideological and political basis for a break with the “traditional” left parties, a kind of transit bridge towards the “new left”. The ideas of Maoism were partly accepted by the trend of the “new left”, which gained special weight among the intelligentsia and students of the continent. This article is devoted to the emergence and development of the Maoist Communist Parties, the reaction of Moscow and Havana in the political circumstances of Latin America in the 60s of the 20th century.

Problems of Liberalization and the Succession at the Eighth Party Congress Roderick MacFarquhar

1973 ◽  
Vol 56 ◽  
pp. 617-646 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roderick MacFarquhar
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Communist Party ◽  
Chinese Communist Party ◽  
Private Industry ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Chinese Communist Party ◽  
Industry And Commerce ◽  
Set Up ◽  
Chinese Diplomacy ◽  
Party Congress

The eighth Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) met on 15 September 1956 in an atmosphere of some triumph. In the 11 years that had elapsed since the seventh Congress, the Communists had defeated the Kuomintang, taken over the country and set up a strong administration that had given the country the peace and unity so desperately lacking over the previous century. They had restored and developed the economy, substantially collectivized agriculture – without the drastic consequences suffered by the Soviet Union – and they had nationalized or semi-nationalized private industry and commerce. The People's Liberation Army had fought impressively in Korea, engendering a healthy respect abroad for the new Chinese regime. More recently, especially since the 1955 Bandung Conference, Chinese diplomacy had won new friends in Asia. China had stood up, Mao had said in 1949, and by 1956 it was clear to all that it had.

The Chinese Communist Party and the Collapse of Soviet Communism

1993 ◽  
Vol 133 ◽  
pp. 1-26 ◽  
Author(s):  
John W. Garver
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Communist Party ◽  
Chinese Communist Party ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
20Th Century History ◽  
Soviet Communism ◽  
The Chinese Communist Party ◽  
The Impact

The collapse first of Communist rule of the USSR and then of the USSR itself was without question one of the pivotal events of the era. Since China's 20th-century history has been so deeply influenced by Soviet developments, it is important to examine the impact of these events on China. This article asks, first, whether the top leaders of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), had a deliberate policy towards the decline of Soviet Communism, and if so, what was the nature of that policy? Did the CCP attempt to assist their comrades in the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) as the latter battled for survival during 1990 and 1991?

Problems of Liberalization and the Succession at the Eighth Party Congress Roderick MacFarquhar

1973 ◽  
Vol 53 ◽  
pp. 617-646 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roderick MacFarquhar
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Communist Party ◽  
Chinese Communist Party ◽  
Private Industry ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Chinese Communist Party ◽  
Industry And Commerce ◽  
Set Up ◽  
Chinese Diplomacy ◽  
Party Congress

The eighth Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) met on 15 September 1956 in an atmosphere of some triumph. In the 11 years that had elapsed since the seventh Congress, the Communists had defeated the Kuomintang, taken over the country and set up a strong administration that had given the country the peace and unity so desperately lacking over the previous century. They had restored and developed the economy, substantially collectivized agriculture – without the drastic consequences suffered by the Soviet Union – and they had nationalized or semi-nationalized private industry and commerce. The People's Liberation Army had fought impressively in Korea, engendering a healthy respect abroad for the new Chinese regime. More recently, especially since the 1955 Bandung Conference, Chinese diplomacy had won new friends in Asia. China had stood up, Mao had said in 1949, and by 1956 it was clear to all that it had.

The Shortcomings of the Soviet Economy as seen in Communist Ideologies

1974 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 263-276 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ota Šik
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Communist Party ◽  
Chinese Communist Party ◽  
Soviet Economy ◽  
The West ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Communist Ideology ◽  
The Chinese Communist Party ◽  
Sphere Of Influence ◽  
Number Of Parties

WHEN DISCUSSING COMMUNIST IDEOLOGY IT IS NECESSARY TO DIFferentiate between two varying - indeed opposite views. Firstly there are the parties, organizations and institutions in countries within the Soviet sphere of influence (including parties in the West which are identified politically and ideologically with the USSR). Secondly the large number of parties and groups, which claim to be communist, and derive their ideology from Marx, Engels and Lenin, but which are highly critical of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and its ideology. Although these fundamentalist groups are numerous and splintered they can be categorized into two mainstreams of thought: Maoist and Trotskyite. The Maoist ideology is not only the ideology of the Chinese Communist Party but also that of smaller, so called Maostic groups in the West.

100 Years of the CCP – The “long road” and the triumphant advance of the People’s Republic and its party

2021 ◽  
pp. 01-11
Author(s):  
Feldbacher Rainer
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Communist Party ◽  
Migrant Workers ◽  
Chinese Communist Party ◽  
Karl Marx ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Friedrich Engels ◽  
The Chinese Communist Party ◽  
Title One

This year not only celebrates the founding of the Chinese Communist Party 100 years ago, but it is also the 110th anniversary of the 1911 revolution, which in addition to many developments in this specific phase played a role – such as the May 4th Movement. Another starting point for the development of the CCP were the communist and socialist positions of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels – the two ultimately formulated the idea – as well as Vladimir Ilyich Lenin and later Josef Stalin, the leaders of the first socialist state. From these approaches, Mao Zedong developed an independent strategy adapted to the Chinese situation. This so-called Maoism spread in particular through the so-called “Red Book”. After the successful revolution that led to the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, the Chinese Communist Party under Mao pursued its own communist path from 1956. In 1960, China and the Soviet Union broke completely because of Khrushchev's policy of de-Stalinization. This development culminated in the Chinese Cultural Revolution initiated by Mao from 1966 onwards. It was based on the theory of a permanent revolutionary transformation of society; the communist ideals should be anchored throughout the Chinese people. From 1979, under Deng Xiaoping, an economic change of course took shape (keyword special economic zones), which led to the opening to capitalist economic forms without having to abandon the CCP's claim to leadership at the political level, but enabled rapid economic, technological and scientific advances that up to stop today. At the same time, the CCP is endeavoring to alleviate the poverty of migrant workers in the coming periods, to solve the ecological challenges in the course of economic growth and at the same time to close the world with the aid of the Silk Road, which once connected continents – now under the title "One Road, One Belt". This global cooperation now seems all the more necessary as in times of the COVID-19 pandemic, the party successfully shows and should prove how this crisis can be contained – for the benefit of the economy, society and health.

Did the Soviet Union instruct Southeast Asian communists to revolt? New Russian evidence on the Calcutta Youth Conference of February 1948

2009 ◽  
Vol 40 (3) ◽  
pp. 449-469 ◽  
Author(s):  
Larisa Efimova
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Communist Party ◽  
Central Committee ◽  
The Philippines ◽  
Southeast Asian ◽  
Soviet Leadership ◽  
The Real ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Archival Documents

This article uses recently declassified archival documents from the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (of Bolsheviks) concerning the Calcutta Youth Conference of February 1948. This evidence contradicts speculation that ‘orders from Moscow’ were passed to Southeast Asian communists at this time, helping to spark the rebellions in Indonesia, Malaya, Burma and the Philippines later that year. Secret working papers now available to researchers show no signs that the Soviet leadership planned to call upon Asian communists to rise up against their national bourgeois governments at this point in time. This article outlines the real story behind Soviet involvement in events leading up to the Calcutta Youth Conference, showing both a desire to increase information and links, and yet also a degree of caution over the prospects of local parties.

Hidden Currents during the Honeymoon: Mao, Khrushchev, and the 1957 Moscow Conference

2009 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 74-117 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhihua Shen ◽  
Yafeng Xia
Keyword(s):  
Great Britain ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Communist Party ◽  
Chinese Communist Party ◽  
Turning Point ◽  
Mao Zedong ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
Soviet Leadership ◽  
Joint Declaration ◽  
The Soviet Union

The Conference of World Communist and Workers' Parties held in Moscow in November 1957 was the largest gathering of world Communists since the birth of Marxism. Scholars have long assumed that the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) dominated the conference. Newly declassified archival records and memoirs indicate that the idea of convening a conference and issuing a joint declaration was proposed by both the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the CPSU. During the conference the CCP leader, Mao Zedong, played an important role. Mao's extemporaneous remarks at the conference shocked the leaders of the CPSU. His comments on the Soviet intraparty struggle, his blunt remarks about nuclear war, and his declaration that China would overtake Great Britain within fifteen years created doubts and dissatisfactions in the minds of the delegates and cast a cloud over the conference. The Moscow Declaration also revealed incipient Sino-Soviet disagreements, portending Beijing's challenge to Soviet leadership in the socialist bloc. Thus, the Moscow Conference was a turning point for Sino-Soviet relations.

scholarly journals Problems and issues of national development in the newspaper "Kazakh adebieti"

2018 ◽  
pp. 368-374
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Communist Party ◽  
Social Life ◽  
National Development ◽  
Native Land ◽  
The Real ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
History Of ◽  
National Power ◽  
Almost All

Literary, cultural and art newspaper of an independent Republic of Kazakhstan – ‘Kazakh literature’ was a judge of justice and truth, and a preacher of national power having the trouble in its eighty five years of history. The edition had a mission to build and develop social concept leading the culture of the nation for the purpose of the country. It has been a part of history of the country being the source of political and social life of the nation. Many problems of the country had been solved by courtesy of the newspaper which couldn’t be ignored. During the Soviet Union the paper supported the mission of the nation in spite of Communist party which was cruel and violent. Because of it, the editors of the edition were precarious between fifties and eighties. Almost all the leaders of the newspaper were well-known writers, poets, publicists and personalities who showed them to be the real sons of their nation. During all periods of its history, the national edition united around itself and brought up ardent publicists, and with the power of a sharp word they fought for the bright future of their native land, for the fulfillment of the nation’s cherished desires. Therefore, from the mid-1950s to the 1980s, its editors-in-chief did not stay long in their post.

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